Tonight at dinner, Griffin told me that a great invention would be a sign on his bedroom door that said "Danger - Keep Out," and a laser beam that if a person walked through it would cause all of Griffin's underwear to be dropped on the interloper's head.

Last Thursday, all five of us skied together up in Vail - it was a first. Griffin and Rowan have both been in lessons at Eldora, so they were both up to speed for the green and blue runs we ended up on in Vail. In fact, Griffin had to be chased by Pam as we descended back to the base. Rowan made wonderful s-turns, following me down the mountain. Berit might have been bored, had she not been practicing skiing backwards.

The snow was epic up there. Berit built a snow fort in front of Grammy and Papa's house, and I followed up by digging a cave that attached to her fort. Grammy and Papa arrived Thursday evening, as did Kip. On Friday, Grammy hung out with the kids - coloring easter eggs, making cookies, and watching Mary Poppins - while Pam, Kip, Al, and I skied Vail together.




At the house we played games - Quiddler and Uno. Rowan also read Harry Potter 4 a lot of the time. Cookie the Mouse was there too. Before we left on Saturday, Grammy gave the kids chinese-takeout-style Easter baskets.

We can hardly extract Rowan's head from the Harry Potter books now. In the past few weeks she's devoured the first two and is halfway through the third one. She walks around with her face buried in it, omitting the occasional giggle or apprising us sometimes of what's happening in the boy wizard's saga.

What can I say except that there’s hardly anything I’d rather do than spend three days in Disney World with my son and my father. February was a perfect time to be there – hardly any lines, and the weather was beautiful.



Griffin had some idea about what he was going to, but I don’t think the sheer magnificence of the experience dawned on him until we arrived. It’s been a few days since our return now, and last night he told me that his favorite was “the log ride” (Splash Mountain). I know that he also loved Philharmagic and Kali River Rapids, both of which we did twice. He loved Mission: Space too, though he has also told me that it was a little scary.



The day after our return home, Griffin wore his mouse ears (Pirate-style, with “Griffin” artistically sewn into the back) and took his pearl to school for show-and-tell. The pearl experience was definitely a highlight – Griffin was utterly captivated that night in “Japan,” watching as oysters were selected and pried open to reveal their precious cargo, and then each pearl was measured, weighed, and delivered to the joyous recipient with a Japanese Taiko drumming accompaniment.



Other highlights included the jungle safari, during which I convinced Griffin to let me man the camera, while he merely checked on me now and again to make sure that I was indeed capturing all this, and Cici’s Pizza, where Griffin got to eat whatever he wanted, including four deserts and soda. My man was exhausted at the end of each day, as were Dad and I, though we didn’t let that stop us from making use of the pool.

We can hardly wait for Christmas 2009.

Pam, while putting Griffin to bed, told him to go to the laundry room and put clean underwear on. I busted him in the laundry room stuffing tools (he has his own tools and they happen to be in his toolbox in the laundry room) into his underwear - I suppose to bring to bed and play with.

Rowan is reading Harry Potter 2 now. A couple of weeks ago she decided that she was ready to start reading the Harry Potter books on her own (she and I are in the middle of Harry Potter 4), and she read the first one in about a week.

Pam and I need to talk to her teacher about bumping her up to the next reading level. She says she's bored.

Yesterday, I picked Rowan up from Rocky Mountain Theater for Kids and took her out to eat at the Spicy Pickle. Afterwards, Rowan told me that her favorite part of the day was spending time with me :)

On the way home, Rowan rolled down the window and pledged allegiance to a flag we were passing while at a stoplight. She also sang "My Country Tis of Thee" to it.

Griffin had a meltdown today about going to basketball practice (he had been crashing from all of the Valentines Day sugar). When I showed up, however, he was happily and aggressively scrimmaging with the other six year olds.

Last Saturday, he was dribbling down the court when Kaden came in front of him to try to steal the ball and ended up slamming his skull into Griffin's nose. Griffin bled like a stuck pig and sat out after that. I was able, before the end of the hour, to bribe him into going back in. So the game didn't end on a negative.

WOO HOO!! Yesterday, Berit found out that she got into her first choice middle school - Platt Choice. It's a lottery system, and Platt Choice accepts a small number of students, so it wasn't necessarily likely that Berit would get a spot. The school is a small charter school that is housed within Platt Middle School's building. They have six teachers, have multi-grade level classes, and an experiential-learning focus. Learn more about the school here.

The downside is that while Berit and another friend both got a slot at the school, the another friend didn't, which is of course a real bummer for her.

Lots happening with the kids and I've been remiss at not capturing some of the highlights. Here's a snapshot of what they're up to right now:

Last weekend, Rowan played Tigger in the Rocky Mountain Theater for Kids production of Winnie the Pooh, after months of practice. She was an exuberant Tigger - perfect for the role, and was highly complemented by the play's director. RMTK will go on to a new play now. Last night, we built an insulating box (making use of bubble wrap - based on the idea that air makes a good insulator) - that with any luck, kept an ice cube from melting at school today.

Berit is practicing for the PBP production of A Jungle Book, in which she has the parts of a monkey, an elephant, and a giraffe. Berit is also doing dance and voice lessons, so she's got the full-on theatrical triumvirate going on. In school, she's starting a unit on immigrants and in math, doing geometry - both of which she likes.

Griffin did karate with me for a month, but I think the twice a week commitment was a bit much when we have so much else coming up for him to do. He just started basketball, which he is having a BLAST with!! Very exciting for me to see the kids take to a sport, because I never really did as a child and I probably feel like it's my fault if they don't.

As an aside - it would be great if one of Griffin's basketball-loving Uncles would take him to a CU game sometime.

I had to sit down with Rowan tonight and talk with her about not throwing a fit when something happened she didn't think was fair. She had been playing Uno Attack with the other kids and Bridey, and when they all decided it was time to stop after an hour, she was very upset.

After I explained to her how she might want to learn to react, she said "Ok, but I'm not going to remember this."

"You're not? Why not?" I laughed.

"Because I have a short memory. I only remember really big things, like when Berit broke her wrist."