Colorayoyo weather

There's a famous saying around Boulder that if you don't like the weather, just stick around for an hour.

I've lived here four years and seen this saying verified mountains of times. It really isn't uncommon to see a temperature drop or increase of 40-50F in just a few hours... I personally like it. 

April was particularly weird this year. We had super sunny and warm days (the usual for Boulder) alternating with short but frequent periods of massive cold and snow. A few of my friends posted this on FB... and it's not an exaggeration.

Less than 3 weeks ago we were up on the mountain hiking in our tee-shirts:

 and playing in the sand box, like it's the middle of summer...

a week later, we were burried in a foot of snow. And that happened 3-4 times in 4 weeks... Crazy (this picture isn't even a good example of the mass of snow we've had).

So we got to spend a lot of days inside. We even had a partial snow day one day (schools and campus closed). I used to dread the days we couldn't go outside but we've had some really fun days inside lately, I guess the boys are growing up. Some of our new favorite activities for snowdays now include nerf guns, building forts and cooking.

Last monday was one of those fun snow days. It didn't stop snowing ALL day. We went out in the morning for my office visit and walked about half a mile in the snow, it was actually fun. We arrived covered in snow, then made it back and stopped at the store for some groceries. We looked like snowmen when we got home. On the way to the grocery store we stopped at the pet store and arrived just in time to see them clean and feed the ferrets. The boys got to touch the ferrets and play with them, they really liked that. Josh wants a fish, his name is already picked out (Goldie)... we are in pourparler. Maybe when we're settled, but I really hope he forgets about it by then.

At home the boys built a fort under the table, and played bringing things in and out forever, somehow it doesn't feel homy until it's packed with 6 pillows, 4 blankets, mountains of stuffed animals and all their favorite toys.

We invented a game to practice shooting on a target (and provide an alternative to the constant man-hunt between these 2 boys). I made the rules at first, it went like this: the closer you get to bullseye the more bullets (chances to shoot) you get, the further you get, the more jumping jacks you do... After a while, the boys changed up the rules, so when I hit bullseye, I was told with excitement I had to do 47 push-ups! 

Then we traced a road on the carpet with painters tape, thank you pinterest for the 2min of entertainment (ok maybe 15, but I don't regret it... just wasn't the hours of fun promised).

And then we made our traditional pizzas and invited our upstairs neighbors to come eat and watch a movie with us.

Ethan, William, Josh and Mael watching "how to train a dragon" while eating pizza and popcorn, and wearing a scuba diving mask, why... don't you?... (if that reminds you of a movie, you have good tastes : ))

And more target practice...

Later that week we attended a Good-bye potluck for our neighbors Helen and Onno. They're moving back to the Netherlands and I hope I'll be able to go visit them or they'll come visit me in France. I already miss them and have a little pinch of heart everytime I walk near their empty apartment. Darn family housing, I've never met so many great people and had to say good-bye so often!

We also braved the snow for a visit to the C4C on campus (for my work) and ended up eating in the food court.

On Saturday the weather was beautiful and I went for a run and worked in the garden. I was a little late for starting my tomatoes from seeds but I found a way to make my own grow-light device under the kitchen neon light... I wish I'd thought about it before. So far it works really well and it is height-adjustable... kind of, so there's room for the plants to grow...

Yesterday we had another big snowfall (and today was even worse). We drove to King Soopers to play on the penny horse (a ride that only costs 1cent). The boys had packed their pockets with pennies and played knights for as long as I let them do it... I was bored after 1 ride but I think they did 9 or 10.

Then we went to the library for story time and it was one of the best story times we'd had. The lady who reads on Mondays is amazing, even more so this week. She picks the best books, sings songs, has the kids stretch and participate in pretend play, she plays with animal puppets and just engages so naturally with the children. They love her.

She read the story "One" from Kathryn Otoshi (here is a link to an adaptation of the story on vimeo) and I think it just became our favorite book. She couldn't finish the story without a broken voice and tears in her eyes... I couldn't either. Joshua drew a picture of the colors standing up for themselves later that day, I'll have to remember to bring it to her next week. 

I discovered freezer paper stenciling lately and have had fun playing with it. I made myself a mustache sweat-shirt last week. I also personalized patches on the boys pants... 

and we made an umbrella fort in the boys bedroom... a pretty big hit, despite William's frustrated face on the picture (he was cold from just finishing playing in the bathtub, but too anxious to play in the tent to get dressed... the life of a 2 year old).

So... winter it was nice, but now we're ready for summer, please?

Jan-March picture dump and a job for the web-developers out there

This is random but I want to say I really REALLY love technology... For example, I love that I don't have to carry a map in my car anymore, or spend hours planning a trip. I can get in my car, enter a general description of my destination and my phone will find the address and the best itinerary. I love that I can carry books, scriptures, magazines, newspapers, encyclopedia, dictionaries, emails, calendar, shopping lists, kids games, a camera and much more in my pocket. I don't think I could have imagined that 20 years ago (man, can I really look back into my past 20 years?... scary!!) It just makes me wonder what else I'm not imagining right now... what will we be capable of doing 20 years from now.

On the same note I'm amazed by what we can do with a computer and the internet (I'm talking positively here). I love taking pictures and journaling but I never had time for it before. Now it is so much easier. I was looking for a way to print my blog history to use as a photo-album for the boys and I found out it's possible and even super easy, I'm not really satisfied with the options offered yet (for resizing/editing/personalizing), but I'm sure there will be a good option soon... So if there are any programmers/web-designers/printing entrepreners out there reading my blog, please work your miracle and give me a way to extract the text and pictures from my blog and turn it into something I'd want to keep. Thank you.

I really should get better at posting on my blog more regularly so I don't end up having to dump a bunch of random disconnected pictures like today... But oh well.

There was a drum expo/demo at the library one week-end in January. My friend Emily invited us to go with her and I thought it would be interesting. I was not disappointed. I think I fell in love with the drum teacher (just kidding), he was so passionate and so amazingly patient and open to any kind of random comment or participation from the cute little kiddos present. Josh was absolutely mesmerized. It's usually hard to get him to participate in anything public but this guy was so incredible he made everybody comfortable (even me, haha!)

He taught about rhythm, and used the rhythm of our heart as an example for music. I think the kids loved to think of their heart beat as a music theme (I did). Then he talked about all the different drums and percussions he had brought (there were a ton), and let each kid and adult choose one. And then we just all made music... and it was pretty. I don't know how he did it!

At one point he asked the kids who wanted to volunteer to play a rhythm that the rest of the participants would imitate. Josh volunteered and did something really simple that everybody repeated. I could see how proud it made him feel and I just wanted to hug the guy. Then he asked if any adult wanted to volunteer and since nobody did, he asked the kids if they wanted their parents to volunteer. Don't say that to my kid! Of course he wanted me to volunteer. So I had to make up a rhythm for everyone to repeat. Again Josh was radiant. There was a young teenage boy with down syndrome in the participants. He seemed really enthusiast with rhythm (and talented too) and the teacher let him make up rhythms for everyone to repeat, for a really long time. It obviously made the boy very happy and it warmed my heart to observe this act of kindness and acceptance. I was really touched by this man's ability to use a fairly simple musical talent he had, to help build up children's self esteem.

After that he stood up and started walking in the room, stomping on the ground to create rhythms for us to imitate with the drums. It was fun and again he let the children create their own rhythms. Josh volunteered and created a very simple rhythm that made him super happy and proud. Then the boy with down-syndrome created an amazing choreography of modern/tribal dance (a little hard to follow with the drums but everybody tried their best) and again it warmed my heart to see how this man had managed to release this boy's mind from the fear of judgement and let him freely express himself. I was not so brave and quietly passed my turn when Joshua tried to volunteer me a second time, haha! Taking baby steps here...

Later in February (I think), we were invited to celebrate our cute neighbor's birthday. Joshua still thinks he is going to marry Clare one day. A few months ago, he was playing with Braiden another neighbor and they discovered that they both wanted to marry Clare. They looked puzzled for a few seconds, wondering how that could work... and then Josh just told him... "You can marry another Clare". Simple, logical, efficient... just don't marry my Clare.

Josh and Clare playing twister, PG style:

and decorating the windows:

We had a few science experiment days and craft days. Here Josh and William made boats with tin foil and counted how many pennies they could put on the boat before it sank. It occupied them for quite a while.

Josh painted a fish tank:

William painted... something (I tried gluing goggly eyes on a piece of paper and letting him create a monster around the eyes... I don't think it turned into anything... then I gave him straws and let him blow some paint on the paper... again the technique needs to be improved... but it was messy, so he liked it):

Around the same time, Sammy came over to play and we redid the boat experiment, but this time I gave them straws and let them blow bubbles in the water... they liked that better than sinking the boat with pennies.

Sammy kept giggling, it was really cute.

We borrowed a book about knights from the library and we learned the names of a lot of weapons: flail, battle ax, mace... I'm amazed at how they both just soak up this kind of knowledge. So we had a crafy afternoon, turning sticks, cardboard boxes and tin foil into knight artillery.

For Valentine's day, Josh and William made candy filled heart-shaped paper presents for their friends and class mates. It wasn't new, we did the same thing last year, but this year Josh was able to write XOXO on the hearts and cut them up himself. It was a fun project.

William still likes to color himself better than paper, haha... (no he did some really cute ones too):

A very diligent Josh counting the candy pieces:

and then I made chocolate covered strawberries and frozen bananas that the boys gobbled up:

I'm not sure when this was, but it was too cute not to capture, they call it the hugging game:

Josh earned some money doing chores around the house (cleaning windows and chairs mostly), so we went to the dollar store and he bought himself this FBI pretend play kit. He generously offered his 2nd dollar to William who picked a spiky ball. I did not ask him to do that, I was impressed and proud.

We've become pizza experts here. I like traditions... so we made it a tradition to prepare it together (we each make one) and we eat pizza almost weekly now. I had been craving for an egg on my pizza for a long time... there was a restaurant I used to eat at when I was a college student where they put an egg on top of their pizza... I loved those pizzas... so I tried, and it wasn't as good as I remembered... too bad.
So far our favorites are macaroni and marshmallow (pepperoni and mushroom in William's language), and the 3 cheese pizza with gorgonzola, swiss/gruyere, and mozzarella. Yum!

We went to a science club my friend Sarah was organizing. It was great, totally my kinda experiments. We made silly putty, or slime, or if you're a geek like me, polymer. I loved showing the boys the magical properties... how it had the properties of a fluid but also a solid... and when squeezed into a ball it could bounce. Ha!! Makes me nostalgic for some chemistry lab experiments...

February weather was really nice, before and in-between the snow dumps, so we went on several hikes (muddy hikes sometimes). Just soaking up the beauty of Colorado as much as we can.

And we started going to the pool regularly too. We try to go weekly, but with sicknesses, weather and Josh's eczema we've missed a few weeks, but the boys are getting really comfortable in the water.

And lastly my friend Sarah organized a big service project: we assembled kits for kids for the project C.U.R.E. They provide basic medical supplies (pain killers, bandages, hygiene products, antiseptics etc...) for children in developing countries. Sarah is one of those  people that constantly inspire me to be a better Mom and a better person. She has a blog where she posts about the projects she's involved in, and invites friends to participate. It's at: http://raisinglittleheroes.wordpress.com

We gathered enough supplies to make 50 kits! Sarah Stith you are the bomb!