About the Weather

As I prepare to post the pictures you'll see below, its hard to believe that it was only a week ago we  spent a blustery, sunshiny day outside at Wade Oval.  Since then our high temperatures have been in the teens, Jack has had his first snow/cold day, and our world is blanketed by a fluffy layer of white. The weather is a little crazy around here.  

So are the children.

You may notice Ivy's "Rocky" impression in these pictures.  She fell while on a walk around the block on Friday. On her nose.  We couldn't get this band-aid off of her for several days.  Cute look, eh?

Last Saturday we went to our second Children's Matinee at Playhouse Square.  Its so fun to dress the kids up and take them downtown, and to see the parade of other littles, dressed and pressed and so excited to be out with their parents.  Or at least, in the case of my little ones, to be getting a package of skittles from the refreshment cart in the lobby.  As soon as I mentioned the play, Jack began to work himself up for those skittles.  The boy is serious about skittles.

The play we say was a puppet adaptation of the children's book "Guess how much I love you."  It was sweet and calm and quite fun to watch and not nearly so over-long as the last one.  We shared a packed lunch in the lobby with Gram afterwards and it was a lovely way to spend a morning.

We got home to find that the day in general was getting lovelier by the minute.  In Cleveland, when you find yourself looking at a 50 degree, sunny day in January, and it's only 1:00, you do not pass go, you do not collect $100, you just proceed directly to the nearest outdoor, picturesque location.  

For us last Saturday, that was Wade Oval.  I am not sure why we don't spend more time at this perfect park in front of the Art Museum.  It is stunning there, really.  Symmetrical and planned, yet organic, dotted with sculpture and fountains, encircled by paths and steps, graced with flat grass begging to be run across.  The wind whipped our hair and the kids played "Daddy Monster" and Corydon and I had a brisk walk around the lake together.

We had to go inside the museum too, of course.   The new Gallery One interactive experience?  Yeah.  It's pretty awesome.  Nat says it is proof positive that we are, in fact, living in the future.

It was so awesome, in fact, that we didn't make it anywhere else in the museum...


The rest of the week, in brief and sans pictures:

Monday-- given a 3 day weekend and no other plans, we did what we always do:  drive to IKEA.  Never mind the two kids who had just come down with colds.  Why not go on a road trip?  We took lots of tissues...  We ended up having a grand day, relaxing at Fi and Anthony's lovely new house, watching Ivy and Keely play together, then a quick shopping run through our Mecca of consumerism where we picked up a new oriental rug for the living room (we'd meant to get a cowhide.... but I am actually-- dare I say it?-- really happy with how this one looks...) and $100 of who-knows-what to go with it.  Happens every time.

Tuesday-- records day for me.  Awful roads. Worked two hours at Starbucks while waiting for roads to improve.  Could get used to that.

Wednesday-- workshop for me.  Great day, really.  The workshop was rather boring and repetitive but the company was lovely.  It is vital to have these chances to connect with co-workers.

The rest of the week-- cold and snowy and busy!  This weekend has found us snuggling in with movies and games, with  one foray out to swim at the J this morning.

I really like my mornings at the J with the kids. We have a routine, and they do very well with it.  We change then swim for about 30 minutes. It's so do-able now that Jack is an independent swimmer (more and more independent every time!  Today he spent almost the whole time experimenting with how deep he could swim under water..).  Then, 30 minutes of enjoying a hot shower in the great, accessible family change rooms.  I am dreading the day we have to bite the bullet and say its no longer appropriate to shower together as a family, because this is SO convenient!  They have fun, they are contained, we all walk out clean and dressed and ready for the day.  We go upstairs and eat lunch and play in the Family Space rooms for about an hour before heading home...  A nice way to spend 4 hours together with a minimum of yelling.

(Sadly, 4 hours at home usually contains far more yelling that I am happy with.  Jack, while stunningly handsome and a pretty good swimmer, has recently been a bit of a pill when it comes to listening to us, or behaving acceptably towards his sister.  If she's not screaming at him for taking a toy or getting in her space, we're yelling at him for ignoring our directions the first 7 times we said them.   I am hoping that this is just one of those "phases" he goes through.  Please....)

And somehow, so soon, we 're entering the tail end of another weekend.  At the tail end of another month!  We shall see where the weather takes us this week...