a brush with celebrity

liam's selection in the "what we're reading" sidebar on the right  hasn't changed at all in the past few months.  we discovered the Magic Tree House series last fall after hearing lots of friends with older children rave about them, and picked up the first book, dinosaurs before dark, at the library one rainy afternoon.  he could not put it down.  literally.  his eyes were glued to those pages all the way through the parking lot, in the car on the drive home, and for twenty minutes after we pulled into the driveway.  he sat in his car seat and finished the entire 60-page book before he even unbuckled himself to get out.  he was transfixed (and, suddenly, a dinosaur expert.)

since then, he's voraciously worked his way through about thirty more titles in the series.  mary pope osbourne, the author, keeps churning out more adventures of the brother and sister duo of jack and annie, as they magically travel through time in their tree house.  the author's sister has joined the family business and writes companion "research guides" that are non-fiction supplements to the stories for anyone who yearns to learn even more information than is contained in the novels.

with liam having been such an independent reader for a few years now, it's sometimes easy for me to forget that there's still a lot of benefit to me reading aloud to him.  so one night a few weeks ago, i picked up his current book and was immediately reminded of just how educational this series can be.  as i read, it made mention of william shakespeare, so i paused to explain to him who william shakespeare was.  "oh, i know him," liam interrupted.  "he was in book number twenty-five.  he wrote these plays in england a long time ago.  one of them had fairies in it and was about a dream or something."  [i'm a little rusty on brit lit, but i'm pretty sure he's referring to a midsummer night's dream, no?] 

so when one of our local bookstores hosted mary pope osborne and her sister for a book signing, i knew we had to be there.  it pains me to ever buy a book -- i'm an ardent believer in reading books FOR FREE through the library -- but this was one instance when i felt like my money was well-spent.  she entertained the crowd by explaining how she had come up with the whole idea, shared where jack and annie might be traveling next, and even solicited suggestions for future topics.  liam sat on the floor a few feet away absolutely mesmerized.  and then -- he could barely believe it -- he actually got to meet her (and her sister) face-to-face.  there will be days in his future when meeting a famous athlete, or actor, or musician will be one of the highlights of his life, but for now, i'm thankful that meeting an author thrills him so.

p.s.  isn't it refreshing that a woman who's sold close to 100 million books can still dress like she, well, hasn't sold close to 100 million books?  :)

wordless wednesday

spring has sprung!  susanna proved to have quite the green thumb, working in the dirt for hours to help chris plant flowers.

it's remarkable that the dirt didn't bother our little prisspot.  but of course, she refused to wear anything grungy to do her work.  seems that in order to garden, large hairbows and plastic beaded necklaces are required.

one thing that definitely did bother her was the worm that liam had to horn in with.  his face = elation.  hers = disgust.  pesky older brother.

top dog

we had the pleasure of taking care of my parents' black lab, omni, for a few days last week while they were out of town.  he's fourteen years old, almost totally deaf, and sure takes his own sweet time while relieving himself in the woods.  and don't even get me started on the tufts of dog hair that are forming tumbleweeds in every corner of our house.

but one perk to dog-sitting is that omni retrieves the newspaper each morning from the end of the driveway and delivers it at our feet.  chris was explaining this to susanna last sunday over breakfast.  "on a rainy day like this," chris said, "isn't it so nice that omni will go out and get the paper for us?"

"how does he know how to do that?" she asked.  the only trick super knows is how to quickly jump off the couch when she realizes she's been caught, so susanna was obviously a bit confused.

"well, pops trained omni.  he showed him how to pick up the paper with his mouth and bring it back."

"oh," she said, and still seemed confused.  "does pops get the paper with his mouth too?"

wordless wednesday

in honor of st. patrick's day, liam's class held an "Eating of the Greens" party.  the kids came up with a list of green foods they like to eat, and parents were asked to bring in a few for the big event.  on the list were the usual suspects: grapes, kiwi, green doughnuts, avocados.  but also included were some surprises: edamame, brussel sprouts, celery, and snow peas.  (seriously.  some kid in liam's class actually requested brussel sprouts.)

liam's teacher instructed all the children to use the four sections of their paper plates to make a four-leaf clover.  on three of the leaves, they could choose any food they wanted; but on the fourth, they were to choose something they had never eaten before, or, at least, something they didn't normally eat.  i was super excited about the prospect of liam venturing forth and trying a new veggie.  peer pressure at its best!

i was on the other side of the classroom helping a child with a spill when liam loaded his plate, so i didn't know what new food he had chosen until he was asked to share it with the class.  liam proudly announced that he had chosen the rainbow jello.  ("my mommy never makes rainbow jello!" he explained.)

here's to culinary adventurousness!

off-putting

one of our children is a morning person.  the other is not.  here's a glimpse into the screenplay of our lives to help you figure out who's who.

ACT I, SCENE 1

it's 7:30 on a friday morning in the mann house.  liam and chris have finished their breakfast, while sara is just waking up and susanna is still asleep.  chris is brushing his teeth in preparation for leaving for work.  liam has his plastic putter in hand, quietly practicing golf in the upstairs hallway. 

the door to susanna's room opens.  susanna emerges, eyes adjusting to the light and her hands on her hips.

SUSANNA:  liam, what are you DOING?

LIAM (stopping mid-swing):  good morning susanna!  i'm practicing golf.

SUSANNA:  well, you need to go downstairs to practice golf.  your ball keeps hitting my door and it woke me up. it is too early for me to be up.  i'm going back to bed.

susanna sighs dramatically, returns to her room, and shuts the door.

END OF SCENE

wordless wednesday

when the temperature hit a balmy 72 degrees yesterday, i couldn't help but feeling like we were finally, finally, finally nearing the end of The Longest Winter in Recorded History.   as soon as we parked the car in the driveway after preschool, the kids beelined it to the yard and never looked back.  i brought out our lunch and we picnicked in the grass, spreading out on the same turquoise comforter that i bought with my freshman year roommate in 1992.  (can you believe that chris has no such cute coordinating comforter from his college days?)

some highlights of our springtime afternoon:

susanna and one of her three babydolls, who were mandatory participants in our first picnic of the season.

super was so shocked to see the warm sun that she lay on her back and stared skyward all afternoon.  she's the weirdest dog.  

funny how just a few months ago i might have captioned this picture as "the future tiger woods" ...

back (-up) to the drawing board

oh technology, how i love thee and loathe thee at the same time.

our public library system has recently rolled out an amazing new offering: online audio books, able to be downloaded to your computer and then transferred to your ipod or mp3 player, for free.  i mulled over how useful it would be for me personally and decided that i myself wouldn't really benefit from it; when i work out, i'd rather listen to music, and i'm never in the car alone for long enough to get through even a chapter or two at a time.  BUT i figured it would be such a cool thing to have for the kids.  susanna might get a kick out of hearing john lithgow reading dr. seuss on the computer.  and liam would really enjoy wearing some headphones and following along in one of his magic tree house books while listening to the author.

so i downloaded a few titles, but then had no idea how to transfer them to my iphone.  i enlisted my far more tech-savvy husband to help ... and that's when things went awry.

i've had this iphone for seven months now and had always wondered why it came with that computer cord.  i had no idea i was supposed to be connecting it to this itunes store thingy for software updates.  which means that i also had no idea that i was supposed to be backing up my phone.  i'm sure you can see where this is going.

so when chris linked my phone to the computer in order to transfer these audio book files, the itunes store thingy almost started smoking, reeling from the number of software updates i'd missed over the past seven months.  and then, POOF.  gone.  out in the ethernet somewhere is floating all of my contacts, my apps, my music, my text messages, my audio files, and -- gulp -- my pictures.  by the time my phone had finished flashing its glaring error message (we're still not quite sure what happened), the only thing left were the basic icons that come when you purchase it.

and this is when i realized how reliant i've become on this little gem of a device.  i couldn't get in touch with ANYONE, since the only phone number i have memorized is my parents'.  i had no idea what i needed to get at the grocery.  (months ago, i downloaded this grocery list app and organized it to mirror the aisles of my grocery store -- by taking a picture of each aisle overhead sign.  so geeky, i know, but man is it fun to go shopping now.)  i couldn't remember what the URL was to check my work e-mail.  dismay set in when i realized i cannot now prove my prowess on the game of bejeweled by showing off my amazingly high score record.  and, most importantly, all these sweet pictures of the kids doing whatever they do day in and day out had vanished.  (hence no wordless wednesday this week.)

it was a sad, sad day for sara mann.  and literally just now as i began to wind down this post, my e-mail just popped up with a new message from the wake county public library system: "reminder!  your digital title is now available for download!" 

i think i'll go actually read dr. seuss to susanna myself.  take that, technology.

and maybe later on today, i'll get around to figuring out this back-up thing.  where's that cord again?

the wedding planner

"i know who i'm going to marry," liam said one afternoon as he helped me put away his clean laundry.

"oh really?" i replied.  i thought of the cute little girls in his preschool class and wondered if he might have his first crush.  "who might that be?"

"susanna."

hmm.  i hadn't quite seen that one coming.  "well, that's a really nice thought," i said, "but you're actually not allowed to marry anyone in your family."

he laughed.  "that's so silly, mommy!  you married daddy, and you're both in our family."

he had me there.  my reasoning obviously needed some work.

he picked up a pair of socks to put in his drawer.  "i mean, we have fun together, and we love each other, and she always laughs at my knock-knock jokes," he explained.  "yep, susanna's the one for me."

and i realized that his reasoning made a whole lot more sense, at least to a five-year old, than mine did.  and i left it at that.