Author: brookeshelf

Eleanor is lucky enough to sing with the Seattle Chidren’s Chorus this year.  This week I got to see her perform!

Here she is with the “Brio” section of the choir (for 7-10 year olds).  They are singing a Christmas song about a cuckoo bird, I don’t know the title.  Eleanor is in the center of the back row and is wearing a pink headband.  I love how she does a little hop when she hits some of the high notes.

And here is the Brio choir singing “Adeste Fidelis” with Intermezzo (9-13 year olds).  Ella’s in middle of the second row of yellow shirts again, but she’s hidden behind another girl.  You can kind of see the edge of her headband if you watch closely.  She says that learning the Latin words was the biggest challenge so far.  I can’t wait to see their full Christmas concert in a week!

 

Eleanor’s Girl Scout troop was lucky enough to have the opportunity to do a flag ceremony for veterans at a local retirement home.  There were several vets there who took it very, very seriously.  I probably would have enjoyed it more if it weren’t for two landscaping guys using their leaf blowers through the whole thing.  The whole thing sounded essentially like 

In Flanders Fields BBSBZBZBZZBZBZBZBZBZBZB

Which was to say, annoying.  But our little troop of girls did everything just right — they’d had multiple rehearsals to learn all the official steps and so forth.  I was so proud of them.  Later, they did a smaller-scale ceremony indoors, for the residents who couldn’t make it outside.

 

What great kids — here are the Brownies lounging on a couch in the lobby.  So sweet.

The Kruckeberg Botanical Garden has added this amazing new statue to its grounds.  It’s called the Wood Wave, and it’s huge.  And beautiful.

Heh.  Katie is crying in the above photo because I insisted she wear a coat.  I didn’t expect her to pose for the photo, but when she saw me take out the camera, she tearfully toddled over to the rest of the group and cried “Cheeese!” in the most pathetic little voice ever.

Anyway.

This sculpture was created from the root system of a 1,000 year old Redwood tree.  The artist intended it to be “interactive” — he wanted people to be able to climb all over it.  There are rods and climbing grips built into the wood; you can see some of them in my pictures.

There are also some designs made of overlapping discs of hammered copper, resembling ancient pictographs.

My kids thought it was a lot of fun; I thought it was something fun enough to share!

The Legend of Zelda has been William’s favorite fantasy play ever since Jeff had his Zelda-themed birthday back in September.  I even managed to find a homemade Link outfit at the thrift store, and William wears it almost all the time.

A few weeks ago, William went upstairs after school and spent a long time working on a “surprise” for me.  He insisted I close my eyes whenever I passed by.

Then, when everything was ready, he gave me this:

“This is a map,” he explained.  Then I was also given this Wind Waker wand:

It’s not a sword, okay?  It’s a wand that, when you wave it like a conductor’s baton, makes magical music that defeats monsters.

Monsters such as this evil lizard that popped up out of nowhere!  Eeeek!

William gave me careful instructions on how to wave my wand the proper way.  “Like this, Mom.”

And the monster is defeated, uuuuuuuugh!

Other monsters leapt out at us from time to time as we continued our quest.  There was one in the laundry room . . .

. . . and another one in the girls’ bathroom.  The wand made quick work of them all.  Of course, the really adorable thing was how William would dart ahead of me and hide, so that he could make the monster “spring” out at me with a growl.  I made the appropriate shocked surprised noises.

On my quest, I also acquired some magic healing potion . . .

. . . and a helpful monkey who I could summon to help me fight bad guys.  William also gave me the fuzzy blue boa and told me to wear it on my head for protection.

So, now I looked like this:

Surely it had become a Quest for Style.  Finally, after much travail, we came upon the dreaded Final Boss Fight.  Behold, Ye Dragon!!  It was so difficult to defeat that I had to use my potion and call upon the assistance of my pet monkey.

BUT DEFEAT HIM WE DID, and I was rewarded with these jewels:

And I also got this fancy crown. 

I had to use my wind waker wand to unlock the crown and take it home.

 

William insisted that I try it on.  So, now I looked like this:

Clearly, we heroes know no shame.

This year, we had characters from the children’s favorite television show, Avatar: the Last Airbender 

Eleanor was Katara of the water tribe.  I made her hair out of yarn.

Jeff was Sokka, Katara’s older brother.

William was avatar Aang of the air nomads.

Brian knitted the hat during the American Society of Human Genetics conference a few weeks ago.

And Katie was Raggedy Ann.  Specifically, she wore the Raggedy Ann costume that my mom made for me when I was a toddler.  So cute!

My sister made the wig.  The original wig was made of crepe paper and really uncomfortable to wear.  Feeling the paper rustle around my head is one of my earliest memories.

We made jack o lanterns, too.  Jeff wanted the Jedi insignia on his pumpkin.  Katie’s is the tiny one; she wanted “a happy face on it.”

Because we get so few trick or treaters at our house, this is how I have out candy this year:

It was really fun to walk around the neighborhood as a family this year.

Jeffrey went after Kit Kats again.  As he put it, “we made a huge dent in the world percentage of candy!”.

So much fun!  I still miss out old neighborhood in Salt Lake at Halloween, but going out all together is really fun, too.  Brian says it’s way, way easier with two adults.

Happy Halloween!

 

This past season, Eleanor has been a very, very lucky girl.

She got to go to Girl Scout Camp  twice — with her grandmas!

The first camp was the “Mom & Me” weekend camp at Camp Robbinswold on the Olympic Penninsula.  Brian’s mom, Kathryn, was able to come out for this event, which was organized by some amazing women in our service unit.

One thing to know about Girl Scout Camps: they have killer locations.  Robbinswold is a narrow strip of land that runs right along the water.  This was the first thing we’d see through the trees when stepping out of our cabin.  Ahhhh, nice.

 

 

 

This is our cabin, which we shared with about ten other people.  It was lovely, warm and snug.  The Downside: our bathroom was an outhouse in the woods.  C’est la vie.

This is from a hike to a little point on the water.  We saw seals in the water, swimming closer to check us out.  They were adorable.

One of the ongoing games at this camp was a challenge to find thirteen little paper cutouts of Alice (of Wonderland fame).  You can see Alice #1 on the tree in the picture below.  Eleanor and Kathryn hunted all over to find them all, and were rewarded with a bag of purple licorice from the game keeper.

There were also lots of games and activities in the lodge.

 

 

This past weekend we were granted a visit from my mom, Suzanne.  We headed up to Camp River Ranch for a campout organized by Eleanor’s own troop.

 

 

Camp River Ranch is enormous, a beautiful mix of forest, lakes, and rivers tucked into the Cascade foothills.

So large, in fact, that we got a bit turned around and had to take a photo of this map to figure out where we were supposed to go:

We got there in time for a geocaching workshop taught by one of the camp counselors.  Then we played “Strut Miss Sally,” a silly song-and-dance game that is  a favorite with our troop.  It’s kind of like the Virginia Reel, mixed with goofiness:

 

After doing another workshop on secret codes, we worked together to prepare, cook and serve a spaghetti dinner.  Our troop is amazing!

 

 

After dinner, we built a big fire and made s’mores.  My job was to lead the campfire songs, most of which I learned at the Mom & Me camp from September.  Getting all the girls to sing and be silly with me was the best.  I think it’s important for kids to see that adults can put aside pretension, loosen up, and play and be silly with them.  On the other hand, I do hope that no photos of me doing the Jellyfish Song never surface on the internet.  What a fun couple of weekends!  What a lucky girl is Eleanor.

The next adventure with Grandma & Grandpa: a drive through the country to pick some Halloween pumpkins.  We started with a hay ride:

And met a baby cow and its mother.

Katie held very, very still for face painting.  So still, in fact, that I’m tempted to bring facepaints to church just to replicate the effect.

After making s’mores and shipping cider around a bonfire . . .

. . . we finally got to pick our favorite gourds. 

Katie had a method for letting us know when she was ready to go:

Heh.

We followed this adventure with lunch at the Cheesemonger’s Table, which is my favorite place to eat right now.  Cheese, Gromit!

Once again, we have been blessed with a visit from my parents.  Katie couldn’t be more thrilled.  Especially since that means a trip to the zoo.

And by “zoo,” I mean “merry go round,” at least according to Katie.

It’s going to be a fun weekend!

Continue reading “Little Drummer Boy” →

It began when Katie and I saw these enormous pumpkins at the grocery store …

This one weighed 1666 lbs. and was planted in 1984. 

There was also a giant pumpkin carving.

Katie was kind of alarmed because the little girls hand had fallen off.  I didn’t even notice until she looked at the picture on my phone and cried.

There were more autumny things inside.  I loved this exuberant display of candy.

After school, William found a rake and piled up a fat stack of leaves.  He insisted I take a picture of him taking a “running start” into the pile.  Love it!