Our Saturdays are filled with fun in the snow these days. Meadow is in WeeSki class first thing in the morning. Sometimes it takes a little encouragement (reverse psychology) to get her engines started but once she’s geared up and on the mountain she loves every minute of it.

Mommy and Daddy spend the time on the adult lifts, which has turned into one of the few moments during the week where we get one-on-one time to just have grown up talk.

Then, after Meadow’s class is over, we hit the green circles as a trio and whoop it up.

For Christmas this year we adopted a 2yr-old cat from the humane society. She’s been hiding out under the bed mostly, but just today warmed up enough to withstand a cuddle on the bed.

Her name is Haleiwa Buttercup.

Meadow hand-wrote a lovely letter to Santa this year but somehow on the way home from our vacation to Hawaii it got lost and she never put it in the mail. We forgot about it until tonight, last minute, before going to bed. She was a bit distraught how he’d get her wishes, so I told her she could dictate a new letter to me and I’d post it “on the line” where he will surely see it. Here ’tis:

“Santa… could I please have a new teddy bear for Christmas and some old clothes for my doll Suzy, a watch, a book of facts, and a new doll, some more spy gear (lots of it)… uhm let’s see… a set of Rudolph’s land and Rudolph and Clarice. I want a scooter. Could I please have a camera. From Meadow”.

In a classic speaking-before-thinking daddy move, while on vacation in HI, I let spill to Meadow that her kindergarten class back home was going ice skating for PE. I guess I imagined she wouldn’t care, since she was spending day after day at the BEACH, in HAWAII.

But she did care, and ever. She broke down in tears and was quite inconsolable. Ice skating is one of her favorite imaginary past times. I say imaginary because until now she’s never done it before, only imagined how wonderful it would be with the help of many ice-dancing ballet books.

So, we surprised her by taking time out from the beach and rolling into the Hawaiian Ice Palace and getting her on skates for the first time. It was trickier for her than she imagined, but she did great and even tried to pull off a couple flourishes.

Daddy vindicated!

The Polynesian Culture Center in Oahu was a lot of fun for all that it has to offer. But it was especially fun just to get to pal around as a family.

A pic of Meadow snapping a pic of some playful dolphins.

Meadow is beside herself and prettying just downright psyched to be living’ it up in Hawaii.

In Ballet I did a lot of things there. I started to learn ballet. We were raindrops. And we actually actually sang a song and it’s

splishing splashing through the rain
up the street and down again

“To Hayden: This is a picture of my friend Hayden and me. Because there was a costume party with lots and lots of goodies. Love Meadow.”

“This is a picture of me and my friend Hayden. And we’re looking at each other! And we’re thinking about fighting! And I love the playdate. I was dressed up like a pirate and I was a princess pirate. To Meadow.”

Part of the drama surrounding Meadow and Hayden’s play is disagreement. They get into arguments, I think, because they’re role playing. On the day of these pics they had a few different arguments, but the one that stood out was: ”life isn’t fair”…. “oh yes it is!”…. “no, it’s not!”… “it is too!”…

While aspects of getting out of the house every morning are becoming routine, the walk to kindergarten is always full of new conversation and observations about all the special little things in the world, which, to a five-year-old, are matters of infinite importance. EG: why do slugs cross the road?

What to do with a box of legos that…

• Started off with me as a child who soaked them in baths, played with fire, mixed them with other non-compatible toy sets, and other general toy-torturing activities;
• Used them as I got older for all sorts of imagination-inspiring activities, mostly centering around science fiction writing;
• Went to college with me and someone came out mostly unscathed;
• Survived our house burning down by being in the basement where the rubbermaid bin they were in filled with ashy chemically water but kept them from melting;
• Sat for a year out in the yard with vegetation overgrowing them, forgotten;
• Were found, soaked in bleach water, and left to dry out for another year… ?

Why – give them to Meadow of course!

Sifting through these old toys brought back some long lost memories and sensations. Some of the pieces in this box are over 30 years old. But now more pleasant than any of the memories is seeing them bring a whole new level of imaginative play to Meadow who has reached an age where she can appreciate them.

When I told them I was giving them to her, she was overjoyed.

I can only hope they’ll bring her as much inspiration and hours of adventure as they did me.