Platonic Solids
the tetrahedron is the one up front
Dodecahedron
Hexahedron
Icosahedron
the octohedron is the one in the middle
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Monday, December 27, 2010
A Letter To Santa
Damek wrote a letter to santa on christmas eve. The reason for the letter was to ask him for the game Chess 4 because when we went to see santa and neither one of the boys could think of anything to ask for, santa told them "well if you think of anything, just write a note and leave it under the christmas tree". Luckily this didn't take a turn for the worse and everything worked out. Right after going to see santa Damek said "I'm going to write a note asking for Chess 4".
When the time came to write the note (11:30 p.m. on christmas eve), Kyan, our 5 year old, had a couple of wants as well, so Damek included those in his letter.
He started writing it in a column style, and once he ran out of room went back up to the top to start a new column. I was sitting with the two of them helping Damek spell words and when he finished the first page, Kyan looked at it (he can't read mind you) and said "I'm worried that santa is going to read it like this, (as he ran his finger from left to right on one line including both columns) and be confused". Damek wrote it to read like this Dear Santa if you have Toy Story 3 + A Farm Puzzle Kyan Would Like Them. After Kyan's statement, Damek looked at the paper and read it the way Kyan showed, line by line, from left to right including both columns. Kyan Kyan Dear Would Santa Like If You Them Have Toy Store 3 + A Farm Puzzle, and we all busted up laughing:) I told Kyan that Santa would figure out how the letter was supposed to be read and not to worry.
Damek had to flip the paper over to write what he wanted:
Dear Santa i Would Like Chess 4 Thank You
Kyan didn't get Toy Story 3 or a Farm Puzzle (I had explained to them that they might not get what they asked for since Santa had already left the North Pole when they wrote the letter), but he did get an Ocean puzzle, which he he seemed satisfied with. Damek of course did get Chess 4 since we previously knew about it and already had it to give.
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Holiday Traditions & Memories
This time of year is special for lots of reasons, and I'm sure the reasons differ for each and every one of us.
There are a myriad of holidays during the month of december, and the ones that are celebrated by each of us will depend on who we are and what we believe, with each and every one of them being valid for the individual person.
It's been a bit hard for me this time of year since my dad passed away in 2002 because most of my memories as a child and young adult that surround this time of year revolve around my family. I very fondly remember and very sorely miss my dad especially during this time of year. My mom and dad went to great lengths to ensure that christmas was special for us kids, and I am very grateful. Although christmas morning was an especially joyous and magical time for us kids, now that I'm an adult, I remember the other smaller traditions just as fondly as the ones surrounding christmas morning.
A few of those traditions were:
-decorating the tree with my mom, my brother & my sister
-my dad grabbing one of our christmas coloring books and painting an entire christmas scene from the book onto our 6 large (floor to ceiling) windows on the front of our house. The one I remember the most vividly is the one of Santa in his sleigh piled high with toys with his reindeer pulling him.
-wrapping presents with my mom and helping my dad wrap presents for my mom
-shopping with my dad to help him find the perfect gift for my mom
-outdoor christmas lights
-my dads homemade eggnog
-helping my mom wrap her homemade suckers and then helping her deliver them to the neighbors along with her homemade fruitcake on christmas eve
-gathering downstairs to listen to christmas music on the record or tape player
-shrimp cocktail on christmas eve
-christmas morning. From a certain age, us kids were always up before mom and dad (they were up late wrapping presents and playing santa), so they told us that we could open up our stockings and play with whatever was in them until they got up. Once they got up and got their coffee, we did our christmas.
-christmas party on christmas day (and into the late night or sometimes early next morning) for friends & neighbors and all the food preparations that surrounded it.
With kids of my own now, I, along with Lee, are creating new memories and traditions that I hope my kids will look back on just as fondly as I do on mine.
Read more...
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
On The Solstice
On the winter solstice we usually decorate a pine tree in our backyard with goodies for the birds. We haven't got to that yet, but will sometime within the next two weeks.
Kyan has been feeling under the weather since saturday, so we've been pretty low key and just staying at home these past few days.
The boys opened two presents yesterday for solstice. Damek got some much needed new snow boots & a much wanted new book. Kyan received some new rain boots (it has been raining lots here this winter), and a new movie ('Happy Feet') because he is totally in love with penguins these days:)
At around noon we got an order for 4 pairs of stilts from our etsy shop begging to be shipping out yesterday. Lee was busy for the next few hours making and finishing stilts and at 4:15 I was standing in the post office line along with the rest of Salt Lake City:)
After dinner at about 10:00 p.m. we all decided to take a walk (Echo, our German Shepherd included) through our neighborhood with our homemade lanterns
as a way to welcome more light into our lives with the coming longer days.
Wishing you and yours a bright and merry time this holiday season.
Read more...
Sunday, December 19, 2010
Recent Goings On
St. Lucia Buns - Just so you know, we let ours rise for 5 hours because we were out and about that day, and they still came out wonderful:)
-Sequence - a christmas gift from the cousins. It's recommended for ages 7+, but Kyan is able to play just fine.
-Graham Cracker House (a work in progress).
-Alice In Wonderland & Through The Looking Glass finished. This Alice In Wonderland and this Alice In Wonderland watched, and this one on hold at the library.
-Reading The Wizard Of Oz and then The Chronicles Of Narnia (both requested by Damek)
-Building, finishing and shipping our etsy orders:)
-Lots of building and making with Magnetix for Kyan
-Homemade granola
-Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows (the film) for Damek & I (we finished the book in January)
-a walk around Christmas Street
-welcoming small goodies for the boys for christmas from a few etsy shops
-tin can luminaries (Damek really went to town with this project. He made an up and down staircase on his that wraps around the entire can. Kyan had fun too, although pounding the nail was a bit harder for him. He did a random pattern of 10 holes, then he was done.)
-fun with Platonic Solids
-re-usable fabric gift bags
Read more...
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
At The Aquarium
On monday we capitalized on the free day at our local aquarium and although a bit crowded, we had fun nonetheless.
Some of our favorites:
 |
Jellyfish |
octopus
starfish
sharks
sting rays
sea turtle
electric eel
penguins (Kyan is currently enamoured with penguins)
Read more...
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Friday, December 10, 2010
Advent Activity #9
Homemade hot chocolate
with homemade marshmallows.
We ended up using the marshmallow recipe from Smitten Kitchen and I had my doubts how the marshmallows were going to turn out as we had a major mishap as well as a missing appliance and no metal baking dish. All of us except Kyan (he's not big on marshmallows anyway) think they came out great nonetheless. Just so you know, using a food processor for mixing and a glass baking dish for setting up works just fine. The only other deviation from the recipe we did was tossing the cut marshmallow pieces in powdered sugar because they were still fairly sticky even after sitting overnight.
We cut up small pieces
and big pieces
and Damek even cut 1 extra large piece for himself:)
Monday, December 06, 2010
Advent Calendar & Activities
We're a little late, but better late than never right?
We hung our advent calendar today (one we made a couple years back and have been using ever since).
Damek wants all the activities to be surprises, so he wasn't in on the coming up with ideas, but Kyan threw in a couple here and there.
Here's what we got:
5 - Decorate tree and put up holiday decorations.
6 - Have family game night.
7 - Grandmas birthday, do something special for her.
8 - Tour our local historic theater (an activity we planned with our homeschooling group)
11 - Make a gingerbread house & go visit santa.
12 - Have a candlelit dinner in front of the christmas tree.
13 - St. Lucia Day! Make St. Lucia Buns.
14 - Have an indoor picnic for dinner.
15 - Make chocolate & yogurt covered pretzels.
17 - Movie night with homemade pizzas and root beer floats.
18 - Make wrapping paper (using holiday stamps and brown packing paper)
20 - Make homemade dog treats for Echo.
23 - Make christmas cookies.
24 - Deliver cookies and christmas cards to the neighbors.
25 - Christmas!
26 - Go on a winter walk with warm soup and a thermos of hot chocolate in tow:)
27 - Make spiced cider and mulled wine
28 - Make paper snowflakes.
29 - Go Ice Skating (this was Kyan's idea, he wanted to do it last year and we never got a chance).
30 - Make a list of things we want to do in the new year.
31 - New Years Eve! Celebrate!
Saturday, December 04, 2010
We started a tradition 5 years ago of going to a local tree farm to get our tree. The tradition continues.
The farm we go to is a couple towns over in Layton, Utah called Neville Farms (scroll down a little on the website to find info for the farm). They have free hot chocolate, taffy & peanuts for snacking on while perusing their trees.
Grandma (my mom) came with us this year for the first time, and we enjoyed her company on the drive to and fro as well as while searching for a tree:)
Damek enjoying his hot chocolate:)
Baby trees
Cows on the adjacent farmland
Kyan searching for pinecones
Damek found a pinecone "for our nature table"
Grandma helping us find the perfect one
Looking at trees wasn't all we did today, the eyes to the sky were due to the many military jets that were flying overhead from nearby Hill Air Force Base.
Found it!
Walking back to the truck.
Now all we have to do is decorate it. We'll be doing that tonight and most likely tomorrow:)
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