The Earth Makes Stone Out of Clay

We had a busy weekend. Bill came by for a quick visit Friday and Saturday, and Todd came by Saturday and Sunday. We took Bill out for a walk at Griffy lake. Julien ran half the way. First he was a velociraptor and we were various other dinosaurs, then, after he slowed down, he was a scientist discovering hard clay and magnetic rock. When Richard asked what is made out clay Julien paused and then said "The earth make stone out of clay."

In the evening Julien combed my hair and his Grandpa Bill's. He did it very gently. He then asked if I would like a massage. He had never asked this before but, of course I said "yes!" He proceeded to give me an amazing massage, as if someone had taught him professionals techniques! "Sometimes they use fists," he said as he carefully kneaded my back. He gently rubbed his hands over my head and down my neck and even lightly used his elbow to run down my arm. I was astonished! When I asked if he did this at school he said "no." Finally, I asked where he had seen a massage like this and he responded, "at the airport, when I was three." And I remembered that in our waiting area there had been a massuse at a massage table. And he had asked me about it at the time, but I had no idea he had taken all that in!

Showing

I am really showing now! Julien felt the baby kicking for the first time this weekend. He shouted "I'm so excited!"

Playdates

Lately Julien has had alot of playdates with friends. In these photos you can see him play in his indoor tent with Marco (who was born on the same day!) and playing scientist with Chase (a very messy project).

Grandad Rick's 60th Birthday

Kathy and Rick visited this last weekend. Their flight in was a disaster, after a 6 hour delay to O'Hare they missed their connecting flight and couldn't be re-booked until Saturday, so Richard drove all the way to Chicago to pick them up. They arrived a bit frazzled, but happy to finally be in Bloomington.

We celebrated Rick's 60th Birthday. Julien and I made a cake (lots of licking of spoons and chocolate covered faces) and Shana and Willem came over to celebrate. One evening we went out to Shana and Willem's house for dinner. They live in a converted one room school house with a wood stove. Julien had been at Jake's birthday party earlier in the day, so he was ready to snuggle by the wood stove.

Julien and Kathy played ice dancing with lots of special tricks. He loves the Olympics and has taken to "ice-skating" races in our family room- which he wins with cheers and clapping and then someone puts a trophy around his neck, which is, in fact, a gold model of the Eiffel tower.

Kathy and Rick left on Tuesday and luckily had an uneventful flight home.

Jake's Birthday

Julien went to Jake's birthday party this last weekend. It was held at the Wonderlab, a local children's science museum. Unfortunately, Julien was still a bit sick with a cough and had a hard time keeping up with Jake, so Julien cried a few times. None the less, he had a good time. He climbed up "the grape vine" which is always fun. An older kid helped him down when it got difficult. He was very nice!

Julien has been carrying around his goody bag at home since the party. The other night after dinner he asked for permission to eat a candy out of his goody bag so I said yes he could pick one treat. After carefully looking over gum drops, tootsie rolls and a lolly pop he declared "I choose the splendor of a lolly pop!"

Waves

Here are a few more photos of Chicago, showing the waves crashing on the shore.

Happy Valentines Day!

Boy

We are having a boy!
Julien is very excited with the prospect of having a little brother. I asked him the other day "Will you wrestle with your brother?" He looked at me like I was crazy and said "No! I will kiss him and care for him. If he cries and he is hungry I will feed him apple sauce and I will change his diaper if it is dirty." When I told this story to his teacher he added "Babies are fragile! You can't wrestle them." Crazy mommy!

Knights

We recently visited Bill and Jan in Chicago. We hadn't visited in a while, so it felt particularly good to be there. Julien knows their apartment very well and immediate went to all his favorite places to check things out: the train viewing window, the knick-knack table, the rocks and shells shelf, etc. On Saturday we all went to the Art Institute to look at the knights' armor, which was cool. It included some horse helmets as well as human. Julien also enjoyed the Egyptian and Roman exhibits. I read some of the translations of the hieroglyphics to him, and at one point, when I had just finished one of the stories, Julien exclaimed "turn the page!" It was pretty funny. (As a side comment, we were recently discussing that we had run out of temporary tattoos and I told him that he could pick out some new ones. He asked "Do they have book tattoos?" If they don't they should!). By the time we made it up to the Impressionists Julien had lost his patience, so we took him down to the kids area. A little girl came up to Julien and asked him to play. She was very charming and won him over, so they played for quite a while.

On Sunday morning we took a walk on Promontory point. It was wintry but there was not the usual ice on the surface of the lake. It was beautiful in a very Chicago winter way. Julien enjoyed the waves and the binoculars. He slept on the entire ride home to Bloomington (4 hours) which is very rare.

Julien's Art Exhibit

Julien is very interested in creating art exhibits lately. This is his process: he paints something (or finds an object) then he asks me to take a picture of him with the painting or object. Then he asks me to download the photograph and print it. Then he hangs up the photograph in the exhibit (his bedroom wall). It is very tricky and postmodern. I love it, of course.

Louisville

A few weekends ago we visited Molly and Steve in Louisville. They live in a cute house in a great neighborhood. We went out for lunch at the Uptown cafe (I had a traditional hot brown which was quite intense), checked out the neighborhood and then we went to a huge playground by the river. Julien particularly enjoyed the pyramid.
After lots of playtime we went out to icecream at Graeters. I had the black raspberry chip which was heavenly.
Louisville was very charming.