Hiking in Texas

Last Saturday we decided that we wanted to go for a walk with Meadow. First we thought about a local park and then I suggested that we get out of the regular suburbaness of our area and go on a real trail. Katie takes science at school on Fridays and they I had done a nature walk outside the day before. I had mentioned to the science teacher that one of the ironies of living here was that I actually did more nature-type walks in the middle of NYC than I do in Dallas. I miss the parks.

So we went to a preserve run by the Audobon Society that isn't too far from our house. Of course now that Katie is used to living here, she thinks anything that is more than 15 minutes away is "far." It was a really nice morning. Meadow loved to hike, though she panted a lot of the way. There were tons of dogs and she was fine. Katie walked about 2 1/4 miles and it wasn't until the end that she took a few short rides on Daddy's back. And it was fun to be away from houses and do something different.

Carnival

The day after Katie's birthday party was her school's carnival. Somehow a few months ago I roped into taking care of all the big events. In case it's not really clear from past blog postings, Texans really love their bounce houses. No community event is complete without a bounce house. There are whole playspaces devoted to bounce houses. And the TE Preschool carnival was no different. So I had to order, sign contracts for, and organize the various bounce houses/slides/water things. Above is Katie and her friend Noah in the paddle boats. Now the paddle boats were neat - that's something you don't see at every event. Unfortunately, I didn't get to see her in them because I was watching the elephant slide the entire time...

Here are some more pictures. Peter had a good time with Katie at carnival and even did some time at the elephant slide so I could be with her. And Nana & Papa had fun with her too.


Katie on a pony.


Katie on the big slide

Katie with another friend named Hannah. Turns out they know each other from ballet. I love that my daughter has a whole social life I don't know about. Hannah's family owns this fire engine. It was the first fire engine in all of Dallas.

Katie and Lainie - another ballet friend.

Katie-isms - April '09

Katie made 2 comments about age and aging this month that I thought were pretty funny. The first was a few days after we returned from visiting Oma. She told me "the nurses always take care of the people with lines on their face."

Yesterday morning we were snuggling in bed (her favorite thing to do in the morning) and she said to me, "Mommy, our house is old but it doesn't have any wrinkles!"

Katie continues to be a really happy little girl. She's agreeable about most things except for getting dressed. Mornings are often a little more of a struggle than we'd like. There always seems to be one thing she'll argue about each morning and Peter sometimes wonders if she gets up in the morning and thinks about what she's going to argue about. It's usually about what she's going to wear or putting her shoes and socks on. On occasion it's what she'll eat for breakfast.

This month she's more into playing house and art projects than dress up and tea parties. She loves to sing, especially the songs she learns in school.

Here are Katie and Peter playing basketball after her birthday party.

Birthday Party!

Katie was pretty insistent from about December that she wanted a gymnastics birthday party. So in January I booked the day after grandfriends day so my parents could share the day too. It was a fun and easy birthday party. Other than the cake and the favors, I had nothing to do. Because there was nothing personal, nothing that made it particularly Katie-specific, it actually kind of bordered on generic. But that's okay. At 4, everyone invites the whole class to their parties plus other people they like. Unlike other kids, we didn't have kids from last year's class to invite. I took the philosophy of it can't hurt to extend an invitation and we included a number of kids Katie knows from her school activities or through me and it was good.

Here are some pictures
Katie wanted to jump on the trampoline in front of number 4

Running with her friends

Waiting for the long trampoline. Katie's in between her friends Abbie and Eva (sisters) and look at the smile on little Ellie's face. Someone wanted to know where we got all the girls since there are only 3 in the class. Guess we've tried to cultivate girl friendships outside of school

The swinging rope

The cake. I didn't go crazy looking for a cake. I had heard wonderful things about Jeanne, this woman at the preschool who makes cakes. We finally tasted her cake at a birthday party in February and decided to get the cake from her. Trying to avoid a character theme, I suggested butterflies to Katie. She loved the idea. Jeanne suggested making a butterfly garden. Here the butterflies are white chocolate and come up from the cake. It does say "Happy Birthday Katie" on the side. It was so delicious and beautiful.

Katie's sitting between Julia and their friend Lexie.

Katie's grandmas

Another birthday blessing

Dipa arrived Friday night and Saturday morning we woke both grandparents up to go to Tot Shabbat. Only one would go though - and Dipa joined us for Tot Shabbat. It's once a month and Katie's teacher Jennifer leads it and Katie loves it. I loved that my dad got to see Katie in action. Here she is with the birthday blessing with Shelly and Cantor Cohn.

Grandfriends Day!

Here is Katie on stage at Grandfriends Day. Wow, was Grandfriends Day packed! Hundreds of Grandfriends showed up from all over the country. Katie was lucky to have Dima, Nana & Papa there.
Katie was so excited to be on stage for Grandfriends Day during Shabbat. The 3s and 4s sang 2 songs, including "Building a Better World." After Shabbat, the grandfriends went to the classrooms for introductions and activities. And Dima got a special honor - she got to read the grandparents book to the Sammy Spiders! I will post a picture when I get one.


And here's Dima reading Katie a bedtime story while Peter went to get Dipa at the airport. It happens to be one of Dima's favorite stories.

Dima!

Dima came to visit! She was off from work and it nicely coincided with Katie's school's grandfriend's day. So Dima came down and spent a nice time with us. I can't remember the last time I spent so much time with my mother by myself. Maybe never?

She brought lots of art projects to do with Katie. Here they are drawing an apple tree with colored pencils that can then be used as water colors.

Vegan Passover

Our friends Andy and Greg came over for dinner the Saturday night during Passover. We've been looking forward to having them over. However, they are vegan... The whole holiday is eggs... I was a bit lost as to what to make. Debbie suggested quinoa. Yes! quinoa is the key to a vegan Passover. It is a protein from the Andes that acts like a grain! Peter made the quinoa with caramelized onions and it was delicious. Deciding that beans were okay for the sake of protein and ease of entertaining vegan guests, I made a great edamame dip, roasted tomatoes with roasted garlic and white beans, spiced roasted cauliflower, and salad. (Yes, I know that I usually don't give such detail for dinner, but it was a creative feast).

Here's Katie playing with the paints they brought her as a birthday presents. We had such a nice time. I'm really starting to feel that it is when I entertain that my house feels most like a home - and the kind of big open home we've always wanted. I wish I liked doing dishes more.

Still infatuated

The next morning after the Mavs game, Katie wanted to wear her Dirk jersey again. Here she is eating matzah for breakfast. And on the table are the flowers my parents sent her for her birthday. Yes, I said my parents, but we know it's really Teddy Bear Dipa. She loved them! How many 4-year-olds get their own flowers delivered?

The Mavs!

Peter would be better writing this post, but he's yet to make a guest appearance on Urban Meadow.

Here's Katie's 2nd Mavs game of the week. It also happens to be the second Mavs game of her life. Papa got seats in a box to the game and asked if we wanted to go. With extra seats, even I went. It was my first Mavs game too. Okay, not surprisingly, I'm not a big sports fan. I find it kind of boring. I tried to like both football and opera is high school with no success (opera did make me want to learn Italian though). I did think it was better than I expected and I can appreciate why people like it. But that's about as close as I can come at this moment to liking it.

Katie loved the game!

She thought being in the box was really neat and loved the ice maker it had when she got a boo boo. And she loved cheering with Nana. And she also liked watching the players. Nana took her to the store to buy a jersey and she almost walked away emptied handed because the blue and the green ones reminded her of the ones her friends in school had (and these friends are boys). But she liked the white one. She's now a big fan of #41 and Dirk. We left with 5 minutes to go (Mavs ahead) so we could avoid some of the traffic and it was already 10:00. She loved the game so much she didn't want to leave.

Birthday blessing

On the Friday morning closest to their birthday, TE pre-school students get their special birthday blessing. It's really just being sung Happy Birthday to in both Hebrew and English while standing under a talit. It's an honor Katie had been looking forward to it all year. There was a Passover play that morning which is why Rabbi Hayon looks like Moses.

Running on bubble wrap

We went to someone's house for a no-seder 2nd night of Passover. I really wanted to go because I wanted Katie to spend the holiday with other kids - she would have done that in NYC. It was wonderful and fun for the kids. The host said her goal was to make it fun so that when her son grows up he wants to do it for his family. So here are the kids running on long sheets of bubble wrap taped to the floor (meant to sound like hail - a plague - and it did!). What fun! They also frosted and decorated matzah.

Passover day off

Katie had the first and last day of Passover off from school. On the first day, her friend Julia came over and they had a playdate. Katie was pretty insistent that the only thing she wanted for her birthday was a table and chairs for outside. I don't know how she came up with this, but once she decided, that was it. I looked all around and most are picnic table style. I liked the idea of a table and chairs and prefered plastic so she could make a mess and it was easy to clean up.

I took her to Ikea and we picked out this table with a variety of seating arrangements. Here it is inside, but we eventually moved it outside. Katie and Julia played wonderfully and here they are being silly and eating matzah and strawberry cream cheese while Meadow patiently waits for things to fall.

Passover birthday cake

Yes - Passover birthday cake! Second time in her 4 years that her birthday has fallen on Passover, though now we're lucky and it won't happen again until 2012. I researched and researched recipes (hope this doesn't surprise anyone) and Katie specifically said she wanted a yellow cake, not chocolate. I was thinking of making Oma's sponge cake, which Debbie reminds me is actually Aunt Flory's recipe. But I felt a little intimidated. First of all, Oma used to get out the ruler to measure how high it came out - must be more than 7 inches in the tube cake pan. Second, they are difficult to frost and what's a birthday cake without frosting? My dad's birthday is right before Katie's and we used to have sponge cake with whipped cream. Peter and I don't like whipped cream so that wasn't an option. And as much as I wanted to honor Oma and carry the tradition of using her recipe to Texas, I didn't think it would be good. My sister Rachel claims she'd rather eat a sponge than a sponge cake.

So I found this recipe from a well-known Jewish baker called "I can't believe this is a Passover cake." And I made the cake. Not happy with the results, I tried again the next morning in spring form pans and using the electric mixer for the whole thing. Here are the beautiful cakes after they fell.

And here's how it looked ready for the table

And here's the interior view. Not too often that I post my culinary achievements. This cake was good! You almost forgot it was Passover. Daiyenu!

Birthday Seder

Katie had the seat of honor next to Papa at the seder. I had gone with a friend to pick up stuff to represent the plagues and Katie had the best time putting stickers on people for boils and playing with all the plastic stuff I bought at US Toy. Yes, my mother-in-law's table, so beautifully decorated for the seder with her china, crystal, and silver and new seder plate was then decorated with the best only the finest plastic bugs, sun glasses, frogs, etc. All of the adults played along which was really nice.

Another wonderful thing for Katie was that Ann & Alan's friends all made a big deal about it being her birthday. Nana bought her balloons and the friends bought her presents. It was also Paul's birthday so I baked a cake for both of them.

Favorites - Age 4

Here's Katie in Aunt Lesley's room looking for the Afikomen.

Katie's Favorite Things at Age 4 (as described by her)

Food - Chicken with mango and miso cod
Ice cream - strawberry
Milkshake - chocolate or strawberry
Song from school - boker tov and bang, bang, bang (obviously this comes from Passover)
Song from home - I Wanna Be Elated (by the Sippy Cups)
After-school activity - ballet
Color - pink
Restaurant (in Dallas) - Purple Cow and the Mercury
Restaurant (in NY) - Gennaro
Book - What Do People Do All Day, by Richard Scarry
Clothes - dress, specifically this one.
Stuffed animal - Sister Puppy

"Baby with no name'

We were creative this, our first year without Katie's Aunts at her birthday. We opened presents while we were on the phone with them! Aunt Lesley sent Katie this doll that has its own carrier/chair/carseat thing. Katie loves it. She won't name her though, she just calls her "the baby with no name." She's playing with it a lot.

Unfortunately I don't have a picture of it, but Aunt Rachel sent Katie a sleeping bag. She's having a lot of fun with it. Katie has forever played the nap game, she loves to pretend to take naps. A sleeping bag is perfect for this. It's currently on the floor in the "other room" with her animals stuffed inside so they can take a nap.

Happy Birthday Katie!!!

Somehow my baby turned 4! Kind of unbelievable.

Katie has been looking forward to turning 4, especially because all of her classmates are 4 already "and I felt leftout," she explained. She began the day by announcing "I'm 4! I'm 4! I'm 4 today!" And continued her morning with a pink frosted rainbow chip cupcake for breakfast.

Because her birthday fell on the day of the first seder (i.e. beginning of Passover), Katie had the special honor of having her birthday cupcakes outside at school. They didn't want the crumbs in the classroom. It was a beautiful day and the class went out to "Gan Tefillah" and outdoor gathering area that reminds me of summer camp (and I think that was the idea in its creation).

3s Seder

Wow, how great to be able to blog about something that just happened in the past week! So glad I'm caught up. The joke is that I wasn't a kid who kept a diary or a travel journal or anything like that. Getting behind means more reporting and fewer stories and Katie-isms. Katie asked me today why I always take pictures. I could only say "So I can document your life." The blog has a number of other unintended positives. It's become of a record for us - we can go back and check what Katie's favorite words were and when she got attached to her puppies.

So here is Katie at the 3s cluster seder. She's sitting between her friends Noah and Hanna. It was a cute seder and the kids enjoyed it - complete with matzoh ball soup. No gefilte fish though.

First swim of the season!

Katie and Meadow went swimming on April 4th - the first swim of the season. It was a beautiful warm day, but the pool was cold, as my wonderful husband reported from the water. No, I did not join the 3 of them!

More fun in home ownership...

More fun in home ownership... We had to have the pool mostly drained due to this terrible algae problem Steve, the loyal pool guy, couldn't fix over the past few months. He said the pool had been neglected and it doesn't really surprise us because we feel like the house had been mostly neglected. But then I think that most home owners feel that way about the previous owners. All we know about them is that they were from the UK and only lived here for 3 years so we figure they didn't want to do much in their short time in the house. The pool looked kind of funny so I had to take a picture. And yes, it took 2 days to fill.

Bonus fish kisses

Because we spent a bonus night in NJ (due to weather), Katie got an extra playdate with Robin and some extra fish kisses from Aunt Rachel. Had to share.

An evening with Oma

Seeing Oma really was the reason for our visit so Katie and I went each day to see her. Turns out that our plane was cancelled on Sunday night so we stayed until Monday morning. More time for family visits - though I would have liked to spend more time with my friends too - another time!

Katie danced again for Oma, this time in her room so there wasn't as much room to dance around. Katie actually took this picture, which I thought was really good for her. It was actually the first time I think that I had visited Oma with my dad and not my mom. Katie even played with Dipa a little bit.

A quick visit with Ania

Our visits with Ania are limited with her proposed return to Poland so seeing her, even for an hour or 2, has become a priority on our trips. I asked Katie where she wanted to go with Ania on Sunday morning and she said that she wanted to dig for dinosaur bones. Ania was happy to comply and we went to the Natural History Museum. Here they are digging in the discovery room. Katie talked about this for quite a long time.

Family bonding continued

After the diner, we went back to Debbie's house to hang out. I really wanted Katie to have a chance to play with Robin and I figured that she could best do that at Robin's house with Robin's toys. They had a great time, of course. We all hung out and enjoyed each other's company and even had an early birthday cake for Dipa and Katie. I feel like it's rare for my family to hang out with each other when it's a not a holiday - it's almost as if my moving has allowed us to do that. But then it makes me sad to think no one is ever going to do this at my home, but the truth is no one did it when I lived in the city either.

Katie, by the way, is now officially taller than Robin. Robin is more leg and Katie is more torso, so they are built differently. It only took 4 years for this to happen and given the height of their respective parents, I doubt that this will change.

Katie and Robin put on a puppet show.

Cousin Andrew

After seeing Oma, we went to a diner to have a late lunch with cousin Andrew. Andrew is Katie's age and lives in Vermont with his grandmother. He's a cute kid and it was fun to see him because we hadn't seen him since he was 1 1/2. It was nice that the stars aligned so we could see him since we now live so far apart. And he and his grandma and Papa were on their way to visit Oma. It was a full family meal too - Debbie and her kids, Rachel and my parents.