My favorite age... 6

I know I just posted, but I had to join (a day late) the writers workshop over at Mama's losin it. The prompt I chose was if you could go back in time, what age would you pick (or something like that).

I picked age 6, kindergarten. Maybe it's cause I have a kindergartener in the house, and she's so cute with her first tooth missing.

Maybe it's cause it was an age for me when I still didn't care about what other kids thought about me. You know, when you're just zen all the time, running around with bed head, mismatched clothes, and food on your face, AND YOU COULD CARE LESS! (Note delirious happy look on my face, DESPITE the fact that my mom chopped up my bangs royally!)

For the most part, you were also too young to help around the house, hence, NO CHORES! How cool is that! No dishes, no dusting, and definately no vacuuming! Just playing playing, playing.

My favorite toys in kindergarten were Fisher Price Little People. I had the house, the school, and the Happy Houseboat, for the bathtub. My friend Lyra had the house too, so together, we had quite a stash. Good times, pretend playing with those little wood bodied people.

Little did I know until Ebay came along, about all the other LP stuff out there that I never had. Wow!

As a kid, I didn't go to the store all the time like consumer savvy kids of today. We got what we got for Christmas, and birthday, and THAT WAS IT! That's all we knew existed out there in the big world of toys.

My daughter, before she could even read, could look through the BIG TOY BOOK, and knew ALL the names of ALL the toys coming out every holiday season, dead on! (Yes, she probably watches too much TV!)

School was easy back then too, unlike today. Kindergarten consisted of crafts, snacks, nap, and recess. Oh, and singing in circle time.

Now? My daughter has no nap, no snack, and has to read and write CORRECTLY, mind you!

She has art occassionally, but it's mostly academic. Thankfully, my admittedly slacker daughter has picked up reading quickly, and is above level, for now.

So that's it. May I go back to be a 6 year old kindergartener, carefree and cute.

Snow Day!

My daughter's principal called us this morning to say that school was cancelled for today! Talk about personal service! Actually, she is an afternoon "Kindie", so they wanted to make sure we didn't show up at 12 and have to drive back home. We're forecasted to get anywhere from 10-16 inches by tomorrow morning. Yikes!

I'm excited to have a snow day with my daughter, and just watch movies, eat snacks, and cuddle.

Here in Colorado, we have had a dismal, dry winter, which in turn leads to wildfire problems around the state, not to mention watering restrictions for our lawns. The city I live in has had water restrictions for years, and so we never have that beautiful, green lawn that I long for. We worked so hard last year especially, on our backyard, to get all the grass to grow consistantly across the yard. We sodded some really sad, bare areas, and reseeded some thin areas. We cheated (don't tell!) on our watering days, and watered longer, to keep the sod from dying.

Who knew you had to water 2+ hours a day for several weeks, in order to get sod to take root? Umm, not us! We killed several batches the 2 summers before, from minimally watering, not realizing how much it really needed! We finally figured it out this last summer, and got it to take root.

Looking at it as things start to warm up, and knowing we've had literally had NO moisture this winter, I can see alot of the sodded area has only bare dirt, and no grass anywhere! So frustrating! Looks like we'll probably have to seed or sod again this spring


On a lighter note, I did the Spice up your life Sunday challenge, and went to the library to pick a book I normally wouldn't read. I actually picked two! Here's what I came up with:

The first book, Babylon's Ark, is an true story about the experience of rescuing the animals of the Baghdad Zoo during the War. It took the efforts of conservationists, soldiers, and civilians, to put aside their differences to save these animals. Not a book I would normally pick, but I think I'll like it.

The second book is the Official guide to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Again, I wouldn't have sought out this book to read, but I thought hmmm, I'll learn something cool if I pick this one.

Picking out something different than I normally would was much tougher than I though it would be! I kept passing stuff by, thinking, Eh, I don't like that one, or No, that looks boring. But then I said, Hey, that's the point of this whole exercise, Susan! To pick something you normally wouldn't!

Have you picked your books yet? If not, get out there and do it, you might be pleasantly surprised!

Me? I'll be reading and snuggling, watching the fluffy snow come down, knowing I'm safe inside.

Have a great day, whatever the weather, and whatever your book! Happy reading!