Baby Groot

Tonight we mixed some soil and planted some seeds - the hope is that we'll see some additional plant life spring up the next few days to accompany Baby Groot here.  Madison was carefully measuring soil, and the depth of certain seeds, along with the amounts of water to mix with the soil.  Hopefully we'll see something start to grow soon enough.

Oh, and speaking of growing, our Bradford Pear Trees are starting to stink up the place.  The smell has even invaded the garage.  The front yard is off limits, at least without some sort of Darth Vader like breathing apparatus.  Few people realize this, but the word "Bradford" is actually translated from Greek, meaning "tree that stinks to heavens."  Legend has it that Zeus himself was angry with a local fitness instructor named Bradford.  One day, Bradford claimed that his physique was as burly as that of Zeus.  When Zeus heard about this, he was so upset, he changed Bradford into a tree that stinks to high heavens.  The moral of the story, of course, is don't plant Bradford Pear Trees in your front yard.

We had ballet tonight, more dancing on pointe.  It's so busy there with the small parking lot that isn't big enough to accommodate all the parents, and the small hallways that can't fit everyone.  We found a spot after doing a bit of grocery shopping, and picked Madison up.  She's getting more used to the shoes, which aren't making her feet as sore as they used to be.  Daddy was sitting outside the hallway, listening to the classical music and imaging the girls all doing their best to be on pointe under the careful eyes of Mrs. Dianne, who runs the entire studio.  Classes may run a little late, but that's an honor for the kids to be there with her, gleaning what they can from so much experience.

It will be a busy season for the dance team soon - here we go again.  In the meantime, this week is no slouch either.  We've got some yearbook stuff to do, plus the start of a science project, and some other things to keep us going.  Madison has her Live to Give after school class tomorrow, and on Wednesday she has her last art enrichment class after school.  There are a few other things like Science night, but we just can't make it to that and piano tomorrow.

Anyway, lots to do.  Madison was studying new vocabulary words after school, playing piano, and eating pizza.  Also, we were doing a bit of "Epic Mickey 2," which can be more of a labor at times.  Still, we're persistent, and getting closer to the end of the game.  We have no idea what half the characters are saying though:  something about projectors and gremlins and so on.  We're like, uh... okay, sure.

Daddy's written three messages based on the Incredibles so far, including the latest on Elastigirl today.  She's the best character in the movie, if you want to stop and analyze things.  But hopefully we have a pretty decent message related to her.  Three down, five messages to go.

We had this wonderful skillet breakfast this morning - Mommy has been using a skillet quite a bit lately, and the results have been magnificent.  It was a nice, relaxing day for Mommy and Daddy, who spent quite a bit of time changing lightbulbs, vacuuming, doing laundry, and researching about water beds.  Oh yes, there's that.  We're almost there with the bed thing, and then we can go back into our bedroom again.

Tonight, in Madison's bedroom, we read another few chapters of "The Thirteenth Pearl."  We're really  close to finishing that one up, and we have a few choices of other books to read following that.  We read from the devotional, said our prayers, and yeah, we all were asleep pretty quickly following that.  Still catching up from this weekend!