the Tucson Gardners | updates on our life together

This Moment

2012-02-10T21:29:00.001-07:00

Painting Dada's Birthday gift

A Short Work Story

2012-02-04T23:09:00.003-07:00

As I was buttoning one of my students pants the other day, I noticed they were wet by the waistband. So I asked, "Patrick, why are your pants wet?" The answer I received: "my penis was out of control!" while he gestured with his finger like a loose, one might even say out of control, fire hose.

I love 5-year-olds.

This Moment

2012-02-03T20:46:00.001-07:00

Go Dada. Max catch.

This Moment

2012-01-27T20:27:00.000-07:00

This Moment (a day late)

2012-01-21T21:17:00.000-07:00

This Moment

2012-01-13T21:16:00.000-07:00

Max put his jacket on all by himself!

This Moment (a day late)

2012-01-07T21:38:00.000-07:00

Painting on the Kitchen Floor

2012-01-07T20:44:00.004-07:00

I had the day off on Monday, and I was bored out of my mind. I was so tired of playing choo choo with Max. The thought of making Googoo walk around the room one more time, made me want to poke myself in the eye. And it was too windy to go outside. So we got out the paints.

We had recently got a large package from Amazon, and they stuffed it full of packing paper. So I laid the paper across the kitchen floor, undressed the kiddo, and opened up the paints.

Max doesn't seem to get finger painting. He doesn't really enjoy it either. So, I gave him a paint brush and threw in some crayons in case he wanted to use a different medium. He decided to paint with the crayons, which was interesting. Haha.

He had a great time painting that huge paper (and a little of my floor). But as soon as I said "don't worry if you get messy, you can take a bath when you're done" that was the end of painting. "Bath? Bath you say, let's go! All done! Bath!"

My son is a daredevil

2011-12-31T20:42:00.001-07:00

This Moment

2011-12-30T21:09:00.000-07:00

Christmas 2011

2011-12-28T21:02:00.002-07:00

I'm going to keep this short, but we had a pretty nice Christmas. Max was thrilled with all of his gifts, and if I could get my phone to cooperate, I would upload a video of him on Christmas morning, seeing all his presents. But I can't, so just imagine an excited little guy.

We spent the morning at our place and the afternoon at my mom's, where all the family that was

in town gathered. It was a nice, relaxing day.

Creative Gifts from a Student

2011-12-26T20:06:00.004-07:00

I received some great gifts this year from my students and their families, as always. One of my favorite surprises was a goody bag full of these homemade gifts:

The tree is made out of paint color samples! Reduce, reuse, recycle! You know I gotta love that!

Some Guatemalan worry dolls, with a kid-decorated box.

And this oh-so-simple bookmark, will definitely come in use, and I won't feel bad when I misplace it- because I will misplace it. I'm amazed at how many bookmarks I go through.

There was also a picture frame, magnets, and some sticky notes. I go through sticky notes like no other, and I need new magnets to hang up the kids' art, so really, these were very useful gifts for me! I love the thought behind them!

2011 Christmas Cards

2011-12-20T21:21:00.003-07:00

I decided to make our Christmas cards this year, because I have soooooooooooo much extra time on my hands, apparently. But I was very happy with the results:

Happy holidays to all!

This Moment

2011-12-16T20:37:00.000-07:00

This Moment

2011-12-09T07:26:00.000-07:00

Review of the Bodyology Exhibit

2011-12-04T20:56:00.005-07:00

Last weekend Max and I went to the new Bodyology exhibit at the Children's Museum Tucson, and we were not disappointed.

Our first stop was the Vegetable Garden, where Max got to harvest veggies like cucumbers and carrots. He enjoyed sticking the veggies in the slots, but it didn't hold his attention for long.

The Juice Bar, however, was calling Max's name. This little mini kitchen was decked out with sinks, refrigerators, and blenders. Max loved loading up the blenders with all the fruit, then pushing the button to turn the blender on. Then he'd pour the "smoothie" into a cup and drink up! It was so neat to watch the imaginary play.

The check out in the Market is not a new attraction, but it's updated and looks very nice. It would have been nice if they could have added a noise element to it, like a "beep" when a grocery item was scanned, or a pretend little handheld scanner. I know Max would definitely play with that. They also need little baskets for shopping, not just carts. The rest of the market is very nice looking, and has the feel of an open air market, not some big chain grocery store.

The big news of Bodyology, I would say, are the over-sized body parts hanging on the wall. Obviously, in this picture, Max is interacting with the mouth, but there is also an ear, nose (complete with boogers! yuck!), eye, heart, and lung. All very cool.

I didn't get any good pictures of the Orchard, but my favorite part was that the fruit is magnetized and hangs from the trees so the kids can pick it! Max's favorite part was the tree house; he liked climbing up into it and looking out the windows. Anything with stairs and Max is set.

Again, when we went, it was $2 admission day so it was crazy busy. We didn't spend as much time as I would have liked in Bodyology, but we'll definitely be back to play again!

This Moment

2011-12-02T20:47:00.002-07:00

I like Max's hand placement in this photo, so I had to include it too.

This Moment (or This Week)

2011-11-25T20:54:00.004-07:00

This week's This Moment, will be a little looksy into our busy week.

Last Saturday was Steph's BBQ at the park.

Thursday was obviously Thanksgiving, and we started a new family tradition of playing football in the morning.

Later in the day we enjoyed a delicioso Thanksgiving feast at my mom's.

And today we had fun at the Children's Museum.

And we still have two more days left in the weekend! Hooray! Gotta love holiday weekends!

The Arch of that Eyebrow!

2011-11-23T20:19:00.004-07:00

Look at this face.

I mean, geez, kid. What I do?? Because with a look like that, surely I must have seriously wronged you. It wasn't my choice to put the gloves on with that shirt. That was all you buddy. All you...

Max's New Friend

2011-11-18T20:10:00.003-07:00

Max has a new best friend.

His name is Googoo (or Goofy, to you non kid-speakers).

Max takes him everywhere lately.

I'm not too eager for Max to have an item he's attached too. So far, we have had no special blankets or loveys, nothing that we can't do without. But it's just so darn cute when he searches around for his Googoo, when he kisses Googoo on the nose, when he takes Googoo's hand and makes him turn off the light. It's nice he has a buddy.

New loves: football and dancing

2011-11-16T20:00:00.003-07:00

Max has really gotten into playing football with Dada. "Hike!"

He throws the ball, runs for a touch down, and even cheers after a good play.

Max has also gotten into dancing with his Dada (while he does both of these with me, he thinks it's so much funnier when Dada does them). He plays the banjo music off his activity table, grabs Jeffry and then they dance and dance and dance.

In this clip, Max mixes his two new loves. He's also added a ridiculous little kick.

This Moment

2011-11-11T21:16:00.001-07:00

Ruining photos

2011-11-08T21:05:00.002-07:00

Dada's Helper

2011-11-07T20:17:00.004-07:00

Mama may not have been watching the boy for all of 5 seconds, and in that short time, Maxwell may have broken the baby gate. So, when Dada got home, Max had to help put it all back together.

This Moment

2011-11-04T21:25:00.000-06:00