The Things Kids Notice

My grandmother on my Dad's side passed away last month.  Blair and I were actually at the airport on our way home from England when it happened. Yaya (Greek for "grandmother") was 80 and had been suffering extremely poor health for years, so it was a blessing when she was released.  But Yaya had lived the last twenty some years with my aunt and uncle, most recently at their condo in downtown Chicago.

This past weekend my sister and her husband took their son Jake, who will be 3 in October, to my aunt's house for a visit. Jake walked in the front door and ambled through the kitchen to the living room. He stopped in front of the chair where Yaya always sat. "Where is she?" he asked, pointing to the chair.

My sister was dumbfounded. It just hadn't occurred to her that he'd remember or notice Yaya wasn't there.

Since I'm rarely around kids, I'm always amazed at what they pick up on. One of my favorite stories about my niece Katlin is when she was right around Jake's age, 2 or 3, and we were visiting Blair's parents for Christmas. Katlin picked up a glass and I said, "No honey, put that down. That breaks very easily." And Katlin looked at me and said, "Fragile?"

Uh--yeah. But how did she know that?? Turns out her aunt and grandmother had been telling her that a lot of the glass ornaments on the tree were "fragile." And she remembered.

Visiting Trisha this weekend, her 8-year-old son Max introduced me to one of his friends. "This is my Aunt Dena. She lives in North Carolina." The friend, also 8, turned to me and said, "Wow. That must be really nice for you."

It was such an adult thing to say I almost expected him to follow up with a polite inquiry along the lines of, "So what are the property taxes like out there?" 

Katlin (now 11) comes to visit this weekend and thanks to my wonderful blog readers, I have a myriad of suggestions with which to entertain her. I'm looking forward to spending time with her. I had much fun hanging out with Max this weekend.  (Oh!  One last cute comment. I asked Max what he wanted to be when he grew up. "Ninja," he replied, not even looking up from his video game. I looked at Trisha. "Yeah, we've got no backup plan for that one," she said.)

Check me out, all hanging out with kids. I'll probably need a pitcher of martinis come Monday but at least I'm going into it with a positive attitude!

Everyone have a great day!

I'm Back!

Back from lovely Cincinnati, Ohio and 4 days spent with my best friend Trisha. We had great fun (other than the fact that we spent yesterday at the pool with her son and my skin is so fried my clothes are sticking to me). 

Friday we drove to our alma mater, Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. (My favorite T-shirt: "Miami was a University when Florida still belonged to Spain.") The campus itself doesn't change. Beautiful brick buildings, slant walk, the Upton Arch where it's said you will marry whomever you kiss under the light there. 

Uptown had changed quite a bit, with several of our favorite pubs no longer there. (A moment of revered silence, please, for Hole In The Wall and Attractions.) But enough was still the same that we felt not too far removed from our time there.

We visited our old dorm, McFarland, on South quad which is where Trisha and I met our sophomore year. Being summer, the dorms were locked. But I spied an open window at basement level and was all ready to climb through and open the door for Trisha.  Saving me from breaking and entering, however, was a staff woman who exited the dorm and agreed to wait the 5 minutes it took for us to race upstairs and visit our old rooms and the hallway where so much of life took place sophomore year.  We also ran into the bathroom and screeched at the community showers where we used to bath and which haven't changed a whit in the 15 years since we left them. (Communal showering...sounds bizarre now, doesn't it?)We visited the apartments we lived in junior and senior year then headed to Skippers for beer and the best fries in town.

We packed a lot into one weekend. More shopping then two women need ever do, LOTS of eating, no exercise, one pool party, one fine meal out, bowling with Max, having friends over, walking her ENORMOUS and perpetually shedding 70-lb Huskie (Bear), 3 Starbucks visits, 2 grocery store runs, 1 video rental, and other miscellaneous moments.  

As with any vacation, it seems like you lost double the number of days you were gone when you return. So I'm off to go through a stack of mail, miles of e-mails, and try to reorient myself to this whole "work" thing again.

Happy Monday.  

Inner Fortitude

Although I'm enjoying my running time, I don't think I'd be able to train for this 1/2 marathon in December on my own. I feel immense gratitude toward my two running partners for keeping me going. Knowing someone will be waiting outside my door at 5:30 AM, expecting me to be ready to run, is a great motivator.

But my running buddies are off to the beach next week, so it's all on me.  I cannot slam the alarm off and roll over and go back to sleep, no matter how much I want to. I need to keep the momentum going.

We're running 45 minutes to an hour 3-4x/week.  We're slow, probably averaging just over a 10-minute mile, but hey, we're doing it. I have immense respect for my neighbor who is 20 years older than me and keeping pace. Her husband (our fearless leader) is almost 60 but he's been running most of his life. M. is new to it and I think she does a phenomenal job.

I'm off this weekend to visit my best friend in Cincinnati. We met when we were sophomores in college and have been pretty much bonded at the hip ever since. We alternate visiting one another and this year is my turn. I've packed running gear, including I-Pod and stopwatch, and hold out great hope of running at least once if not twice over the weekend.  Trisha is the one who started me running in college. Unfortunately, she's almost blown out both her knees and isn't supposed to run anymore. Not that that stops her, but she's not supposed to.

I expect to sit down at Trisha's computer and do a bit of blogging over the weekend, but in case I don't, everyone have a fun and safe weekend.

Activity Ideas for a Pre-Teen?

At the end of this month our 11-year old niece Katlin is going to come up and spend the weekend with us and you all must help me. I want it to be one of those fun, magical, "Aunt Dena and Uncle Blair are the coolest people on the planet"  weekends. But I'm drawing a blank.

On our side is that this isn't one of those forced activities.  She wants  to come for the weekend.My sister-in-law shared with us that Katlin told her that if anything ever happened to them (meaning my sister-in-law and her husband, Katlin's parents), she wanted to live with Uncle Blair and Aunt Dena.  How precious is that, I ask you?

But what to do with a pre-teen in 100 degree North Carolina heat? If the river is up, we're thinking maybe a 3-hour kayacking trip. Also, Katlin has been to England several times and inherited her grandmother's teapot collection and is big into afternoon teas. She has a little recipe book for things like cucumber sandwiches, scones, and other snacks that go with tea so we thought we might spend some time in the kitchen. (I know, I know. I'll be careful. And hopefully Blair will be there to supervise in case we need to use the stove.)

But if anyone has any other ideas, send them on. I'd prefer it be a weekend spent bonding vs. watching movies or TV. I'm trying to remember what I liked to do when I was eleven. Play with  make-up? Ride bikes.  I also had my cousins around to play with and we did a lot of neighborhood activities. 

I caught the tail end of a report on NPR that said directors of national parks and other outdoor places are worried. It used to be American kids growing up spent the majority of their time outside either playing or working. But in the last several decades there's been a severe reversal and people--kids especially--don't go outside like they used to. This is translating into less people wanting to spend time camping, going to national parks or participating in any kind of touristy outdoor activities.  I hadn't thought about it in those terms, but that makes sense. As kids, our parents sent us outside in the summer with instructions to come home when the street lights came on. No way I'd do that with a child nowadays.

Sorry, got sidetracked. To sum up, please share any ideas you have for aunt-uncle-neice bonding time. Thanks!