Sun Halo

For over a week now winter has been forcing it's presence upon the U.S.  It seems no one is immune to the arctic plunge that has dropped temperatures to record lows all across the continent.  Being in Minnesota, you would think the cold is something we are used to.  True, your body adjusts to anything, even cold temperatures.  But I'm not sure it adjusts to living in arctic conditions.  It seems the arctic circle has decided to make Minnesota it's new home for a while.  The high this past Saturday was -1.  It was -11 when I got up and had to leave the house.  Yesterday, because of the wind, it felt like -23.  10 degrees feels quite warm by comparison, it's all relative.

But the point to this story is not the cold, but the beauty that can be seen amidst it.  Everyday for over a week now that we've been in sub zero temperatures I have noticed a rainbow around the sun for 4 hours each day.  It makes my heart so incredibly happy I cannot even describe it.  I prefer to call it my Rainbow Parentheses.  It's just beautiful!  I know there is a scientific explanation for it (they call it the Sun Halo) but I prefer to think of it as my own special gift from God making each day more bearable and happy.  Honestly, I don't mind the cold as long as I have my sun.  I need the sun.  Now, not only do I get to see the beautiful sun each, bitterly cold day, I also get the added bonus of rainbow parentheses...how can that not make anyone giddy?!  The arctic is no match for me and my 3 layers of pants, shirts, socks with heated warmers stuck to the bottom, snow boots, hat, scarf, mittens with heated warmers and down jacket with hood....because I have a sun halo to keep my heart warm and a smile on my chapped face.  Life doesn't get much better.

A Weak Mind

After a very, very long work day this weekend, I was greeted at home with lots of hugs and kisses by my brood.  I was soon to find out that I was the perfect test subject for the latest middle school humor.

I was mentally exhausted.  I had nothing left.  I was just happy to be home and see everyone before bed. They were all extra giddy for some reason.  Bennett informs me, "Mom, your socks are untied."  I look down at my stocking feet 2 seconds too early.  It doesn't click right away that socks don't have ties, therefore, can't untie. He was preying on a weak subject.

You would think I would be extra cautious with anything else that spewed forth from his mouth.  So when he told me, "Mom, did you know that if you say 'gullible' real slow it sounds like 'orange'?" you would think I would know he was up to something.  But being me, I fell for it like gullible fool I am.

I immediately start sounding out 'gullible' in the longest, most drawn-out fashion I could muster because I wanted to see if it indeed sounded like 'orange'.  "Gulllllll....iiiiiiiiii....bbbbbbbblllllllllle. "  I didn't even make it to the 'i' in my slow speaking voice before everyone was laughing hysterically and pointing at me.  But I pushed through, still unsure as to why they would be laughing so hard.  Was there a joke in there somewhere I wondered?  After I said the word as slow and as stupid as possible (you can't have one without the other), I realized, ah yes, there is a joke and it is on me.  Gullible will never sound like orange, only a gullible person would try that.  Duh.  

I am definitely not a jedi.  I am one of the weak minds that the jedi's use their superior powers of mind control on.  Apparently, Bennett is a jedi, as are all the 6th graders in his class where this joke is having a hay-day.

Our First Christmas

Do these look like blissful newlyweds or what?!  This was our first Christmas together 18 years ago. Believe it or not, it actually got cold enough in Dallas to wear jackets, gloves and blue furry ear muffs. It was also in the age before digital cameras.  We had to wait a whole week to find out what all those photos looked like stuck inside our camera.  We had no way of knowing if they would turn out blurry, or if we would have weird expressions or enough lighting until we actually had the photo in hand.   But we still managed to have fun and have visual reminders of good times.

This particular evening we were at a very special event.  The ritzy, upscale area in Dallas known as Highland Park Village always had special horse drawn carriage rides during the Christmas season. They were rather expensive, but this was our first Christmas, we both had jobs, we figured we could splurge.

The carriage takes you through the mansion lined streets of old Highland Park where you see the gorgeous houses decorated to the hilt.  It was everything you could think a romantic evening would be. But we didn't end up going by ourselves, we went with my parents.  We thought we'd enjoy the evening together and maybe grab some tea or hot chocolate at La Madeline, our favorite little French cafe, after our special horse drawn carriage ride.

Oh how quickly things deteriorate.

Yes.  We did end up riding one of these beautiful carriages.  We waited in line for what seemed forever (probably only an hour) in the freezing cold (for Dallas, it must have been at least 50 degrees) until it was finally our turn.  Unfortunately, two other people were already in the carriage that was supposed to be ours.  These carts are made to carry two people on either side, facing one another.  How were we all going to fit when there were already two strangers in our cart?

Apparently we didn't feel the need to wait for the next carriage.  Maybe the cold had frozen our sensibilities but we were all getting on that cart do or die.  It was like the last helicopter out of VietNam and there was no way it was leaving without all of us on it.

So let's just throw 'Romantic Evening' out the window.  This is how it all went down:  No one really knows who was directing this show, was it the carriage driver?  was it my parents?  was it the other two people in the cart?  One thing is for sure, Chuck and I were the pawns and just went where we were told.  That meant that I was sitting in the middle, between both of my parents staring at the two people in the seat opposite us while Chuck was sitting on the bench seat next to the driver.  Yep.  I got to look at the back of his head the whole, romantic, horse drawn carriage ride.  Not only did he get to sit up high, he also got the special job of flipping the tape so we could have continuous Christmas music playing.  

Technology plays a big part in this little story, doesn't it?  Again, these were the days before ipods or even cell phones that could play music.  If we wanted music that could travel we either had to bring a tape deck that had enough batteries in it to last or a walkman.  But walkmans only worked with headphones (think ones with spongy ear pieces), so that was out of the question.  So Chuck is freezing his butt off with no blanket to wrap around him on this windy, chilly night as he has to play meticulous attention to the tape deck so he can manually take out the tape and flip it over and press the 'play' button again so we can all enjoy the beautiful Christmas music while sitting snuggly together wrapped in warm blankets enjoying the view from our cozy carriage.

Ahhh....the memories. Life doesn't always work out how you plan....and that's the beauty of it.  Who knew this would be the beginning of a lifetime of Mallott Family Adventures that always ended up other than we planned.  One thing's for sure....we know how to laugh - at ourselves and situations out of our control.  Who wants a bunch of boring old memories where everything goes the way it's supposed to...where's the fun it that?

Associations

Last night at dinner Gavin was telling us about an activity in one of his classes.  He started a new trimester yesterday and in order for the teacher and students to better remember one another's names, the teacher had them all say their name and an animal that started with the same letter.  Before they could say their own name, they would have to repeat the names/animals of the people before them. Gavin was thrilled that his was number 5 to go.  I asked him what animal he picked and he said, "Goshawk".  He said that caused quite a stir since it wasn't your typical, gorilla or gator.  He likes to be different.  He likes to stump people and keep them guessing.  However, he later conceded, "Had I given it just a little bit more thought, I would have chosen 'gnat'."  Another typical Gavin move.  He likes to make fun of the English language and that technically starts with 'g' which is all that matters to Gavin.

Of course the rest of us didn't want to be left out of this oh-so-exciting-name-game.  So we went around the table introducing ourselves and our animals.  Daddy wasn't there so we got to pick for him.  Chloe just couldn't commit, she had to pick the perfect 'c' animal.  So she got plenty of help from the peanut gallery.  She ended up going with Chloe the Cobra.  I was Cori the Cougar.  Then there was Bennett the Bunny, Chuck the Chipmunk and Gavin's revised animal: Gavin the Gnat.

This little exercise reminded me of a similar activity by one of my college professors.  It was the same concept, a way to get other's to remember your name, instead she asked us to attach a character quality we felt best represented us to our name.  Better yet, in our version of this name-game, we get to attach a character quality to our animal as well as ourselves.   Bonus!  This is how we would prefer you remember us:

Chuck the Cheery Chipmunk

Cori the Courteous Cougar

Gavin the Genius Gnat

Bennett the Bouncy Bunny

Chloe the Curious Cobra

We had loads of stories going about each of our alter egos.  It reminded me of by-gone days when we were superheroes at the dinner table (all day long for that matter).  The stories wound deeper and deeper. We acted them out.  It was the perfect dinner drama.

This is what happens when the children and I are left alone.

Love On A Sticky Note

The other night before bed Bennett was excitedly writing down a poem.  We never see him hunched over his desk at this time of night, so this must have been truly inspired.  In only the way that he can, he comes inching into my room, a goofy smile plastered on his face, light in his eyes and a sticky note in hand. It's not good enough to just leave the sticky note for me to read, he has to read it to me:

And then I have to respond cuz that's what he's standing there waiting for.  But I can't get past the "Yo Mujer Padre" title.  He's dangerous now, knowing only bits and pieces of Spanish from his Duolingo exercises.  I love how he piece meals it together.  He means to say, "My Woman Parent" since I guess he can't remember the Spanish word Mama.  But it reads as, "I Woman Father".  Of course I get the giggles.  It is the sweetest gesture.  He lives to fill up my love tank, even if it means calling me his 'woman parent'. 

Sleeping Well

This morning Chloe woke up and said, "Mom, I R.I.P'd last night."

Huh???

"You know, I rested in peace."

"Honey, do you know they reserve that phrase mostly for the dead?"

"Well, I really did rest in peace, there's no other way to say it."

"Well then, I'm happy for you."

RIP everyone, RIP tonight.

The Latest Greatest

This, my friends, is what it's all about.  Duolingo.  We do this night and day.  We do it all in the same room.  We do it on our phones.  We do it on our ipads.  We do it on our computers.  We are crazy for duolingo!

It is a new language learning software that Chuck found and brainwashed all of us on.  Being that he used to work for Rosetta Stone, another language learning software company, he knows a thing or two about what makes a good language learning ap.  The coolest thing about this program is that it is completely free and so much better than Rosetta Stone.  I find it much easier.  The lessons are concise, the explanations good and the teaching method is sound.

We now have 2 Spanish speakers, 2 French speakers and 1 German speaker in this house.  Not that any of us are fluent in anything, but we sure are having fun learning our languages together.  Seriously, we never make the kids do it - they can't wait to do their daily lessons!  I love it because I don't feel like a fool. I gave up learning French on Rosetta Stone when I realized I sucked so bad.  I thought I was just bad at languages.  I just didn't "get it".  Ahh...but now I do.  It's always the teacher, isn't it?!

It's fun to all be learning together as well.  It's good for Chuck and I so we can keep our brain sharp as we age. It's good for the kids so they can learn to become less ethnocentric and understand other cultures better.  Nothing but good comes from knowing other languages.

Sunset

a sphere of fire

placed in the sky

at just the right angle

to catch my eye

a palate of color

with hues all aglow

on a back drop of cerulean

it’s just one of a million

my heart skips a beat

with the image i see

i gasp and i stare

awe is reflected there

the orange glow 

beckons from afar

i’m drawn to behold

the image so bold

i stare in wonder

my heart all aflutter

the smile on my face

held by my gaze

at the gift in the sky
love spoken with no words

the Creator gives to me
this portrait of beauty

i stand amazed

i feel so small

encompassed by love

beneath a fireball

Manners

At dinner tonight (my famous last words)....

Bennett was choosing to not eat with manners that have been indoctrinated in him since the beginning of his life.  The lesson on manners is an old, beat-up, worn-out record.  I'm not even sure if it's in English anymore because it seems to go in one ear of each of our off-spring and directly out the other.  I could have just said, "Please do not use your arm as a lever, rather bring your fork up to your mouth" and with-in the next nano-second, one of the three of our children will have done just that.  Like I was asking them to do it - not refrain from it.

For the love!

So tonight, with great exasperation, and in all sincerity I look at Bennett and seriously proclaim: "I refuse to allow you to succumb to barbaric mannerisms!"

I surprised even myself.  I had no idea that combination of words could come out in a sentence string of that nature. Words typically stumble out of my mouth and rarely reach their intended purpose. I sat smugly in my seat.  That is, until Bennett almost fell out of his chair laughing at me. Literally. He just couldn't help it.  My people do not normally laugh at me when I am disciplining them.  For the life of me I couldn't understand what was so funny.  All of them could hardly contain themselves.  The giggles dominated the dinner table.  Gavin asks me if by chance, I'm quoting Shakespeare.  Then it kind of dawned on me...that did sound rather funny, I guess.  My attempt to evade further sloppy manners by speaking out in exasperation only seemed to further the cause, unfortunately.

Note to self: speak their language when trying to get them to understand something!

Turning 12 on Halloween

Bennett just loves that his birthday is on Halloween - and so do I!  It's so much fun to dress up and there's always a festive atmosphere.  We had fun celebrating Bennett prior to celebrating Halloween. The funniest part was reading the cards that Chloe and Gavin made for him that listed 12 things they each liked about him - those were hilarious!  Then came the part we had waited for with much anticipation all day long - dressing up!

Bennett was Mr. USA Biker Dude in memory of all 

the bikers we met on vacation in S.D. this past summer.

Some black leather chaps, tattoos and chains would have 

made the outfit that much more believeable.

Chloe was a Japanese girl.

Gavin was a billionaire financier.  I preferred to call him Artemis Fowl

but he said nobody else would get it since they probably didn't read the books. 

Chuck was Morty.  I especially loved his one strap velcro shoes.

Too bad I didn't get a photo with his red Las Vegas hat perched deftly on the top of his head.

I was a disco queen.  White boots would have made the outfit

 that much more believeable. (btw - I don't even know any disco moves).

Somebody actually asked me if I was Madonna (but that's a good idea for next year!).

 One big happy family!

More Math Please

After reading this amazing book I decided it was time to step up the 'math confidence' in all my people. The ability to do math and do it well, interestingly enough, is one of the key indicators of good critical thinking skills in adults. (Cool tid-bit: Gavin read this book before I did and was totally absorbed in it. We had some awesome conversations about what makes for good learning/teaching.  He highly recommended the book to me, even though I was the one who originally checked it out to read first. He just beat me to it.) 

There are so many other interesting observations in this book beyond math, such as, having high standards for our children which is a good thing - not bad.  Children rise to meet your expectations. Children know when they are being 'dumbed down'.  Children know when they aren't being respected. Children need to fail in order to learn, not giving them that chance is detrimental to them.

My favorite quote in this book is:

Parents who view themselves as educational coaches tend to read to their children every day when they are small; when their children get older, they talk with them about their days and about the news around the world.  They let their children make mistakes and then get right back to work.  They teach them good habits and give them autonomy.  They are teachers, too, in other words, and they believe in rigor.  They want their children to fail while they are still children   They know that those lessons - about hard work, persistence, integrity, and consequences = will serve a child for decades to come.

Parents make all the difference!  

The kids have heard me talk about my struggles teaching adults math.  But they've also watched me bring home books to study and brush up on my skills that had a few cobwebs on them from underuse so that I could be a better teacher.  I don't want to stay stagnant.  I want to keep growing and learning, even if its things I previously learned that I forgot.  Enthusiasm for learning is contagious.  The opposite also holds true.  If I complain about math, then that gives them freedom to complain about math - I don't like that.  So from now on, math is my friend. :) 

As with all things in life, we get better when we practice.  So I started printing up extra worksheets at home for Chloe and Bennett to do everyday after school.  They never seem to have math homework and that concerns me.  They agreed that one little sheet every day would be fun.  

Gavin saw that I was handing out math worksheets like candy bars and asked why I didn't have any for him?  He was genuinely offended.  This coming from a person who has found math to be his sweet spot.  I was like, "Uh...I thought you had math homework." And he was like (cuz that's how you have to talk when you talk with teens), "Ya. But I think that would be fun.  See if you can find me some worksheets too."  And so I was like, "Sure."  Voila....algebra 2 worksheets started spewing forth from my printer.  He was a happy camper.

I've always made each of my kids blog everyday to keep up their writing skills (another thing I don't feel they do enough of in school).  But I totally ignored keeping their math confidence up.  Duh!  Proof that we only do what we think is important.  

I am off to do some applied mathematics as I cook dinner.  I have to measure the ratio between rice and water and all that stuff...I better go put on my thinking cap.

Who's Idea Was This???

Why do we carve pumpkins again?  Could somebody please remind me?  Cuz it's certainly not for the fun of it.  We don't do this every year, so I guess I forget from year to year, but this whole pumpkin carving thing is for the birds.  Even the kids were like, "why are we doing this mom?"  And I'm like, "I have no idea.  Why don't we just draw the face on it instead and be done with it."  But nooooo, that would not be in the spirit of pumpkin carving and for some reason, Chuck was dead set on carving every last one of them.  He started by cutting the top off each one and then told us to scrape out the inside.  Like it was just no big deal.  Like we scrape gooey, slimy, stringy, wet, puke-inducing stuff out of other stuff all day, every day.  This is so not the type of environment I work well in.  Neither do my kids for that matter - guess they got that one from me.  Poor Chuck had to scrape out all 5 pumpkins.  It was cold out.  But gosh-darnit, we are going to do this thing and we are going to enjoy it, because that's what you do prior to halloween, right?!

Once he finally cleared out all the pumpkins, we were free to be creative and carve our little hearts out - except for its hard to do when your hands are almost frozen stiff and your nose is running like a faucet. But...we were having 'fun'.  Come to think of it, I don't remember ever carving a pumpkin when I was a kid - maybe my parents already on to the lameness of this so-called tradition.  For whatever reason, now we all have our very own pumpkin face that now lights up.  I sure hope it was worth it.  Yay fall/halloween/harvest time.  I can think of many other ways to celebrate rather than having a pumpkin face that glows in the dark on my front porch.

Here is our fun documented in pictorial form:

Chuck removing pumpkin guts

There was lots of huffing and puffing and sighing during the carving process:

 The end result:

 Chloe wasn't very pleased with her craftsmanship.
Later we referred to it as "The Minecraft Pumpkin"

A perfect likeness

Gavin's math pumpkin: Epsilon equals infinity.  He says he's spreading

 mathematical lies but he doesn't care at this point

A no-name pumpkin with sun glasses

 The wonky eyebrow pumpkin

And of course I forgot to buy tea candles to put inside so they glow.  Let's hope I remember to get the candles before the all important night of Halloween when they must shine and show our skill to all trick or treaters!