HoodedHawk

Every once in a while both Olivia and Preston are smiling at the same time. Nice to see!

But it doesn’t always last. Olivia tends to like to “poke the Tiger”. Sometimes the Tiger pokes back, other times he’s stoic.

A couple of weekends ago Preston and I spent a nice Saturday (March 12) at the Natural History Museum, in Washington, DC. This was the first time I had been since the new “Hall of Human Origins” was opened, and we spent a good bit of time in there. Preston loved all the skeletons/skulls. And of course, he loved the dinosaur exhibits – which hadn’t changed much since last time we were there (~2 years ago). He kept going from exhibit to exhibit: “what is this one? And this one?…” until it felt like I had read every caption in the museum. But he was very happy. Naturally, we had to stop and watch every video/movie presented in the various exhibits.

I did like the Hall of Human Origins; they have a neat entrance tunnel that portrays in a repeating video-mural the evolution of Homo Sapiens from earlier hominids. And the models of the various species of hominids are very life-like. I especially liked seeing a model of Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis) as I had only previously seen (castings) of the (partial) skeleton. And I swear I’ve seen some specimens of Homo neanderthalensis walking among us; that model was particularly enlightening. Pictures of both are below.

This museum isn’t as hands-on as, say, the Baltimore Science Museum, but it still has enough to keep the interest of a 4-year old for most of a Saturday! Afterward we had a bite to eat at the restaurant out by the (temporary during winter) skating rink in the Sculpture gardens. Great way to end the day!

Click any of the images for a larger-size and slideshow. Enjoy!

 

Yearly Christmas portrait (click on any pix for larger version/slideshow). Only took 61 shots to get this one. Amazing how hard it is to get three kids to look at the camera and smile. Or at least look near the camera. Big brother Dylan gets the prize for being the most patient of all four of us.

For example:

     

The downstairs toilet has been either blocked or *very* slow flushing for the past few weeks: Preston flushed “a box” down it. Hmm.

I’ve been using a plunger periodically, but mostly we haven’t used it much. We figured it would eventually disintegrate. It wasn’t improving so the plumber came by today and had to remove the toilet to get to the blockage.

The Altoids tin was definitely not going to disintegrate (soon).

Monday night after dinner Preston and I enjoyed a game of Kids of Carcassonne. It’s one of the few kid’s board games for which he can sit “still”. A typical game only lasts around 10 minutes, which is just right for him. He even remembered the name of the figure pieces: “Meeples”. The “full” version of the game, Carcassonne, (I think it’s for 10 to adult) is also a lot of fun, but too long for him.

This is a much simpler version – you basically pick a tile from a stack and place it on the table next to another. When you “complete” a road (when it has an obstruction on both ends), you can place your meeple on any same-colored meeple picture on that road. First player to play all their meeples (8) wins. Fun!

The game itself is well-made, with nice wooden “meeple” figures and thick cardboard tiles which hold up well to a 3yr old’s treatment. Not much can stand up to the gnawing teeth of a 1yr old, so we keep Olivia at bay during play. The graphics are very good as well, and Preston enjoys finding all the little animals, etc. on each tile (“Hey! A sheep! What’s he doing there?”).

Not bad for a game without dinosaurs.

Kids of Carcassonne Board

Kids of Carcassonne

Preston and Kids of Carcassonne