We all live in a yellow submarine...

Monday, February 20, 2006
Not much to say about work today. Same old same old. Pluggin’ along, still enjoying my new duties more than the old.

Word(s) of the day:  ELOQUENT THWACK

Lexie log:  Saturday we went to Gramma Betty’s house for a couple hours.  We brought Thumper, as usual, but this time he got to go in the house.  Lexie loved watching Thumper and Pete play.  Thumper is 62 pounds of puppy and Pete is a Dachshund who thinks he’s a Husky.  Then Lexie’s second cousins Marissa and Gavin stopped by.  After playing for a short time at Gramma’s they went back to Aunt Patty’s (their grandma who lives one house away) and Lexie went with them.  She had a blast over there.  That evening and the next day she kept asking to go over to Aunt Patty cake’s. No one knows where she came up with the name, but it’s cute.  I know her Grammy sings patty cake to her, so she must have come up with the new name.  – Saturday night we swam for almost two hours.  She had a great time going to the bottom of the pool to retrieve toys.  She spots the toy on the bottom, I tell her ‘ready go’, and she hold her breath as I help her reach the bottom, then I let go and let her swim back up to the surface.  She cried and had a tantrum when it was time to leave.  The lifeguard actually had to convince her that it was time to go.  – Sunday she did super in swim.  She listened and followed instructions.  The only issue she kept having is that she refused to climb up and sit on the edge of the pool.  The other two kids, Donovan and Gabe, did the same thing.  She was being really stubborn from being sleepy.  She went to bed later than usual Saturday night, and had been up since 8:30am with no nap.  – After swim, we met Grammy and Grandpa at OMSI.  What a blast.  While we waited for the OMNIMax theater show about Dolphins, we went up the super sized escalator and followed Lexie around the Children’s science play area.  She put pieces of plastic fruit over a cone of air to levitate them.  She lodges a plastic apple in the opening, and Mommy had to maneuver it out.  She splashed around in the water play area.  Then she spent about 15-20 minutes barefoot in the sand play area.  She even poured a bucket of sand over her head.  We sat in the top ten rows at the OMNIMax Theater and watched a fabulous short film about dolphins.  It was Lexie’s first theater experience, and even though she was really tired, she enjoyed it immensely.  We will have to go back for the animation one.  Mommy was a goober and left the tickets in the jacket that Grandpa took back out to the car, so we had to wait to get in line while he went to get them.  It put us back in line quite a ways, so next time I’ll be more prepared.  While we were in line, Lexie was fascinated by the motion simulator ride.  Unfortunately, they require that riders be at least four years old.  She freaked when she couldn’t ride it.  So, I know what we’ll be doing this December.  After the show, we went to the café and ate lunch.  Lexie has decided that she no long likes pizza, reason unknown.  So she nibbled on cheese, muffin, and chocolate milk.  Then we went on the tour of the submarine the USS Blueback.  That was pretty neat.  She looked out the periscope, sat in the navigators chair, played with huge gold locks on torpedo lockers, and spun some dial/wheel that claimed to be responsible for some equipment, but obviously not since it produced no effect.  She spun it around the whole time the tour guide talked about the particular area we were in, all the while chatting about how she was turning the corner.  At one point, we had to wait in the crews quarters while everyone caught up with the tour and she had a captive audience.  She stood in the center of this barely lit area (red submarine lighting) and stomping her feet and asking how we got in here. At the beginning of the tour she scampered into the captains room, under the ‘do not enter’ sign.  The look on her face when the sounded the ‘dive’ alarm was priceless.  After the tour, we watched this three dimensional led ball, mechanical maze.  She cried when we walked out the door, but cheered up as we walked through the parking lot.  She took of her jacket, and because of the static winter air, her hair stood on end.  I rubbed her head with her jacket to enhance the effect, and almost fell with laughter.  She saw her shadow reflection and laughed too.  Passers buy chuckled at her.  It was about the funniest thing I’ve seen in a long time.  She cried a little more about having to leave and part from Grammy and Grandpa, but was asleep in the car before we even hit the main road.  She slept the whole way home, and then some.  Daddy got her a beautiful apache tear necklace that she loved wearing.  Grammy got her a stone decorated to look like a ladybug.    – All in all, a terrific weekend.  Lexie took at least another 30 pictures.   She is now paying attention to the subject matter, seriously picking and choosing what she shoots, even trying again when she doesn’t like the result.  I really need to get some CD’s to start storing these.  Our computer is already pushing what I’d like it to store.

Today I’m grateful for Frank and Lexie, Mom and Dad, weekends, water, energy, flowers, colors, happiness, and laughter.