Luuuuuuuuke... I'm your Father!

See for yourself. Click PLAY.

The first official "friend" sleepover

Cousin Olivia had a sleepover with Beck and Caden last night at our house. The mommy's and daddy's went to the Loffler Companies Holiday Party at the Metropolitan while Aunti Sheri and Cousin Viki presided over the ruckus.

It was great to FINALLY have a volunteer to help me out in the kitchen! Livi helped make pancakes, eggs and bacon for breakfast.

Then everyone played hard to work it all off.

Cousin Livi (a.k.a. Buzz Lightyear-Fireman-Pirate-on-Lightening-McQueen) and the boys played Ninjas and Star Wars. Despite the costume to the contrary, Liv insisted she was Yoda.

And then Livi honored us with a little ditty she calls "The Train" on the harmonica. She must get it from her daddy!

Nana's gonna go broke

The amazing thing is... Beck can't really READ the poem yet (he IS still in preschool)... but he figured out that if he counts the number of lines in the book and then follows them as he recites it... he won't miss any of them.

Ca-ching! $ $ $

(Caden, in the background of the video, thinks Beck's performance is "excellent" too!)

Out of the mouth of Cade

We were watching American Idol as a family on Friday night...

I must have been singing along...
Caden swung around and said to me:

"Sing it in you'we head mommy!"

What does he know!

It's not ALWAYS about B and C (despite the title of the blog...)

So, we (A & D) decided that it was high time we got out more - alone. In December we decided to institute "Date Night" every other Tuesday night. We lined up sitters through March 2009 and headed out the door. Something we probably haven't done, together, sans kids, after 7pm on a weeknight in, let's see... how old is Beck now... FIVE years!

We've decided to leave it up to UrbanSpoon to decide where we go every other Tuesday night. (If we didn't, I'd likely keep us going to Salut and Broders Pasta Bar every chance I got!)

So we shook my (super-cool-new-can't-live-without-it) iPhone and UrbanSpoon landed us at:

Victor's 1959 Cafe at 37th and Grand Ave S. Cuban food. And Perfectly located! Still right within my coveted five mile radius!

Of course, my fancy new iPhone has a built in camera... Which... of course, we didn't use since it doesn't have a flash... (or video... okay, so it's not perfect. But even so, I still can't live without it). And we took these photos to share our newest dining experience with the always trusty (and pocket sized) Canon PowerShot (that Alex conveniently had in his coat pocket).

It started out like any other night out. A bottle of (cheap - but quite good) house wine. We had the Yuca Frita ANTOJITOS (an appetizer where the yuca is steamed, then fried, and served with a special garlic & lime juice mojo with lightly sautéed onions.) It was a little bland - but the mojo helped.

And the games began...

And kept going... and going... and going... (remember, this is a school night and we're not used to this whole being-out-after-7pm-on-an-empty-stomach-after-work-thing!)

Fortunately dinner arrived. Alex had some Cuban thingy with Shrimp (3 stars). And I had "old clothes" (4 stars). Who knew someone's old clothes could be so tasty! (I also had it for lunch the next day and was sad when it was finally all gone...) I'd rave more about the food... but I generally get bored reading food reviews myself, so I won't subject you to my writing about it. Your welcome.

Then the games continued...


And we debated about what to do for POSTRES (dessert). Go somewhere else? (What the ??? - no way! It was well below zero outside!) We finally settled (quite easily) on the Xango!Chango! (rich smooth cheesecake with a slightly tangy finish, rolled in a melt-in-your-mouth flaky pastry, tossed in a sugar and cinnamon blend, then served on a fresh guava puree) and a couple of Café con leches.

Oh... wow! Was that the smartest thing we did all night. (Since it looks like the cheap red wine probably wasn't...) It's worth it to go to Victor's for the Xango!Chango! alone!

And then of course, we did what every other patron that has ever visited Victor's 1959 Cafe has done... we wrote our name on the booth. Well, actually, we carved our name in it... the wood was so old that the ball point pen (given to us by the waitress... we're not complete hoodlums!) was sharp enough to actually cut through it!

All in all - Victor's was a roaring success and we'd go back in a heartbeat. I'm sure Minneapolis/St. Paul magazine will be knocking down my door for permission to reference my blog in their next review!


But more importantly, DATE NIGHT was a blast. Why didn't we think of it sooner?!

Caden has 20 teeth. Yep. They're officially counted!

Caden made his first trip to the dentist today. He was an excellent patient and didn't complain one bit when Mr. Thirsty sucked all the water out of his mouth and made him gag.

He told Dr. Nelson (a.k.a. Doogie Howser) that he is a Pirate with yellow teeth and that "pi-wits" don't "bwush" their teeth! (Unless their mommies make them...)

Here's what we get for sleeping in until 9am on a Saturday morning...

And this was just one of three rooms...

Beck is Famous today!

At least, in the Twin Cities.

His Nana's guest editorial was published in the West Metro section of the Star Tribune today. Beck is a central figure in her article. We'll probably be reading the article at bedtime tonight instead of memorizing any new poetry (sorry Nana!)

Dollar in pocket puts poem forever in heart

(by Kathy Coskran)

Word Cloud courtesy of http://www.wordle.net/

I’m paying my grandchildren to memorize poetry. My mother did it, paid my brother and me a dime for “Grass,” a quarter for “O Captain, My Captain,” thirty-five cents for “Sea Fever.” It was the fifties, we were on winter break, driving from Georgia to California, five days each way, and missing a week of school. It was educational she said and the money we earned would be our vacation spending money. It was also a strategy to keep us from arguing over who crossed the imaginary line in the back seat of the car. We made it to Los Angeles and back in relative peace and with sufficient funds for cheap souvenirs, so it worked. My mother was a practical woman, but she also loved language; she knew what she was doing. I don’t remember what I bought with those dimes and quarters, but I still have the poetry. Fifty years later, I can close my eyes and the words come rising in my throat.

Which is why I am now paying my grandchildren to memorize poetry. Like my mother, I too believe in the power of language to soothe and to heal; to inspire and to calm. Poetry is to be spoken aloud, learned by heart; a poem spoken in the music of your own voice becomes a part of you, and if you learn it when you are young, you will have it forever.

At Thanksgiving this year, I gave each child a book of poetry, told them the story of my mother’s payment plan, recited de Regniers’ “Keep a Poem in Your Pocket” (“…and a picture in your head/and you’ll never feel lonely/at night when you’re in bed”) and promised to pay up whenever they learned a new poem.

That was on Thursday. Friday morning Beck who is 5 appeared at his parents’ bedside to recite Stevenson’s “Birdie with a Yellow Bill.” They had read it to him the night before and he had taken de Regniers’ advice to heart. Beck often has trouble sleeping and knows what it is to feel lonely at night when he’s in bed, so he said the poem to himself, over and over, until he fell asleep.

At 5 Beck discovered what poets and mystics have known for centuries: be present to the moment, give yourself over to the rhythm and mystery of your own voice, lose yourself in the hum of the words, and you will find that quiet place within. The little poem was a mantra for him, a chant, a meditation. The rhythmic combination of sound and sense slowed his fluttering heart and lulled him to sleep. He ran to tell his parents because he had just discovered that the most fundamental gift of our species, language, has the power to communicate inwards as well as outwards.

I gave him a dollar (2008 rates) and I’ve made several payments to my other grandchildren, ages 3 to 13, but they seem more interested in “the little poem [that] sings to you” than the money earned. At Christmas we heard “Jabberwocky, “ “Tyger, Tyger,” “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening,” The Man That Wasn’t There” and, of course, “A Birdie with a Yellow Bill.” Nobody asked how much their poem was worth, because they already knew. Money may have been the carrot, but it is love that keeps “a poem in your pocket and a picture in your head.”

40 is the new 30!

So look who's 28! (ah-hem...)

Happy Birfday Daddy!

Picasso in the HOUSE!

Our little Picasso was at it again this morning. (Still in his PJ's... a common theme at our house over the last few weeks).
As Caden was painting this canvas, he took a few moments from his work to tell us the story of his creation...

"Rain is coming down on the man. But the sun is melting with the snow. The man might be under the rain. Brown is for the stem of the tree. It is nighttime in the purple sky. And then it is morning time again."

Whose yer daddy?

Caden:
"Hey BE-ECK! Wanna pwetend your da Daddy and I'm da Baby?"

Beck:
"No-OOO Ca-DEN!
How about YOU'RE the Baby and I'M the Daddy!"

Oh No! The Gazelles!

Beck's Space Ship

A Dozen Gazelles Jump into Hot Lava!
By Beck Sosa (Age 5)

I asked Beck the other day what he thought he was REALLY good at. He said: "Drawing". I'd agree.

Then I asked him what he thought he wasn't very good at. He had a hard time thinking of anything for a while. Then he said: "Taking my medicine." I'd agree with that one too!

There's been a LOT of the pink stuff in our house lately... which leads to lots of time at home drawing and playing trains and cars and playdough...

Did you know that Gazelles like to jump into water but then they find out it's hot lava instead! And they all die?! Not very smart those Gazelles!