tea party

Yesterday Owen's class threw a tea party for all the parents. Toby left work early in order to come. It was very sweet. They sang a bunch of songs and then invited us to the cafeteria for cookies and drinks. There we received gifts the children had made us - potted geraniums, a magnet with their picture in a popsicle stick frame, a washcloth with their handprints and, my favorite,this self portrait.

Owen's drawings of people are insane, I mean that in a good way. They're so primitive looking and I'm sure some art therapist could read a lot of bad stuff into them but I just love how simple they are. We have a lot of drawings of Owen and Darth Vader fighting each other with light sabers - it's very hard to tell just who's who. In the cafeteria they showed us a powerpoint presentation capturing the class throughout the year, someone had a fun time having the type come in and out in every conceivable manner possible. My guess is the teacher's assistant Mr. G. a goofy (not goofy looking, he can just act funny at times) young man who the kids all adore. During rest time, where Owen hardly ever rests, his mat is next to Mr. G's and he watches him on the computer where he downloads music (a parent I'm friendly with was like 'thank God he isn't downloading porn!') and he sings along at times, which makes all the kids that are awake laugh, so I guess that is a good example of the adorable goofiness. We had a great time and then went to the park afterward, where we fried like eggs under the sun. I hate to complain about warm weather but it's like spring and summer no longer exist, at least they don't seem to exist in Pittsburgh.

And speaking of Pittsburgh... did you know it has been rated as the most livable city in America?! Yes, it's true. The much maligned Steel City is actually a wonderful place to live with children. It's small enough to make getting around and doing cultural activities with your kids fun (rarely a problem with parking) but it's large enough that it has top notch hospitals (a sigh of relief from the eternal worrier) great museums and a science center that's amazing. They profiled Pittsburgh on an episode of Dragonfly TV, which I watch with Owen, it's a great science show for kids. They showed the inside of the sportsworks part of Carnegie Science center, you can design your own roller coaster and actually test it out and they have a rock climbing wall and tons of other fun stuff. We'll just have to wait til the kids are older because sportsworks seems more oriented toward tweeners.

Well, I hope everyone enjoys their weekend. We're heading to New York City so I won't be posting until we get back on Wednesday. Toby has a conference to attend where his boss is giving a presentation, by the way his boss was profiled in yesterday's Wall Street Journal, complete with stippled portrait on the front page. I'll end with a picture of Oona, who was very good at the tea party, she clapped and tried to sing along to the class.