Outdoor Naked Fun!

We are hankering for spring. After a fall that seemed to extend summer well into mid-November, it seems winter is equally late in its departure this year. We've had exactly two sunny, warm spring days. It might snow later this week. We are just going bonkers in anticipation to start up our summer lifestyle: dinner on the porch, bike rides to the library, evenings at the park, etc. Given how dreary its been outside, though, a day like last Saturday, mid-50s and not entirely overcast, can seem downright luxurious. So we made the best of it with a little hike in a city park with our friends Freddy and Lisa. It was great to see the kids running around in the woods. But not five minutes into our walk we came upon a sandy shore along the creek and spent the next hour or more there. The kids slowly but surely lost their clothes, until they were stark naked, running in the shallow water and up and down the "beach." It was a lovely way to spend an afternoon and we left just as the rain started up again. You can see some of the fun here:

Naked Fun at East River Park

One Smart Boy

James' ability to recall seemingly minor facts and events has often impressed us. Of course, he also has the amazing ability to "forget" that he was supposed to do simple things, such as put on his socks, within 10 seconds of the request. This afternoon, however, he offered a great demonstration of his impressive memory. I don't recall how the subject came up (his mnemonic abilities are obviously not genetic), but we were talking about a part of the Winnie the Pooh movie when all the characters fall in a mud pit and mistake each each other for mud monsters. This is similar to a book we had read recently called "Two Dumb Ducks" in which two duck friends fall in the muck and are able to scare off the pesky seagulls. Hoping that James might remember this book (and make what Becky might call a text-to-text connection in teacher parlance), I said, "That reminds me of a book we read recently." I had hoped that maybe he would recall the name of the book. Of course, his response far exceeded that as recalled the ducks' names, exclaiming "Carl and Steve!" Then, he went on to say how he really liked Carl's two sock puppets, named "Cornelius and Zanzibar." How this boy can remember the names of the sock puppets of the characters in a library book baffles me. But I suppose that's maybe what kids do best: baffle us.

Two Dumb Ducks:
http://www.amazon.com/Two-Dumb-Ducks-Borzoi-Books/dp/0375845763/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1365904677&sr=8-1&keywords=two+dumb+ducks