Learning Something New

Living in Southern California, you will always here people talk about how it’s so great because you can go skiing in the morning and the beach in the afternoon.  Technically that is true.  Well, the beach part we have down.  We all love going to the beach in the summer.  Skiing however…it’s not exactly my thing.  We have been up to Big Bear a couple times with the girls just to go sledding.  Every year we say we are going to take the girls skiing.  It’s so close and now is the time to teach them, right?  I might as well learn something new while we’re at it.  So back at the beginning of November I booked us at a hotel for MLK Jr weekend.  Too bad I didn't know then that we would be in the middle of one of the hottest and driest winters in So Cal history.  But they  make snow, and it still gets cold in the mountains at least right?  So we went anyway despite the fact that there has been no percipitaion since the middle of December.

We left after the girls got out of school that Friday, and I want to say it was about 85 degrees that day here in Burbank.  I had check the local forecast for Mammoth, which is where we were going, and it was to be in the chilly 60s during the day and the freezing 30s at night.  Stop laughing Megan Drew.  Just because your schools in Wisconsin have been closed for four days this winter due to unhealthy below freezing temperatures doesn't mean that 30 doesn't feel cold to some of us still.  I think that is the part that I find most fascinating about this winter.  Here we are in California with summer like weather for weeks, while the entire east coast has been under a pile of snow for a month.  My sister Beth is on her SEVENTH snow day!  She doesn't live in Wisconsin though.  Nope she lives in Virginia.  A place that MAYBE gets two snow days a year.  But Global Climate change isn't happening or anything.  Sorry, I digress.

Mammouth Mountain is about a four hour drive from our house and unfortunately, the girls fell asleep in the car so when we got there at 9:30pm  they were a bit wired and wouldn't go back to sleep until after 11.  Yay.  It's not a bad drive though.  And we definitely didn't need to worry about those chains I brought for the van just in case.  

View from our room.  Note lack of snow, but closeness to the lift!

Andy kept saying how there wasn't going to be any snow and it was going to suck.  I, being the eternal optimist, said none of us knew how to ski anyway and this would be a better way to learn.  Guess who was right?  (It's me in case you didn't get that, but read on to find out more.)

The next morning we got up, ate breakfast and got ready to go to our ski lesson.  I had booked us a private ski lesson for the whole family, because it ended up being the same amount if we would have all taken group lessons.  The girls had never done this and Andy and I have been before, but I don't really count the one time I went skiing over 20  years ago.     So ski lessons were definitely a must.

Funny side story about me.  It was my freshman year of college the last time  I went.  I had never been before and all of my friends who had been skiing their entire lives assured me it was EASY!  I would pick it up no problem!  I didn't need to take a lesson!  I was 18, so you know, I believed them.  They told me as long as I stayed on the green circle runs I would be ok.  So they took me to the top on the ski lift, showed me how to get off the lift and then promptly left me.  I stood at the top of that mountain with no idea how the hell to get off of it.  Eventually, one of the really tall frat boys we had come with, showed me  how to "pizza" my skis. Then he helped me by putting me in front of him and skiing down, much like they do with little kids.  You would have thought that would have been enough for me, but no.  I got down once I could do it again by myself this time!  Only  there was nobody with me to take the ski lift so I did it alone.  No biggie right.  I got this!  Toward the end of the lift,  I scooted my but to the end of the seat like my friends had shown me and went to stand up.  Only I never stood up for some reason, and the next thing I knew I was still sitting going back around to go DOWN the mountain.   Well I couldn't allow people to see me going down the mountain on the ski lift!  That would be much to embarrassing.  So I did the only thing I could think of. 

I jumped. 

Off the ski lift. 

Face down into the snow.

Yeah.

So, that happened.  It goes down as one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. They had to stop the lift to help me up.  I wasn't too far off the ground when I jumped.  Maybe 8 feet?  So I was perfectly fine, except for my bruised ego.  I was done with skiing after that and hadn't tried it again since.  Andy and I did go snowboarding about 10 years ago and I did like that better, but the ski lift still gave me anxiety.  This time I was determined to have someone show me how to ski and try to do it for real. You know face my fear and all that.  

Back to the present!  So we got all of our ski gear and headed to the area where we would be taking lessons.  We weren't having them for a while, so Andy, who has a bit more experience than I do, helped the girls get their skis on and they practiced in a little side area for a while.  There wasn't really even a slope, but we just wanted them to get a feel for it.  They took to it quickly.  

I will be honest here and say I was a bit concerned about taking my girls skiing for a few reasons. Sonya and Lana. Sonya is a perfectionist and if she can't get something right away she gets frustrated and tears follow.  She doesn't want to give up, which will make her more frustrated and difficult to deal with, and that just leads to even more crying.  Lana will try something and if she doesn't get it right away or decides she doesn't like it she will just give up.  And not give two shits about it.  No amount of bribery will change her mind if she decides she doesn't want to do something.  Georgia will just follow whatever her sisters do.  She is very influenced by them and if left on her own would probably try and do well with just about anything.  However, if her sisters aren't doing it, then forget it.  So I had no idea how this was going to go.

The fact that it was 60 degrees was helpful.  They weren't cold.  Cold would have definitely made it worse. Especially for Lana who puts her bathrobe on and complains when the house is at 70 degrees.  

 When it was finally time to take our lesson we were all excited and ready.  Our instructor, Ken, was great and all three of the girls started picking it up fairly quickly.  Turns out I picked it up fast too.  By the end of our three hour lesson we were all on the biggest of the practice hills and Sonya, Andy and I were even picking up weaving in and out of the cones and turning.  The little girls were doing well too and Lana didn't even complain once.  I'm pretty sure that was a first.  

Lana and Georgia Pizzaing downhill.

Sonya getting the hang of it.  

Our instructor told us that Andy, Sonya and I were ready for the Green Circle hill that was right there next to us.  The little two, not quite, although they were getting it.  That particular run was two miles and for new skiers it would take at least 30 minutes to get down.  For  Lana and Georgia it would take about two hours.  He said it would just be too steep for the in certain parts.   

No matter, it was the end of the day at that point and they were soon closing the lifts, so we thought maybe we could try that hill the next day.  

The good thing about being in the mountains on a holiday weekend with not much snow is that it was completely dead.  There was no wait at restaurants and it wasn't packed with people everywhere.  It was great for us, not so much for the people who work there.  The next morning we got up and contemplated going to the other side of the mountain where there was an easier shorter run, but the run we were right next to was so close and the practice hills were better for the little girls.  

We practiced for a bit on the learning hills and then Andy decided he wanted to try the big run.  We asked Sonya if she wanted to go and amazingly she did.  She had been doing better than I thought she would, but she does tend to be afraid of things, so I wasn't sure she would do it.  They left, and for the next 40 minutes I was nervous for them to come back.   I pictured Sonya coming back in tears saying she wanted to go back to the room.   I distracted myself with practicing with the little girls and they started to get better and better.  By the end they were both weaving in  and out of the cones on the practice runs too.  

Lana taking a run, Georgia waiting

Snow/ice angels

Finally I heard Sonya calling for me and I looked up to see her smiling from ear to ear and waving excitedly.  She absolutely loved it.  I breathed a sigh of relief.   She loved it so much she wanted to do it again.  I decided to put my big girl pants on and brave the thing that gave me the most anxiety, the ski lift.  We went and ate lunch first, but after lunch Sonya and I headed right to the lift.  Turns out that thing is really fucking high in the air.  Turns out that I never thought I was afraid of heights, but I think I might be just a little now.  Turns out, my nine year old was less afraid than I was.  She was calming me down,

Me: "Wow!  We are really high huh? Breeeaathhe, juuust breathe...."

Sonya: "Mom (eye roll) it's FINE!"  

Me: "Ok but I have to get off of this thing too."

Sonya: "Oh that part is EASY!"

Oh sure maybe for someone who didn't JUMP OFF ONE 20 YEARS AGO!!!

Good news!  I managed to get off the ski lift just fine.  After that I felt better and wasn't worried about skiing down.  However...DAMN it was a looooonnnngg hill.  Because they hadn't had snow in so long, what was on the hill was not the best to ski on .  There were quite a few patches of iciness.  I had to "pizza" most of the way down.  Sonya was ahead of me a good amount of the time, looking like she came out of the womb skiing.  Since she had already been up there with Andy she knew which way to go.  That was good, because the last thing I need was to end up on a blue square run.  I would still be sitting on the mountain if that was the case.  We got to the bottom and my feet and ankles were killing me from braking the whole way down, but I had made it down and I was incredibly proud of myself and my daughter who had just done it twice! Plus, PLUS!  I didn't fall once!  I was done though.  Didn't need to go again.  

Sonya on the green circle run

Sonya and me on green circle

We found Andy and the girls and he decided he wanted to go again. Surprisingly, Sonya went with him for her THIRD time.  I was kinda happy just to do the practice runs again.  Not to mention I was extremely exhausted.  Then something weird happened.  I thought I didn't want to go again, but I started to get the urge to want to go again.  Unfortunately, there wasn't enough time, because it was the end of the day and the lifts were closing.  Plus Lana had decided about 15 minutes before Andy and Sonya came back that she was done.  Her skis were off and she was chilling making angels in the snow/ice.  I'm pretty sure Georgia would have continued to ski until it got dark.  She was having a blast.

After Andy and Sonya got back we returned all of our ski gear, since we would be leaving the next morning.  Then we went back to our hotel to sit in the hot tub for a bit before getting ready to go out for dinner.  

Later that night  when the girls had gone to bed, Andy and I talked about what a successful weekend it was.  Sure it's incredibly expensive, but I did manage to borrow all of our snow gear from friends, and really what's money compared to an amazing time learning something new with your family?  For me it was one of the best times I've ever had had with all of them.  It gave me a chance to be fun mom who learned something new with them, instead of naggy do your chores and homework mom.  It gave me a chance to actually sit down and hang out with my husband instead of cleaning the house and the kitchen until ten o'clock at night.  So was it the best skiing weather ever?  No, in fact I'm sure most people would say it was the worst.  But as far as I'm concerned though it was the best and I would do it again the same way in a heartbeat.  Okay well maybe a little bit more snow would be nice. 

A family of skiers!

Frozen in Song

Most of you who read this site have kids, or know my kids.  And if you have kids there is a 99% chance that you've seen the Disney movie Frozen sometime in the past few months.  And if you've seen the movie Frozen, you've heard nothing but the soundtrack on repeat since the Christmas music subsided at the beginning of the year.  Well, at least that's the case in my house.

Now let me just admit right here up front that I personally LOVED the movie.  I think it is probably in my top three Disney movies of all time.  I don't know if it was the fun music, or the fact that it's a story about sisters saving each other and not about a prince saving them.  But yeah, I loved everything about it and cried a good 40% of the movie.  I may have  been PMSing.  Anyway-right after we saw it, I downloaded the music and within two days the girls knew all the words to every song.  Okay, fine I did too.  We play it at home and in the car.  I will go through a day or two where I just can't listen to it anymore and within a day I want to hear it again.  I love to belt out, "Let it Go" in the car with the girls.  We have a blast.

One day last week we were in the car with Andy and I think he had enough of the soundtrack.  We weren't going far, just to Menchie's, so we drove with no music.  Then the girls started the soundtrack on their own singing a capella.  We took a break in Menchie's and they started right back up when we got in the car going from one song to the next in the order of the soundtrack.  I joined right along.  So when I found out that the El Capitan theater here in Hollywood was having a Frozen Sing-A-Long, it was a no brainer to take the girls.  This Sunday morning we will be singing our hearts out in the theater, and they are beyond excited.

A couple days ago I pulled out my phone and recorded the two little girls while they were home.  Georgia singing "In Summer" and the both of them singing "Let it Go".  Unfortunately my phone cut off the end of "Let it Go", but it was long enough.  You don't need to suffer through the ENTIRE song.  So for your entertainment pleasure, my own cast of Frozen....

I'm pretty sure we won't need to follow the bouncing ball or snowflake on Sunday at the sing-a-long.  We've got these songs down pat!

She's My Little Runaway

Hasn’t every kid at some point in time decided they were going to run away?  To be honest I don’t remember going through it myself, but I have heard stories from friends, and I kind of recall my sister Megan deciding she was going to leave at some point. A few weeks ago, Sonya decided she was done with this place.  

We were arguing about something.  Who knows what?  She wasn’t listening to me, throwing attitude my way and I was apparently annoying her.  It's been a trend around here lately.  I'm fairly certain that this is just a small glimpse into the teen years.  She was outside with her sisters pouting for a bit, but then she came in and went straight to her room for about five minutes.  I wasn't sure what she was doing in there until she came out to the kitchen to grab a pear from the fruit bowl and took it back to her room.  It was then that I realized what was going on.  

I walked over to her room and stood in the doorway where I found her packing up a small backpack.  I'm not sure what she had put in there, but I knew there was one pear!  She was smart enough to bring sustenance.   

"Whatcha doing?" I asked, trying my best not to break into giggles.

"I'm running away," she told me.  She was also doing her best not to laugh, because she knew that she wasn't going anywhere and she was being silly, but she was out to prove a point dammit!

"Oh.  Huh.  Where are you going?"  I asked.

"That's not something you need to know right now," she indignantly replied.  I assumed she wasn't telling me because she didn't know where she was going herself.  

"Well, that's too bad," I said.  " You are going to miss out on movie night tonight and the special surprise we are taking you guys to tomorrow."

She shrugged her shoulders.

"Ok, well, I still love you and I'm sad that you're leaving," I told her.  "You are welcome to come back anytime you want."

She didn't say anything to me, so I left the room and let her continue.

It was then that the wonder twins came in the house and became curious as to what was going on.  

"What's sissy doing?" Lana asked.

"She's running away," I informed them.  

"Where is she going?!" They asked.

"I don't know," I said.  

They tried to go talk to her and find out her plans, but she wasn't giving anything up.  Then she marched out of her bedroom with her bag over her shoulder and headed out the door. She did manage a "bye" toward us over her shoulder as she walked out into the evening.
Keep in mind that it is around 5pm and starting to get dark and all of my girls are very much afraid of the dark.  I had a feeling she wasn't going far.  

The little girls ran over to the window to see where she had gone and reported that she was just sitting on the porch swing out front.   Lana started thinking about life without Sonya and asked,

"Hey mom! What are you going to do with her room?"

"Lana, she's not really going anywhere.  Don't worry about it," I told her.  

"She's leaving, she's leaving!!" They yelled.  

Apparently,  Sonya wasn't up for being watched so she decided to walk away in the hopes of making it look more real.  Lana bought it.  

"If Sonya really does leaves, I get to have her desk right?" She asked.  

"Lana...."  I gave her the 'that's enough' look.  Although I can't say I didn't laugh about that one later.  

I wasn't really concerned that she was really going far, but then I did start to worry that she might try and walk to one of her friends' houses.  Luckily that was about the time that Andy came home from running some errands.  He had run into Sonya in the driveway and she told him of her plans to run away.  He took the same approach I did and told her that was too bad, but wished her luck.  Look at us being on the same parenting page!  I gave me the rest of the story when he walked in the house.  

I continued to make dinner and let her go for a few minutes, but send Andy over to look for her out the window.  He couldn't see her anywhere so, okay, I started to worry.  I sent him out to see if he could glimpse her walking down the street. He started calling for her and didn't get a response but then found her just hiding behind one of our cars.  It was obvious she had no intention in going anywhere, just wanted to get a little attention.  I guess it did work for a bit.  

Andy coaxed her inside where she went directly to her room.  I heard her crying but he managed to hash things out with her. He's good like that.  Sometimes she and I butt heads so his intervening usually helps smooth things over.   I only hope it's this easy in six years from now.  She didn't want to go anywhere, and we worked things out, which was good for us.  Not so much to Lana's liking though.  She was really hoping for her own room with a desk.  Next time, Lana.      

Making Menchie's Proud

Several years ago I wrote a story on here about Sonya's gymnastics experience of climbing the rope. She was just five when she climbed that rope and so determined to do it.  Now she can climb that thing four times in a row.  Lana is still taking gymnastics but had yet to master the rope.  She would get about halfway up, look down and decided "forget it" then drop.  Sonya and I kept encouraging her to go all the way, but unlike Sonya, she just doesn't care as much about things.  She never got riled up about it or worried about it the way Sonya did.  She wasn't ready and really didn't care one way or another if she did it or not.  Just one of the major differences in those two.  Sonya will make herself crazy trying to do something and do it right.  Lana will do it when she's good and ready.  No amount of coaxing or bribing is going to make a difference.  She will care when she wants to.  The end. Although whenever she did get to the top, she knew she would get a trip to Menchie's, just like Sonya did.  

Then we went to Disney on Ice a few weeks ago and Andy is certain that is what sparked her interest of finally getting to the top of that rope.  There was a point in the show where Ariel spun and did tricks on a rope above the ice.  I did notice after that she was more determined to try and get to the top of the one at gymnastics class.  There were a couple of classes she almost got there, but I wasn't there to encourage her or see it, so she didn't quite get there.  

Then last week before class she said, 

"I'm gonna do it today! I'm going to climb to the top of the rope!" 

I made sure I was there by the end of class just in case, and damn if that kid didn't do exactly what she said she would. 

You might be able to tell from the video that there was a point she contemplated giving up, but I started my encouragement yelling and I  think that helped to keep her going.  Well, at least that's what I thought.  

On our way home that night as I was congratulating her and telling her how proud I was, I asked her if she almost gave up.  She admitted she did.  

"Why did you keep going, because I started yelling at you to keep going?  Did that help?" I asked, feeling like a proud supportive parent.  

"No," she told me.  "It was because I really wanted to go to Menchie's."

Nice.  Well, whatever it takes I guess!

It's Only a Four Letter Word

Well, how were your holidays?  Ours were fabulous, thanks for asking!  No, I really mean that.  Well, after I got through all the preparation crap of the weeks before, once Christmas hit we had a great time. My parents were here and they are always super helpful, so I didn't do laundry or wake up before 8am all week.  It was awesome!  Thanks mom and dad.  Andy took the week of New Years off, so we were able to hang out and do some fun things as a family, like take the kids to Disney on Ice and complete our Star Wars Trilogy with Return of the Jedi.   Overall it was just what I needed.  What all of us needed.  A couple weeks to do nothing.  No running to school, piano, gymnastics, Girl Scouts, or music class.  I can't say that by Friday we weren't all a little over it, but still it was good for a while.

And what would the holidays be without a funny story?  Of course I wouldn't disappoint.  Although this isn't a holiday story per se, it is something that happened while my parents were here.

We were all sitting around after dinner one night, but Andy was still at work.  My parents and I were chatting and I was texting Andy to see when he would be home.  The girls were starting to get a little rowdy and had gotten up from their seats to play…hmmm…I'm not even sure the name for it.  It's the game where you slap  hands and say a rhyme.  Like "Miss Mary Mac, Mac.  All dressed in black, black, black…"  You remember.  Anyway, they were doing that.  I made Lana and Georgia do one that Lana had learned from one of the girls at school that goes a little something like this:

"Postman, Postman do your duty, here comes the girl with the African booty!"

Yeah.  I know.  I got raised eyebrows from both my parents.  All I could say was "Oh well!  It's what they learned from other kids at school.  Guess every kid doesn't have great parents.  Whaddya gonna do?"

We weren't really paying  much attention to them when they started another one I hadn't heard before.  I wasn't even sure what they were saying and was in the middle of texting Andy when I heard this:

"…then the farm got sick, how many animals got the DICK?! One, Two, Three…."

Yeeeeaaaaahhhh...so THAT happened.  

To be honest, I'm not even sure that's how it went.  All I know is I heard them say the word Dick.  Loudly.  In front of my parents.

I immediately looked up from my phone wide-eyed over to my mother who had the same horrified/amused expression on her face and she my father and I burst out laughing.  Threw my fits of giggles I asked the girls,

"Wait, wait, wait!  What did you say?"

And both my little girls shouted, "DICK!"  Which only made us laugh harder.

Sonya started to become concerned.  "What? What's wrong?" She asked.  "Is that a bad word?"

"Where did you guys get this one from?"  I just assumed it was another one picked up at school until they proudly told me,

"Sonya!"

I looked at her and asked her the same question and she said, "I made it up!"  Oh boy.

"Why?  What does dick mean?"  She asked.

"Well…." I said. "It's another word for a man's penis."

"Ohhhhh…" she said and her eyes got wide.  "Oops!"

Meanwhile the little girls are yelling, "Dick, dick, dick!" 

"It's fine." I told them still trying so hard to stop laughing.  "You didn't know. Let's just not sing this one again and certainly not at school ok?  And I know you were trying to rhyme with sick, but let's change it to Mick."

"Okay!" They all replied.

Then I thought about it a minute and asked, "You guys didn't tell this to anyone already at school right?"

They all shook their heads no and I breathed a sigh of relief until Lana said, "No.  I just learned it to my friend Audry."

Wait what?  "You taught this one to your friend, Audry?" I asked.

"Uh-Huh," she replied.

My parents roared with laughter and I just shook my head wondering when I would get the phone call from Audry's parents.

A Bad Place For Charlotte's Web

Hi.  Phew!  Does anyone else feel like they are sinking in the quicksand of Christmas?  I don't know if it's the fact that we only have three weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas or that I am just busy ALL THE TIME ANYWAY!  But seriously.  These last few weeks have been killing me.  I will be happy when Christmas is here and I can relax for minute and have leftovers, while playing with my new toys for few days.  Because I've been so busy, I haven't had time to sit down and write, but I managed to find 20 free minutes today.  Even though my body really wanted me to take a nap, I denied it just so I could entertain you all with a new story.  Aren't I so nice?  Let's call it my Christmas present to you!  Because I really can't do any more shopping or bake any more cookies.  I might hurt someone. Plus this is a quick one, so I can maybe write this and STILL get a 10 minute nap in.  If there are spelling mistakes in here, forgive me.  My body took over and put me to sleep.  

A couple of weeks ago, the girls went back to my room to take a shower after dinner, as they do most nights.  Andy was home that day and he went to monitor them, while I cleaned up the kitchen.  I was busy trying to tame the kitchen mess, when I heard Georgia start to cry.  I ignored it partially because this was not an unusual occurrence.  Chances were that one of her sisters did something that upset her, and her cries are mostly fake.  I also ignored it because Andy was there and I decided let him deal with it for once.  Then I heard her running down the hall and I realized her crying wasn't the typical "waaa! she hit me!" kind of crying.  This was a panicked, sobbing, couldn't catch her breath cry.  That's when I intervened.

"Georgia what's wrong?"  I asked.

Between her sobs she tried as best she could to tell me.  "Sssttthhhpppiiidddeeerrr!"

"What?" I asked, not sure what she was telling me.

"Sthpider (sob) in (sob) da toilet (sob sob sob)!!" She said.

I walked back to our bedroom where Andy was standing at our toilet trying to flush down a Daddy Long Leg spider.  The floor in front of the toilet was wet with urine.  

After calming Georgia down and piecing it together with the others what I found out was this.  Georgia got on the toilet in our bathroom to pee before taking a shower.  She looked down in the bowl and there was a Daddy Long Leg trying to make his way out of the bowl.  So, mid-pee, she hopped off crying and ran down the hall naked.   Now, I'm personally not afraid of spiders, but even I would have freaked the hell out had I seen that while trying to go.  Not to mention that at five years old, that Daddy Long Leg probably looked gigantic to her.  

If felt so bad for her and consoled her until she calmed down.  Then she her sisters took a shower. Problem solved!  Right?  Issue over! Right?  Now you all now better than that!

For five days afterward the child held her pee.  I would see her dancing around and when I asked her if she had to go she would deny it.  Eventually she would have to give in, but before she would go in ANY toilet, I had to thoroughly check for spiders.  Then I had to stand there until she was done.  As the weeks have gone on she's gotten better about going, but she is still making me check the toilet and I can't go very far until she is finished going.  You know, because I have nothing else going right now but to wait in the bathroom while my child poops.  It's more fun than you know.

She still refuses to go in the toilet in our bathroom though.  No matter how much checking I do in that one, she doesn't trust it.  I really can't say I blame her.  I got up in the middle of the night to pee a few nights ago, and her incident popped in my head.  I didn't want to turn on the light so I just peed like I do in a public toilet, hovering above the seat.  I couldn't be positive that Daddy Long Leg hadn't creeped from back out of the bowl and I wasn't looking to find out.  Guess we will all be checking the toilet for a while.  

20 (or more) Questions About Star Wars

Lately, we've been trying to have a family movie night at least a couple times a month.  We will do it on a Saturday night when the girls can stay up a bit later, but not every Saturday night is open.  If it is, we usually pick a movie,  Andy makes some popcorn and we all settle in to watch.  Yes, even I will put aside the messy kitchen or the laundry to spend a couple hours just chilling and enjoying a movie. We've watched some older Disney movies like the Shaggy DA and The Apple Dumpling Gang as well as some of the more recent ones like The Incredibles.  One night we even watched Smoky and the Bandit.  That led to some fun questions.  Then about a month ago I mentioned to Andy that we should watch The Star Wars Trilogy.  You know, the only ones that matter.  Episodes 4-6.  We try to forget about the "other ones".  He agreed.  

If you have been reading my blog for a while, you might remember that we watched this movie a couple years ago when the girls were younger.  We decided that they might have been too young at the time to appreciate it.  Especially the little ones.  Sonya had enjoyed it, but still we thought it would be better to wait before moving on with the others. 

Now that they all enjoy movies, and Lana doesn't stand in between rooms looking for an escape route in case it gets to scary, we figured they would actually enjoy this trilogy.  I was younger than Sonya when I saw "The Empire Strikes Back".  So earlier in November one Saturday night, we all settled in to watch one of my favorite movies, Star Wars Episode 1 A New Hope.

The girls watched the whole thing without getting scared and enjoyed it so much they even talked about it the next day.  They were, of course, infatuated with Princess Leia.  She was the only character name Lana and Georgia could recall.  Oh well, except for "Dark Vader" as Lana called him.   They were excited to watch the next two.  Georgia even said 

"We will watch Empire Strikes Back with the guy, the guy, Princess Leia, and the fuzzy carpet!"

Then they would continually ask, "When would we watch the next one?  Today?  How about next weekend?" Finally, I told them the next free Saturday we had.  That ended up being this past Thanksgiving weekend.  

Now like most Star Wars fans out there, Empire is my favorite.  However, it's been so many years since I've seen it my memory was hazy on exactly what happened and when.  It's so much fun watching it again and especially with your kids.  The only problem with watching movies with some kids, especially movies like these, is that they get confused and have questions.  Sometimes they like to ask you those questions during the movie.  Sonya and Georgia are not those kids.  Lana however….

Lana likes to sit next to me no matter what movie we watch.  I think it's part of her still being a bit scared about what might happen during the movie, and if she will be afraid.  I have always been her comfort.  So when we watched the first movie she sat right next to me and would ask me questions here and there, but it didn't get to bothersome.  Then we watched Empire.  I don't know if it was just a more confusing movie for her-which I guess it kinda is-or what, but that child did not stop asking me questions almost the entire two hours.  

Now there are certain things that I have no patience for with the girls and I have to defer to Andy.  Then there are things he has no patience for that I have to take over.  Let's just say that it's a good thing she was sitting next to me asking the questions.  She would ask me question after question and I could just see him shaking his head.  Then he would sigh and start to say, "Lana…."

"It's fine," I would tell him. "I got this one."  Then I would continue to answer her.  

About halfway through the movie it started to get comical though and I had to write down some of her questions.  Sonya was starting to become annoyed with her by the end too, but I told them all to back off.  The biggest reason-I have vivid memories of my father taking me to these movies as a child and DOING THE EXACT SAME THING.  He was always very patient with me and answered everything I asked.  Then I understood better what was going on.  I believe that is why science fiction is probably my favorite genre of movies to this day.  Thanks Dad!  Still-the questions she asked had me giggling from time to time:

"Is he dead?"
"Is that the other Dark Vader?"
"Is he dying?"
"Is that Boba Fett?" (oh yeah, she and Georgia were obsessed with seeing Boba Fett for some reason.  I have no idea why.)
"What is he doing?"
"Are they going to die?" (very worried about people dying)
"Is that were Dark Vader goes?"
"Is he a bad guy?"
"Where are they?"
"Is he going to die?"
"Did he come with him?"
"Where are they going?"
"Where does that kind of animal live?" (Yeah, explaining that most of those animals in the movie are not real animals and are from another planet is fun.)
"Is she going to die?"
"Does he not have a hand now?"
And my absolute favorite question came toward the end of the movie just before Han Solo goes into the freezing chamber.  I said something about Han Solo and Lana, after now watching almost 2 of these movies asks,
"Who is Han Solo?"

Yup. Are we not watching the same movie Lana??

I honestly didn't care though.  In fact I found it kind of cute.  I answered every one as best I could, sometimes with a "Let's watch and see what happens."  This was one of those things that didn't push my patience button surprisingly enough, because I would have thought it would.  I guess I just love these movies so much and want my girls to like them that I'm willing to answer whatever they might ask.  It showed that she was at least interested, and to me that made it all worth it.  

Now I'm looking forward to the upcoming Christmas break in a few weeks and sitting down for a little Return of the Jedi.  I'm sure that will be their favorite for a while, as it is with most kids because of the silly Ewoks.  It's okay though, over the years they will re-watch them and come to the conclusion that the movie where Luke discovers that Dark Vader is his father is undoubtedly the best.  As for those other ones they made a few years back, Andy says they are never allowed to watch them in this house. Okay that might be going a little to far, but I will wait until these original three are embedded in their heads before we go down the road of Jar Jar Binks.  I'm only hoping that JJ Abrams does as kick ass a job with these next ones coming out as he did with the new Star Trek.  Taking my girls to the movies to   see a Star Wars series, like my Dad did with me, would be something I would love to experience with them and that they would hopefully remember forever.