Oh, the weather outside is frightful

For our fair weather friends (which I still consider myself), you may have burning questions about surviving in arctic weather on the east coast. Well, it was easy up til now - I was thinking, hey, I can deal with New England weather. Alas, but then, my Boston friends reminded me that we were having unseasonably warm weather. Oh.

Well, now all of you who have been on Al Gore's Global Warming bandwagon - give it up 'cuz it's freeeeeeeeeezing here. Ok, don't worry, the K school hasn't made me soft on radical politics. But the weather has made our small apartment seem more and more like a little rat cage for the kids (no offense George and Martha). So there are a variety of indoor gym-like spaces that open up just for the winter, so all of that exuberant kid energy can be vented (hmmm....maybe that could be used as an alternative fuel - see!)

Anyway, so Friday nights we've been going to a co-op gym space. Anita had told us about it, and now we're hooked. It's in a church basement - but it is a gigantic wonderful space - a large gym with oodles of slides and climbing structures that Kalian loves (with safe gym mats underneath), lots of riding toys, even one of those mini-roller rider roller coasters - and then there's another huge room with a toddler area, play kitchen, dress-up and, of course, trains, trucks and lots of stereotypical boy toys. Of course, the best part is the array of tables set up, so grownups can sit and eat pizza or whatever other takeout they've brought, socialize and generally ignore their kids for as long as possible. Ok, not exactly - especially for me since I have such rare opportunities to see the kids - but Liam and Kalian love it so much that they would happily engage themselves without begging for parental attention. It's actually a nice time to hang out with some of our parent friends.

Of course, I had to intervene on Friday when I saw Kalian in the dressup area trying to put on her first pair of f#&k me shoes - yep, those ridiculous barbie slip on heels with the feathery top over the toes. I was simultaneously horrified and curious about her interest in them. And when I sat down next to her to observe, she immediately asked me for help putting them on. What do you think I did?