Winter Fun

After a wild and crazy sledding adventure yesterday afternoon,:

the Rowe family was ready to brave the elements again today, heading out on foot to attend the various "New Years Needham" activities around town. 

First stop was the town library, which was host to a variety of entertainment, including the story-telling we attended.  The kids were captivated as they sat and listened to each story, and Julia was blown away by the fact that the story-teller made references to things that Julia herself knows about.  In response to each thing mentioned, Julia would turn her head, like a whip, to gaze at me in delighted astonishment.  I had to stay on my feet in order to be aware of the significance of every single astonished look.

Among the many things Julia was excited/astonished about: the storyteller's announcement that her next story was a Native American folk tale (Julia did an extensive unit on Native American culture in school this fall), the fact that said Native American tale comes from a tribe that was native to New Hampshire and Vermont (we went to New Hampshire on vacation!  And Daddy grew up in Vermont!!), the matter of the main character in the Native American story taking off his moccasin (Julia made a moccasin out of construction paper at school!), and the fact that the main character in the last story was a girl named Beatrice (Beatrice Quimby!!  From the Ramona books!!)

Madeleine had a different take-away from the whole experience.  After the three tales had been told, the storyteller explained that the final story (about Beatrice) was written by the storyteller herself, inspired by a childhood memory of a squirrel which had fallen through the chimney of her house, caught its tail on fire, and extinguished its tail on the snow outside the house. 

ME: Madeleine, which story was YOUR favorite one?
MADELEINE: Um...when the mouse put his tail in the SNOW to get the FIRE out.

Is she with the program or what??

Second stop was the gymnasium of one of the private schools in town, at which we got to see a really amazing puppet show put on by Tanglewood Marionettes:

Madeleine was thoroughly delighted by the puppet show.  She couldn't control her exclamations of delight about the various happenings throughout the show, starting with the appearance of a magical, sparkly-finned fish.

ME: (whispering) That looks kind of like the Rainbow Fish, huh?
FISH: I am a creature of the sea...
MADELEINE: (turning to me in glee) Mommy!  She's a CREATURE Rainbow fish!

Later on in the puppet show, we viewers got a glimpse of the Dragon Castle, outside of which two Chinese princesses were giggling and comparing ball gowns for the upcoming party that would only occur if the Dragon King came out of isolation.

The key word Madeleine zeroed in on was princesses.

MADELEINE: Mommy!  PRINCESSES!  (pointing to one Chinese marionette) That's JASMINE!  (pointing to the other Chinese marionette) And that one's ARIEL!

Perhaps the most exciting part of the show, for both girls, was when the dragon came out into the audience and sprayed a spritz of water into every row of seats:

Madeleine simply could not contain herself.
"MOMMY!" she squealed, hopping up and down joyously.  "The dragon was my favorite puppet AT ALL!"

Overall, the show was a hit with both kids, and a nice respite from the bitter cold outside, though afterwards we threw ourselves right back into it in order to ride the train at Memorial Park:

I think this may be the first year that Julia realized that riding a kiddie train around a parking lot is not *all* that exciting.

JULIA: Mom?  Why doesn't the train even GO very fast?

Because, Julia.  As I said above.  It's a kiddie train.  In a parking lot.

Our final stop was the marshmallow campfire sing-along in the Freemason Hall. Before the campfire started, the kids were encouraged to dance:

Afterwards, they all sat around the Christmas-light "campfire" with their marshmallows-on-a-stick.  Half of the kids ate their marshmallows right away.  The other half slowly sucked on theirs so that their faces were covered in goo.  Julia, however, decided to play it safe and wait until given CLEAR instructions from the man leading the sing-along before eating hers.  Even when I whispered to her that it was okay to eat it, she was not willing to give into temptation.  "The teacher didn't TELL us we can!" she retorted.

Notice that Madeleine's is all gone already:

On our walk home after all the fun events, Julia fell into her lollygagging reverie, letting Daddy and Madeleine get WAAAAY ahead of us.  I was miserably cold, and encouraged Julia to hurry along because I was so chilly, to which she responded, "Mommy?  Is it okay that I don't feel sad that you're so freezing?"

Nice.

We are now about to head out to our traditional New Years Eve dinner at one of our favorite family-friendly restaurants.  Wishing all of you a safe and happy  New Years Eve!