story starters

I have a confession.  Most of the time, I hate playing pretend with my kids.
I know.  I'm terrible.  I can hear their little imaginations being crushed as I type these words.

Here's the thing.  No one ever wants to do my ideas!!  About 20 times every day Eloise says, "Okay, guys what do you want to play, sing, or do?"  No matter what I suggest we always end up with a variation on roughly 5 different scenarios created by Eloise.  The scenarios have changed throughout the years but not before they are done to death.

My ideas are always something like, "Let's pretend Mommy has fallen into a deep, deep sleep on the couch and there is only one secret word that will wake her up--what is it?"  Or maybe, "Mommy is at the doctor's office in a deep, deep sleep and the doctor is trying to figure out what is wrong with her."  Or even, "We are all in a contest called the 'Deep, Deep Sleep Contest'--do you think you can beat Mommy?"

A couple of years ago my friend sent me a post she had come across on another blog.  I loved the idea and thought the day would come when it would be perfect for Eloise and even Harriet.  The author was in a similar pretend play rut so she came up with oodles of ideas to start different stories.  She printed them all out and and made a cute little game out of them.  You take turns drawing a story starter and let your imaginations run wild acting it out however you choose.

We did the same thing over the weekend and it was a huge success.  It is fun to pretend again!

You can make up your own ideas to suit your family's interests or genders and ages, but check out these downloadable ones courtesy of Penny Carnival.  Just reading them is kind of entertaining.  I'm sure we'll need to replenish ideas after a bit, but for now the creative juices are definitely flowing.

cutting out the story starters

getting ready to play

"one of you is a monkey the other is a 

giraffe.  you live at the zoo.  the zookeeper

drops his keys in your cage so 

now you can get out!"

"you are two dogs locked in a cage

at the animal shelter, waiting to 

be adopted"

"you look up in the sky and realize the rainbow

has lost all of it's colors.  how will you help the

 rainbow get it's colors back?"

I'm actually not sure which one they are doing here 

so I'll just say, 

"you are two girls taking a pretend nap on a gnarly

princess blanket.  your mom is yelling at you to 

hurry up because you are going to be late

for school.  you are both wearing tap shoes"

let's do lunch

*

Eloise is taking her lunch to school every day now.  I was pretty excited about this idea and put some preparations in order.

We picked out a lunch box along with coordinating water bottle, snack containers, thermos, and backpack.  We went to the store and got the organic milk, the organic apples, and all the healthy snacks and items that would be good for lunches and the daily required snack.  We made sure there were no peanuts in anything (which bugs the hell out of me and takes many easy options off the table).  We got a little frozen pack, naturally, shaped like a pink flower, that goes in the lunch box to keep things out of a botulism danger zone.  I got some cute little papers to write a note everyday.  I even sewed little reusable 'baggies' so we wouldn't have to waste ziplocs everyday.

Even I was starting to get annoyed by me.

As I am getting the 2011 version of lunch ready every day, I can't help but think of the 1979 lunches we used to have as kids, and laugh.  My dad would surely get a kick out of my version.

I'm sure my mom made thousands of lunches throughout our school years but my dad's lunches are the ones that stick out in my mind.  My dad's lunches were epic.

Some of my all time favorites from my dad were the always classic CheezWhiz and mustard sandwich.  A close second was the peanut butter and mayonnaise sandwich.  Bologna and Fritos were almost always present but a few times my dad broke up taco shells from the previous night's dinner and tried to pass them off as Tostitos in our lunch.

We were always a brown bag family.  Some days we would run out of brown paper bags so my dad would pack it in an empty bread bag.  There was always a handful of breadcrumbs lingering in the bottom, getting all over everything.   The whole lunch would be slip down to the bottom of this 2 feet long bag as we carried it, creating a nunchuck-like effect.  Incidentally, I think those might have been the same bread bags that we wore over our shoes inside our winter boots.

Sometimes we would be out of baggies so everything would be wrapped in aluminum foil.  I tell you, it was a hard week when a baggie shortage/foil lunch one time coincided with having some cavities filled at the dentist.

You wouldn't think that school lunches would matter that much to kids but I still think about the other kids' lunches that I coveted.  I always wanted a real lunch box and a  Campbell's Soup thermos.  I always wanted my sandwiches cut on the diagonal into triangles.  I always wanted a Capri Sun in my lunch.  I longed for a cute little note written on a napkin---or a napkin, for that matter.   I never mentioned any of these things to my parents.  I think the response would have been something like "you get what you get and you don't get upset" or  "some kids don't even get to eat lunch" or "when you have your own kids, you can make them whatever kind of lunches you want, Elizabeth".

Well, that is what I have been doing

Every day, as I pack the 'pefect' lunch with all the 'right' things in it, I know that somewhere, my dad is rolling his eyes and breaking apart a taco shell.

all packed and ready to go

these are the snack baggies I have been making.

they have been working great, so easy, and cute too!

the link to the tutorial is above

lunchbox action shot

chinatown

Recently, Eloise let me know that she has never ridden on a boat in her whole life!

Wait, before you call DCFS, we have remedied the situation.

We were staring down a beautiful day, had no plans, and Mike did not have to work.  We thought it would be fun to go on a little adventure with the girls and did just that.

We packed up a few things and walked over to the Metra station and grabbed a train to the city.  From there we took a water taxi down to Chinatown for only $2.00. The boat ride is just long enough.  Only a few minutes but there is a lot to see and the views of the city on the return trip are beautiful.  Thank goodness, Eloise can now cross 'boat ride' off her bucket list.

There is a great park at the Chinatown water taxi stop and the taxis leave every 15 minutes so you could just hop off and play for a bit or head in to Chinatown for lunch and some sightseeing.  We did the latter and I am so glad.

We walked around and looked at all the shops, had a delicious lunch at one of the many restaurants, watched someone making ramen noodles by hand, bought some souvenirs, and danced in the town square.  Well, Harriet danced.  We laughed.

We caught a late afternoon water taxi and did the whole thing in reverse.  Great day and wonderful end to the summer.

The best line of the day was when we were reading a plaque in the town square about how paper was invented in China.  I could see the wheels turning in Eloise's head and she said, "Mom, I think they invented pencils there too because all of my pencils say 'Made in China' on them".

Awesome.

harriet thoughtfully riding the train

here comes the taxi

taxi stand in chinatown

eloise's new favorite... bubble tea

harriet's new favorite... shrimp tempura

headed back to the city on the taxi 

with dada