Kid-friendly Weekend

We use the adjective "kid-friendly" a lot in our pages, but I have to admit that weekends aren't usually that kid-friendly in my family. Between laundry, grocery shopping, house cleaning and all that routine, we're happy just to get outside and play or take a family walk. Sunday evenings, I sometimes look at the RPM calendar and go, "Oh, yeah--that would've been neat to see..."

But this weekend the kids lucked out. Emily spent Friday night at a friend's house, then they went to the Christmas parade together on Saturday morning. Manuel took Helen to the parade, too.

I overheard the girls talking to each other when we were all back at the house: Emily, 10, started in with a jaded, "It wasn't that great" analysis, but Helen was describing the charming antics of the Hello Kitty balloon with such unjaded, 4-year-old enthusiasm that Emily, bless her heart, realized that she should just keep her big-girl opinions to herself.

In the afternoon, I took both girls to the Children's Museum. I performed Christmas music with a violinist in the Commons area, then the girls and I played in the exhibits. I hadn't been to CMoR in many, many months, and it was great to see the changes.

The new apple tree has several improvements over the old tree--most importantly, small children can actually reach the apples to pick them now. Plus, the tree itself is more attractive--it looks like it grew to life from the pages of a children's book.

The "Tower of Power" has been removed, allowing more light from the dramatic skylight to reach the floor. In its place is a low-key dinosaur play area, including two bone excavation pits. (One has sand and one has chopped-up rubbery bits, so don't wear your nice clothes.)

But wait... there's more! On Sunday we headed to the Modlin Center at the University of Richmond to see a performance of "Pincus and the Pig" by the Shirim Klezmer Orchestra.

I had to wake Helen up from her nap, unfortunately, to make the 3 p.m. performance, and it was quite a scene. The drive there was long enough for the screaming to settle into some noisy kvetching, then into irrational insistence that I carry her into the auditorium barefoot, then into a resigned clamming of the hands upon the ears. But the hands came off eventually, and we all loved the show.

And now the weekend is over, children are in bed, and it's a nice, quiet, mom-friendly evening.