The Sunchild decided to sort Legos yesterday. Usually, I am the one to attempt to create order out of chaos in the Lego area, with his resistant help. This time, he decided that he wanted to collect all of the white pieces into one area so that he could make something. I was doing some packing and whatnot, and began freeing up more containers for his project.

This picture shows the result. He wanted to sort by color, like he has seen at Mr. Cap's store, in Chesterland. It was actually much quicker than the schema I had been using, which was to sort by piece classification. This way is far more simple, and easier to put into practice. I like the way the buckets of pieces look rather like paints on a palette... 

Spring is in the Air!

...and that makes it all the more difficult to sit myself down and write about all the fun things we have been up to lately. The lupines and the lilies have poked their curious tips up into the air, and the weather is wet, but with a hint of warmth for a change. The sap is moving in the trees, the birds are dancing up a storm, and our stuff is slowly making its way into boxes and bags.

This past weekend, we had a chance to forget about moving for a little bit. We went to see The Wind in the Willows at the Cleveland Play House. (I was hoping for a more interesting link, but there isn't much of a write-up about the show.) We enjoyed the performance immensely. The Sunchild picked Badger as his favorite character.

Of course, Bionicles & Legos are never far from our agenda in these parts. We have been reading from the Unofficial Lego Builder's Guide, and this has inspired him to new feats of creativity with the material he already has. He had been making more buildings, robots, and working with the concept of scale. We sorted his collection again, which always helps smooth out the creative process. "It's amazing what you find when you bother to clean up!" he told me the other day. He has also been working on creating Rahi for his collection (Rahi means 'wild beast' in Bioniclespeak). I want to take pictures of them, but he is so prolific that it is hard to keep up!

We did discover Lego Digital Designer today. This is a neat program, which in many ways, reminds me of a simple CAD or designing program. He can choose from sets of differing pieces, manipulate them graphically, save his designs, and print out a brick list. In fact, (and here is the commercial application) he can even order his designs, with a custom built box to go with it. I don't know if we will get that far, but he did design something today and has printed out the bricklist in order to see what he already has in his collection.

He went rollerskating again this past Saturday. He is doing laps on his own now, with 46 seconds being his best lap time. I am excited to go with him soon & see his developing skill.

We have read (and listened to) quite a few stories (and audiobooks). We have one disc to go in The Hobbit, which is what we listened to whilst playing with Legos today. We also read a version of The Odyssey, and I caught him playing Bionicle & the Cyclops shortly thereafter. The Secrets of Droon are our latest series, and I have been keeping our stash of folktales & the lore of fantastical creatures well stocked from the library. Speaking of which, I think it is now time for a story...

We had the car last Friday, so we went on a trip to the Chagrin North Nature Center. The very first thing the Sunchild did once we arrived was to go to the drawing table, grab supplies, and sit down to draw some birds from the identification poster. I sat and knitted for a while, and watched the birds.

Eventually, school let out, and children began to arrive at the Center. He made friends with a girl a few years older than himself, and with many giggles, they played in the nocturnal exhibit. They were being dragons, and were on a mission to save the animals from the forest fire by leading them to safety. This went on for some time, until it was time to head to the library. Luckily, we found quite a few good books on dragons, and have been reading about them all week long.

This artistic impulse has been prominent, as well. The Sunchild has been getting out paper, and drawing maps. He did this with his best buddy D last week, during their weekly get-together. He has been in a creative frenzy of cartography ever since, and plans on bringing all of his work with him on our next visit to D's house.

We have been drawing together, as well. We pulled out some of the dragon books, and tried our hands at drawing them. I showed him how I am not very adept at drawing dragons from my mind, because my mental image of them is unclear; yet when I copy something I can see, it becomes easier. He tried this approach with good success, and now his made up dragons are even better than ever.

I had the opportunity to go to the library alone last night (ah, the joy of it!) and found quite a few kid's videos on drawing, cartooning, and sketching. We watched one last week, and he really enjoyed it, so I wanted to give him some more choices to select from.

Today, he had a movie date with Nana. He will have a sleepover, and is going roller skating tomorrow. He has been doing this regularly (we all went last Sunday) and has been having a great time. It is good to get him interested in something active, as his geek genes show up in a strong tendency to spend endless hours indoors, fussing with minutae in awkward positions. We have been dancing lately, but not often enough. I hope to do more of that once we relocate to the West Coast.