questions

finn is a big question asker.  

i know all kids go through a "why" phase, but finn wants to know, when, where and how, also.  

and he is sincerely inquiring.  he really wants to know.

 and he is always satisfied when he is given adequate answers to his questions.  

he is just generally interested in the workings of the world.

i love this about finn.

we have some genuinely good conversations as a result.

now, as a side note, i lay down with finn almost every night before he goes to sleep.  

i usually start to dose off myself while laying there and almost like clockwork, every night before he falls asleep, in a mostly delirious state, he asks me the most random question.
just one question.  every night.

i don't know if his little brain has been following a logical train of thought, but where these questions come from make no sense whatsoever to me.

a few from recently:

"what is ear wax?"

"how do you win risk?"

"why don't you let us watch movies all the time?"

as long as i give him some sort of reasonable answer, his response is always the same.

"oh, i was just wonderin' 'bout that."

and then he goes to sleep.

just for fun.

hope you have a fun weekend.

my little pinch of valentine cheer.

i guess i should have shown that these hearts are about the size of my fingernail.  oh, well.  so, there you have it.  we are totally ready for valentine's day.

so, i went to alt

can i first say, that i loved salt lake city.  i don't really know why, but for some reason, i didn't really expect to.  however, when you wake up in the morning and look all around you at the beautiful mountains, especially covered in snow, its really quite something.  i am making a point to get back there.  and, next time, i am making it to park city...
anyway, we spent our first day there walking the streets and checking out shops and the city.  we didn't do our research very well (or, at all) so we didn't have any good ideas for lunch.  we came up with the plan to walk into anthropologie and ask for a good local recommendation and this is where they sent us...

i knew i was in a good place when i sat down and this poster was hanging above my table.  most of you may think i am joking, but i am entirely serious.  this was a family favorite when we were kids and i couldn't believe we had walked into this random little pizza place in salt lake city that was rocking big trouble in little china art.  fantastic.  (erin, you will be interested to know that most of the artwork in this place was from the alamo drafthouse.)

on to alt the next morning, which was overwhelming and wonderful all at the same time.

 *image from alt design summit 2011's photostream on flickr

for dinner on thursday night bev and christine and i sat with jane and caroline, two lovely bloggers from salt lake city.  it really was so much fun getting to meet so many new, talented and creative people.  obviously, my favorite part about the whole thing (other than just hanging out with bev and christine and declan, of course), was all things photography.  i listened to hands-down the best panel with these two speakers...

 *image from alt design summit 2011's photostream on flickr

rachel devine from sesame ellis and ryan marshall from pacing the panic room.  they are amazing photographers and i learned so much just listening to them talk.  i also learned what a terrible photographer i am, but now i am really motivated to try my best to be a decent good one.

the next day i got to take a class taught by this amazing husband/wife team from blue lily photography.  

*image from blue lily photo

they are amazing photographers and absolutely hysterical.  i mean really laugh-out-loud funny.  if the above picture doesn't convince you, read this.  awesome.  if i was more outgoing, i would have asked them if i could hang out with them.  maybe next year...  

i am sure there is so much more i could write about this whole experience, but i'm tired.  so, if you are really interested you can check out the alt blog (or just about every third blog you come to, i am sure has their own recap).
it was really great.  the end.

interesting logic

this afternoon at 2:55 i called for lucy and finn to hop in the car to go pick up jack.  lucy came straightaway and jumped in the car.  i called for finn a second time and he jumped up yelling, "ok, mommy!"  i simply said, "thanks," not mentioning, as we often do, that would our kids please come the first time we call them.  apparently this has been mentioned enough, however, that finn thought about it.  thus, he explained to me, "i didn't hear you the first time you called me, so when you said it again, it was like i came the first time you called me."  quite pleased with himself for being so obedient, i decided to let him have his moment and i just smiled and said, "thanks, buddy."  he hopped in the car quite proud.  then i started wondering if he was proud of himself for being so good, or because he pulled one over on his mom...

not so sure what these gang signs he's throwing up at me are all about...

where we've been...

nowhere really.  i have just been a huge blog slacker.  i kept trying to post during the holidays, but there was too much fun stuff going on and i didn't want to miss out on any of it.  and then, whenever i did have a spare moment, i had all these dishes and laundry and messy house looking at me as if i better not sit down anywhere near that computer until they were all taken care of.  and i still fell desperately behind on all those chores (possibly prompting pete to suggest "not leaving dishes in the sink" as my new year's resolution...).  anyway, since i am a huge dork and had already started posts earlier, i just left all my holiday posts back where they belong.  thus, if you are interested in seeing any of those, you have some serious scrolling down to do.  and, if not, i hope to be back here a little more frequently, so as to avoid any annoyed comments from luke speier...

lucy and erin

i was just sorting through my pictures and found this one of lucy and erin.  lucy more or less lives and dies for erin.  she absolutely adores her.  when erin is around, lucy doesn't want anyone else.  while erin was here for christmas she, ever so sweetly, took lucy out for the afternoon to do something special just the two of them.  they went to the sugar bowl and then walked around old town scottsdale.  they, of course, had to hit up the mexican import store, where erin bought lucy this fantastic paper flower.  my kids are so lucky to be loved by so many different people.

sorry

ever since we came back from balboa a couple weeks ago, all finn has wanted to do is play sorry.  he and i probably play sorry close to 5 or 6 times every day.  then, he hits up lucy and jack when they get home from school.  anyway, the other day he was setting up the game for us to play and i went to get something in the other room.  i came back and sat down to play and he said, "you go first."  "no, that's ok, you can go," i replied.  "no, you go," he insisted.  ok.  i flipped a card.  10.  nothing.  his turn.  he flips a 2 with a funny smile on his face, gets a guy out and gets to go again.  12, with an even funnier smile on his face.  i asked, "did you put those cards in that order, so you would get those?"  he looked at me, trying to hold back a smile, thought about it for a minute, then said, "yeeeees..."  i told him he couldn't do that, so he apologized and we started the game over.  now, whenever he gets a good card, he looks at me and says, "i didn't even know that i was going to get that!"
the really funny thing about it all to me was that pete and i always laugh about how our kids each have these similarities to their godparents.  obviously there is no real logic to this, we just think it is funny how much it has turned out to be so.  jack does so much that reminds us of al (mr. practical), but also of my sister mary (slightly sensitive).  pete freaks out all the time over how much lucy reminds him of christine.  finn was the only one we hadn't quite pinpointed as either of his godparents.  so, here is where this all ties together.  there is a story in the burch family that is often told about a time when bev got a phone call from pat's kindergarden teacher expressing concern over the fact that pat kept rigging the cards in candyland...  so there you have it.

baths

what is it about bath pictures?  i just love them...

presents for lucy

i love the things lucy comes up with to want for her birthday or christmas.  last year on her birthday all she wanted was a typewriter.  a real one that she could really type on, just like kit kittredge.  this christmas all she wanted was a golden key (i read her the story "the golden key" by george macdonald and she loved it, thus the request).  currently she keeps telling me that all she wants for her next birthday is a camera.  a real one that she can take real pictures on, just like kit.  i have to say, for anyone who doesn't like american girl dolls, they sure have encouraged lucy to like very interesting things...

finnmas tree

if you want to make taking down your christmas tree a good time, just dress your kids up like christmas trees...

kitchen helpers

finn and lucy have been big into helping in the kitchen lately.  i love it.  it makes me more motivated to be in there myself.  and this cornbread we are making is just about the tastiest cornbread ever.  i will have to get that recipe up over on pots and peter pans soon...