School let out for my children on Friday!
Well, let’s have a slightly closer look at that statement, because actually, two of my three school-age children weren’t in school, per se, that day so the end of school was a bit more fuzzy. A-, my oldest at 18, is in an online school and she’s close, but not quite done with 12th grade. G-, my 15yo son, is taking a bit of a break from school and is in a wilderness program in Utah right now. Which leaves K-, who at 11 was the sole student actually in school. Thank goodness one of ’em was in school, at least. 🙂
To celebrate the end of school, K- and I had all sorts of adventures this weekend, starting with her dying her hair with Kool-Aid. Who knew it would work?
Look like an uncomfortable pose? Yeah, and she had to sit like that for 25min to get the portion of her hair in the bowl to turn red. A very cool effect that was, disappointingly, mostly dissipated by hours spent in a chlorine-heavy public pool on Saturday at a sleepover party. Still looks cute, but much less vivid than the initial effect!
Saturday while she was at her sleepover, I went to see the Colorado Rockies beat the Miami Marlins and after the initial deluge that delayed the start of the game 75 minutes, we had a fun ballgame. It also reminded me of how the social aspect of going to a game can overcome the tedium of hours upon hours of watching a sport you’re not particularly caught up in. 🙂
Sunday my girl and I met up with my friend Steve and had lunch at a favorite Denver restaurant, BD’s Mongolian BBQ, followed by a stroll around the popular Denver Chalk Art Festival. Here was one of the most impressive, in progress, working in the middle of multiple streets full of artists showing off their chalk skills:
Some people are saddened that the art washes away but I like the ephemeral nature of chalk art. It’s rather zen.
From there, we headed over to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science for a special Mythic Creatures exhibit. Like my daughter, who is herself a somewhat mythic creature, certainly when it comes time to do chores or homework!
Lots of really cool exhibits around mermaids, dragons, unicorns, Bigfoot, Chupacabra, and many other creatures to spark our imagination. Nothing too intense or creepy, though if you read some of the signage a few of the mythic creatures were a bit hungry for us humans, whether it was us en toto or just specific parts of our bodies. ‘nuf said in that regard.
My favorite of the creatures, the massive Roc:
It’s the original “Big Bird”, but no cute yellow feathers for this guy and I’m confident he’d have been happy to have Bert and Ernie for lunch. Literally!
We also wandered around the exhibits in the first floor of the Museum, notably the gem exhibit, a favorite of my daughter’s, but then again who doesn’t enjoy seeing gorgeous gems and jewels? Some of the best portions of that permanent exhibit are about silver mining, a critical part of Colorado history, as highlighted in this particular display of from Creede, considered the very last of the silver boom towns of Colorado:
A busy weekend, but a great way to enjoy our first post-school weekend!