Effects of Nostalgia

Don't we all get nostalgic now and then for our younger years, our years of innocence, our childhood and all that came with it? We remember our friends, our favorite toys, or favorite places to play, and of course our favorite TV cartoons. Now, thanks to the wonderfulness of the internet you can find almost anything online, especially on Youtube.

Periodically KC and I will spend a few minutes looking up our favorite cartoons and watching the opening credits or some clips from the shows. They are never what you remember them to be. I can't believe I actually enjoyed some of them. I think some shows though are classic. They still inspire the imagination and delight in a little boy or girl.

One of those shows I guess is He-Man. I never really watched it as a kid, though I think I watched She-ra a bit. KC says He-Man was his favorite cartoon when he was about 5 or so. So it's no suprise when the other day KC pulled up the opening credits to He-Man on youtube to show the boys. He was hoping to find an episode to show them, but didn't have any luck. For some reason I remembered seeing that Fancast.com had old cartoons on it and sure enough they have a bunch of He-Man episodes available to watch. So we all gathered around the computer screen and watched it.

Now it's no wonder then, that the night before last I had a certain song in my head all night and the next day, and I had certain phrases run through my head willy nilly. Why? Andrew and Isaac have been watching episodes of He-Man on the computer every chance they get. Isaac has been pointing his play sword in the air and trying to repeat the phrase "By the power of Grayskull!" He only get's out the skull part though. It's cute. They've really been into swords lately and since He-Man uses a Magic Sword, well it's a no brainer they they are drawn to it.

I have to leave the room when they watch it. It annoys the heck outtta me. Why to do they care so much to protect or conquer a land that has no plants and is filled with craggy rocks and mud? Why do they live like they are in stone age/medieval times but they have flying vehicles and computer guidance/targeting systems. Why is the cat/tiger so afraid? Why is Skeletor's voice so high pitched and annoying? What is the deal with those circle shapes on the women's outfits? If you've seen it, you know what I mean. I could go on, but I won't.

There is one redeeming thing about the show. At the end of each episode they have a short moral or uplifting message about something that happened in the show. That is something that a lot of the cartoons out there should have. Still, I'm hoping that this phase blows over soon and I can enjoy more episodes of Wow, Wow Wubbzy and The Backyardigans again. I get those songs stuck in my head too, but they don't annoy me as much.

Kindergarten Here We Come!

Yesterday we celebrated Andrew's 5th birthday with some of my family visiting. Last year we had a friend party for his birthday, this year was just a family party. Grandma and Papa came from Southern Utah to visit for the day and they brought Andrew's cousin Dean with them. We had a great time bowling. Andrew was old enough to handle the ball himself although he couldn't get much speed on the ball. Suprisingly Isaac didn't run off more than once and was a good little boy. I would have never thought the day would come. We went home and had a pizza and chicken nuggets lunch with grapes and hawaiian punch. All Andrew's choice. We then had cake and cake batter flavored ice cream and finally he got to open presents. KC and I got him a new bike since we sorta broke his old one trying this and the old one was a garage sale special. We'll have to work on the no training wheels thing this summer.
Now that Andrew has turned 5 he is quite anxious to go to kindergarten. I feel bad having to explain to him that he has to wait 6 months before he can go. I think he understands though. In the meantime we spend a little time each day doing pages from a Kindergarten workbook.

Happy Birthday Andrew!

Rrroar! Yikes!

"Rrroar!"

"Yikes!"

Sitting next to Isaac in the Energy Solutions Arena during the Walking With Dinosaurs show last night was a treat. A few months ago KC heard about the show and thought it was be a fun thing for the family to do, so we got tickets. The boys have been looking forward to it for a while, and they weren't disappointed.

(We went sledding yesterday morning and Isaac scraped his cheek a bit on the ice.)

The first dinosaur came out was a smaller scary one and Isaac literally yelled "Yikes!" to the delight of all sitting around us. Each one they showed was a wonder to the boys. They had a huge mommy brachiosaur (not sure on the spelling) protecting her kid and later a huge scary Tyrannosaur protecting it's baby from two larger armored dinosaurs. Three Utah Raptors where shown eating a dinosaur corpse. "Yucky!" Isaac said. Andrew says the end with the Tyrannosaurs was his favorite part. They loved the fight between two triceratop-like male dinosaurs as well, Andrew compared it to a Super Smash Bros. fight from the Nintendo. He wasn't fooled by the wires used to make the flying dinosaur fly, but thought it was pretty cool still.


Here is a shortish video showing some of the boys' favorite parts.