Paige Lee Hoyt

One week, after I got back home from a trip, Paige and Marna met me for lunch. After lunch we walked around the outdoors mall, and made our way over to one of the boutique stores that sold accessories. For my geek friends, no, not accessories as in iPod cases or USB-enabled peripherals, but accessories as in earrings, hair extensions, and lip gloss.

We actually stopped by the store looking for a wand and crown for Paige's Halloween costume, a Snow Princess. I said "Ice Princess" but she disagreed. While we were there, we also saw some hair extensions that would work great for the upcoming Awana crazy hair night. Snap them in just before you have to go, and snap them back out when you're done.

For the next three weeks we heard non-stop requests for "how many sleeps" (Paige's unit of measurement for a "day") until crazy hair night. No, not for Halloween, or for the custom made costume that her Grandma Pat made for her, or the bags of candy and staying up late, but for crazy hair night. When it finally came, as one might expect, she was elated!

She even got an extra splash of purple spray in her hair. Where did she get that? Well, this year, I went with an all purple hairdo. There were a few sprays left in the can afterwards, and so Paige got a little extra splash of color.

After the attractions we moved onto the checkout process. There's always an assortment of other melons and such available, and Marna picked up some smaller pumpkins for her Awana kids. Grandma picked up Paige some cotton candy and a carmel covered apple. Despite some miscommunication on when Paige could eat the apple, she did eventually get a chance while showing off her Halloween costume to Grandma Linda at a nearby McDonald's.

My only hope for this particular pumpkin patch is that it doesn't get too successful. There used to be something quaint about a quiet and peaceful morning out on the farm picking a pumpkin. This year it was a zoo (and not with animals, with people). The extra attractions really took away from the simple pleasure of those more natural means of entertainment. As a good friend of mine says (and I'll paraphrase), why do people always have to go for bigger and better? Why can't they just let something that's perfect, stay perfect?

This is one of those pictures that compositionally is quite bad, but that will make at least three other parents quite happy. With due respect for those that don't want their children on the internet, it is also one of those that shows as few distinguishing features as possible.

This is Paige's second and last year in Cubbies. Her vest is filling out nicely with awards, and she already looking forward to being five and moving on to Sparks. I think this has to do mostly with the fact that she's grown considerably over the past year, and that she's finding the first-year Cubbies to be less than tolerable. She doesn't seem to recall that she too was in that position the year previous. Not that a four year old should of course, which is why she's ready to move on.

Some of her friends from other church activities, or the friends she plays with before and after Awana, are also already in Sparks, so she misses them when she has to head off to Cubbies.

There's some new leaders this year too, which has added some great freshness to our group. Two of the younger leaders in Cubbies, who happened to be Truth in Training students last year, run the Cubbie games most of the time. This usually consists of "Duck. Duck. Goose." where the kids express their tendencies towards favoritism, and becomes dull quickly. The follow-up then is "Red light. Green light." where everybody is so competitive that they really don't care so much about the rules, or lights, and just run for the game leader.

I was surprised then the other day when I walked in to see them playing musical chairs. I was also surprised to see how well the kids were playing the classic game. Everybody seemed to be able to related to running around in circles while dancing to music. And everybody seemed to enjoy dashing to sit in a chair. When a chair was taken away, and one player was removed, there were no tears, simply anticipation for who would finally win. For the record, when there was only one of the chairs left above, Paige was sitting in it making her the winner.

Last year Paige made a really good showing, once down the straightaway, but was unable to qualify for anything else. She didn't get any assistance, and was competing of her own abilities. This included literally straight-arming herself off the floor to be close enough to blow into the sail. Her competitor was fortunate enough to have a leader as a mommy and got a little boost. Really, it's all about the fun, but we were sad to see Paige lose, and had high hopes for her this year.

While the races were more evenly matched this year, sadly Paige got only one run in before being beaten by another clubber, Jamie. I think the loss this year really goes to Paige's parents, who in their eagerness to see her win, gave her some last minute coaching advice en route to the church. Paige only partially understood those directions, and although she followed what she understood about taking deep breaths and blowing as fast as she could, it just wasn't enough to win.

The interpretation ended up being simply to blow as fast as she could, which meant her sail never had enough wind behind it to gain momentum. Jamie on the other hand went on to first place.

While I was taking pictures of the races, I couldn't help but get caught up in the geek in me. It wasn't long before I was imagineering all fashion of sensors and timers that would automatically log times and promote winners to subsequent rounds. These thoughts were of course followed by thoughts of data mining, and in wanting to chart the speed of the yachts during the duration, as well as the force of the air hitting the actual sails themselves.

Of course, it's way beyond me as to how to actually make all that happen, so I smiled at the split piece of PVC used as a track and pressed the shutter on my camera.

We've been so busy this year, that we barely had time to make the annual visit to the pumpkin patch. It quite simply came down to this one weekend, or not at all, and it turns out that the weather was so nice (for once) that everybody else had the same idea. We spent forever in lines and fighting crowds - demonstrably more than in years past. That's probably where I get really on edge. Then to further matters, Paige was about as nimble in the pumpkin patch as a bunny on a manicured lawn. Keeping her in vocal range became challenging.

At the end of the day, we came away with five large pumpkins (and a bunch of smaller ones as gifts). One got painted, and then received press-in face parts the day of Halloween; kind of like Mr. Potato Head. One was left to me to carve, and I went with a good old fashioned toothy smile with triangular features. Marna let Paige pick the last design, which became an amazingly detailed Tinker Bell. I think Marna is still shaking off the finger cramps from carving that one.

Paige's senses and depth of knowledge have come a long way as well. She definitely gets that activity of selecting a pumpkin now. In years past, it was merely any exercise for her to navigate a bunch of weeds. She's also learning about color, texture, and starting to form her own opinions about what makes a good pumpkin and doesn't. She now see the splattered guts of broken pumpkins and says "Eww, yuck" based on appearance alone.

It has been a great experience for Marna and I to watch her grow. While back on the home front, Paige isn't particularly eager to be involved in cleaning out the pumpkins, it will be interesting to see her opinions and values changes on what makes a good pumpkin in the years ahead. Will she finally get that we're looking for a good place to carve some fashion of face or design?

For a while now, both last year at preschool, and this year, Paige has been going to preschool with one of her friends, Ally. Ally and Paige actually met when they were both much younger, and the neighborhood had a play group. That's two days a week she see's Ally. Well, now Ally has joined Paige's dance class, which makes it three days per week.

We used to get reports that the bond between Ally and Paige was so strong that they'd not play with other kids at preschool. We even went so far as to be proactive about it this year and tell the preschool teacher up front that they shouldn't be afraid to separate them. You might think the three days a week would really undo it, but as it turns out, I think they're actually getting enough of one another.

The latest reports put them expanding their horizons and mingling with new classmates. Maybe they're getting sick of one another?

Where we went camping is important. Lynx Pass Campground is where I first learned to fish, as well as both of my sisters, Christy and Casey. When I think back to all the camping we used to do in my youth, Lynx Pass is easily the location that most often comes to mind. Well, it has been twenty years since my last visit, and we returned this time with Paige, continuing the circle of learning to fish.

We actually got Paige a fishing pole about a week before the trip. A rainy week before the trip. No matter however, as Paige would sit merrily in the garage casting out onto the driveway for hours on end. She was thrilled when she finally go to throw it into a real lake. Then after a few casts, she was rather disappointed by the lack of her ability to catch anything, and moved onto rock climbing.

This most certainly had something to do with the fact that she didn't have a hook on her line, but also that she only left her line out for a minute before reeling it back in.

Paige has always been outdoors-y. She'll do just about anything, including clean up her toys, if it means she can go outside. The freedom of an entire forest to explore was a real treat for her. Being around grandma and grandpa, and even sleeping in their camper was also a real treat (though I'm pretty sure the grandparents will be just about exhausted when they get home). Paige saw numerous deer, chipmunks, squirrels, hummingbirds, and even helped dad identify species of wildflowers.

On the morning of the last day, Paige and grandpa got up early to give fishing one more try. After a little more honing of the lure, they finally caught one on grandpa's pole. She got to see the action and even touch the "sticky" fish, a little brook trout. When asked if she wanted to eat it, she replied that she didn't like fish. She later decided that her tummy was hungry for that fish, but it had long since been released.

One day, after Paige's pre-kindergarten class, she and Marna went over to the studio and enrolled Paige for lessons. Paige has always loved dancing around the house with mom and dad - especially since dad is 6' 7" and can hoist Paige to significant heights for thrilling moves. There's no hoisting here however, with the class tackling ballet first, and tap later.

No little dancer would be complete of course without her pink leotard and tutu.

It's too early to be sure if Paige's enjoyment of dance vis a vis the Daddy Express translates well into something more formal, but so far she is definitely showing interest. On the first day of class Paige remarked to the instructor that the tap shoes were too noisy. To which came the swift reply of "well now, that's why you're here isn't it?"

Marna has been getting more involved with home schooling now as well. In addition to Paige's normal pre-kindergarten classes, Marna also works with her daily on a variety of books, stories, writing exercises, and so on. The curriculum she's currently using is the Sonlight curriculum, which was recommended by a friend whom home schools her three boys.

Each path is not without its own challenges. Paige is very strong willed, so the more formal classroom setting of this year is being actively tested. She's actually already had to go to "time out" for interrupting during "circle time". Conversely, while Paige has made remarkable strides forward in various areas at home, both mother and daughter seem to wane in the area of patience by the end of the week.

Many of Paige's classmates from last year are in this years class including her closest friend, Ally. We look forward to Christmas recitals and other photo opportunities in the year ahead.