Sugar cookies

My parents were in town last weekend, and my mom brought up her baking supplies so we could making sugar cookies with my little sister. It was a huge success!

She had never made sugar cookies before and loved the whole process - rolling out the dough, punching out the shapes, decorating them with frosting and sprinkles. But her absolute favorite was adding the food coloring to the frosting; she had never played with food coloring before and thought it was the coolest thing ever. After the cookies were all done, we just filled a bunch of cups with water so she could further experiment with different food coloring combinations - she was very scientific about it, and tried every possible combination of the four colors we had.

Also - we had this funny exchange when I picked her up:

LS: My sisters and I stayed up until midnight last night listening to music!
Me: Wow! Aren't you tired?
LS: No, I never get tired!
Me: Really? You never ever get tired?
LS: Never! Except for at night, when I get tired.

Kids are the best.

Hanging with my little sister

My little sister* was in a really funny mood today, I think because she was insanely excited about a sleepover birthday party at a hotel that she was going to after I left. We had a bunch of ridiculous conversations - I wish I had been writing them down since I know there were more, but here are the top three I remember:

LS: What would happen if it rained gumballs??! [There was absolutely zero context for this question, by the way.]
Me: It would probably hurt!
LS: Nuh uh, how could a gumball hurt?
Me: Imagine if someone threw a gumball at your head really hard.
LS: I would throw it right back at them!!!

LS: When I grow up I'm going to start a business and live in a pink mansion with a pink swimming pool and pink hot tub. [If you can't tell, pink is her favorite color.]
Me: That sounds awesome - am I allowed to visit?
LS: Yes, but it will be really far away. It will be in California.
Me: Why will it be in California?
LS: Because that's where businesses come from. Duuuuuh.

LS: [Talking about playing school with her little sisters, and pretending to be their math teacher.] I taught them about the nominator and the equinominator.
Me: The numerator and the denominator?
LS: No, the nominator and the equinominator.
Me: [Thinking this was some new math thing that I'm ignorant of] I haven't heard of those before.
LS: That's because I made them up! [She then proceeded to explain that the "nominator" is the math problem itself ("2 + 2") and the "equinomator" is the solution ("4"). She had her sisters underline the nominator and box the equinominator for a bunch of math problems - she even made worksheets for them. I love that she is nerdy enough to make up math terms for fun!]

* The one I am mentoring, not the one I shared a uterus with. The uterus one actually came for a visit today, which was excellent, but she wasn't quite so adorable. No offense, Mariel.

Conversation with my Little Sister today

Her: Guess what? I have a new friend! Her name is Michelle!
Me: That's great! Did you meet her at school?
Her: No.
Me: Does she live in your neighborhood?
Her: No.
Me: Did you meet her at church?
Her: No.
Me: Did you meet her at your after school program?
Her: No.
Me: Okay, I give up. Where did you meet her?
Her: My imagination.

Science!

Yesterday was the annual Philadelphia Science Festival's culminating "science carnival," and Ben and I both brought our "littles" (from Big Brothers Big Sisters). We went separately and didn't even see each other there, but my little and I had a great time - she blew giant bubbles, played with cool underwater robots, and even made her own lip gloss. There was a giant inflatable brain you could walk through, a blimp, a zoo booth with a bunch of different animals, and even a Ben Franklin impersonator walking around (she couldn't quite decide if she believed he was "real" or not). Almost all of my pictures are of my little doing fun stuff so I can't post them here, but here's a picture she took of me with a model of the space shuttle:

Science party yesterday and Star Wars Day today - what a great nerdy weekend!