Alaska: Day 11

Last night, I gave a teaser for today's post: I got to pet a dinosaur! A baby dinosaur!

This is a fossilized dinosaur footprint. It was just being brought into the lab while we were visiting Denali. Because we have great friends, the paleontologist (NOT archaeologist) carrying it stopped to give us a look. It was a three-toed beastie, quite young based on the size. And the coolest thing? You could see skin impressions -- the actual texture of the beastie-skin:

See those ripples in the rock? That's the skin. I got to touch it. Pet it. Like you'd pet a baby dinosaur. Pretty darn cool, right?!

The Dinosaurs

Many of you may remember this picture of the Wright Family, taken last fall at the height of Darcy's Wright Brothers obsession. All animals and toys were available to play a part in Darcy's fantasy of the 21st century Cima branch of the Wright clan. The Wright Brothers have waned as play objects these days, although the blue baby and Mickey Mouse are still Orv and Wil about 50% of the time. You might be tempted to think that all the animals could now go back to being themselves, but you would be wrong.

Instead, they have been drafted into Darcy's current dinosaur enthusiasm. Almost every night after dinner, she asks if we can all go up to play with her "dinosaurs". She does own about a dozen solid plastic/rubber/whatever dinosaur figures and they occasionally get to play dinosaur with her. Tonight, they did not. They stayed put in the toy storage bin. The teddy bears (mostly giganotosaurus), dogs and cats (triceratops[ies]), octopi and monkeys (oryctodromeus), and assorted other dinosaur stand-ins do most of the heavy lifting. It's a little disconcerting, but then it's also disconcerting to watch Darcy page through a book about dinosaurs, get to a particularly fierce T. rex and hear her coo, "Oh! A T-rex! Isn't he so cute?"

Those of you who play Facebook have already heard this story, but for those of you who don't, Darcy was recently at a playground next to our community garden. I was working in the dirt while she and Michael went to play. A little boy was playing there too and he took out a dinosaur and showed it to Darcy saying, "Look -- a dinosaur!" And Darcy looked at it and said, "Oh what a cute parasaurolophus!" And she was right! When I asked her about it tonight, she told me that he had a hadrosaur. That's also correct, because parasaurolophus was a type of hadrosaur.

I figure that we have about two months left of the total fascination with dinosaurs before she moves onto something new. The Wrights stuck around for almost exactly six months and we're now on month four of dinosaur everything. It will be very interesting to see what gets her interest next.

Drinks, Fungus, And Actual News

The pictures don't have much to do with the post, but I know everyone likes pictures! So here's a series of Darcy trying to drink from an outside water fountain. She had seen some other kids playing at it earlier and I think that and the big puddle of water at its base (from the playing) made her view this differently than every other water fountain she's used in the past. Michael first had to demonstrate the technique.

Then there was a serious attempt.

And then there were just giggles.

And about twenty minutes later, there were teeny-tiny mushrooms growing in the debris on a downed redwood log. The range of fungus types up here (and mosses and lichens, too) is incredible.

In actual news, Darcy has moved on from her obsession (my mom says I should call them "enthusiasms", but I've already got an obsessions label for this blog) with the Wright Brothers! Other than a very occasional slip-up, I am no longer Will. And Michael is no longer Orv. We are infrequently mommy and daddy, much to Michael's delight. (His delight is that it happens at all, not that it happens infrequently.) More often, we are reflections of her new obsession.

After six months of living and breathing the Wright Brothers, we now live in a dinosaur nest. When we've been running errands (a lot) this week, Darcy has asked several times, "Is it time to go back to our nest?" In keeping with the new theme, Michael and I are Mr. and Mrs. Pteranodon. In case you're not up with your Cretaceous Era critters, here's a tutorial on pteranodons. Pteranodons were fish-eaters, so all treats (candy, Christmas presents, cakes) are fish now. Darcy is a T. rex. Buddy the T. rex, to be exact, the orange beastie seen in the birthday summary post.

My small T. rex is waking up now. I expect to hear, "Good morning, Mrs. Pteranodon!!!" at any moment, so I'd better wrap this up.

For those of you who haven't already heard, I got a job offer on Friday and will start working full-time in February. The hunt for day care prospects has begun in earnest and at some point when I don't have a dinosaur waking up from her nap, I'll even provide more details.

In the meantime, Merry Christmas to you all and for those of you who sent the packages under our tree, thanks for all the fish!