Megan's Space

Alex attends a Montessori school here in Huntsville. Around the holidays, they send home a catalog filled with great books and materials that are in line with the general educational philosophies of the school. The toys and games (“materials” in Montessori-speak) are all educational in one way or another and are things that you won’t generally see in the regular stores. Their hope is that you will order from the catalog because the school gets a credit to order their own materials when school families give the school’s special code. As much as I wanted to order some of these great materials, I just couldn’t bring myself to pay the prices in this catalog. Yes, I could have considered the order a donation, but even then it was pushing it.

I put together a list anyway, thinking I would pass it along to any relatives who were still looking for gift ideas. As I did that, I realized that a lot of the things on the list were all from the same German company, Haba. A little Google research revealed several internet retailers here in the US, including Padilly. I put together a hypothetical order, which included all the items in the Montessori catalog, a few extras, and some gifts for friends. It turned out to be far less costly than the original catalog, so I went ahead and ordered. The order got here faster than I thought possible and everything was packaged very well for the journey. They even included a hand-written thank you note! I can’t remember the last time I was surprised by customer service – in the positive direction.

When we opened everything, I was genuinely surprised by the quality of even these little games.  The pieces are made of wood, not plastic, and the boxes are the most adorable little metal boxes, not cheap cardboard that will be crushed the first time a little foot steps sideways.  Rod and I even broke out the Junior Poker set one day when Alex was with his grandparents to “test” it and make sure it was appropriate for a three year old.  It was, of course.

HABA toys go on our “good” list and I highly recommend Padilly if you’re in the market for a great online toy store!

The weather forecasters threaten it several times each year, but it’s only happened once in the nearly seven years I’ve lived in Huntsville – until last night. When we woke up this morning there was a good covering on the ground. It’s that really heavy and wet stuff that isn’t good for much, but it’s nice to look at. Alex was very excited when I showed him and wanted to go outside to play in it. Unfortunately, it had already started raining so that didn’t happen.

The first time I saw it snow here was the very first winter I lived in Huntsville. I woke up one Sunday morning, looked outside of my apartment and saw snow. I had just moved here from the Frozen North, so this wasn’t anything exciting to me. Around lunchtime, Buddy (my cat) and I decided that a Mexican pizza from Taco Bell sounded pretty good, so I headed out. I got to Taco Bell, pulled to the drive-thru, and waited. And waited. I thought they were open on Sundays, but a lot more things are closed on Sunday here than they are in the Frozen North. I drove around to check the hours. Yes, they were definitely supposed to be open. What the heck was going on? Then I looked around. My car was the only one out on any of the roads. My tire tracks were the only ones that had disturbed the three inches of fluffy snow on the ground. I still couldn’t figure it out. Then it hit me. I think I actually said “you have got to be kidding me” out loud. I went back to my apartment and turned on the TV to confirm my theory. Yes, Huntsville was closed. Every store, factory, and restaurant had their name crawling along the bottom of the screen to let everyone know they were closed. Some were even announcing closures for the next day! This was a completely foreign concept to me. It warmed up that day and some of the snow melted, but it got cold again overnight, so it all froze again. The city doesn’t own even one snowplow, so they were not able to clear the roads before the second freeze and everyone got another day off. A guy I worked with, who is originally from Ontario, just laughed when I asked him about it. “Welcome to the South.”