"Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you do not know what it will bring back, a new life, a new friend, a new love, or a new country."

There's something special about a kite when it's soaring in the air...it takes on a life of its own. Getting a kite to take flight makes you feel like you have a little magic of your very own. I haven't been kite flying in years and years, and had spotted kites at the dollar store and picked them up. One warm spring day a few weeks ago, the wind was blowing just right, so we decided to take the kids out in the backyard and introduce them to kite flying.

Did they have Ben10 kites when we were little? I seem to remember balsa wood dowels, tissue paper and tape. Note Mia in the background, trying to achieve liftoff in her princess dress and uggs.

We finally got the knack of it, and Daddy managed to keep the kites up in the air for a long time. The spell was broken when both Aidan's and Mia's kites ended up stuck in our gutter and the neighbor's tree, respectively. Next time we'll have better kites and go to the park for more open space. I'm glad we enjoyed the spring weather, because less than a week later our backyard looked like this: