Nov. 25, 2009 M, You Really Know how to have Fun
On Monday, the weather report was for pouring rain all day with only a little bit of sunshine first thing in the morning. So decided to rush the kids through breakfast, forgive the chores, and go to the pond first thing in the morning. We even walked Daddy to work - and slowed him down considerably.
 But he was patient and K looked like Cindy-Lou Whoo.
Approaching the land preserve from the mill building parking lot, the boys remembered that there were paths made by the air soft guys that we hadn't explored yet. Getting to them involved crossing the small, stagnant channel near the old turbine site. There used to be a long board you could cross. "Swallows and Amazons." I told myself, more adventure...but that board had rotted, and there was now parts of a pallet, very narrow to cross on. B suggested that he leap the channel, I hand K across, and he help M. "Swallows and Amazons." I told myself. I told M, "Now, your brother is just going to help your balance, not carry you."
He got half way across, then jumped for B's arms. "They are both going in," I thought, and closed my eyes.
Splash! Splash!
They both went in.
We were about 5 blocks from home, one parking lot away from Daddy's work, but I realized that I'd locked us out of the apartment. So we trouped (shivering) to Daddy's work. The lab manager met us at the door. DH was back in the noisy part of the lab with the vibration tables, but the manager paged him for us.
"M, what happened?" he asked. M looked at me with that "help, I'm so embarrased!" look, so I answered, "He fell into some stagnant, scummy water."
"M," said the lab manager, "You REALLY KNOW how to Have FUN!"
M grinned broadly and started smiling and talking.
Swallows and Amazons. Yeah, it's the way to go. And the scum washed out, and the boys cheerfully drew in their nature books, again, after we went home and changed, and walked back to the pond.
  B even carried K partway home when she got heavy. OK B, I'll write it: What would I do without you?
|
•
Comments (1)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Nov. 18, 2009 We got Outside today...ahhhh
M and K cannot function without lots of exercise outside. Getting them outside enough is a big challenge; because how can I cook, tidy up, wash laundry, and do sit down school outside? The weather is less of a challenge; they have good coats and can usually find hats and mittens. Working around nap time and now the early sunset is another problem. We stop kitchen table school at 11 most mornings and go to the play ground.
I've been realizing lately that I also need to get them into natural spaces too, as Annie was thinking, and the Circe institute lectures mentioned. So, Today, tataratare! We got outside in nature.
We walked a few more blocks than usual and went to the Larsen Purchase of the Attleboro Land Trust. M and B grabbed their long neglected nature notebooks (long neglected because Mom has not taken them along on walks in a very long time), some colored pencils, and a field guide to New England wildlife (it's even got sharks in it).
K walked most of the way there, I carried her home on my shoulders, which are now a bit stiff, so that must count as weight training. The boys ran past the waterfall, paused to watch a mallard swim to the falls, then fly down over the rough bits. This used to be the beginning of a lock leading to turbines in the basement of the mill building DH works in. Then the boys ran ahead to the sandy point on the mechanics pond. Two swans swam up, probably looking for bread. I cautioned the boys not to get too close (I got a really impressive bruise off a swan bite once, for not forking over my sandwich I think. It chased me up a picnic table. Yes, where you imagine the bruise to be is where it was...) They got to watch the swans feed, drink by scooping water into their bills then tipping their heads back, and see the silvery color of the juvanile's bill.
K began to want her dinner, so I started her home, while B finished his drawings. They caught up with us pretty quickly though, K didn't want to walk very much. I was playing the "Oh look, there is a Canada goose dropping, there is a goose track in the sand, there is a lawn mower..." K played along and said what could have been truck, or duck, I'm not too sure which right now, either could fit.
I need to do this more often: the boys loved it, I didn't make them draw or write, and they did both, they looked up swans and ducks and geese in the book, and didn't want to come home, even though they were hungry.
They did drop very strong hints that as long as they had the backpack with them, some unlined drawing paper would be welcome, and some cookies and water.
Gotcha boys, anything to get cheerful voluntary note taking!
|
•
Comments (0)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Jun. 13, 2009 Ruby Throated Hummingbird (female) I Think
M saw her zooming about our Baptisias in the flower garden, DH asked me to run and get the camera, to my amazement, I actually did get some snaps!
 |
•
Comments (2)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Jun. 8, 2009 Waterfall Walk
 Uncle E took us hiking at Robert H. Treman State Park.
 Mom snapped this backlit Mayapple while DH and I were attempting to tie K into her Ellaroo as a backpack carry. I wound up wearing her forward as usual. She kicks me these days, but I just can't get her securely comfortable in a backpack tie.
 The rocks in the gorge had eroded in right angle patterns. We kept wondering that it was natural.
 Sometimes the erosion seemed comical.
   Somehow this photo doesn't look as scary as the view itself. When we turned the corner on the path, it looked like the drop of doom, something out of Indian Jones. We actually got to walk down beside the falls.
I saw red columbine growing right out of the rocks. But it was too fine and delicate looking to show up in these photos. Funny, anything that can grow out of a rock face isn't really delicate!
|
•
Comments (0)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Apr. 24, 2009 Walk at Oak Knoll
 Well, I did not have my backpack tie technique down, so K got down.
 What she really wanted was to walk with a stick.
  M had found it for her.
 Then there was the little tree.
 It bent when she bumped it
 But I would not let her eat it.
 |
•
Comments (0)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Mar. 25, 2009 Possible Nature Study topic: Chickadee Nest
I was skimming the Handbook of Nature Study for a topic that I know I can do this time of year and is found near the church building where my co-op meets. My mom recommended birds, and I remembered that some chickadees had nested in our bird box last year, and the Audubon society recommends cleaning out the nest boxes before earnest Spring to guard against insect pests.
I thought our box was only a backup house, but there were egg shells in the little nest!
It came free with a trowel, I got it safe in a shoe box to transport to class. Hopefully we can observe some birds as well on Friday!
I think the white fluff on top is scraps of the thinsulate that I lined my cloak with when I needed a warmer maternity cloak. The bottom layer is moss, then they used down.
|
•
Comments (0)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Nov. 17, 2008 So that's why they call it "cat-mint"
Well, last Spring I found the Handbook of Nature Study Blog, and filled my copy of the Comstock book with hopeful sticky notes. This year I would actually use the book. So far I have too: twice. We examined milkweed this Spring when it was in flower, and this week in the Fall when it is setting seed.
 M's drawing of the inside seed clumps of the seed pod
 B showing the open seed pod
 K happy to have escaped the stroller, free!
M so enjoyed opening seed cases and putting the seeds into the stroller so much, that two days later, while standing in line at the library circulation desk, he fluffed up the seeds inside. They instantly began to swirl through the atrium, chased by me and several other grownups, while the circulations librarians serenely checked out books.
|
•
Comments (0)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Oct. 15, 2008 Bird House Renovation
This wooden post in my flower garden is for training vines on. The birdhouse should have been several feet higher, and facing more true south (or was it west?) but we hung it up here because we wanted to get it off the shelf where it was gathering dust, a full year after the Earth day celebration at the Audubon Society, and we wanted it out on the garden pole where it would look pretty and might shelter some birds.
 This Spring some chickadees built a nest there, but didn't lay eggs in it, the year before some house wrens sang songs about it, but didn't nest there. This fall, this wood pecker decided to occasionally stop by and enlarge the entrance. Wonder if he'll use it?
|
•
Comments (1)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Jul. 21, 2008 Bog Walk - Guest Blog by my Guys
As I blogged here,
we heard about the bog walk at the Roger Williams Park Botanical Center. When it came down to it, I decided to stay home with K and sew cool, comfy nursing tops, but DH took the boys to the great swamp for New England Carnivorous Plant Society bog walk. So, this is a compilation of their comments:
M said, "See all those grasses right there? That's where I got my cuts. I called them cactus grass."
 Here is a pitcher plant flower, the don't eat their pollinators.
 If you were a bug, this would be very scary.
 John showed the kids the ripe blueberries, thus fulfilling one of my long held educational goals for my children: to know that blueberries don't come from cardboard boxes.
 bladderwort
 Not a carnivorous plant, but fringed orchids are rare and "cool!"
I asked M, what was your favorite part of the walk?
"The berries!" |
•
Comments (0)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
Jun. 28, 2008 We Finally Studied Milkweed
When I started out homeschooling, I read about the Handbook of Nature Study, probably in Pocket Full of Pine Cones but possibly in the Veritas Press Catalog. I mentioned wanting it to my friend L, and she promptly gave me her copy, "You are the sort of person who will actually use this." she complemented me. I read it, got over whelmed, and decided to try to keep it in the car for reference. Each year I tried again. It was like an alter call that I kept backsliding from. So last Summer I read a link to the Charlotte Mason Blog Carnival, and found The handbook of Nature Study Blog
Wow. A manual for the manual.
I marked my calender with months various plants should be doing something noteworthy, then let the milkweed grow in what was supposed to be our trial/nursery bed. With little boys, the advise is to start with creepy crawlies, but as I blogged elsewhere, K is cute, messy and organic enough for now.
 In fact, she found waiting for the boys to write their observations and finish their drawings maddening, whether she was in her stroller, blanket, my arms or B's. I finally left B in the yard to finish up and brought her inside to nap. She went to sleep right away. M played with blocks. (or did he watch TV? I don't remember how good I was being that day)
 But before all that, I pulled out the milkweed that was growing through the bushes, cut it at various places to show the milky secretion, decided not to let a drop dry on their hands (just in case they develop a latex intolerance, there is a lot of latex in the world, it's an inconvenient intolerance), and had them draw the leaves and plant. I thought it was fun to poke a needle in between the nectar "cornucopias" and see the pollen sacks pop out, but it was so small I could have used a magnifying glass, no wonder the author mentions a lens. I did see a bee with pollen sacks stuck to her feet, but she was moving too fast for the boys to see her too. We had two different sorts of bees working the flowers, and lots of flies too.
 I left the milkweed growing in the garden for the butterflies later on, but I did pull the ones out of the lawn and shrubs. Enough is enough.
I took M's dictation in his book, and managed to get the boys to write sequentially in their books, instead of on random pages. We glue sticked the drawings in later.
|
•
Comments (2)
• Post A Comment!
• Permanent Link
|
|
