Summer: Mon. 7/6 (NH)
A day of reading. The kids woke up and read, ate breakfast and read, and then Greta read on the couch while Lucia and I read in the hammocks. Then we joined up for lunch and read Harry Potter together.
We spent the late afternoon at the pond. I floated in a raft; the kids sneakily swam after me, trying to be inconspicuous; Andrew pulled out algae. Farrah lay quietly under a chair, trying to avoid another dip in the pond. (Andrew tried to carry her in again, but she was so clearly horrified that he didn't make her do it.) Both girls caught a couple of frogs. It was a warm, quiet, beautiful day.
Dinner was chicken legs on the grill, and then s'mores. L&G became hysterical while playing their Harry Potter game with burning sticks. I love how they can crack each other up.
After the kids were in bed, I made my annual batch of strawberry jam.
The low part of the day was this morning, when I came back from the grocery store. I drove the car up the drive, but I saw movement ahead, so I slowed--it was a tiny baby bird, trying to flap its wings, with another bird fluttering beside it in alarm. NATURE IS THE WORST. Clearly it had fallen from a nest. I backed the car up and drove to the house on the other side of the barn, then got Andrew to come outside without alerting the kids. He scooped up the little bird and we put it in the woods. It is a goner for sure. Its wing was clearly injured, and it was too young to fly. The harsh reality is that it would not survive if we put it into a shoebox and tried to care for it, and can you imagine how frantically distraught the kids would be when it inevitably died after we'd made a bed for it, tried to feed it, named it, etc etc? Greta is still planning ways to Honor The Mouse she found yesterday on the road. So we had to make the decision to not go this route. So yeah. Lots of close encounters with nature up here.
A more entertaining nature encounter was also this morning, before I left for the store. I was saying goodbye to Andrew and Farrah and looked out the bedroom window--and there was a giant flock (?) of turkeys in the middle of the road. Five huge male turkeys, three females, and a whole slew of little turkey babies, all mincing along. They were in no hurry. Eventually the females led all the little babies into the field.
We were also woken up at an ungodly hour this morning by a woodpecker, whose pecking sounded like it was pecking our windowsill. Nature!
We spent the late afternoon at the pond. I floated in a raft; the kids sneakily swam after me, trying to be inconspicuous; Andrew pulled out algae. Farrah lay quietly under a chair, trying to avoid another dip in the pond. (Andrew tried to carry her in again, but she was so clearly horrified that he didn't make her do it.) Both girls caught a couple of frogs. It was a warm, quiet, beautiful day.
Dinner was chicken legs on the grill, and then s'mores. L&G became hysterical while playing their Harry Potter game with burning sticks. I love how they can crack each other up.
After the kids were in bed, I made my annual batch of strawberry jam.
The low part of the day was this morning, when I came back from the grocery store. I drove the car up the drive, but I saw movement ahead, so I slowed--it was a tiny baby bird, trying to flap its wings, with another bird fluttering beside it in alarm. NATURE IS THE WORST. Clearly it had fallen from a nest. I backed the car up and drove to the house on the other side of the barn, then got Andrew to come outside without alerting the kids. He scooped up the little bird and we put it in the woods. It is a goner for sure. Its wing was clearly injured, and it was too young to fly. The harsh reality is that it would not survive if we put it into a shoebox and tried to care for it, and can you imagine how frantically distraught the kids would be when it inevitably died after we'd made a bed for it, tried to feed it, named it, etc etc? Greta is still planning ways to Honor The Mouse she found yesterday on the road. So we had to make the decision to not go this route. So yeah. Lots of close encounters with nature up here.
A more entertaining nature encounter was also this morning, before I left for the store. I was saying goodbye to Andrew and Farrah and looked out the bedroom window--and there was a giant flock (?) of turkeys in the middle of the road. Five huge male turkeys, three females, and a whole slew of little turkey babies, all mincing along. They were in no hurry. Eventually the females led all the little babies into the field.
We were also woken up at an ungodly hour this morning by a woodpecker, whose pecking sounded like it was pecking our windowsill. Nature!
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