A couple of weekends ago, we had a rare free Saturday. We knew the hurricane was coming, so we wanted to get out and see some fall foliage before it struck. I'd recently read a Civil War era novel that mentioned John Brown and Harpers Ferry, so I thought we should go check it out. While I'd heard of Harpers Ferry, I don't think I'd ever been there before.
It was just the right distance away, about 1.5 hours, split between highway for the first part, and winding country 2-lane roads for the second, with plenty of rolling vistas and fall colors on the way. When we got to the National Park parking lot, we learned there are two ways to get to the main historical town area - take a shuttle bus or hike (an easy terrain 1.5 miler.) Guess which we did.
When we got down there, we found they were commemorating the War of 1812, so we sat and listened to some fife & drum, and an explanation of uniforms and other military traditions of the time.
Hazel was so into it. She loves learning about other times, and especially pretending she is in them. There's a lot of historical play at our house right now, and she is devouring the Laura Ingalls Wilder Little House series.
Poppy, however, was "so tired", you know because she had such a hard job of riding on Dad's back during our hike.
But tickling brings out a smile.
After the demo, we wandered the town. Harpers Ferry is really an impressive spot, with something for everyone (a difficult feat for our family), and history from several eras. George Washington, Lewis & Clark, 1812, Civil War, manufacturing & industry, civil rights, and on top of all that, it's the halfway point on the Appalachian Trail between its two ends in Maine and Georgia. We saw several Trail hikers throughout our day, reminding Ed that hiking the AT is high on his bucket list. And if that's not enough, Harpers Ferry is at the confluence of the Shenandoah and Potomac Rivers, which was pretty awesome to look out at, and which fascinated the mountain man in Ed. We saw some kayakers out there in super hero Halloween costumes.
Ed's a reader. Meaning, in any historical spot, scenic outlook, museum, etc. - anywhere that has a marker or sign to be read, he reads it. That's good, because he learns a lot, and then can tell me about it if I'm interested. Me, I glance or skim, but I like to keep moving. I like to take in a place, not scrutinize it.
This is easily my favorite photo of the day. This fellow was playing some mean banjo; Ginger and I watched him for a long time, enthralled. I love the banjo. Then when the others joined us, they all broke into spontaneous dance, and danced uninhibited in the street for quite a few minutes. There's nothing like music, dance, views, history, (and a little frozen custard) to make a fabulous Fall family day.
Favorites from the day: play dough. Hands down, the most fascinating
peek into their little minds. So glad I caught a tiny snipit on video.
Don't mind my annoying teacher voice and enjoy the kids.
Arrive/Free Play
-Farm Animals
-Cars -Ball Track [Really fun to just sit and watch them interact,
and use their imagination. Totally understood how children learn best
through unstructured play. Poppy definitely was the most descriptive with
what she was doing. Often the boys would just stop and stare at her
while she told them about her Dog fluffy and the duck she was keeping in
her backpack (so it wouldn't get lost). Hilarious.]
Circle/Welcome -Welcome Song
-5 little Pumpkins [they LOVED this]
-Count 12 #ed Pumpkins -Sing "Pumpkin Pumpkin" -Alphabet Song (march), stop on "P" and make a scary jack o lantern face
-Book *discuss seeds, and growing *focus on the pumpkin becoming a jack o lantern Activity #1 -Remember the seeds we planted?
-Sing Little Seeds
-Go “pick pumpkins” (I put our pumpkins we made last week, out in the back yard) *Have kids pick out their pumpkin by identifying the letter their name starts with [we'll keep working on this] -gather rocks for pumpkin faces
Snack
-wash hands, potty [Jackson had a hard time letting Henry use his potty--good thing Henry is so patient]
-pumpkin muffins, raisins, apples (make jack o lantern faces w/
raisins in the muffins) [Henry was the only one who tried this and was so proud of the faces he created]
-recount the field trip to the pumpkin patch
-Read “Apples and Pumpkins”
[The kids did SO well listening to "Apples and Pumpkins" while eating their snack, totally impressed]
Activity
-Sing 5 Little pumpkins
-Play dough jack-o-lantern faces w/ rocks
[Besides
what you'll see in the video, these jack o lantern's turned into
walrus', rocketships, balls, hot dogs, snakes, etc. They loved kissing
it, and Bodie couldn't stop eating it--luckily this wasn't news to his
mom. I let them play for a good 20 min, and I should have let them keep
going--their attention spans and interactions were incredible. Poppy
kept giving Jackson pieces of hers and saying "Here you can put it right
here"--Jackson was completely confused why anyone would be sharing with
him. Henry was initially concerned with how messy his hands felt, but
eventually got over it and joined in the imaginative fun.]
Pumpkin Making
-Make last weeks pumpkins into Jack-o-lanterns
-black triangles, glue
[Bodie apparently understood Dance Macabre much better than the average
person, and was totally scared out of his wits (it's really not that
scary of a song, so this was fascinating). So, Bodie went and sat in the
dining room, which seemed to make him feel better. The other kids
oscillated between being confused as to why he was scared and running
around like the headless horseman. Jackson repeatedly asked Bodie
"Whatcha doin?" Poor Bodie kept answering, but Jackson in his normal 2
year old self, continued asking until I diverted him away (Bodie hasn't
learned to ask it back at Jackson.)]
Close
Re-read book
So Long King Kong [they can pretty much do this by themselves]
Happy Halloween, everyone! We weathered Sandy not too badly - 26 hours without power, just enough time to bundle up, have a fire in the fireplace, and share a couple of cold meals tempered with hot cocoa and cider we made on the camp stove.
Unfortunately, most houses in our neighborhood, and our elementary school, are still cold and dark. But it takes more than a power outage to cancel Halloween!
Things were rushed tonight getting out the door, but here are some pictures of the girls in their costumes at our church party last weekend.
The Cupcake:
The Pirate:
The Tooth Fairy:
Strike a pose:
The donut eating contest:
And here are the pumpkins Ed and the girls carved when we were homebound on Monday:
As I've been handing out candy tonight, Ed's pumpkins have gotten serious praise, especially from the middle school-age contingent.
The girls are trickling in now, with their heavy bags of sugar and loot. Time to check out the takings, trade, sort, and eventually get them to bed - hopefully before the inevitable meltdowns - crossing fingers!
I guess the storm's a'comin'. School's cancelled today. And tomorrow. Which means I've got three extra bodies around here in my space. Good thing I like them. They say a power outage is more likely than not, come nightfall and the high winds that come with Sandy's landfall a few hundred miles from here.
We've got batteries, water, and loads of food. We're spending our apparently last hours of electricity today watching movies & news, charging i-things, baking, doing laundry & dishes, vacuuming, pretty much anything I can think of that we might need power for this week. I will be bummed if we lose the contents of our well-stocked fridge and freezer, but so it goes. Some day we'll get a generator.
In the mean time, we're keeping an eye on this tallest-on-the-street tree in our neighbor's yard. (It looks like one tree, but there is a short one on this side of the street, and a tall, tall one behind it by the white house.)
Also mourning a bit the fall foliage that may be blown off before ever reaching full color. Hoping our sump pump can keep up with the water. Crossing fingers Halloween will be OK. And wondering what kind of natural event it would take to give MOM a day off. I know, no such thing.
I'm keeping a few activities in reserve, for if and when we lose power, like a blanket fort, nail painting, easel painting, story telling, pillow fights, et cetera. The rain's really coming down, the wind starting to pick up. We are hunkered down with The Weather Channel and some peach pie we baked out of the freezer this morning rather than risk losing it. Our evening plans include homemade pizza and carving pumpkins. So don't worry about us, we'll be OK.
And speaking of pumpkins, last Saturday I wanted to take my girls out to get some, but I wasn't up for the drive, expense, or crowds of Cox. I decided to try out a new place (new to us) - Krop's Crops. As you can see, the day was perfect, and it was just what we wanted - a simple hay ride out to the pumpkin patch, a few pens of animals, and a small store with apples and local honey (which supposedly helps with allergies - gonna try it out.)
A bonus discover when we got there, and the hit of the day, was a sizable corn bin to play in. And since this place is low-key, we had it practically all to ourselves both before and after the hay ride.
Then we went to Wendy's for lunch, and Target to buy Halloween candy - pretty much a perfect Saturday. When we got home the girls colored their smaller pumpkins.
And that night I went with grown-ups to the Mariinsky Ballet's Cinderellaat the Kennedy Center. Yeah, I'd say a perfect Saturday.
It's almost impossible to not visit Cox Farms in the fall - slides, hay rides, farm animals, live music, more slides, free apples & cider, pumpkins, kettle corn, and more slides! So since we are doing Pumpkin, Pumpkin this week, off we went to Cox.
Pumpkin, Pumpkin by Jeanne Titherington
I always love the little tidbits about the kids, this is what I noticed:
*Poppy
was quite the chatterer. Though I find this hard to believe, I've never
conversed to Poppy! It was fun to hear her speech patterns which remind
me so much of Ginger. So fun.
*Henry was our man of color. For whatever reason, half the time I asked
about the colors on the page, or the paint, or what color their pumpkins
were the other kids were not interested in responding. Henry never let
me down. He was always enthusiastic about the colors.
*Bodie was passionate about whatever he was doing--playing with the
cars, tackling the other kids, or painting his "pumpkin," this kid does
not lack enthusiasm.
*Jackson was our resident noise maker. He was an
enthusiastic singer, noise maker, and crier. Oh yes the tears flowed
strong today. It's so hard to share our toys!
Here's
the synopsis (I just kind of filled in my lesson plan, sorry it's not
beautifully narrated, but my nap time is still too preciousl! Also,
pictures were difficult to manage, but I did get a few)
9:30 Arrive/Free Play (LR):
-Farm Animals
-Cars
- Mixed pumpkin muffins together [found the recipe on Kari's blog--thank
you] (Bodie had no interest, so he kept playing while the others mixed
these up, Henry was really anxious to crack the eggs, but I decided I
wasn't quite ready for that adventure)
9:50 Circle/Welcome (BSMT):
-Welcome Song -Passed around pumpkin to touch, smell, and describe
**interruption to take out muffins from oven
-Sang "pumpkin pumpkin" while waiting an extra min for muffins to finish -Counted 12 paper Pumpkins
-Alphabet Song (marched)
-Read "Pumpkin Pumpkin" 2 times (first w/ discussion, 2nd going through)
-Gave each child a (butternut squash) seed, talked about pumpkins growing from seeds, sang "little seeds" (children's songbook)
10:15 Snack (DR)
-wash hands, potty (only henry had to go to the bathroom)
-pumpkin
muffins, grapes, carrots
-Discussed Pumpkin Patch and sang "pumpkin pumkin"
[In case you can't understand her, Poppy is saying she will get an "oranges" pumpkin - she uses the plural all the time and I never correct her because I love it. Then she gets excited to point out that the carrot she just ate is also "oranges."]
10:30 Art Pumpkin Making (BSMT)
-showed kids my "pumpkin"
-we stuffed the bags, and taped the top
-Showed kids how to paint the
pumpkin with the sponges, and let them go at it. This was harder than I
though it would be, but they all did a great job. (No one liked when the
paint got on them! Poppy and Bodie were especially studious, Jackson
and Henry painted and then left for the looming balls)
-Sang more of "pumpkin pumpkin", and introduced "5 little pumpkins"
11:00 Activity (BSMT/Garden)
-Handed out seeds again and discussed digging in the dirt
-Sang "little seeds" multiple times, pretending to grow into pumpkins
-Went outside to plant our seeds.
-found a worm, planted our seeds, and watered them
11:15 Close (BSMT)
-Re read book
-So long king kong
11:20 After Party (BackYard)
-Brought balls outside to shoot some hoops
-Sang "Scary Skelatons" 5x
-Bodie
stuck the basketball in the garden, and pretended it was a pumkpin. He
kept saying and acting out, "it's heavy! it's heavy"
-Looked at the flowers on the zucchini plant, and picked some zucs. Poppy kept exclaiming, "oh wow! oh wow!"
-ran around the house to distract Jackson from his inability to share
