Bird and Little Bird

Proper Beach Going.

Yesterday afternoon was hot, and not a little bit humid, and after some amount of debate about exactly which direction to send ourselves in, we decided to head for the beach. I sort of had visions of finding a tide pooling beach, because that is very much my thing, but instead, we landed on a sandy swimming beach about forty-five minutes from here.

 

The idea that a person might find a beach that is both sandy and warm enough to swim at is still something that I am getting used to. Being from Northern California, this is a bit of a novel idea. There are sandy beaches there, but none with ocean water that is warm enough that you would want to touch it on purpose. And, most of the beaches we visited often in California were rocky beaches better suited for trying to spot tiny creatures than to wading around anyway.

 

The big kid immediately knew what to do, and was hard at work on a sand castle within minutes of our arrival. Z. was less sure, and had to stand around and stare at everything for some time before he was ready to even think about touching the sand. It was pretty funny, actually.

 

The tide was high when we arrived, so there wasn't much to be found on the beach in the sea life department. But by the time we were getting ready to pack it up and head out the tide was receding, and some little bits of seaweed and the occasional shell were starting to appear here and there. I gathered a small handful of shells to bring home. I didn't think to take a picture of them before Mariam promptly took them and stashed them in the Lego bin she had brought along to carry various important items (such as a small looking glass and a stuffed walrus).

In all, a pretty good day. I think next time, I will totally go for it and bring a beach umbrella. Because I was a little jealous of the folks with beach umbrellas. They looked pretty comfortable. But I think next up is a tide pooling beach, because that is really the kind of beach going that I do best.

For those of you familiar with Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Southern Maine: do you have a favorite beach to recommend?

Rainy Days and Neighborhood Explores.

I have begun to accept the fact that it might actually not stop raining. Ever. It is marginally easier to regard this situation with cheerful resignation when I think about the fact that my children look very cute in their semi-matching rain jackets. The baby likes his very much, and regularly asks to put it on so that he can wear it around the house.

Since it seems that it will be raining always, we have been just going about our business with some expectation of being wet, and maybe a little cold. I have been letting the kids wear whatever shoes they want and haven't said a word about avoiding puddles. Really no point. Yesterday Mariam tromped through about six inches of water along the edge of the sidewalk as we walked to the farmer's market in the afternoon. It is a tiny market by any objective standards, but it is also a few hundred feet from our front door. Seriously. And we were able to get everything that we needed for dinner, including some haddock filets from a local lobsterman. Then we walked home in the rain, which took about a minute and a half.

 

For today's explore, we visited our new local library and got our library cards. We also grabbed a copy of Regarding the Fountain, which will likely be next in the read-aloud cue after we finish the second Mysterious Benedict Society book. I love Regarding the Fountain, and can't believe we've never read it together. Although I think it is sort of a perfect end-of-third-grade read, so perhaps that is why.

Oh, and the blur of baby in a blue rain jacket pictured above? A pretty accurate representation of what the world looks like from my point of view basically all the time these days.

Budgies and Birdseed.

Towards the end of last week, as the pile of boxes appeared to be magically multiplying itself everytime that I turned my back on them, we decided that we very much needed to do the one thing that made good sense: ditch the entire operation for a few hours and go to the zoo. I have complicated feelings about zoos, if we are being honest, but I also think that sometimes there is nothing in the world that will make you happier than feeding a parakeet with birdseed stuck to a popsicle stick.

Additionally, the word "budgerigar" is remarkably difficult to pronounce properly. Go ahead, try it.

 

This guy, on the other hand, has no complex relationship with the idea of animals in captivity. He knows exactly what he thinks and what he thinks is that it is the most amazing idea. This was his first zoo experience, and when he caught on to what was actually happening there, he very nearly lost his ability to function. He just stood with his feet firmly planted in place, waving his arms and yelling at tree kangaroos with an unbridled joy so intense I thought he might fall over. It was something to see. Total strangers shook their heads with laughter and said things like "Wow. He is excited!"

 

Oh, and did you know that you can do more than feed parakeets with leftover popsicle sticks? True story. You can also make harmonicas out of them. The baby is somewhat less impressed by this trick than the bird thing, though.

Hello, Big World.

We woke to the grand discovery this morning that our little nest has a trio of chicks inside. We will be mostly leaving them alone now, so as not to upset the bird in charge over there, but I thought that I could sneak one little photo to share.

So here you are: a Northern Cardinal at less than one day old. I am sure that what he or she lacks in traditional beauty is more than made up for in spunk.

Don't forget about the big Alphabet Glue May moving sale!  Any and all issues of Alphabet Glue are on sale until May 15th! Enter "may25" at checkout for 25% off. There are lots and lots of great book recommendations, printable pages and fun science and craft projects in there; perfect for getting busy with the small folk this summer!

 

Home Here, Home There.

Well. After spending the last many days totally immersed in the soul crushing process known as "urban house hunting" I am happy to report that we are emerging victorious. It was nobody's idea of a good time, but it looks like we have signed a lease on an apartment in the Boston area. You'll note the word "apartment" in that sentence, I suppose, so let's discuss a bit.

We drove down to Massachusetts early Saturday morning, and spent Saturday and Sunday looking at place after place. We looked at an old farmhouse on acreage, we looked at city apartments with funky wood paneling and no yard space to speak of.  We tried very hard to be open minded, which I think we did a reasonable job of, considering. After seeing a particular place in the heart of the downtown area of a little city outside of Cambridge, we decided to go for it. It is indeed an apartment- on the second and third floors of an older house- but it is sparkly and clean and is walking distance from things like the library, the park, and the town pool. It will be a different life than the one that we live on our acre here in Vermont, but we knew that was coming and have at least some sense of adventure. I think.

So, we put our eggs in the proverbial basket, laid down a deposit, and put in an application. And then, of course, we found ourselves totally entrenched in three days worth of ridiculous back and forth negotiations with the property management company, during which we spent a lot of time playing in the local park near the apartment and envisioning what life would be like if we got the place that was so very much better than anything else we saw. In other words, we tortured ourselves a bit. Just for fun.

 

But last night we finally got the word that the place is ours. I'm still holding my breath a bit until our signed copy of the lease comes back this way with the landlord's signature on it as well. I'm an optimist at heart, but goodness, a girl can only take so much. To celebrate the sudden reduction in massive family-wide anxiety, Mariam gathered huge bundles of flowers from the backyard and brought them inside for me to put in empty Mason jars.

Any and all available surfaces in this house will soon be laden with boxes, packing tape, and piles of stuff to sort through. But I think for the next few days, we will go with the jars of flowers instead.

A bit of relative peace and quiet is very well deserved for adults and small people alike around these parts, let me tell you.

Birds by the Bay.

For the last couple of years, a pair of eagles have appeared sporadically in the trees along a local stretch of rocky beach. Being the bird enthusiast that I am, I find this all quite exciting. And, because up until just a few years ago Vermont was actually the only state in the lower 48 that could not lay claim to a single nesting pair of bald eagles, the local populace is pretty excited too.  In other words, these eagles occasionally make the front page of the paper.

Yesterday afternoon I took my camera along when I made the drive to get Mariam from school. I was planning to drive along the lakeshore, and I figured that I might catch a photo of some of the geese that have begun to return from their winter vacation lands. I pulled over to the side of the road near a small inlet, and I did manage to get some at least semi-decent geese photos, although I had been hoping to get closer. But then, as we began driving again and rounded a curve in the road, we saw it: the eagle.

 

Yep. The bald eagle, just sitting there, on an exposed branch above the water. And me with my camera in my lap and the telephoto lens attached. I proceeded to engage in a vociferous display of nerdy enthusiasm that I am profoundly thankful no one but my children was there to witness.

 

I pulled over to the side of the road again, and got out of the car to see if I could get closer to the bird. There is a set of train tracks running along a small hill between the road and the trees on the shore, so I could really only get so close. But I did manage to get a handful of pictures of the bird. The combination of the distance between us and the wind made it hard to get the sharp focus I wanted, but did I mention the part about driving by the elusive eagle while my camera happened to be sitting in my lap?

So, it all felt sort of blessed and fortuitous. And then, it became kind of funny, because as I stood in the mud, squealing and snapping photos, I looked to one side and saw another person taking pictures too. And then I realized that we knew each other.

Ah, Vermont.

 

Playful Learning and Birdwatching with Kids.

It would seem that I never got around to writing the post that I had intended to today. The sun was shining and the baby declined his regularly scheduled nap, so it seemed to make good sense to abandon our various household responsibilities in favor of hitting the trail. We spent our afternoon trudging through the mud and snow on a favorite local hike, and the housework and the blogging? Not so much. But there is always tomorrow, I suppose. 

I did want to stop by just for a moment, however, to mention that I have a post up at Playful Learning today. It's a handy little list of ideas for making birdwatching with kiddos an enjoyable prospect, and I think that some of you all might very well like to have a read through. You can find it here. 

Also, I am woefully behind with responding to comments and emails, mostly due to just having been really busy over the last week or so. But believe you me, I appreciate every last sentiment that you send my way, and I will try very hard to get caught up this week. Pinky swear.

Backyard Beaver Lodges.

This past weekend, we went for a snowy walk with some friends from Dan's medical school class. It was remarkable for a number of reasons, not least of which was the fact that the dog belonging to said friends appears to be some kind of canine frisby savant. Also, despite temperatures in the low twenties and a late-in-the-day sinking sun, the baby enjoyed himself enough to be almost non-verbal. No crying whatsoever. But the most exciting thing about the walk was neither of these things. It was, instead, Mariam's first up close and personal, entirely hands-on viewing of a beaver lodge.

It is probably important to pause at this juncture and mention that the girl child has an incredible fondness for all mammals, with the possible exception of what she terms "dangerous wild dogs." But beavers fall into a special category of animals so beloved that they have become the inspiration for Halloween costumes, the thing that her fairy tale princesses wish that they could become, the characters in the plays that she writes for her classmates. She really, really loves them.

So, the discovery of this beaver lodge, nestled right alongside the trail on the edge of a creek, was The Best Possible Thing. Our friends mentioned that it would be coming up, but as soon as we rounded the corner and saw how close and accessible it actually was, Mariam ran down the hill breathlessly and started gently examining it, peering into holes to see if she could catch a glimpse of the animals inside.

After spending a few quiet moments peeking through a hole in the side of the lodge, she jumped up and excitedly reported that the lodge was, indeed, occupied, and that she had seen her first live beaver in its very own den. My first instinct was to think that perhaps her enthusiasm had conjured a beaver mirage of some kind, but then the dogs became very, very interested in the lodge as well, and it was clear that Mariam was right. We quickly moved on so as not to disturb our lodge dwelling friends.

In the car on the way home Mariam was quiet for a little while and then said, "When we get to school tomorrow, don't tell anyone about the beaver lodge, okay?"

I thought for a minute and then said,"You mean because it is so good that you need it to be just yours for a little while before you share about it?"

"Yes."

Weekend Notes.

It isn't so much a question of what we did around here last weekend as it is what we didn't do.  Goodness, what a busy couple of days we had.  But busy in all the nicest ways, really.  We welcomed Dan home from a trip out west, Mariam had her first orchestra concert of the year, we had friends for dinner on Saturday night and stayed up far later than we probably should have.

Our friend Matt came into town from California on Sunday, and though he is here for work-related purposes, we took advantage of the free time that he did have and went for an afternoon walk down to a favorite beach on Shelburne Bay. 

We filled our pockets with especially lovely rocks and searched for beach glass by the shore.  Annie 2.0 found some kind of crayfish-type fellow.  He was long dead, but still in very servicable condition for observation and investigation.

Mariam received some solid instruction on the fine art of rock skipping from Matt, Mark and Annie 2.0.  She is already a much better rock skipper than I will ever be.  I consider that good news.  The skipping of stones, after all, is one of the more satisfying idle-time activities available out there in the wide world.

A couple of other notes today:

:: Mariah lives in an area where the recent storm caused significant damage to many, many communities.  She is generously donating all proceeds from Playful Learning e-courses through the end of this coming weekend to the recovery efforts, and you can find out more about how to sign up here.

:: David and Lisabeth have a free Thanksgiving-themed Sparkle Story up on the Sparkle site and are also offering a special Martin and Sylvia sample pack all week long with proceeds going to Heifer International.  Heifer is an amazing organization, and we always love Martin and Sylvia around here! Check out the details and find the free story here.

Fall on the Farm.

And just like that, the weather here has taken a reasonably dramatic turn for the colder.  It snowed off and on all day yesterday, although none of it stuck, and this morning, we woke to temperatures in the twenties.  Ah, Vermont winter.  It starts in October or November and lasts until April, or sometimes even May.  Mother's Day snow? It has been known to happen.

We aren't farmers, and we don't play them on TV, but we do spend a good deal of time visiting with the animals on the farm where the big kid goes to school.  Once the cold comes in, these visits tend to be less frequent, especially once the animals are transported to farther flung areas of the farm for purposes of their own winter wellness and warmth.

Zak and I made the rounds in the barnyard the other day; saying our hellos to a few favorite friends before our visits are curtailed by icy conditions for a few months.  By the time the chickens are running free there again in the spring, Zak will be of proper chicken-chasing age. Which might be the best age.

In the meantime, keep warm barnyard buddies.  We will be so very happy to see you on the other side of these cold and snowy months ahead.