sunny day at Cylburn

We had a great visit at the Cylburn Arboretum last week. Although the gardens are more manicured than the wild things I grow and love, they are home to all kinds of creatures. It was fun to watch E try to catch butterflies, touch the flowers and taste peppers from the garden. He also loved spending time with his little buddy!

 

 

fast times

It's been a whirlwind of work/family juggling this last month. I don't even know where to begin!

Let's start with the year-end celebration of my Nature Preschool in May. The final festivities felt like we were throwing a giant wedding! All went off without a hitch - even the weather cooperated - and the children had a joyful day to celebrate with loved ones.

We said good-bye to diapers Memorial Day weekend.

Fast forward two weeks to the first annual Nature Preschool Conference on June 8-9, 2012. It was a huge success! We had nearly 100 attendees from across the country and a wonderful keynote speaker, author/educator David Sobel. Marty Watson from the Dodge Nature Preschool in MN and Stephanie Bozzo's crew from the Audubon Nature Preschool in MD presented insightful perspectives on how they approach nature-based learning. I've never been more nervous, or felt more relieved, after presenting and learning from this amazing group of conference participants. I'm already making plans for next year's big conference on June 7-8, 2013 at Irvine Nature Center!

Did I mention that I booked a trip to Rehoboth and we left the day after the conference?

So, yes, crazy busy, just how I like it.

The boy is doing BEAUTIFULLY with potty training. I read "Diaper Free Before Three" by Jill Lekovic and the minute I put it down I thought, yep. Let's take this bull by the horns and dive in. Day 1 was the most difficult but we stuck to our guns! We used a pull-up on the first day at his nap and then at bed, but my clever husband said "that's confusing - if we're going to do undies we should get rid of the diapers altogether". How smart he is! On Day 2 we were totally undied up.

For your amusement, this is Day 1 of potty training.
I believe there were 9 wardrobe changes all told.
But smooth sailing from Day 2 forward!

Rehoboth Beach was a great get-away for all of us. I really wanted to re-connect with E after being pulled in so many directions for work. He loved the beach (once he took his hands off his ears). He's highly sensitive to sounds so the crashing waves, laughing children, squawking gulls, and boats took a couple of days to get used to. Thank goodness summer is here!

rise and shine

It started at 6:45 a.m. Rise and shine! Guess who's ready to go outside? A little dew in the grass never spoils his fun. I am (yawn) happy to follow him out to the backyard in my ragged out jammies when the sun is already shining and the air feels warm. It's going to be a good day. Now if I could just get the coffee started...

I'm happy to report that our fruits and veggies are well on the way. The downside? My kid is like a rabbit! He is so excited to pick the strawberries that he wants to yank them off (unripe), take a bite, and then chuck them in the yard as he exclaims "birdies eat dat!". Sigh. I suppose there are worse things he might try to eat. (Like his boogs. Or his bath water. Or potting soil.)

natural backyard play space

Visit (cool)progeny to see my latest guest blog post! It's full of ideas for you to create a natural backyard play space for your cutie pie. Here's a dreamy sketch of mine:

Believe me, I'm fully aware of the fact that my dream space will be different than this idealized sketch. But hey - a girl's gotta start somewhere!

And since you're looking for reasons to play outside, why not turn an egg carton into a scavenger hunt? This is my version after I was inspired by someone else's egg carton on Pinterest.

leaves!

Fall is such a beautiful time of year! I love all the changing leaves, especially when you get one of those days where it's just windy enough for leaves to come spinning down as you walk under them. We've had lots of days like that during our neighborhood walks this week. I can't resist gathering and pressing leaves in the hopes that E will enjoy using them for art projects in the winter. We like to watch the leaves come circling down.

Here is some fun video of our little guy having fun in our backyard leaf pile. (Thanks for raking, Pop Pop!)

a visit to the lake and pumpkins!

 

This tulip poplar leaf was floating on the lake. Too pretty to pass by.



Daddy taught E how to toss sticks in the water.



There was no keeping him dry today. He had a point:
Why are we going to the lake if we can't get wet?!

The weather was too beautiful to be inside today so we ditched our Montessori class in favor of a walk at the lake, Loch Raven Reservior to be exact.

After E was good and soaked from trying to wade in the lake with the Canada geese, we headed over to our local nursery. Watson's is a wonderful mom-and-pop garden center so we support them any chance we get by purchasing most of our plant material there instead of a big box store. The good news? They had a great selection of pumpkins!

Despite the fact that E loves to walk in a stream or lake, he really hated getting the sticky pumpkin pulp on his hands. He's the opposite of his mama!

And in case you were dying to know, here's his most recent talk list:

ack = snack

guck = truck

uck = duck

bive = five
rrr = grrr (as in, I'm angry)
ug = hug
k = lake
k = bike
k = music (accompanied by sign language)

k = book (also with sign language)

dis = this

dat = that

nk = drink

up = up (as in, pick me up)

elp = help (and baby sign language)

t = eat

ess = eyes

sis = shoes

ess = kiss

iss = juice (as in his first taste of orange juice that was definitely memorable)

us = bus

ock = rock (like ones he picks up outside)

f = teeth

atch = Chatch (short for our cat's name)

ba ba ba = him singing a little tune :)

I'm sure there's more, but those are the ones I can think of right now. He's on his way!

The toddler busy-ness continues...



Why are we doing this again, Mom? For your amusement?

little things

Our baby is growing ever closer to age two. And with his independent, determined, busy-body spirit comes a faster paced world for us to keep up with. I'm trying to savor the little things, those simple moments of discovery and joy. But wow is the cliche true: oh how time flies.

Pipe cleaners + plastic jar = fun!

"Well, if I can't ride my trike yet I'll just sit on it in the rain."

Mushrooms are weird but irresistible to touch!
(Yes, we wash our hands. No, we're not freaks about letting him touch them.)

This makes my heart pitter patter.
Is it wrong for me to hope he'll be an artist like mama and dada?

The orange paint is a natural cornstarch paint that we tried.

That's it, E. It's more fun when you get messy!

This is a favorite pastime: - s-l-o-w-l-y rolling cars and trucks on the table and watching with steely concentration.

happy trails

When the weather hovers between summer and fall and the sun starts to cast that undeniably autumn amber glow, I know it's only a matter of time before the leaves wrinkle and the blooms fade. Before summer gets away from me again, I plan to go hiking and photograph some of summer's last flowers.

This weekend we hiked on the NCR trail. Besides our favorite mud puddle (E likes to stomp in it with his Gram), there were tons of flowers to photograph along the way.

Jewelweed - a yellow variety I hadn't seen before. Usually it's orange.

I think this is upland boneset? Frothy white flowers attract a lot of insects!

Gorgeous Christmas fern peeking out of rocky crevaces.

Posion ivy. People never seem to remember what it looks like, and it's a tricky plant because it can be a vine or growing low with other herbaceous plant material. Sometimes it looks bright, almost lime green and other times it's a dull evergreen color like this. Sometimes there's a sheen on the leaf (the icky oil!) but not always. The little "lobe" on the lower part of the leaf helps me distinguish it. And yes, there are three leaves.

Phlox spp.?

Beautiful goldenrod in all its glory.

Hibiscus moscheutos (rose mallow spp.) looks ultra violet at sundown. The ants just love it!