Week 5, Day 4: Life is a BEACH!

When my kids went to the local Parks & Rec's camp, their favorite days often involved our quaint quiet local beach. I figured for the last day of Camp Dawin, especially since I only had six campers so I could fit everyone in my van, we'd go there! 

It is not big, but it is family oriented & has all the right elements for a summer beach: soft sand, cool (LI sound) water, life guards, a playground and a fabulously affordable snack bar. I had hopes of including another letter box or a chat about water or the eco systems etc... but simple beach fun prevailed (and really, isn't that what summer is about too?). 

Sandcastles became a very serious task - something about ______ and villages and fortress walls was discussed. As it got warmer, some splashing about. 

Eating took forever since we went up to the snack bar and had to compete with the city camp (but good to see familiar faces). So as I waited the kids frolicked in the playground. 

  

Though I could have done "more" for the last day, I think sometimes simple is best. 

A big group hug ended the day... and year... of an absolutely FABULOUS GREAT group of kids and families. Never to be forgotten! 

Week 5, Day 3: Field Trip!

There were two instructions for campers today: remember your socks, and forget your lunch. I didn't tell them the plan, but it all revolved around one of our campers finally turning eight! 

We started with a warm-up I stole from Week 1, Day 1! They did an awesome 10x10 activity and so I had my kids write an 8x8 (we snuck in a ninth). The kids all happen to take Karate but in different dojos, and the local martial artists loved sharing the burpee and mountain climber techniques they'd learned.

We took a quick break for some raspberries from our patch -- we were away last summer and it grew like crazy. We decided not to trim it back and we've had a bumper crop this year. Once they're gone, though, we're going to have to evict half the stems at least, it's just gotten ridiculous. One camper figured out a longstanding mystery for us and told us this variety of raspberries is called the wineberry, or Rubus Phoenicolasius. Finally! One neighbor told us they were tayberries -- we knew that was wrong because they weren't long enough. Another said they were dewberries, but they never turned black. Glad to solve the mystery of this (invasive but delicious) plant in our garden. Over the years we've gotten a few handfuls, nothing like this year. We've already made pie and snacked extensively.

Then everyone came inside for a bit so I could reveal our plans for the day. Bowling! But of course, we were in the House of Science, so we could not JUST BOWL. We started by watching a couple of videos about how pinsetter machines work:

• This episode of "Machines," from The Science Channel, showing a Brunswick A2 Pinsetter
• Part of this episode of Dirty Jobs, where Mike Rowe learns to be a pinsetter mechanic
• and this video of old manual pinsetters in action. 

Finally, we were off to the alley! We're down a couple of campers this week, and though we're bummed they had to go on vacation and miss the last couple days of camp, it enables the rest of us to fit in cars and hit the town. We're trying to see the good side here.

We tried to get a behind-the-scenes tour of the pinsetters at our local lanes, but the mechanics were swamped and couldn't get us in today. They offered to do it another time, though, so maybe we'll all return for a group bowl. Um, I'm an awesome bowler (was there a smoother way to mention this?) (OK, truth is, the bumpers helped, and today was an unusually good bowling day for me).

After bowling, we headed to our local pasta shop whose website plays an audio track to grab some lunch. (It was the birthday boy's choice -- and a great choice at that.) Luckily, they have their own letterbox, so this trip was completely justified. It also made for a great way to kill the ten minutes we needed to wait for a table on the deck.

We also talked a little bit about what goes into homemade pasta. There was a big bowl of flour on a scale by the counter, so we knew there was flour. Flour and... flour and... This was a surprisingly tough one. Flour and eggs (and/or water)! Wish we had a little more time to talk about this. If you want to learn some more about pasta, here's a link to the history of pasta. 

Last day based at our house, and I took a moment to reflect. Couldn't be more amazed by this incredible group! I feel very lucky to have spent my summer with them. 

One last look in the window. Bye, Paul and Mike! 

When we got back to the house, we had about an hour left. The kids said they wanted to just have some free time, but eventually, they found there way back to the porch, where I'd laid out the supplies for some solar printing using cyanotype paper.

The recipe called for a few drops of lemon juice so some also took advantage of the opportunity to also make some delicious and refreshing citrus water.

Cyanotype is a printing process, the same process used to make blueprints. We weren't making blueprints, though. We made Anna Atkins-style botanical images, using plants we found around the yard. We put samples on the prepared paper, and the UV light from the sun caused a chemical reaction on the chemical (which had been pre-applied to the paper) that resulted in exposed areas turning a very light blue. Once this happened, we immersed the sheets in a pan of water. The water rinsed away the unreacted dye on the paper (the parts that were in the shadows underneath our samples). The non-water-soluble Prussian blue remained, and the exposed areas turned that beautiful signature blue color. We loved watching this part.

Finally, the day closed with some Warriors. They are so deep into this game, it's incredible. Behold the backyard catmobile. I can't even begin to explain the complicated things that are happening in this days-long narrative. There are babies, they must not grow up too fast, the apprentice is missing, etc.

I'm sure a more formal wrap-up post is forthcoming, but on behalf of my family, this summer has been such a pleasure. Amazing kids, great opportunities, good timing, great cooperative work by families to make each kid have a fantastic set of memories. I want to thank all the kids for making my days with them such a pleasure, and all the adults (my friends) for including us. I've already got an activity list a mile long for next summer, can't wait!

Week 5, Day 2: In a Bit of a Jam

For the last Darwin fling of the summer at our house we took a final stop with our food time machine. After talking about how hunter-gatherers harvested food during week 2, how the cultivation of grain and the development of bread enabled people to develop stable situations during week 1, how we've come to the prosperous position of paying other people to make our food during week 3, and not quite getting to a discussion of what astronauts each in outer space during week 4, we focused this week on how food came to be preserved so we have plenty to eat even when it's not in season. All this as a backdrop to making and preserving our own blueberry jam.

The most basic and earliest known form of food preservation was drying foods in the sun. We played a game matching other methods with the agents involved and the types of food associated with those methods. There was much deliberation . . .

]

. . . but finally all six campers agreed. They did great!

Some of the other methods we discussed were curing, fermentation, freezing/refrigerating, pickling, and canning. We talked about how some early American immigrants built their homes over streams for refrigeration, how Pa Ingalls of Little House on the Prairie fame built his own smokehouse out of a hollow tree, and how canning your own fruits and vegetables was common just a few generations ago. (Although canning was discovered by a French confectioner in 1790, it wasn't until after World War II that mass-produced canned fruits and vegetables became widely available to consumers, and for several years these were more expensive than the home-produced versions.) I forgot to share with the kids my experience of seeing the huge cistern at Haddon Hall in England that stored the ale allocated to every man, woman, and child in the absence of a consistently safe source of drinking water during the Middle Ages. 

Next we piled in the car and went berry picking. I was impressed that these kids could pick for 45 minutes in the hot sun before anyone said anything about wanting to go home. They were great at not only picking . . . 

. . . but also contemplating . . .

. . . and eating the blueberries.

In all we ended up with around 8 quarts of berries. Kudos to our diligent berry pickers and to our friends for letting us invade their berry farm!

Back at the ranch, kids ate lunch and launched into a serious game of Warrior. Apparently this is a kid-only, top-secret endeavor, since I was met with some serious attitude when I skulked onto the scene to snap this shot:

Somehow I eventually managed to lure them into the kitchen to transform our berries into jam. Okay, there's no "somehow" about it - I offered them each a spoonful of the first batch which I'd whipped up while they were playing. They were hooked! We separated into teams to wash, smash, and cook the berries. 

Before long we had 27 half-pints of this:

And it was tasty! We used the recipe on the low- or no-sugar pectin from Ball. Because the berries were a little tart, we added the full amount of honey recommended. The honey, together with the lemon juice, contributed to a pungent berry flavor reminiscent of a down-home blueberry pie. Absolutely delicious!

The one downside to the day was not having three of our nine campers with us, their family having left on vacation. A, D, and S - we missed you!

Notwithstanding the culinary feats of the day, when I asked my kids at bedtime what their favorite part of camp was today, they piped up right away, "Playing Warrior!" I guess there's no beating the cats.

Week 4, Day 3: Confronting our Daemons

Today we discussed two works of contemporary children's fiction — Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass, and book 1 of the Warriors series, Into the Wild, by Erin Hunter (allegedly). One of the campers was crushed to learn that Erin Hunter is actually the pen name of a gaggle of ghost writers who produce books for the Warriors franchise faster than you can say ThunderClan.  But since having our idols exposed for what they are is part of growing up, we soothed our disenchanted spirits by engaging in a rousing game of Warriors at Fort Griswold.

And since the detached spirit (or "daemon") is a major theme and plot point of The Golden Compass, we spent some time talking about, and then drawing and sculpting, what our daemons would look like if we were characters in Pullman's trilogy:

Given the large number of cat daemons, the Warriors universe clearly melded into Pullman's throughout the day (as it should with fantasy!). There was no lack of enthusiasm for the readings — some of the campers literally couldn't put their books down:

Week 4, Day 4: Water & War

Living in the "city" does have it's advantages. Living so close to the major bridge and the river, means the water treatment plant is right down at the bottom of the hill (plus a few more blocks). The kind city crew were more than helpful by giving us a tour. (Josh - you were AWESOME!) It was a hot day, and after last night's camp out, the kids were moving like a herd of sloths, but once there it was quite interesting. 

We got to see the schematics of the pipelines leading to the plant. We got to see the waste water as it came in to the plant and what it was composed of: everything you flush or put down the drain. 

 We learned a little of the science of how it treated before being released into the river (bubble bubble).  We were regaled with stories of the goldfish that was put in the water and lived for years, adapting to his environment with all the constant swimming he had to do to keep up with the current. The smell was not the most pleasant, but remarkably the campers did not complain too much.

All in all the questions were intelligent and a bunch of "what's that do?" But after exhausting all we could learn in the time frame we were there, we bid our farewells onto our next LETTERBOX!... but wait - I've got nine hot, tired, hungry kids... better eat soon. 

The treatment plant, like I said is located at the bottom of the hill, right below the entrance to Fort Griswold - there is a whole slew of letterboxes there, one group set by an Eagle Scout. So we decided to look for one letterbox... and failed due to the lack of our compass -(ooops)- and a frightening amount of poison ivy. C'est la vie! So then off to the picnic tables we went. 

After refueling the campers revived a bit and went to find box #3 of the series (#1 being down the road, too far for walking today & #2 the failed attempt). Note to self: read through the entire clue before starting off. If we had, we would have realized the directions were simply a basic tour of the fort grounds and took us back a mere 10 yards from our resting spot... sigh! But at least we were successful in finding ONE stamp :) ! 

After that, the desire to continue letterboxing waned drastically and was out voted by the chance to play MORE WARRIORS! (who can argue with creative fun play?) Suddenly energy returned enough to run all over the fort's grounds again. 

Did not follow the whole story, but I think someone got promoted and then an actual "battle" occurred, where casualties took out most of the campers... oh well. ;)

The only lure to get them back to base camp, was our spa tub, but that was enough to get them moving. So the very hot kids trudged back... to get into a hot tub... (yeah, it didn't make sense to me either, but they loved it!) I insisted on 10 minutes of journal-ling, but then into the tub with the whole crew, until pick up. The tub water was created as having  "restorative" properties as all the fallen warriors were put right again. I just love a happy ending :)