A sandy spot in wonderland

We are officially on a roll with our playscaping! With the garden beds built, planted, and protected by a tall, tall fence it was time to move on to the sand pit. We went to our local landscaping center and bought 1200 pounds of local river rock for the bargain price of $18!  Spending a drizzly morning picking through a huge pile of rocks may not be everyone's cup of tea, but it is a geologist's dream!

With a growing mess on the driveway from the mountain of dirt, and then the pile of rocks, we needed to get to work. We marked out the area where we wanted to build the pit, and handy husband excavated the ground with his sturdy shovel and steel shank boots. Waterbug helped, too, with his own shovel.

Ladybug and Waterbug helped to haul the rocks and place them around the pit. 

Then we added a few bags of river pebbles to fill in around and behind the big rocks for stability, and it was ready for sand! 750 pounds of sand later and the sand pit is complete! Not bad for one afternoon's work, and the kiddos agree...and so does a chipmunk who has taken to hiding underneath the tarp cover.

Let the building begin!

Nearly two weeks ago a huge pile of dirt was dumped in my driveway. 

After three full weeks of illnesses being passed around the house, we have finally started work on our garden. The garden will eventually house lots of veggie plants that I will undoubtedly kill, and hopefully some assorted berries that will survive my not-so-green thumb. My handy husband, with some help from the kiddos, is building two raised beds this season, with a third one planned for next year. We have a herd of deer that live in our woods and are always on the lookout for a new buffet, so we will do our best to keep them from eating everything. 

We also planted tons of sunflower seeds in the plot where the vegetable garden used to be. I am seeing sprouts, but I'm not too hopeful because we are seeing some severe flooding this week and the bed was under water, and is still completely saturated. A positive side of the flooding is lots of puddles to splash in, plus the water that washed over the bridge left behind some sand perfect for drawing in!

The weather (aside from the torrential rain) has been on our side and we hope to start work on the dry (or not-so-dry with this weather) stream bed and sand pit later this week!

Nothing needed

A nasty illness kept us cooped up in the house for nearly a week as it struck down 3/4 of the family. That was followed by a spell of windy, chilly rain. When the skies cleared we were absolutely itching to get outside and breathe in the fresh spring air. We may have big plans for the backyard with so many natural play spaces, but it's important to remember that the only things you really need to have fun outside are already there: mud, flowers, wind, sticks, water. You know...NATURE! The only missing ingredient is imagination. 

So many of the spring wildflowers appreciated the rain followed by the sun. The dandelions are painting the yard a cheerful yellow, and the spring beauties and trout lilies have bloomed! We also found some green leafy lichens and what the kids called "saltine mushrooms"- some sort of fungus (maybe?) growing on the log that looked like little bits of crackers. 

The rain replenished the vernal pool which has nearly doubled in size. The sticky beast of mud underlying it threatened to claim both of Ladybug's boots as she tromped through it. She found a tiny, but thrilling, waterfall in the stream of water overflowing from the pool. 

Taking a break from running and splashing and jumping doesn't have to mean an end to the fun. Sometimes it's the quiet moments that kicks the imagination into overdrive. Here they were riding on the piggy-train to find some faraway land with all kinds of exotic creatures.

Little things for a big, big earth

Earth Day is upon us and it's a cool, rainy day. Great for the earth and the plants, but not so great for playing outside without rain jackets and mud boots. That's ok because we've been celebrating all week!

I believe in, and adhere to, the place-based pedagogy that focuses on the here-and-now before the long-ago-and-far-away.  As David Sobel said in Beyond Ecophobia:  "What's important is that children have an opportunity to bond with the natural world, to learn to love it and feel comfortable in it, before being asked to heal its wounds." The best way to bond with that world is to connect with the small patch of it outside their own door, in their schoolyard, and in the local parks. So we do just that, not only to celebrate Earth Day, but as a part of our daily life.

Yesterday we went to one of our favorite local parks with our preschool nature club. We brought a bag and filled it (along with a couple more bags that others brought) with garbage along the trail. The fallen trees and huge boulders along the trail are an outdoor jungle gym. The long, shallow "cave" with its mud floor and dripping ceiling is mysterious. The crevasse with the inexplicable brick wall is cold and spider-ific. The steep drop-off into the gorge is dizzyingly beautiful.

At home we built a birdfeeder out of popsicle sticks, filled all of the birdfeeders, scrubbed out the bird bath, and put scraps of sisal rope in the suet feeder for birds to use in their nests. Then we took a walk through our own woods and picked up all the trash we found. 

While we were out there the kids decided to play the food web game (that they learned on Wild Kratts).  They found a patch of soft green moss and decided to start the game there. Now we needed to find something that would eat them as moss. After a bit of a search we found a slug under the rocks of our fire pit. So slugs they became! They decided to hunt for a robin to eat them next, which we found on the hill of the back yard. Higher order predators are difficult to come by, so they decided to call it a day and go in the house to let our cats eat them. 

I'd call that a successful Earth Day.

Signs of life

Today while Ladybug was at school, Waterbug and I went exploring the yard. He was playing "Wild Kratts" and was on the creature-trail looking for the elusive (and very imaginary) black-footed fox. I was looking for any of the signs of life that come with spring.  His hunt was unsuccessful, aside from some tracks in the mud that he was sure belonged to the creature. My search turned up quite a bit, and together we found some beautiful, springy shades of green. 

  My lilac is starting to leaf out, and my despised lenten roses are blooming.

The kids' strawberry plant is growing, and the mottled leaves of our trout lily patch blanket the ground under the big oaks.

 There are tulips budding in the fairy garden, and hostas popping through the soil.

 I even found some rogue daffodils under the baby pines.  I didn't plant them that I can remember, so I was surprised to see them there. 

We always take the time to stop at each large rock and flip it over to see who is living in the cool, dark dampness underneath. Today we saw worms, ants, and centipedes. 

Play is easy. It is natural. It doesn't need any planning or equipment. It is as simple as flipping rocks and searching for made-up animals. And it is fun!

Our nature loom!

I am starting with the easiest projects first, so the loom was at the top of the list. Luckily my husband had recently pruned some trees in the way back so I had nice, healthy branches to choose from. I used two maple branches and two from a hawthorn. I didn't realize I grabbed hawthorn branches until I got stabbed. So my project began with snipping the thorns off. 

 Then I screwed the branches together at the corners. I realized that pilot holes were necessary when screwing into green wood.  I also drilled pilot holes for all 40 eye screws that would line two sides of the frame and screwed those in. That was a tedious task, and hard on the fingers.

 Finally, I threaded the twine through the eye screws. Ladybug helped me with that, then she helped weave in some twigs and sprigs we found in the yard- white pine and spruce needles, dry ornamental grasses and sedum flowers, and flowers from the awful hellebore that I am in the process of pulling out. I'm loving the end result! Eventually the loom will attach to the end of a privacy fence that will partially enclose the new patio. I love that it will bring constantly changing art to the yard.

Greening our patch for Earth Day

Earth Day is a great day to get our children involved in protecting, caring for, and cleaning our planet. For us though, we need to keep in mind what is developmentally appropriate for preschool-age children. At this age keeping it small-scale and keeping it very local are important. So we will be greening our own patch. This post by Fireflies and Mudpies was a helpful starting point for our plans.

• Since we have a lot of pin oaks in our yard that are always dropping branches, there are always sticks to pick up. We transfer the sticks to the woods to make new habitats there for animals who need shelter on the ground. 
• Our woods are full of invasive Autumn Olive. I'm enlisting the kids to help me identify some of these and cut them down.
• We have a half-pound of native wildflower seeds to plant, so we need to prepare some of the areas by breaking up dirt clods and pulling up existing plants. 
• Our creek carries storm water so it also tends to wash litter through our backyard. We will clean out any junk we find in it.
• We have a batbox just waiting to be hung on the perfect tree. With dad's help the kids will locate an ideal site and help put it up. 
• I would like some bluebird boxes along our woodline, so we will build a couple in hopes of getting them up in time for their nesting season. 

the kids helping in one of the beds that needs to
be cleared, aka "English Ivy should be illegal".