Noodle and the Goose Again

A month later

So it has been brought to my attention. That I haven't posted in a month.

Here's what we missed.

Tulips. Not many, but lovely spots of color in the dreary front yard.

Azeleas.

Apple blossoms.

Dogwoods.

White

and pink.

and Wisteria.

And then, we went to the beach. Ocracoke Island, Outer Banks. Somewhere between the Atlantic and reality.

I love this place.

I would have stayed forever, if I could have.

(Next up: actual words and complete sentences. Maybe.)

Abloom

The warm weather has brought out the early blossoms in our neighborhood.

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now,

is hung with bloom along the bough.

And stands among the woodland ride,

wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my three-score years and ten.

Twenty will not come again,

And take from seventy springs a score,

It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom,

Fifty springs are little room,

About the woodlands I will go

To see the cherry hung with snow.

 

Somewhat sobering to realized how much closer I am to those 50 springs than when I learned this little ditty in voice class years ago.

MOVING ON.

The Pears.

The Forsythia.

The violets scattered across our "lawn".

Up next?

The Dogwoods.

And the tulips that survived the squirrels and neglectful tenants.

Updates as warranted.

Wil & Ben

Then there was the day when both girls set off to school in costume.

Goose's class had been reading Charlotte's Web and learning about farm animals. They concluded by dressing up as a character from the book or a random farm animal.

I give you Wilbur, Some Pig.

Astute readers will recognize the nose as a reprise of the "Third Little Pig" costume from last year's Book Week in Indo.  Ears and tail did not make the trip home with us and had to be reconstructed.

Noodle had been working at a report on Ben Franklin with the culmination a "Wax Museum" wherein she was to dress like the old guy and give a three minute speech about his life and accomplishments.

She was resplendent.

And probably a bit more dignified than the man himself.

Her speech went quite well, though she confessed to having wobbly knees and a flock of butterflies in her tummy. Public speaking is a new thing for our Noodle.

In our quest for the perfect Ben Franklin report and costume we hit both the public library and the old Colonial section of our city. I always forget how much I love the restored 18th century buildings and the folks wandering about in mob caps and tri-corn hats and how I used to dream of having a job at Colonial Williamsburg doing crafty things like shearing sheep and spinning wool. I was so pleased to see Noodle (and Goose to a lesser extent, she was mostly focused on finding the bakery) catch the scent of history - specifically American history and get excited about it. True, we've been to many and sundry historical places - thousand year old temples and The Forbidden City e.g., - and my Chiquitas will do well in World History.  But there is just something about them learning the story of the country we adopted them into. Good non-patriotic Mennonite that I am withstanding, I had moments of verklemptness when we read the Preamble to the Constitution together (children of the 70's, can you sing it along with me??). We read it, and the Declaration of Independence critically, of course. All men are created equal, to secure domestic tranquillity, what's up with that? And I'm very happy that their school teaches American history critically - history is told by the victors, what happened to the Native peoples? , what's up with that?  But geez. That rhetoric of freedom, equality and happiness is good stuff.  If only we could live up to it all.

If only.

(I hasten to add, to strengthen my Menno cred, that neither of my children recites the Pledge of Alliegence at school and Goose reportedly informed her friend that she does not do so "Because it is about guns and war and killing people, and we dont' do that".  Ha.

The States

Earlier this Fall, Noodle completely bombed an "Identify the States" quiz at school. Looking at a map of the US, the girl recognized 3 states - North Carolina, Florida and Texas, which I'm guessing she knew from the Spongebob episode where Sandy the Squirrel is missing Texas.

After being an indignant parent - "Unfair!! If they asked about THE WORLD she could place any country. Or a map of Southeast Asia! How many American fifth graders could get all those countries correct???? Or properly place and name the provinces of China????" - I realized we might have some remedial work to do here.

My immediate thought was The Game of the States which I recall playing as a child with my brother and my Mom. Yeah, it is available again - riding on the apparent wave of reissuing all the "old" games for nostalgic parents/grandparents to buy for their wee ones who would just really rather have a DS. But imagine my surge of happiness when I dug up our very original (one might even say vintage if one were selling it on EBay) game from my childhood (I'm guessing we got it for Christmas sometime in the late 60's or early 70's).

I hauled that thing home and we've been playing every other evening or so (interspersing it with CLUE). The girls like the buying and selling - sell your furs in Maine for $400, buy them back in Nevada for $300 - ah sweet Capitalism. Plus, they seem to be learning what State is where, and importantly as we ponder doing family vacations here, how one gets from here to there, where ever there may be.

My girls may have a chance at being "Ameri-kan" after all.

Autumn

We've been having perfect fall days, cold in the morning, warm by afternoon. Blue skies. Leaves turning all lovely golden, red and orange. This morning a cold front moved in, rain and clouds and wind. But yesterday? Was glorious.

(I know. The photos are huge and we've all seen better leaves, but I need indulging on this one, 'cause I missed it so).

The view from my front stoop - where I spend much time watching the dog run pell mell after squirrels.

Our front yard Maple is still green - it always turns late. But the one across the street is like this:

We live in a hollow ('holler' as they are called down here) which is terrible for cell phone reception, but look up and it's all okay.

Our back deck is covered in crunchy smunchy leaves. Probably what I missed most about the season while living in Indonesia. Crunchy smunchy leaves.

Mazie is still intimidated by the steps to the back yard.

I even like it all from inside.

Outer Banks 2011

I'm not even going to talk about how COLD it has gotten the last few days here. Just to say, thank goodness the furnace is currently being serviced and heating oil set to arrive today.

To give me the illusion of heat,  I'm finally posting photos of our trip to the Outer Banks last month.

It was warm. It was sunny. It was a lovely, lovely week.

On the way we stopped by the Aquarium to say hey to the gators and other slimy creatures,

watch the sharks being fed,

practice  a little lesson on sea turtle rescue,

check out the gift shop (as a companion piece to the Panda Hat from Beijing? What do you think? Too much?)

dig for some shark's teeth,

and just hang out in the sunshine.

Then we were off to meet up with T's family at our oceanside house with a boardwalk to a gazebo (or as the oratorically gifted Uncle D called it "the pagoda") right to the beach.

Score.

Much sand was moved, many, many waves battled and boogie boarded.  Books were read. Lemon-aide consumed. Gossip exchanged. 

Plus, there was this cuteness to marvel over - our (currently) littlest nephew/cousin who was just a wee babe last time we saw him.

When the beach got tiresome, we retired to our pool.

Or hung out in the house enjoying family time.

Part of Noodle's educational activities - helping Auntie J with the NYT Sunday crossword. (And yes, that is one of Oma's Cinnamon Rolls with pecans on her plate - the food? was exquisite as always - this is a family that loves to cook).

The Atlantic was glorious.

The Mid-Autumn Moon Festival fell on Monday night. Goose and I made mooncakes for all and glow sticks were employed.

And the moon rose full and bright  over the ocean before disappearing behind some clouds.

More beach days,

 

And family nights.

Oma's Ice Cream.

Auntie J's Shrimp Feast.

  Danger Boy - The oldest nephew. 8 months younger than Goose and totally on the job keeping us from calamity.

A family stroll thorough the evening light,

Cousins.

Even Opa came along, on his zippy little go-go cart.

Ably assisted by grandchildren, of course.

And this is my favorite photo of my in-laws. Go-go cart on the sand. Got a little stuck? Who would have guessed? But the W family is on the job !

And we're on our way back to the house.

In time to watch another moonrise from the Pagoda.

We tried to visit the Lighthouse (actually leaving the house for something other than grocery store runs? What?!! Crazy), but it was closed. Little Boy was quite annoyed making a fine cousin photo op.

Noodle and the Goose mobile? Oh my.

The rest of the family had to leave early on Friday morning and with them went the perfect beach weather. Storms rolled in across the ocean, the temps fell and we spent most of the day snuggled in the house, watching.

Except for a jaunt to the lighthouse (stormy windy day? perfect to climb the light house).

Way up to the top!!!

A tad gusty up there.

Anon, we too have to make the long trek home again. Good thing we had our in-car entertainment system to keep the little ones occupied.

(This photo? Could be entitled, "how I spent most of my childhood - without the seat belt".)