Buzz-kill.

We haven't had dinner inside since Father's day. We got D a gas grill, and he loves it! He and the kids have probably eaten more meat in the past three weeks than in the past three years combined, thanks to the wonders of propane and a good set of tongs. I've learned to make a pretty mean grilled sandwich with fresh mozzarella and basil. (well, OK, D still does the grilling but boy can I slice those tomatoes!)

I love eating outside! Be in on a picnic blanket, a fancy table or just a patch of grass, there is just something special about food consumed under the blue sunny skies of summer, no? We have this great old silver maple whose branches just drape over the back yard, creating a delicious breeze and dappled shade. Our "dining set" is an old, rusty number I scored at a yard sale for $25 years ago. The thing is charming since I coated it with "cornflower blue" spray paint.

Dinner was positively lovely the other evening, a sunny, breezy night. We had just sat down to feast on the vinegar-and-salt roasted potatoes (Yum!) that I had made when our party was spoiled by -who else-a bee.

To say that L freaked would be an understatement. She screamed so loud I was worried the neighbors would call 911. She pretty much lept into my arms and buried her face in my neck, screaming the whole time.

We retreated to the safety of the kitchen where she managed to calm down a little bit, and I explained to her that bees are mostly harmless, that they don't want to hurt people, they only sting when scared, and that they actually die if they sting. Oh, and they do something pretty neat: help spread the plants and flowers that we love. Help the plants that grow fruits. But I backed off on that angle. She was so not there yet. She was still fearful and freaked out.

Since she is still fuzzy on the whole "death" thing, I explained: "The stinger is at the very end of the bee. And when the bee stings, the back of their body rips off. And that hurts the bee too. So, you see, they don't really want to sting you."

A couple of days later, she was still asking me to explain this. "Mommy, tell me what happens to a bee when it stings you?" "Mommy, why does the bee's body rip apart?" So I told her, again and again.

I love bees. And although I was tempted to seize this as a "teachable moment" and expound on the virtues of bees, I also recognized that she was still in a place of fear. Rather than inundate the girl with facts and information about how great bees really are, what an important role they play in nature, I just wanted her to not be afraid. That's the first step toward appreciation. After all, she's not going to give a hoot what bees do if she's terrified of them. Right now, she just needs to know she's safe around bees.

In our mail that afternoon was the DNR's great magazine, the Volunteer, and this month's issue had a feature on bees! Wonderful! We got to look close-up at the bodies of different species of bees, and L actually saw how cute and fuzzy the little things are! She was really interested in the pictures and picked a few "favorites" from a page with a dozen or so pictures. Here's a link to a great article on bees from that magazine. I mentioned very briefly that bees help spread plants around, and help fruits and flowers grow.

My hope, of course, is to help her move from fear to curiosity. I want her be intrigued enough by what they do, that she is curious and wants to learn more. So, the next day when we made strawberry popsicles, I had to put in a good word for the bees who pollinated the strawberry plants.

cool bee links to check out:
http://www.gpnc.org/honeybee.htm
And did you know the honeybee population is on the decline? It's scary and true. Something big is happening, and scientists are not sure what. Read more about "colony collapse disorder" at this link:
http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/pr/2009/090519.htm

Summer in the city

Spent a lovely evening at one of our favorite places. We packed a picnic dinner, which although passable, wasn't what I would consider nutritious or interesting. (fried chicken, pasta salad, watermelon. Fudge stripe cookies. Yawn.) Despite the boring food (which the kids weren't into anyway, come on, what can compete with the trees and a gloriously green park on a summer evening?) we had a wonderful time. There was a live tango band playing in the pavilion, and lots of family picnics and revelry. Red white and blue balloons, people grilling, kids playing and screaming, dogs barking.

There was, for some strange reason, a pile of freshly pruned branches and twigs scattered about the ground, and for several of the kids at the park, (mine included) this provided fodder for a game I call "gather up the leaves into a pile and throw them into the air"--it was great to see kids ranging in age from 1 to probably 8, all coming up with an impromptu game, then playing together and enjoying nature, despite the fact that they didn't know each other at all. And with no parental involvement or direction. It was cool to watch the game just "happen" spontaneously.

The game ended poorly, as games sometimes do, with one boy, I'd guess him to be about 4, getting mad for some reason, picking up a branch, and just whacking the crap out of a smaller boy, I'd guess to be about 2. The older boy's parents were watching but didn't intervene. The 2 year old wasn't physically hurt, but he was clearly upset and stood off to the side for the rest of the time the game went on. Just watching. It was sad, and I felt a little weird about it. I wanted the parents to intervene, or to have the bully make peace somehow. They didn't seem to care at all about what had happened, they just ordered the boy to the sidewalk with them so they could walk on. I felt sorry for the 2 year old.

L and J saw the incident happen, and stood quietly watching while it was "going down" but quickly moved on. The drama of kid play never fails to surprise me. My kids were over it before I was, although they did lose interest completely in the leaf game after this happened.

L and J each had brought along a doll stroller and had great fun pushing their "babies" (stuffed cat and puppy, respectively) around under the huge, spreading oak trees. After the leaf drama, they resumed racing around and around with the strollers and pretending to "go home"-walking as far away from me as they comfortably could, (always turning around to make sure I was watching them go, and still within their sight), then turning around and racing back to me. Sometimes they even stopped to collect "spaghetti" for me on the way. (stacks and handfuls of thin twigs)

And the trees, oh, these trees were mammoth! And they just felt so, I don't know, happy to me. Was it all the happy people enjoying the first evening of a long holiday weekend, milling about beneath them? Was it the sunshine wrapping each and every leaf in warmth? (I could practically hear the leaves at work, photosynthesizing their bad ol' selves like nobody's business) Was it the fact that today was the first day it's been above 60 in days? Who knows? Who cares?

It's summer in the city. 'Bout time.

Spent a rainy Saturday indoors, just me and the kids. D was at a pool tournament and so the kids and I had lots of time to work on puppets-their latest fascination. A favorite destination of ours is the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum, where there is a wonderful free-play area for kids. Among the many things my kids love to play with are the "puppets" they have in a basket under a large sprawling oak tree. The puppets are nothing more than slices of trees, round discs of tree, cut thinly. Kids can use pencils to draw faces on them or just let the design of the wood be a face. There is a stage which they can hide behind to perform puppet plays. For the longest time J delightedly referred to every piece of fallen wood he saw as a "puppet!"

This weekend, however, the puppets became so much more elaborate. Fueled by excitement from having seen a puppet show in a friends' yard (community theater at its best!) the kids wanted to make their own troupe of characters. We got out the pipe cleaners, pom poms, styrofoam balls, and I weilded the glue gun (at L's precise direction, of course) and by the time the afternoon was drawing to a close, we had a lively bunch: an octopus, a "quad-pus", a cat, and several butterflies. I was treated to several exciting puppet shows as the weekend wore on. None of the kids felt inspired to make a human puppet. (oh, they are so my children!)

Something else I'd been meaning to make with the kids that we finally tackled: treasure boxes. These are simple decorated boxes for the kids to keep their very special items in. Our house is filled with clutter and toys, and we needed someplace really special to keep our nature treasures. The kids each got a plain cardboard box with lid, and decorated it with crayons. L put her growing feather collection (which now amounts to three feathers: a woodpecker, cardinal, and turkey feather--this last one a souvenir from the puppet show), her favorite rocks and a couple of shells she scored on our last trip to the St Croix River. I'm not sure she needs to know that the shells are from Zebra Mussels, the highly invasive and absolutely harmful species that is taking over Minnesota's waterways.

For now, she's delighted to open the box and tell me the story of each treasure inside. And I'm delighted to listen.

rainbow

this morning J and I stopped at the "dandelion fountain" --a place I remember from my own childhood (though, I'm not sure why...we rarely ventured into the city when I was young. Hm.) The kids have been fascinated by this since they first saw it earlier this week when we were driving around killing time, waiting for L's preschool program to start. As soon as we dropped L off at school J started requesting a trip.

It rained early this morning, one of those wonderful, early summer rains, dumping buckets of fat raindrops all over, with the low rumbles of thunder urging me out of bed. I love summer thunderstorms. By the time we dropped L off at school the rain had stopped and the sun was out. The grass in Loring park was wet and the sidewalks were steamy.

We walked around the fountain and watched the water pour from one pool to the next. We felt the spray of mist on our faces. J watched a pigeon land and we listened to its wings, like crisp fabric flapping as it took off. Another bird landed on one of the drain thingies-and J was intrigued as it munched bugs and bits of seeds, then flew straight through the mist from the dandelion and off to a tree.

"Bath! Bath! Bird took bath!" he yelled.

Then he noticed the rainbow. The morning sun was shining through the droplets of water just so, and we were treated with a long, wide rainbow. J reached out eagerly. "Grab, grab" he said. "Touch rainbow"

"We can't touch the rainbow, because it's made of the sun hiding in the water." I told him.

"pleeeeeeease" he begged.

We watched the rainbow a few times, then the church bells started to peal in the distance. I'm not even religious but it was a moment I will never forget. A perfect moment with my sweet boy.

When it was time to go we walked around the fountain a couple of times, watching the rainbow disappear and reappear. "Bye rainbow," he said as we walked away, "lub you."

crushed

Coaxing the kids through the back yard and into the car last week, I stepped on an ant. L stopped and crouched down while I was busy wrangling J and the ancillary "kid stuff" that seems to accompany us everywhere these days.

"Mama, why did you step on the ant?"
"uh, well, sweetie, I guess I just wasn't paying attention to where I was walking."
"But you squished it. It's not moving."
"Well, honey, I must have killed it. " I said sheepishly. "I'm so sorry." And I was. (Honestly, I really do usually try to avoid stepping on them.)

She gingerly picked it up and carried it to the car. I opened her door and she climbed in and set the ant ever-so-carefully into the cup holder of her booster seat. The girl was sad. I think it might be the first time L has seen something go from living to dead. I think she saw the finality of it: the ant was walking along, I stepped on it, and then it was dead.

We drove and drove, L asking over and over "Why did you step on the ant?" And me just repeating the same ol' thing, over and over. "I made a mistake. I'm sorry."

We've been in the car about a dozen times since this happened. The ant is still in her cup holder.