Here's another

 

Granny

I can hardly believe I'm doing this yet again, but here's a little more sad news. Ethan's great grandmother Jeanne passed away today. I think you can see how much she enjoyed her family from these pictures. I hope I can teach Ethan even half of what she taught me.  We will miss her.

Survey Says

Just for kicks, I asked Ethan a few questions last week and took note of his answers. Some are no surprise, and most could vary by day and time they are asked.

What's your favorite dinner? Mac and cheese
Favorite dessert? Raspberries
Special treat? Chocolate bar
Hey wait a minute, those are all my answers too... hmmm.
Color? Red
Hobby? Painting
Sport? Baseball
Movie? Cars 2
TV Show? Curious George
If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go? North Carolina
What's your favorite thing to do in the summer time? Go to the beach
Winter time? Make a snowman
Fall? Jump into leaves
What's your favorite thing to wear? Hats
What's your favorite kind of music? Rock n roll
Favorite song? Crocodile Rock
Favorite singer? Mr. Elton John
Favorite book? Percy's Chocolate Crunch
Favorite thing to do on the playground? Slides

Gardener

Tonight James brought home some herbs given to him by a coworker. The busy gardeners went to work  planting and watering. Earlier in the day, Ethan and I went to Litchfield to attend a program at the museum. He got to see Benjamin Tallmadge and learn about Washington's spies. I think he enjoyed playing in the soldier's tent in the Civil War exhibit the best (it's all reproduction, playing is encouraged). He also liked that we got pizza and stayed for lunch. We visited the library this afternoon and got a very large selection of books as well as two new movies. We are participating in the summer reading program. For every hour, Ethan gets a raffle ticket to enter for prizes. He got three for last week and put them all in a box to win historical figures made out of legos. After that we came home and danced for a while before it was time to make dinner.

Day at the Zoo

Saturday the weather cleared and it was beautiful, so we decided to head to the zoo and see the puppet show Ethan enjoyed so much last year. We got a special treat because they had two enormous tortoises visiting the zoo. Ethan was happy that he got to show James the new fish feeding pond in the greenhouse, and it was especially fun when the fish started fighting over the food and splashed them both! We did our usual circuit around the zoo and watched the puppeteer. This year Ethan decided not to go up on stage but opted to sit with us to sing along.

Rainbow

Friday night Ethan's friend had a birthday party in Cheshire. It's on the other side of Waterbury and of course around 4pm the torrential downpours started and the traffic slowed to a crawl. To get from his school and go one exit on 84 took 40 minutes, so we got off and went the "long" way and arrived just a few minutes after someone who left school before us and stayed on. Well, at least we were moving. The kids had a great time at the party despite the weather and on our way home we were treated to a bonus- we got to see this beautiful rainbow which we could still see when we got home. Hope you can see it!

Summer!

Summer is officially here, and so is our farmer's market! Ethan has been asking about it for at least three weeks, so he was pretty darned excited to go. It was fairly warm, so it wasn't too busy and it seemed like a few vendors didn't show up, but the ones we were looking for were there. Averill Farm came with the donuts. We found Ethan some baby spinach from a local organic farmer, and then we got to sit down and listen to "the man with the guitar" sing Do You Know What it Means to Miss New Orleans. We even saw Ethan's school chum Teresa and her family. After the farm market we went on a birthday present hunt. We ended up at the art supply store and Ethan chose some great presents for his friend's birthday party tomorrow.

Happy Father's Day

We started off the day by making James pancakes, per Ethan's request. Then we took the ice cream mix we made yesterday and put it in the ice cream freezer to get it ready for tonight. After that, Ethan and James read a while and I cleaned. Then we headed to the Goshen Stampede to watch the rodeo. We've never been, and given their seating situation I'm not sure I would do it again. I think there are about three rows of bleachers where a person could actually see, and the people in them were probably there all day to keep them. We did manage to see a few things through the slats of the fence, that is when the rude people standing there (despite being told repeatedly to move) shifted just right. Once we had enough of that we let Ethan pick one ride. He wanted to go on the Scrambler, and he's not tall enough to go alone so I went on it with him. He loved it, he giggled the whole time. Then we headed home where Ethan and James hung out in his room playing dinosaur while I pulled weeds and made dinner. After dinner we got to try our ice cream. It came out great. Can you see the line of ice cream on Ethan's forehead? That's from picking up the dish to try to slurp up the melted ice cream ;)
 Happy Father's Day to all the dads.

First Graduation

Tonight Ethan's school had a graduation for the kids who are going to kindergarten next year. It was very cute. They all recited a line from the book "The Night Before Kindergarten" then they sang a song and got diplomas. After that they had hot dogs and burgers followed by ice cream sandwiches. We thought we'd take Ethan to Rich's Farm after but he wanted to stay and play with his friends. He was very happy that his buddy Jack was there because they've been on opposite schedules this summer.

Bubbles

Caught Up!

Sunday after we arrived home from our trip Ethan had a birthday party to go to. He had a really great time at his friend's party. They had this great bouncy with a slide.



Monday we went to the Memorial Day parade in town, then came home to be lazy. One of Ethan's favorite pass times is  sitting in my "resting chair" and looking at my books. He also spent some time perusing the comics.

Tuesday James had to go back to work, but Ethan and I had some fun. We did our normal Tuesday shopping trip. We went to the library for new books and movies. In the afternoon, since we were still having pretty warm weather (so much for that) we got out some squirt guns and had a squirt gun fight. Somehow, even though I had on my glasses, the little stinker got me right in the eye about five times. You should have heard him giggle.

Day 14: Harpers Ferry & Home

We drove to West Virginia the night before, got up in the morning and headed to the Harpers Ferry National Park. It was a beautiful day and a really beautiful place. We decided to climb up to Jefferson's Rock immediately upon arrival because we figured it was going to keep getting warmer. After that we explored some of the other areas, buildings, and a railroad bridge that had a pedestrian walkway. 

Before getting on the road home, we had some lunch. Ethan decided to try taking some pictures with the real camera, these are some of his work.

Days 12 & 13: Pigeon Forge

When we got to Pigeon Forge, a show was letting out. That added about half an hour to the drive. Apparently every hotel, "attraction" and show in the place is on one street. It looked to me a lot like Vegas would look if it were in the South. Over the top times ten. We made it to our hotel and Ethan loved it. It was a Christmas themed place with Santa all over and a tree in every room. We went to Dollywood the next day. It was ok, but when compared with Hershey or Disney the rides for kids were not nearly as entertaining for adults, and there weren't as many of them. So that was a little disappointing. Also it started raining around 5pm so we had to get out and got soaked in the process. But when we got back to the hotel James and Ethan decided to get wet again and had a great time in the pool.

The next day before heading to West Virginia, we stopped in Greenville at the Andrew Johnson National Park site. It was another really nice site. Ethan really liked the rocking chairs on all the porches.

Day 11: Parthenon, Opry, Hermitage, and Out

We started the day by heading to the Parthenon. It was right near our hotel, we had to go in. It was a bit insane really, reproductions of all sorts of antiquities, and most of the originals aren't owned by Greece, but by the British. No surprise really. Anyway, it was something to see. You can probably tell that Ethan wasn't such a great sleeper in the hotel. Napped on the trolley, and at the Opry. Didn't even know he was on stage.  He did enjoy the extra large guitars outside, however.

After the Opry we found some bbq for lunch and then headed to the Hermitage. It was lovely, nearly as Jackson had left it. Ethan really enjoyed the grounds and investigating the plants and animals. There were some rather large cows and a horse drawn wagon. A little more challenging were the slave quarters. It's not exactly possible to explain that to a four year old, especially when I can't comprehend that kind of inhuman cruelty as an adult. On a lighter note, we left Nashville to drive to Pigeon Forge. 

Day 10: Nashville

For our first morning in Nashville, we stopped at the Ryman Auditorium. After standing on the stage of the Grand Ole Opry, we headed out for a trolley tour of the sites around the city. We saw the RCA studio that was a favorite of Elvis and a variety of other stars, and lots of other places. Well, James and I did anyway. Ethan napped. The bottom middle and right are the view from our hotel. Yes, you are seeing correctly- that's the Parthenon. they recreated it in Nashville for the Centennial Celebration and never took it down. More later on that. 

After Ethan woke up and we exited the trolley, we found some lunch. Then we decided to hop on it again so we could actually get off at a few of the sites. We stopped and spent an hour at bicentennial park where we saw the farmers market and got some fantastic strawberries and peaches. We found a local burger joint for dinner and then I think you can see what was for dessert.

Day 9: Bourbon, Lincoln, and Drive Time

We had a fairly long drive to Nashville, so we didn't do a lot this day. We visited the Bourbon Heritage Center at one of the distilleries and took their trolley tour of Bardstown, KY. We had some lunch and headed to another distillery where James toured and Ethan and I blew bubbles and played ball in the lawn. After that, we drove to Tennessee with a stop at the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Park, arriving about 20 minutes prior to closing. We managed to race through the site before continuing our drive to Nashville.

Day 8: Lexington

 
While James visited another bourbon distillery, Ethan and I went to the Shaker Village of Pleasant Hill. It was a very nice place, and a nice day. Ethan was the only kid who turned up for the gardening program, so he was able to get personalized attention. He planted a watermelon seed and brought home some other seeds to plant. He also got up close to a number of young farm animals including chickens, sheep, goats, and a couple of barn cats. 
 
When I finally convinced him to go inside a few of the buildings, he enjoyed listening to his echo in the meeting house (which, fortunately, was nearly empty) and then we went across the street where there was a hands on room and a chance to card wool and write on a slate.


 
After James retrieved us, we found some lunch and headed to downtown Lexington. We found this marvelous pink fountain and Ethan had a fantastic time getting soaked. It was pretty hot so we didn't mind. 




 
Then we wandered around with a walking tour map and saw the historic sites, including Henry Clay's Law office. No, he didn't attend the Litchfield Law School, but many of his contemporaries did.







 
You probably thought that was a full day, but as we're always looking for one more adventure we played a game of mini golf before dinner.