Preschool, year 1, part 1

We just received a disk filled with pictures Silas' teachers took during the 10/11 school year. Silas just started a new school year today, so I thought it was good timing to share some images from his first year of school. Above, Silas on his very first day, with Teacher Debbie.
Art.
More art.
Who can forget Halloween!


This is the picture they used for the Christmas ornament Silas made for us:
This brings us to about November. Stay tuned for the rest of the 10/11 school year...

Last September, Silas was pretty apprehensive about starting school. Things could not be more different this year. He's really excited and is so glad to be back with his classmates and beloved teachers!

Backtracking: forgotten summer photos

There's so much that I haven't posted yet from this summer, so here's a combo-post for you.

Silly boy:
We went to the Underwater Naval Museum. Silas LOVED being on a sub, which he was (sort of).
What little kid wouldn't love to see this:
We got an awesome farm table for FREE! We love it!
We went to Port Townsend, several times.
While there, we got to watch a boat being made at the Wooden Boat Foundation.
And we hung out...basking in the sun, while there's still sun to bask in.

In the garden

I've been meaning to post some pictures from the garden for, oh, several months now. Here are a few pictures from today. Above and below, this is the flower garden I started this spring.

To give you an idea of how far we've come, this is what the space looked like last summer:

I've got three raised beds this year. There have been successes and failures, as is usually the case in gardening.
I've got lots of these squash below. The kids who sold the starts to me at a farmer's market said they were acorn squash, but they look more like patty pans to me. Either way...
An incomplete list of the produce I'm growing this summer: peas, chard, spinach, zucchini, pumpkins, corn, 5 varieties of tomatoes, potatoes, radishes, strawberries, onions, garlic, broccoli, cauliflower, red cabbage, and green beans. Happy harvesting!

Romeo and Juliet

Editor's note: Silas has an Olivia the Pig play stage which consists of various scenes from three performances: Turandot, Swan Lake, and Romeo and Juliet. He spends quite a bit of time acting these out, performing opera or ballet, as the case may be. Today, he performed Romeo and Juliet outside for us. The porch was his stage. I asked him to tell me the story so I could write it down. The following is my best effort to write down precisely what he said. You may notice the tense changing, and you may also notice that he has taken a bit of artistic license with the plot.

Romeo and Juliet

rewritten and performed by Silas

Juliet was sleeping on the stage. I was in the bathroom peeing, when a monster came and she didn't even know. She was towed away! And now she's trapped with a monster in his dome.

I (Romeo) am going to try to rescue her.

I'm going to give the monster a ticket for towing Juliet away. I give him the ticket, but he throws it away.

I then use an ambulance because I think (I'm not sure) he left her on the floor. He might have dropped her and she might have hurt her head. But my ambulance doesn't work and it needs to be towed, so the tow truck is going to take her home. But the tow truck doesn't know yet that she's trapped because I didn't call them.

I need to call them and tell them that they need to come over. I think they probably will, actually.

that's pretty much what happens. When Juliet gets home, she likes to put on performances for people with me (Romeo).

That's it.

Polliwog Camp

This week, Silas attended Polliwog Camp at Stillwaters Environmental Center. I think it's safe to say that he thought nature camp was awesome. The campers hiked on local trails, studied bugs, bird-watched, did nature art, and learned about ecology.

There's a fabulous climbing tree on the grounds, which saw lots of use. Silas also told me that he made a secret fort with several of the other boys.

There were three other children at the camp from Silas' class at preschool, and I think this helped make Silas feel comfortable right away. Here he is with friend J, in the gazebo overlooking the pond:

When I asked Silas what his very favorite thing about camp had been, he said it was "walking on the trail looking at the ecology huts." I don't quite know what that means, but I'll take his word for it.

We hiked up a mountain (again)

Last weekend, we hiked up Hurricane Hill, just like we did last year. The biggest difference was that this year, there was a lot more snow. I mean a lot more. The pack from last winter was dramatically more than the year before, which I think must be a good thing.

Mt. Baker is just barely visible in the distance:

We saw an Olympic Marmot, which was bigger and more golden than I remembered.

And there was no shortage of deer.

Silas enjoyed making snowballs (and then holding onto them until they melted away).

Hello little cloud.

On the way home, we were waylaid by a bridge opening on the Hood Canal Bridge. This gave me a rare opportunity to get out of the car whilst on the bridge in order to take a picture of the Olympic Mountains.
Thus ended our day trip to the mountains.

We hiked to the ocean

Last Sunday we hiked to Cape Alava/Sand Point. This is a 9.2 mile triangle: 3 miles from the trail head to the ocean, 3 miles along the coast, and 3 miles back to the trail head. I was afraid that, going at a 4 year old's pace, we wouldn't make it up the coast before the tide came back in. When the tide is high, this is a much more difficult hike, as the beach along certain stretches becomes submerged, and the only way to get through is to swim, or haul yourself up a cliff with a rope. To avoid that possibility, we walked around Sand Point for quite a while, then headed back up the path. So, about 7 miles overall.

The forest, on the hike in:
Checking out a location for a potential driftwood house:

Look, ma, I'm at the ocean!

On the top of what Silas calls "Dragon Mountain."

Me.

Us.

Strong (little) man:

Putting the finishing touch on the driftwood house:

Ta-da!

Enough of us. Here's what we came to see:



It rained during the hike back. Thankfully, the rainforest canopy kept us from getting totally drenched (sort of).

Long day. Good day.