The crab apple tree stump

We finally got the tree cleaned up out of our yard. The stump was the only thing left.  What were we to do with that?

Then someone had a great idea...Let's built a fire pit there, and roast marshmallows.

Ok....sounds good to me.

This tree stump has provided us with several evenings of s'mores and hotdogs. 

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade (or s'mores, in our case ;) )

Crab Apple Tree

There is a philosophical question that asks, "If a tree falls in the woods, and no was is there, does it make a sound?"

 

Interestingly, we lived this on a small scale this past week.

 

Last Saturday, Mike and I were talking about this one tree in our yard.  Some of the branches seemed to have died, but others seems to be thriving.  We were trying to decide should we chop it down, or let it be.  We decided that we would leave it, and let Adam continue to chop on the dead branches.

 

On Monday, Austin was looking out the deck doors and said, "The tree fell over!"  He did not see if fall over, it was already down.  But we had heard nothing. We have no idea if it fell down while we were home or not.

I guess the tree was maybe a little worse than we thought.

We started chopping it into smaller, more manageable pieces yesterday.  Dad came with his truck, he and Austin filled the truck.  Mike and I were out most of the morning, and Adam had been with Mamaw. 

When we got home, Adam went right to work, chopping that tree!  He worked on it for several hours once he started.

Until I got home and was able to get a few pictures, Austin had already been working on the tree for several hours.  Once Adam started, Austin stepped back and supervised a bit.  At that point he had already gotten 4 blisters on his hands.  I'd say that the blisters were proof he had done his part.

It will seem odd to not have this tree in our yard.  I have taken some really neat pictures of the boys in this tree, but apparently it was not healthy.  Although the tree is down, it is still providing hours of entertainment for the boys.

Sandy Bottom

One day this past week, Adam's science class went on a field trip to Sandy Bottom to study the water there.  He is still at the age that he enjoys me going on the field trips as well, so I joined them.

They were looking to see how clear the water was.  They filled a really tall tube with water and then drained the water until they could see the marking on the bottom of the tube. 

Here, Adam is draining the water.  He is waiting for the girl to say that she can see the marking, then he would turn off the drain tube.

They wanted to see the velocity of the water.  The kids got a partner, then they each went to their own line.  One line got a ping pong ball, they released the ball and timed how long it took to get to the partner.

Adam is listening to instructions, he is in the ping pong release side.

Another station was to find macroinvertabrates. 2 kids are are working up the bottom of the stream.  2 kids are holding the net, catching what the others have worked up.

Then they carry the net out of the water, and look too see what they caught.

I love this picture of all the kids hunkered over the net, looking to see what critters they caught.

Then they went back in the water, and switched places.

Adam was excited to be a "dancer" and work up the bottom.

Since I know that this phase of Adam will come to end at some point (probably sooner rather than later)...

I had to get a picture of Adam and myself on this trip.

NYC

Several months ago, Austin started talking about a friend of his.  He called his friend "Miller."
I thought,  "What an interesting first name to give a child."  It took a while, but it came out that Miller's first name is Jacob.  Apparently, Jacob was a common name the year that he was born, so friends at school have taken to calling the Jacobs by their last name.

Several months ago, I got a call from  Jacob Miller's mother.  She was thinking ahead to his birthday in April.  She wanted to take him to NYC and wondered if Austin and I would like to join them.  We thought that sounded like a lot of fun.  Plus, they were wanting to do some things that we did not get to do when we were there last July.

Yesterday, was the day that we had been planning for.  We got on the bus at 4:45am.  Luckily, we were able to sleep a little on the way.  We got dropped of in NYC around 11am.  We thought we would go and do some of the things that were a little farther away from our bus stop first.  We got taxi and went to battery park. (At this point the weather was a bit drizzly, but our cab driver assured us that by 2 it would be clear and a lovely day.  Looking back he was exactly right!  At 2 it had quit raining, and was a really nice day weather wise.)  We wanted to see the Statue of Liberty, but really did not want to spend so many hours on the tour, plus that would have been another ticket to buy.  We went to battery park and we got a decent view of the Statue.  It would have been better if the weather had been more clear, but Austin and I had the Statue of Liberty experience in July, so we were fine with this choice.

After the Statue, we wanted to go see the Freedom tower.  It was a reasonable walk from one area to another, so off we went.

Jacob's mother, Bobby Jo, and I thought we should have at least one picture of the boys together.  They were not excited about that, but humored us.

There is the Freedom Tower.  I think it is such a beautiful building.

Near the Freedom Tower, there is a wall memorial about 9/11.  It has different scenes from the horrific terror attack that NYC had experienced 14 years ago. There was a really interesting man that was cleaning the memorial.  He would answer questions, and tell facts that few people knew about.

This was not the boys first choice of a place to visit, because it is "depressing," but we thought that this is a part of the boys life history, one day they may appreciate that they had been taken here.

Then we went to site where the twin towers had stood.  They have a really nice memorial there.  They have names of those who lost their lives along the edge,

a double waterfall fountain is in the center.

When we were at the fountain, we were able to get a really great view of the Freedom Tower.  It is just amazing.

We were fairly close to the Brooklyn Bridge.  So, we headed over there to see that.  Since we are not there day in and day out, we decided to take a short stroll of on the bridge.  The boys got bored with that, so we had to cut it short, but at least we got a good look at the first pillar.  (It was a bit unnerving to walk on this path and have traffic flying on both sides of the dividers.  I guess New Yorkers gets used to it!)

Several years prior to ever going to New York, someone told me that we should visit Little China, and Little Italy.  We had wanted to eat in Little Italy, but in order to get there we had to walk through Little China.  It truly was like tiny replication of what I imagine those countries to be like. 

After lunch, Jacob and Austin wanted so true Italian Gelato.  I thought, "Well, we might as well make the most of this experience."

After lunch, we headed to Central Park.  We weren't sure what we should see (Central Park is a very big area).  This guy started talking to us about bike tours.  It was a tour guide that has a 2 seat carriage on the back.  The tour guide tells you things about the park, that would not know otherwise.  Plus, we got to see a lot of more the park this way.

Jacob and Austin got a carriage, and Bobby Jo and I got another.  The tour guides stayed together so that we would be able to experience this with our boys. 

One of the first thing they pointed out was the building with 2 towers in the background.  That building is the building they used in the movie Ghostbusters.

The bridge in the background here is the bridge they used in the spider-man movie.

Then we went by the fountain that was used in the beginning of the show Friends.

Then we were taken to another area in the park, where there is a memorial for John Lennon from the Beattles.  It is just a short distance from the apartment building where he had lived.

Had to get a picture of Trump tower in case he would be our next president.

There is a Christmas movie called Elf.  In that movie there is a snowball fight scene.  This bridge is where the snowball fight took place.

One of the things the boys really wanted to do was to go to the top of the Empire State Building.  We bought tickets prior to our trip that allowed us to go to the 86nd floor and the 102nd floor and not have to wait in lines.  The only condition was that the boys wanted to see the city at night.  So, this was the last thing we did.

This is the view of the 86th floor.

And the 102nd.

Shortly after we did this we headed back to our bus to come home.  

It was a busy day.  But it was filled with experiences that I hope Austin will remember to many years to come.

Blessed

We went to Pennsylvania this past weekend and celebrated Easter with Mike's parents.  As I was thinking about this post with some of the pictures that I had, one word kept coming to mind...Blessed.

 

~We are so Blessed that our boys are able to participate in a 4 generation picture.  They have their Great Grandfather (Pop-pop, Henry, which is where we got Adam's middle name), Grandma Sandy, Mike and our boys.  Not many kids anymore can say they have a 94 year old Great Grandfather. We were able to go  to Easter service with Pop-pop at the home where he has an apartment.  Then we went back to his apartment and got this picture.

~We are Blessed that both sets of Grandparents live in a reasonable distance.  My parents live in town and we see them quite often.  Mike's parents are several hours north of us, but we can still get there easily without a plane ticket.

~Lastly, I am Blessed that I got chosen to be the mother of these two lovely boys!  I love this picture because both of my boys look so genuinely happy.  (An added bonus is that you can see Sandy taking the picture if  you look in the window :)

This Easter Season, I know that I am very Blessed!

Old Tree

We have an old crab apple tree in our yard.  For some time now, the tree has been looking less and less healthy.  

About a year or so ago, I was going to take a picture of Austin.  He wanted to climb in this tree to have his picture taken.  He stepped on a branch and it broke.  

Here we are a few years later, and the tree is still in our yard.  Mike and I were discussing this the other day after school.  Mike was saying that this tree is a real pain to mow around.  I said, it is nothing but truly ugly.  Adam heard all this and asked if he could chop it down.  

We agreed that he could do that.  He got his eye protection and his little ax and went to work on the tree.

I'm sure the tree will not come down quickly at the rate that Adam is going, but it is nice for him to have a project to work on.

Fire Pit

This year is a leap year.  On Leap day we had very mild weather.  The boys really wanted to do a fire in a fire pit.  

Mike helped the boys build a pit in my garden space.  He ran to the store and got marshmallows, and Adam invited a few friends over.  Once it started to get dark, the boys got the fire going. 

The boys had a great time.  I'm so glad they could do something fun on a mild day at the end of February.