It Started with a Baked Potato

Fun Friday lived up to its name this week. My son was invited to attend the unveiling of the winners of a design competition at the Library of Virginia.

To accompany the exhibit "Never Built Virginia" featuring models and plans of buildings that were never completed, the Library hosted a youth competition to design a building to fill a narrow, vacant city lot.

Here's my son with his design of a "Sky Lab":



And here's why we came - he placed second and his design will be a part of the Library of Virginia's archives!



One of the highlights of the event was to spend time with Mr. Haigh Jamgochian. He was the architect that had several models in the exhibit. His design for "Tree House" inspired the youth competition.

Here my son posed for a picture of Mr. Jamgochian with a Cub Scout denmate who also happened to be a contest winner:



Mr. Jamgochian discussed how he got started with architecture. He talked of how quickly time goes by, making it important to engage the opportunities that come by each of us. He also talked about how inspiration can come from all around you. One example he gave was seeing a baked potato wrapped in foil. He thought it would make a good siding material for a building. His resulting design is the Markel Building and is now a historical landmark in Richmond, Virginia:



Even the entrance speaks of Mr. Jamgochian's design: groovy circles, curves upon curves, an almost lunar quality.



And since things are lighter on the moon, my son could easily support the Markel building:



And to think it all started with a baked potato.

200

I can't believe that this is post #200 for TenTen. All these words and I still haven't said anything!!

But it is a good time to reassess. Internet issues plague me and my posting abilities, making blogging more work and less fun. My knitting is on the side line in an attempt to repair a lingering case of tennis elbow. So I am moving toward using this as a glimpse of our whole family life. As is the case in my real life, my private endeavors seldom stay that way. They are inseparable from my family.

Case in point: strawberry picking. The kids are finally old enough to pick more than they eat and they really helped in the kitchen making the jam. So this wasn't my venture to the fields and the ensuing canning activities - it was OUR story.

Having kids gives me a different perspective of life. I wouldn't have noticed this toad, let alone spent 20 minutes hunting and losing and re-hunting him:

Child labor (yes, my children are really that pale!):

My son hunts for strawberries with the same gusto as he searches for archeology finds:

It's good to pick with friends. Lots of friends.

Evidence of a hard morning's work:

And quick - one more family portrait (with a bigger me!):

And what was the end result?

Luscious strawberry jam!

My absolute favorite part is when you have to skim off the hot jam foam before ladling it into jars. We made 3 batches, so we had a nice little bowl full of strawberry fluff. Delightful!

We packed this jar with State Fair intentions, so I'll keep you posted.

I'm one step along on my resolution to can more this year. It is awfully fun in May when the weather is gorgeous. I'll let you know how August goes!

Mother's Day

We had a cool Mother's Day weekend - literally! I packed for our weekend at the River as if it were July and discovered it was more like March. (Don't ask why it has taken so long to get these up.)

The kids were entirely nonplussed with the temperature and spent hours playing on the "beach":



Daddy found time to sharpen the lawn mower blades he thought to bring from home:



I lazed around as much as possible (with children close to water and insufficiently dressed!). Mother's Day morning was a bit of deja vu. As a toddler, my son liked to wake early and I'd quickly shuffle out the door with him to allow everyone else a bit more sleep. We explored our old haunts like the crab pots on the dock:



Mud puddles are still a big draw:




And just when I thought that we'd run out of adventures, we spied the cavalry coming after us:




Special delivery of Mother's Day loot:



My favorite - coupons! They are for "Lunch", "Dirty Dishes" (unloading the dishwasher), "Wash the Car", "Day Off" (woohoo!), "Whateveryouwant" (double woohoo!), "For One Week: Feed Tubby and Feed Chickens" (complete with "buck, buck"). These are the reasons for Mother's Day!

And there was more:




My son's card has three plain circles and then a fancy Spirograph creation with the caption "You are Unique!" (SO sweet!). The kids gave me a copy of Martha's Cookies book and my daughter crafted a sleeping bed for Tiny (who I need to introduce you to) and a sewing "kit" for me:




I'm supposed to sew on the hearts myself to make a pillow. I think I might frame them instead!

I'm in My Cups

I laughed when I saw my coffee cup the other morning. Is it telling that this was taken around 1 p.m.? Each time I got interrupted or paused to get something, I noticed that a little ring was left behind. Can you see how many rings this day had? Kind of like a tree, telling about its life by the story it leaves behind. This story is all about learning to read, figuring out math problems, internet research, catching up with friends, getting bills paid - just a regular life, but with lots of "rings".

Chickens Grow FAST

Just a little trip down memory lane.



We brought home Petunia and Marigold on April 10th:





Here they are 8 days later with their new sisters Dandelion and Chick Pea:



And here they were this weekend (28 days after arriving home):




That's some potent chick feed they're eating!

Welcome Home

We have been spending. every. single. minute. for the past week getting the chicken coop built. I would never have imagined the sweat and the toil for a "chook shack". But we finished today and moved the girls into their new digs.

Here the kids are performing their forced labor for the day - coop transport. The idea was that this coop would be mobile, but it is SO heavy that mobile will mean moving only a few feet to fresh grass. Americans call it a chicken tractor, but I like the British name of chicken ark.



We ran into a bit of a speed bump coming across the bridge:



The kids added the bedding to the roost area (my daughter even patted in all out as if making a bed):



And tended to the laying boxes (which I tied to explain wouldn't get much traffic 'til later):



The did SO much of the work and thinking about the project. They found sticks for the roosts, helped figure out how to make the doors and latches work, and did a great job with painting. SO their last decision was how to get the chickens into their new home. They wound up with two going below and two up top.

Here are Petunia and Marigold enjoying the grass:



and Dandelion and Chick Pea wondering what the nesting box is all about:



I'm a little worried about releasing my little girls into the big bad world, but I've tried everything I could to create a home that's safe and comfortable for them. Not having any idea about what I am doing is probably not helping. Rain is forecast tomorrow, so that will be the real test of the ark. And did you notice how Tubby is in most of the pictures? He is very interested in these little fluffs that keep changing and growing and getting more and more animated. He's slowly creeping over to the predator list at this point. I'm sure that the hawks and foxes are already into what's been in the works. Let's hope they stay safe long enough to enjoy their new home!

Ashland Feed and Seed

Here's another peek at our new favorite store. They have so much in there that we always discover something new. The employees must think that I am a crazy person as I am always wandering down an aisle calling out "Well, look at that" to the kids. It doesn't help if you also take photos of buckets and shelves.

Here's the storefront:



I still haven't found out where you are "supposed" to park. It's a bit of a free-for-all by the side of the building and I've been known to circle the block a few times to get in, but get in we do.

Especially for sights like this:



That's not just a charming modern-county-gone-faux display - that's seed by the ounce. Really! Look closely:



Names, prices by the weight, and a helpful employee hovering somewhere to scoop and weigh. I picked up onion sets, blue seed potatoes (who says these guys are hip and with it?), and horseradish. I have little idea how to plant these, but isn't that the fun of gardening?

Chicken Reload

It's been a week ago already, but we went back to Ashland Feed and Seed for more chickens.

The Rhode Island Reds weren't in yet on our last visit.

The sign out front has a BIG cute factor:



Here are a box of little ladies that they used to restock the pens out in the store. They were quick to assure me that they don't keep them like this in the back, they just use the box for moving purposes. I was tickled by the sight of wall-to-wall fuzz:



Tubby's adjusting very well to having chickens around. I don't think that he wants to eat them, but he REALLY wants to play with them. We had them out in the yard (before the monsoons set it) and he almost rolled over on one.



He's almost the same color as one of the new girls.



So cute!

Carmel Church Quarry

We had glorious weather for a field trip to the Carmel Church quarry. Led by Dr. Dooley from the Virginia Museum of Natural History, we were allowed access to an active archaeological dig being conducted by the museum.

This site is "one of the most significant fossil deposits on the Virginia Coastal Plain. The Carmel Church Quarry is one of the richest vertebrate fossil sites east of the Mississippi. The 14 million-year-old Calvert Formation deposits at Carmel Church contain at least five species of whales and two dozen shark species, as well as manatees, crocodiles, turtles, birds, and bony fish".

The site itself wasn't overly large - perfect for a group of enthusiastic diggers:



Previous diggers had burrowed into the hillside leaving little "caves". The small piles at the base of the hillside are the remnants of past digs. While the piles had no fossils, small sharks' teeth were found in them.



Here's my littlest rock hound prying through the crumbly layers with a screw driver:



My son was really into it - literally!



Our find for the day - a partial shark's tooth:

Other's found more sharks' teeth and fossilized whale parts (technical term). One person even found something "museum worthy" that was taken by Dr. Dooley for further evaluation.

The only down-side of the day was the family that coordinated the trip was unable to attend, so I felt a little guilty about enjoying ourselves so much. They were sorely missed!!

The Eagles Have Landed

Our new babies have arrived! This time with much less fuss than the two unfeathered ones.

Here the kids are holding our two new Plymouth Barred Rocks:



We picked them up at the Ashland Feed and Seed. We wanted to get Rhode Island Reds also, but they won't be in until next week. By then we'll be professionals!

They had so many little chicks out in holding pens, and lots of folks just stopping in to ogle them. The 90-year-old gentleman helping us deftly cut air holes in a box with his pen knife and scooped up some shavings and two little layers and off we went. So cute and fuzzy:




Here they are warming up under a heat lamp in their box full of shavings:



One of their cuter features is that they have little pale yellow bottoms:



And their own little mama:



My daughter is going to wear those little ladies out! But she and Tubby are trying to be gentle. We'll see if it works.

Next up - the quest for the perfect coop.