This week we reached the end of our "official" Arc of Abilities' spring birthday blitz when we celebrated Xavier's on Tuesday! It's been a lot of fun with all the celebrations since March and April, but now we'll slow things down a while, even though we still have Devin's postponed celebration to come after he returns from a family trip. We'll celebrate Tracy's next week, but our next official AoA birthday isn't until Nan's at the end of July! We'll have Laura's in mid-August and then in mid-September we'll start the fall birthday blitz with Tessa's. Meanwhile, here's a look at our wonderful, and busy, week:
Tuesday, May 14
First thing this morning, we welcomed Carol, Drew, and Patrick back after their (fortunately) mild cases of Covid last week. Next, before we could head over to Freedom Park to meet with our master gardener friends, we checked on our sunflowers and strawberries. We're proud to say the sunflowers are still growing, and we harvested 7 strawberries! We were pleasantly surprised that critters hadn't eat more of them than they did! 🍓🍓🍓
At the garden we were so happy to see Krafty Karen back after spending time with her mom, who, by the way, is doing very well and back at home after surgery to repair her broken hip. She's 94 and a real trouper! We were also joined by Barbara, Joanne, Carolyn, and Jay. We planted seeds and plants today, and learned about "Companion Gardening," which is putting plants that compliment each other together. We planted tomato, basil, and peppers near each other, and also corn and beans. We also planted cantaloupe and cucumber seeds, and harvested radishes and more garlic and onions!
Welcome Back, Karen!
Liz planted basil.
Beka, Barb, and Erik planted bean and corn seeds. They are companion plants!
Devin planted a red pepper plant.
Joanne, Sam, Tessa, Carol, and Bryan planted tarragon in the herb bed.
Radishes! And white flowers on our potato plants, a great sign that they are growing well!
We told the master gardeners about our success with the sunflowers and strawberries, and Alexis showed pictures from her phone. Next, Jay talked to us about companion gardening. He showed samples of corn and bean seeds and explained that the Powhatan Indians knew to plant them together because the corn stalk would provide a good "pole" for the bean stalk to climb, and the bean stalk would provide extra support for the corn stalk! He also said they planted melons and squash around the base of the beans and corn to provide shade that helped keep the soil moist! Very cool information!
We always learn something new with the master gardeners, and we thank them for the wonderful lessons and experiences!
This is a corn seed that produces black corn! Jay said it tastes just like yellow corn!
We also put some cute little figurines in the fairy garden that Alexis donated after a recent clean out of her arts and craft supplies!
Thanks, Karen, for the "herby cracker" snack that we enjoyed on the van ride back to the center. Lunch was a little later today, so it helped to tide us over! It was also very flavorful and Erik and all of us agreed it's a "keeper" recipe!
Check out Carolyn's latest edition of the Master Gardener Journal Update! Great photos, and a great summary of our time together, Carolyn!
Once we got back to the center, there was a delicious lunch, birthday party, and more fun in store! We celebrated Xavier's 29th birthday, today! His actual birthday is Saturday, but his mom will be out of town later this week, so we worked it in today. Leah and Steve were waiting for us when we got back, and they had hot dogs, fruit salad, chips, lemonade, and cupcakes with them...oh, yeah! Steve cooked the hot dogs up in a jiffy and we enjoyed a tasty birthday lunch for our guy, Xavier!
Happy Birthday, Xavier! We hope all of your dreams come true! We loved celebrating with you and the cupcakes were the best!!
Wednesday, May 15
Our therapy dog friends visited today for reading, games, and good fun! Since we were having a lesson about cicadas in the afternoon, we asked our Library Ladies to check out books about insects for our reading rotations. Thanks, Alexis, Laura, and Liz! Great selection!
Greeting everyone before reading rotations!
Liz and Kevin reading with Carol and Casey while Heike, who also loves to pet the therapy dogs, cleans the windows on the doors!
Indy has her eyes trained on a little bug crawling along the wall while Abraham, Drew, Alexis, Caroline, and Pip read about ladybugs and spiders!
Vicky and Aubree enjoyed learning about very hungry caterpillars with Patrick's book, and cockroaches with Tessa's!!
Sam and Devin read with Kent and Leo, and learned a few facts about the praying mantis.
Marisol, Tucker, and Nan enjoyed being read to by Devin and Erik.
Last, but definitely not least, we had Kate, Laura, and Xavier reading to Aja.
After reading rotations, we played a group game with our dogs and handlers called "Swap Seats." The "It" person had to give directions and if they applied to you, you had to swap seats with other players. We were always one seat short, so we always ended up with a new person to be "It." The game was a fun (and funny) way to wrap up today's visit with our therapy dog friends!
Devin said, "Swap seats if you like the Washington Commanders," and poor Liz was the only one who got up! She was a super good sport about being the only Commanders fan in the group!
There was a little more movement when Vicky said, "Swap seats if you've seen a cicada in the past week!" 👀
After Choice Time we listened to our read-aloud, and tasted the strawberries we picked yesterday from the pot in our garden plot. They were a little tart, but Devin, Sam, and Bryan said they definitely tasted like strawberries!
We ended the day with a lesson about the current cicada emergence. Two different broods (XIII and XIX) are making a lot of noise in some parts of the country right now, so we wondered about how they do that. Mystery Science explained it. Click on the video for a link if you're curious!
We also learned about the life cycle of the cicada, and were surprised that they live most of their lives underground. Currently, in eastern Virginia, Brood XIX, which emerges every 13 years, can be heard and seen in some of our neighborhoods. They are represented by red dots on the map. The blue dots represent Brood XIII, and they only emerge every 17 years. The year 2024 is unusual because both of these broods are emerging at the same time, and that only happens every 221 years! Crazy, but fascinating, too! Thomas Jefferson was president in 1803, the last time these two broods emerged in the same year!
Thursday, May 16
It was a colorful day at the center as we welcomed volunteers from Williamsburg United Methodist Church to help us paint rocks! It was their "Hands On Mission Week" and we were so lucky they chose to visit with us. We also played Bingo and loved the extra prizes they donated!!
We were tickled to see that Pip and Indy's dog mom, and our friend, Caroline, was one of the volunteers! She didn't tell us she would be back today when we saw her with the therapy dogs yesterday. Laura, Liz, and Xavier loved being surprised by her!
We apologize for snapping the picture before Gayle looked up, but she was so dedicated to helping Drew, Bryan, and Sam. She made three brand new buddies for sure!
Janet worked with Devin and Kevin who appreciated her tips for their rock painting. They were quite chatty with her, too!
This is Jim who was so encouraging with Tessa and Patrick! They were kind of quiet, but Jim helped them create beautiful pieces of art.
Working with Beka and Kate was our new friend, Jeannie. She and the girls delighted in talking about the fact that her grandson is the goalie for the W&M men's soccer team!
Emma and Alexis made friends with Suzanna who was very complimentary of the girls' colorful creations!
Nella loved Annmarie's confidence in using lots of color, and she gently encouraged Erik to expand his idea for painting flowers on his rock!
Drew got to put finishing touches on his rock with Zack, who is the Family Ministry Coordinator at WUMC. While Gayle began to tidy up, Zack and Drew got to laughing over a silly joke!
We took a break while the base colors on the rocks dried, and played an enthusiastic game of Spring Bingo. The clues were in the form of rhymes about objects related to spring, and we think our visitors were impressed with our quick responses to the clues!
Xavier was the first winner! He spotted some Starburst candy and was very happy!
Our finished rocks! Aren't they dazzling?!
Thank you so much Williamsburg United Methodist Church! Your time with us today was a true blessing. Thanks for your patience and encouragement as we worked, and for sharing in delightful conversations with us! We love making new friends!
The rest of the day was spent having lunch, Choice Time, and a lesson for Endangered Species Day, which is tomorrow. We had a very nice day today!
Bryan is going out of town and won't be here tomorrow so he made sure to grab a helper in Emma and get the bird feeders filled for the weekend. Bryan has become very diligent in feeding the birds! 🐦
During Choice Time, Alexis, Emma, Carol, and Kate painted a few more rocks. We're going to put them in the Kindness Garden at the Rec Center on Longhill.
We saw a video about endangered animals and did an activity to learn more about the differences between "vulnerable," "endangered," and "critically endangered." We had extra time so Liz did a quick Google search and found a great online memory matching game about endangered animals for us to try. Tessa made a match for tiger!
We won the game just as time for dismissal rolled around!
Friday, May 17
Eaton didn't need us after all this week, so we found ourselves with vans and a free day! First, we spent a couple of hours at the center enjoying our dance warm up and then making thank you cards for recent birthday party lunches from Michelle's and Xavier's families. We also had a crew prepare a cart of JRES Library books for discard. As lunch time neared, we loaded up the vans and made a drop-off at Eaton before heading to Newport News Park to meet Tracy, Rachel, and Intern Javante for lunch and fun! It was a wonderful day, and a relaxing way to say good-bye to another busy week!
Devin proofreading one of our thank you letters!
Cute cards!
Rosemary was cheering for "Fri-YAY" and Ethan was all smiles at Eaton as Abraham and Sam unloaded several tubs of work we had completed at the center.
We were excited to have Tracy, Rachel, and Intern Javante join us at the park!
We had a special Corn Hole Challange today: Rachel's Rockers vs. Javante's Jammers! Liz was up for Rachel's team and she notched a couple of points!
Xavier showed Javante how "cool" he is as he casually tossed a bean bag and made a point!
When Erik coaches Drew to try an underhand toss but Drew throws overhand anyway and scores 2 points!
Rachel's Rockers won by 2 points! Thanks to our guest team captains, Rachel and Javante, for playing with us today, and to Tracy for cheering for us all! We had a blast hanging out with you guys!
After corn hole we walked over to the reservoir and spotted a snapping turtle right away! We asked about it at the Discovery Center, and as it turns out, they are native to freshwater in Virginia and have lived in the water at NN Park for years. When we expressed surprise at never having seen snapping turtles here before this year, one of the Discovery Center guides told us they prefer the more swampy water in other parts of the park, but they come out here every now and then.
We saw plenty of other turtles, too!
Heading across the bridge to show Tracy, Rachel, and Javante a great trail!
A quick stop inside the Discovery Center where we read books and colored pictures.
We made rubbings with Rachel, too!
We returned to AFCC for about a half hour of Choice Time and then it was time to start the weekend! Our pleasant afternoon at the park capped off a busy, but enjoyable week. We've got great plans for next week, too. Here's a look at our agenda:
Tuesday: Since we didn't have a lesson with Mike this month, we've decided to spend a day in Yorktown. The weather forecast looks beautiful so we will plan to walk and explore, ride the trolley, have lunch at our favorite picnic area, and play bocce by the river! Please bring a bagged lunch.
Wednesday: This morning we will volunteer at Grove Christian Outreach Center, so please wear Arc shirts! It's National Maritime Day and National Solitaire Day, so we'll check them out with stories, crafts, and games. We'll also begin preparations for one more birthday...Tracy's, which we'll celebrate on Friday. Lunch on your own. JRES Cafeteria is available for Cheesy Pasta Supreme or Sub of the Day.
Thursday: We're going to have our annual lesson on Memorial Day today and also discuss sun and water safety as we prepare for the unofficial start to summer this weekend. We'll also finish our read-aloud, Lone Wolf, today! Lunch on your own. JRES Cafeteria is offering Domino's Pizza, Yogurt Combo, or Chef Salad today.
Friday: This morning we'll send a crew to work at Pet Supplies Plus, so please wear your PSP shirts. The rest of us will spend the morning preparing Tracy's birthday lunch - baked ziti, green beans, and fresh veggies with dip. It's also National Scavenger Hunt Day, so we'll celebrate with a challenging indoor version. Finally, we'll end the day with a new yoga adventure from Jaime!
Have a Wonderful Weekend,
Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang
