Snakes Alive!

Yet another busy week got underway on Tuesday when we met our MG friends at the Botanical Garden in Freedom Park for a fun and informative session on bees!  But bees weren't the only live creatures we experienced...keep reading!

The MGs set up a visit for us from Pete and Steve, beekeepers from the Colonial Bee Association.  They gave a visual presentation that helped us understand why and how bees are so "busy."  

Steve showed us the hive and some of the other tools they use to raise bees.  He told us that the Europeans imported bees to the colonies as they are not indigenous to North America, and the Native Americans called them "English flies."  🐝🐝🐝 The basket-looking object on the right is similar to what the colonists would have raised bees in and is called a "skep."



The bees in this box were live, but we were assured they couldn't get out.  😏 Here, Steve helped Drew and Patrick look for the queen.

Bo tried on the beekeeper's suit.  Kate thought it was a good look on him! 😀  Umm, you may want to put your arms in the sleeves, Bo!

The MGs provided us with samples of light and dark honey.  Liz said she preferred the taste of the light one!

We were a captive audience!  Several of our friends asked good questions, too!

After our bee lesson, we walked out to the garden to harvest some spinach and lettuce. Time for another yummy salad tomorrow!

Sam and Bo learned to pick the outer leaves of lettuce.  It takes care not to pull the entire plant out of the soil.

Alexis asked if we could also get more onions!

On our way out of the garden we were surprised (to put it mildly), when someone shouted, "Snake!" and we all rushed to find this "friendly helper" meandering along.  He was just looking to eat some of the garden "pests" according to our MGs, so we kept our cool and wished him happy travels.  Then we hightailed it to the vans to get our lunches!

Before leaving the garden, Kacie decided to hide her rock in the onion patch.  We sure hope someone finds it and posts a picture on the Facebook page we are following, which is Williamsburg VA ROCKS!  (Update:  When we returned to the garden on Friday to hide a couple more rocks, Kacie's was gone.  Someone has it...now to wait and see if they post it as per the instructions we wrote on the back of the rock!)

After lunch, we headed to Studio South for our monthly visit with Katey and Kiley.  Kiley couldn't be with us today, but Katey did a great job on her own.  We had a full and rewarding hour stretching, getting into several gentle positions, and trying a couple of new things!

The session began with everyone passing around a small instrument.  Katey asked each of us to share something for which we are grateful, and then play the chime.  We then listened to the tone as it quietly faded away before passing it on to the next person.  Here, Katey and Drew look on as Liz plays the instrument.

With the "help" of his many friends, Devin shared that he is grateful for family, Frosties, friends, and his dog, Zinnia!  

Katey gave each of us a yoga band and taught us how to use it to help us stretch our legs and lower back.  We did a pretty good job for our first time.  It felt really good, too!  Later, Katey gave us a drop of citrus oil to rub between our hands and then taught us how to give ourselves (or a friend) a soothing hand massage.  Wow!

News flash!  EVERYONE was in attendance on Tuesday and EVERYONE wore their Arc shirts!!  PHOTO OP!!  Thank you, Katey.  We are grateful for the opportunity to visit your studio each month.  We're so chill when we leave!  (Thought this was an appropriate picture to make size XL in the blog!)

Wednesday was a fun day.  We were supposed to have activities centered around Lucky Penny Day.  But, after visiting with the beekeepers, we remembered that Laura's mom, the soon to be retired teacher (Yay, Lisa P.!), had sent us a leftover science activity from her class that would help us learn about vibrations and sound.  And it would, if we were lucky, sound like a swarm of bees!  So, we didn't have time for Lucky Penny Day...

But, we did see THIS on the floor when we entered the room this morning (no kidding), so we had high expectations for our sound project!

After watching a video and having a discussion about how sound is made, we began putting together our Bee Buzzers.  Devin shows step one:  we colored bee photos to glue on either side of a folded index card.

Cameron looked on as Xavier attached cap erasers to either end of a popsicle stick.

Drew put his folded index card over the popsicle stick.  We also tied string to the stick and then stretched a rubber band across the length of it.

Laura demonstrated, with Sam photobombing in the background, how spinning the gizmo around very quickly (super quickly!) should have caused the paper/rubber band combination to vibrate and create a buzzing sound.  Getting the spin on fast enough was challenging for most of our guys.

They persevered for a long time, even trying modifications such as using an index card with no pictures glued to it, a shorter/longer rubber band, and stapling the top portion of the index card together.

In the end, we had a good time, and a few of them were able to make the buzzing sound.  Chloe demonstrates, with Kevin saying, "Oh my, Chloe!" and Laura wondering, "How'd you do that?"  It was fun!  Thanks, Lisa P., for sharing your leftover materials with us.  We enjoyed learning about sound waves, with Kacie calling the process of hearing sound "unbelievable." Everyone stuck with it and didn't give up!  Worthwhile lesson any day!

Meanwhile, our friend Chuck from the Williamsburg Rotary Clubs stopped by and worked with a number of our friends on word processing...and chit-chatting, by his own admission!  That's ok!  Our friends enjoy socializing and it's just as important as word processing...😉

Yum!  Fresh salad again this week with spinach and lettuce from the Botanical Garden.  Thanks, MGs!!  We enjoyed Strawberries and Cream Day, too!  Separately from the salad, of course! 😋

Happy Birthday to our friend Tracy from Parks & Rec!  We made cards for her on Wednesday (her day) and we also made cards for Devin.  His birthday is Thursday, but we knew we would be working at Eaton so we made them a day early.

Yoga with Patti had to be canceled (she was not feeling well this week).  We missed her!

Thursday brought sunshine and Devin's birthday!  He was a good sport about having to spend it working at Eaton. 😎 Everyone knew that Happy Birthday Frosties from Wendy's were on the agenda after the work day, so we cranked up the tunes and got to it.  Here are some pictures of our hardworking team:

Kacie and Chris separated parts.  They (with some off and on help from others) got through about 2/3 of that blue bin!

Here's Xavier doing what he does best and really enjoys - packing parts.

Nan and Laura made a good team assembling these parts.

Sam was all smiles working with Meemaw to unpack side doors.  They also made a good team and he managed to keep up with her!😉

Bo went through these photo cell plates and verified that all were assembled properly.  He found and corrected several mistakes.  Good eye, Bo!

Alexis and Liz had a challenge today when they found out the light bulbs that needed unpacking were from a different vendor and the packaging was much more difficult to open.  Carol helped them figure out a way to "break through!"

Over at the aluminum plate station, Kevin, Cameron, and Chloe removed the pink film from hundreds of plates.

Drew and Birthday Boy Devin used the box-carrying skills they worked on last time as they hauled stuff to the recycling bin.  They added the skill of walking sideways (in unison) today!

After lunch, Devin and a few of his besties posed by his makeshift birthday board in the Eaton break room!  On his shirt is a note that his sweet mom tucked in his lunchbox.  Liz pinned it on for him. 💚

After lunch another shipment of light bulbs needed to be unpacked.  These were in the packages that are easier to open and Liz and Kacie were happy!  There were so many of them that Meemaw, Carol, and Nan chipped in to help them finish.  😊

Finally, the moment we all had been waiting for...the stop at Wendy's to truly celebrate our Frosty-loving friend, Devin!  Thanks to his family for treating us to a cool treat on a warm day!  Frosties with Friends can't be beat!

Friday was so much fun!  We spent the morning having a cook-off.  Our two teams worked beautifully to create our lunch - Tater Tot Casseroles.

First, preparations had to be made.  Chris put on gloves while Alexis and Liz plugged in the electric skillet.

With cooking underway, Kate and Kacie looked on as Cameron browned sausage.  They were so patient as he worked at something he didn't seem too familiar with.  It was obvious they both wanted to jump in and take over! 😜

Eggs and milk had to be whisked together.

Many hands were needed to distribute the tots!

Ready for The Nina!

Ready for our tummies!

We welcomed Tracy and her summer intern, Maggie, for lunch today but forgot to take a picture of them enjoying our cooking!  But here's one of Alexis giving Tracy the birthday cards we made for her on Wednesday.

We hope you liked the Memorial Day rice candle jars we made today.  We used empty baby food jars and when we took the labels off, there was a sticky residue left on each jar.  Not sure what we could do to remove it, we found our problem solved on Friday morning when Kacie came in with lots and lots of patriotic stickers her Aunt Wendy had sent for us to use!  They covered the sticky area perfectly. We also used them to make Memorial Day mini-posters.  Thanks to Kacie and her Aunt Wendy!  The stickers were great for what we needed!

After lunch we needed to do two things:  walk off the Tater Tot Casserole and hide our painted rocks around town!  We loaded up the vans and hit the road.  

Drew hid his pizza rock at Sal's by Victor restaurant.

Chris and Sam helped Kevin find a spot to place his rock at the William Pitt Store on Duke of Gloucester Street.

Sam chose Harris Teeter as the hiding spot for his rock which looked deliciously like a piece of chocolate pie!

Becky, who used to teach Virginia History to 4th graders, painted this rock and hid it on DoG St.  It was a perfectly shaped rock for her to paint!

One of our groups posed for this picture near Zable Stadium on the campus at W&M.  Intern Maggie is in this one...can you spot her?!

Friends looked on as Laura placed her butterfly rock at the Botanical Garden in Freedom Park.  It looks good next to our growing tomatoes!  They didn't spot our snake friend, thank goodness!

It was a beautiful day to hide rocks and end up in Colonial Williamsburg.  We took this group shot on the steps at The Brick House Tavern guest house on Duke of Gloucester Street.

From there, we made it back to the AFCC where we tidied up the room and bid our friends goodbye after another fun week together.  Here is a look at what's in store for next week:

Monday, Memorial Day:  Hope to see some of you at the Zumbathon!!  This is a FUNdraiser, so join the FUN and consider donating to the FUND!  Thank you!

Tuesday:  If the weather allows, we will spend the day enjoying the River Pool at Kingsmill, as guests of Kate's family!  THANK YOU TO THEM!  We are looking forward to this as we hear there is a lazy river... Please wear your swimsuit if you're comfortable (otherwise you can change at the pool).  ALSO, bring $10 to buy lunch (or bring your own from home).  AND, bring sunscreen!  Bring your own towel if you'd like, but Kate says we can use the towels at the pool. If it looks like bad weather, an email will be sent by Monday afternoon informing you of our change in plans, and we will go bowling instead.

Wednesday:  Hopefully, our yogi Patti will be back and we plan to try chair yoga, so dress comfortably.  We will use our computers for group activities today, as well as work with our Rotary volunteer.  We'll also have a chance to learn about pennies (and other coins) as we backtrack to celebrate Lucky Penny Day.  Lunch on your own!

Thursday:  As we bid farewell to May, we will mark Save Your Hearing Day with educational activities related to our ears.  As if that's not fun enough, we'll also prepare PB&J sandwiches for lunch with a side of homemade macaroni salad!

Friday:  We are not going to Eaton this week, so we will try again for a visit to Newport News Park and the Discovery Center.  Please wear Arc shirts and bring a picnic lunch!  If the weather is bad, we may just have a goof-off day...as no other plans are in the works.  Oh, and we will also find a way to "celebrate" National Donut Day!  Welcome, June!

There is a lot of info about upcoming opportunities in last week's blog, so please review at your leisure!  We aren't going to include them this week...but they will be back.  📅📆

Before we close, here is an extra special video clip of the AoA Chorus singing part of the Star Spangled Banner (the entire song is too long to upload).  Enjoy, and Happy Memorial Day to all!

Lisa, Carol, and Nan