Wow! We have said it before many times, but where does the time go?! We started a new week and a new month on the same day, and it's hard to believe that month is August! Time AND summer are flying by as we fill these days with much to keep us busy. This week we had a terrific bowling session, checked the garden at Freedom Park, visited Jeff's studio to paint our merpeople, finished preparations for the WOTM golf tourney, and wrapped up the week with a movie and yoga. For us, it doesn't get much better than all that! Check out our fabulous week!
Tuesday
One of our favorite outings is bowling, and we love to visit the lanes on the first Tuesday of each month. Today, 3 of our girls and 1 boy (Liz, Michelle, Annmarie, Kevin) were traveling with their families. Our friend Cameron was visiting, which was a nice addition, but with 3 girls missing, we were a little off balance for our team lineups. Kate held her own with Sweet T and Drew as teammates. Or should we say she kept them in check?!
Alexis did the same with Erik, Dev B, and Patrick. They didn't get away with too much nonsense!
Laura easily handled Lane 1 with Cameron, Xavier, and Sam, even though Sam thought he was in charge! 😂😂
Abraham found himself on the only team with more than one girl. He, Adia, and Tessa had a great time bowling together, and were very supportive of one another!
After bowling, we picked up pizza from Domino's and enjoyed it at the shelter at Kiwanis Park. After the warm and muggy days we had last week, today was delightful. It was warm, but there was a slight breeze, and the humidity was down, too. We got lucky!
Our next stop today was the Williamsburg Botanical Garden and Freedom Park Arboretum, where we were delighted to harvest cherry tomatoes and basil!
We're going to make fresh pesto tomorrow and toss it with pasta and the tomatoes for a lunch side! Kate was helpful in holding the bowl of goodies, but will she try the pesto?!
We also harvested yellow squash and zucchini. Tessa and Dev B weren't sure what we could do with them, but we could slice and grill them for another side dish one day next week. 😋
Erik checked the progress of our pumpkin plants. They are flowering, so we know that means pumpkins should start growing soon. Hopefully the pollinators are visiting frequently!
Xavier and Drew checked on our sweet potato plants, which the photographer kind of left out of the picture! They are growing, but they don't look quite as good as our pumpkin plants. We'll let MG Karen know and see what she thinks?! 🍠🍠🍠
Our baby watermelons are looking good. Alexis counted 5 on the vines! We're excited about what's growing in the garden!
We returned to the center a little after 2:00, so we had Choice Time to end the day. Some chose puzzles or reading, others computers or checking their personal devices. A few elected to spend time in the gym. We like choices!
Kevin sent us greetings from Acadia National Park in Maine today. Wow, Kevin! What a great hike you must have taken. We are jealous! Have fun and we can't wait to hear all about your trip next week!
Wednesday
It was a day at "home" today as we stayed at AFCC and worked on a variety of tasks, starting with changing our calendar from July to August. We have a lot of activities to look forward to in August, including meeting a new friend who is going to introduce us to "Laughter Yoga." Stay tuned to find out what that could be!
We're also changing the display on our entrance wall. We're going to put the "Spotlight on August" and post colorful pictures of a few of our upcoming events. Here, Drew was taking his time and using a lot of different colors for the bowling picture!
Fun times ahead!
Kevin is out of town, and so is Michelle, who is his backup for resetting the number spaces on the calendar where we post our event squares. With a bit of coaching from Lisa, Sam was able to step up and get the job done today!
We had morning movement time in the gym. Next week the gym floor is being refinished, and we will miss having it as a convenient place to burn off some energy or stretch our legs.
Look at what we did with the basil and cherry tomatoes we harvested at the garden yesterday: Fresh basil for spreading on crackers, and a beautiful pasta salad, too! Very tasty bonus side dish for our lunches from home today! 😋
After Choice Time we channeled our inner scientists and finished the experiments from the kit we recently bought. Laura and Abraham arranged colorful fruit candies in a ring on a plate and Cameron gently poured water in the middle of the plate until it reached the candies. After a few minutes, the water caused the candy pigments to dissolve and it looked like a rainbow ferris wheel...until we forgot it was still in progress and moved the table, causing the colors to all mix together! 😳
Sooo, on to making snow! We learned that there is a powdery substance called "absorbent resin" that is similar to what is used in baby diapers, and can absorb up to 300 times its weight in water! Sam, Patrick, and Tessa mixed up quite a bit of William and Mary colored water (green and gold) and then poured it into a small amount of the absorbent resin. It didn't take long before we they realized they could turn the test tubes upside down and nothing would run out. The absorbent resin had soaked up all the water!
We scooped the mixture out of the test tubes and it looked like colored snow! There is no way we could have poured all of that water onto this plate that Sweet T is holding, so the absorbent resin is pretty cool stuff! It makes us very happy for babies who aren't potty trained!
Our next science "experiment" had Erik a little nervous! We talked him into sitting under a plastic zip bag that was filled with water while we stuck sharpened pencils through it. Erik, and most of his friends, thought the bag would burst when the pencils pierced it, and the water would go all over him. First, Xavier stuck a couple of pencils through and no water leaked. Next, Lisa talked Drew into piercing the bag with another pencil. Drew was as nervous as Erik...but again, no water leaked! The water molecules form a seal around the pencil, and it acts like a plug. So, as long as we don't pull the pencils back out, Erik will stay dry!
Our final experiment involved trying to pop a balloon over a flame. We read that if there was water in the balloon, and you held the balloon over a flame, the balloon wouldn't burn (pop) because the water would absorb a lot of the heat and the balloon's rubber wouldn't weaken. Adia volunteered to try, and sure enough, the balloon filled with water didn't pop.
We decided to see what would happen to a balloon filled with air. Would air absorb much of the heat, so the balloon wouldn't weaken when heated??? Here's what happened, and it was great! Thanks for your bravery, Adia!
After all that scientific research, we deserved a treat. Happy National Ice Cream Sandwich Day!*** What a great day!
Thursday
We got an early start as we headed to Artist Jeff's studio to paint our merpeople! He was ready for us and got right down to giving us directions about coloring the bottom halves of our sculptures.
He explained that he had colors for the tail sections, and different flesh tone colors for the top halves. There were lots of pretty choices! Thanks, Jeff!
This is Allison, Jeff's 10 year old daughter. She joined our class today and worked on a cute mermaid of her own, and also helped Annmarie touch up hers so all the gaps would be covered. Thanks, Allison! We enjoyed meeting you today!
Adia was very focused on using metallic paint to add scales to the tail on her sculpture. We were glad to see her focusing on her own project, because she also spends a lot of time helping others. 💙💚💜
Kate had finished her "tail touches" so she quietly encouraged Xavier to keep working on his!
Alexis was happy to add more highlights to the bottom of her mermaid's tail after she had used the metallic paint to create the scales. Everyone worked diligently on their merpeople!
Nan assisted Laura in adding details, and they were proud of their efforts. As they should be!
We want to showcase some of Jeff's work. These are fun sculptures made with wood and brought to life with colorful details. Jeff is working on a new "school of fish" and several other projects because he's having a show at his studio in October. The walls are a little bare right now. Many of his pieces can also be seen at Berret's and/or Two Drummers restaurants.
Sweet T was sitting near this mer-skeleton painting, and we thought his outfit complimented it very nicely! We'll be sure to let everyone know when Jeff's show is. He's very talented! Thanks for a great experience today, Jeff. We'll see you at our place next Thursday to wrap up the mer-peeps! It's going to be epic. By the way, don't forget your music. Your playlist is epic, too! 🎜🎶🎝
We could not believe how perfect the weather was today. If only the humidity would stay away!! We enjoyed lunch under the beautiful shelter at Little Creek Reservoir Park.
We also enjoyed having the playground to ourselves. It's always amazing to see how many times our guys climb up and down the slides and other equipment. They get a good workout!
Before heading back to the center we squeezed in a game of boys vs. girls corn hole. They guys won today, but it was close!
We needed an hour or so of work time for various things today, so back to AFCC we went. There was Eaton work. Alexis applied gaskets and Erik and Carol worked on putting screws in u-brackets. Eaton had to cancel tomorrow's work day due to a function they are having onsite, but we usually have a few tasks to work on from here!
Moose Patti asked if we would make one of our "beautiful" cards for a WOTM member who is having a birthday Saturday. Patti wants to give her a shoutout at the golf tournament. We were HAPPY to oblige, and appreciated Dev B, Patrick, and others who colored some pictures for us to cut out and use on the card.
There was also a cart of books from the JRES library that needed to be prepared for discard. They had to be stamped, and also have some identifying information blacked out with Sharpies. Kate, Adia, and Laura handled this job efficiently and with smiles! Another fun and busy day in the books for Arc of Abilities!
Friday
After a string of pretty days, we were ok with the rainy Friday we got today. We always love a chance to break out our disco light ball during dance warm up!
It was also a good morning to catch a showing of The Goonies. Most of our guys had not seen this classic from 1985, but they really enjoyed it, and thought it was funny that all the stars are in their 50s now!
Prior to the start of the film, Adia got the popcorn ready for everyone. It was perfectly popped and hit the spot! Thanks, Adia!! That was a big help this morning!
We forgot to mention that we got a new couch this week! Big Red was moved to the back, but will be removed eventually. After being inspired by The Goonies, the guys named this one Blue Willie, after the pirate, One-Eyed Willie, in the movie. Go figure, but they all said "Aye" when we voted on it! Thanks for the suggestion, Dev B!
We'll also string fun golf-themed pictures on the carts. We've been coloring, cutting, and laminating (by hand, with contact paper, the old-fashioned way...thank you Carol!) for a couple of weeks. The golf carts are going to look great!
Here's the birthday card Moose Patti asked us to make for WOTM friend Laura, who will be having a birthday at the tournament. Tessa, Erik, Dev B, and Patrick were the coloring crew for the card yesterday, and their work makes the card perfect!
Our afternoon consisted of finishing our read aloud, Earthquake Terror, and a lesson about clouded leopards in honor of International Clouded Leopard Day. Clouded leopards are native to areas of Asia. They aren't actual leopards, but they are in the feline family and their fur has spots that resemble clouds, thus their name. There are probably less than 10,000 in the wild. Habitat loss and illegal hunting make them a vulnerable species. 😔
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Soon it was time for yoga, and today we worked with Jaime on a "mental health superpower" called visualization, followed by an active segment called Pokemon yoga, and then a relaxing Peace Out. Next thing we knew, our first week of August was done, and it was time for the weekend!
Until next week! Speaking of, here's what we'll be doing:
Tuesday: We're planning a return trip to the Army Transportation Museum at Ft. Eustis for today. We went a few months ago, but didn't give ourselves enough time, as it was more interesting than we expected! We'll return to the center for lunch since the weather is supposed to be "seasonable" this week (aka, warm and muggy). After lunch we'll work on our money skills as we celebrate National Dollar Day! Arc shirts optional. Lunch on your own...microwave available.
Wednesday: This morning we will volunteer at GCOC, so wear Arc shirts. It's National Book Lovers Day, so bring your favorite books for reading activities! We're meeting a new friend today, too. Her name is Laura Beach and she's going to talk to us about Laughter Yoga, which is her thing! She'll return in a couple of weeks to participate in a laughter yoga session with us. Laura will join us for lunch and we're having Chicken Pasta Caesar Salad and Grilled Zucchini/Squash (fresh from the garden).
Thursday: Artist Jeff returns today to wrap up our Merpeople Project by assisting us with finishing touches like hair, eyes, wings.....whatever! So much fun! We'll include Jeff in our lunch plans: Sloppy Joes, watermelon, and S'mores no bake cookies. It's National S'mores Day, but we aren't lighting a campfire! We will also have a lesson for World Lion Day, and probably celebrate National Lazy Day at some point, too... 😃
Friday: We're headed to Pet Supplies Plus for a work day, so wear your PSP shirts. It's Presidential Joke Day, so we will have fun learning about presidents, one of our favorite topics, and we'll have jokes, too. We'll also have yoga, so dress to stretch. A highlight today will be lunch: Kate's family is treating us to Chick-fil-A sandwiches! Thank you, Thompsons!
Hurry! Registration for the 5k is open and the rate is only $35 through August 20th. That includes this year's beautiful t-shirt! We hope to have a great showing from the AoA, so click the pic and you can sign up today!
Have a wonderful weekend,
Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang
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