My stochastic existence yesterday took me to my sister's place for a little surprise visit. Having not visited in a while it took a few minutes to convert the shyness of my nieces into the little clinging monkeys that I so enjoy. It's pretty neat to see their personalities and interests develop. Ember, junior nature nerd, is 4 and Ivy the analyzer is just about 2.
Being a nice day outside we quickly suited up for adventures at the park. Crossing the street, soccer, blowing dandelions and disaster containment led us to the "wee wees" (Ivy-speak for swings) where we hung out for a while. Ember had Erika to explain the various cloud types, including the term "nimbus" (which I learned means a cloud that produces rain). I had Ivy on my lap who was busy saying "weee, weee", punctuated by the odd "dat" while pointing at something.
Round 2 outside, after a bathroom intermission, took us to a little community garden across the street. Ember and Erika bee-lined for the veggie patch to learn the names of all the plants, which flowers were edible, why some tomatoes are green and some red. It seemed she was already quite familiar with all that but still needed some pronunciation tips for "nasturtiums". Before joining the veggie patch, Ivy directed us to a rototiller on the periphery of the scene. Encountering no resistance from me, we had a "basics of rototiller 1" lecture...covering the blades ("dangerous, don't touch"), the motor("moves it"), spark plug("zaps"), exhaust("hot"), and the control panel. The throttle had little icons of a turtle ("slow") and a rabbit ("fast") which she seemed to enjoy (mental note: revisit this interface once the rabbit and hare story+analogy has been learned). I can't wait for rototiller-2 and 3 where we'll cover "magnetos", "2 vs 4 stroke", and the differences between a rototiller drive("horizontal"...good for go-carts) and "vertical"(typical, useless lawn mower).
On to the jungle gyms, slides, and stuff. Many ups and downs, near misses, don't throw rocks at other kids lessons, that's dangerous lessons kept us on our toes for a while. Eventually, getting bored with the play structure, Ember wandered over to a tiny tree aka "baby pine" and started gently covering its base with pine needles and other organics collected from the area. "it'll keep it warm so it'll grow big and the pine beetle won't get it and I'll water it too" was the motivation. She's quite fascinated by the pine beetle and was eager to hear from me that the beetle only eats a teeny bit of the bark inside the tree but then the whole thing dies...she ran over to Erika and explained word-for-word this new revelation...and, in return, learned the term "phloem layer"...Erika's replacement for my "teeny bit" vocab.
Turning to locate Ivy, and possible trouble, I was relieved to see her taking a look at the playground's modular construction...the joints, pipes, and bolts. We learned about "Allen bolts" and made a game of trying to find as many as possible. This reached a mini-crescendo when we happened upon a "different" type of bolt. I started in on the differences between Allen bolts and the newly discovered "torx" bolt but she just laughed at me. I don't know quite how to take that...I'd like to think that she's
just a toddler and can't comprehend such things but I reckon closer to the truth is that her mental capacity to learn far outstrips my own and the the bolts being different is such an obvious, and thus hilarious, fact to make a lesson about.
Before going inside, Ivy and I decided to take a peek at my bike that was suspended off the back of my car. Turning the front wheel proved to be a hit...as did the chain ring when her head smashed into it. As the bawling decibels ramped up I gave her a little hug and started to quickly explain the bicycle sprocket and drive train. After about 3 seconds her knowledge receptors overtook her pain receptors and she eagerly soaked in some basics. I left out "gear ratios" but pretty much covered everything else...including the tactile element of "pointy and hard" ...and also "dirty". A careful touch of the end of a chain ring cog with the tip of her finger led to some giggles. Ember then demonstrated the proper method of "ducking under" the pointy and dirty parts of the bike while I explained the technique. "Bikes are cool" would be the net result of that interaction.
Ember explaining something to me...
Ivy enjoying life...
Happy sibs...
Happy feet...
Ivy and uncle John...
Hugs!
Belly button...
Cuddle puddle...
