Rainy Camp Outs

I feel like this week we've been baking a lot.  We finally got out the Little House Cookbook that someone let us borrow around 9 months ago.  I decided we'd try sourdough.  Celee is my baker, so we whipped up two loaves.  It was pretty good!  That led us to make more later in the week and then make cinnamon bread from scratch today.  To top this all off, the menu has been a bit odd this week.  The girls had to each make a week's worth of meal plans, so they are taking turns doing their menus each day.  So tonight we had Carrot Soup.  It was surprisingly good.  Prior to eating it, everyone just gave me blank stares when I told them what we were having for dinner (except the child whose menu it was) but it was tasty!

     Friday Gwyn and Celee had a class on circuits at the Maryland Science Center.  Lyla and I did some of the museum scavenger hunt that a public school kid dropped while the older two were at their class.  We learned all about dinosaurs, the human body, and Chesapeake Bay ecology.  Gwyn and Celee got to experiment with connecting circuits to lightbulbs.  Then we all got to see the IMAX movie, The Serengeti.  Super cool. They all laid on the bed of nails.  We got to make our own shadow puppets. Then, thanks to a wonderful friend who works at the Science Center, we got to see the Mummy exhibit before it leaves.  It was sobering and I know at least Lyla was a little unnerved, but I think they handled it well, asked a lot of good questions, and learned a good bit.

   
     The weather was not very great for camping this weekend, but all three of the girls' troops signed up for a Girl Scout Camp Out.  Thank goodness it was cabin camping.  And we were in the boathouse, so electricity made that even better.  Lyla and Gwyn's troops slept together in the boathouse.  Celee's troop had cabins a little way off from where we were.  Thankfully it was not cold.  The temperature was perfect for camping.  The rain wasn't perfect, but it wasn't enough to make the trip miserable either.  And as usual, the kids don't care.  They just have fun anyway.  So everyone got to make smores, hike, make and swap swaps, learn about first aid, make sit-upons, and canoe.  That's the one they all came for.  The canoeing.  Lyla in particular was super excited to canoe.  I don't really know how the organizers pulled it off (other than don't ask don't tell) but usually Daisies don't get to canoe at GS sanctioned events.  But this one they did.  I think all the girls would just canoe all day if you'd let them.  Again, it's that freaky attraction to any and all water.  I have to admit that I wouldn't mind a canoe myself.  Anyhoo, all three girls had a super time rain or no rain.

     The sun finally came out on Indigenous Peoples Day (aka Columbus Day) so we raked!  We haven't had to rake in over a year so the girls had lots of fun - for the first hour or so.  It took a long time to rake the yard though and by the end they were done.  So was I.  But thankfully, they kept up a fairly good attitude throughout the 2 hours and we did get it done.  Until the other 75% of the leaves in the trees fall, then we get to do it again!  I came up with all kinds of clever metaphors for the benefits and purpose of work with your own labor - much of this was lost of the girls though.  Contrary to the pictures, raking is not "women's work" in our house.  It just happened that Jason started making Gwyn and Celee's bed and so he lucked out on the raking.  In the end I don't think either of us felt like we lucked out of any work.  When we finally put everything away for the evening, we laid down on the trampoline and fell asleep.  Until a certain little girl came to snuggle up with us, which is never a peaceful snuggle.  But it was nice.

     Happy Indigenous Peoples Day!  And Happy Fall!