Tag: winter

Caitlyn, field trips, Seasons

Field Trip: Snow at Mt. Rainier

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Caitlyn loves snow. That’s a horribly brief and to the point sentence that doesn’t convey the degree to which Caitlyn loves snow. Of course, we live in a place that gets only occasional snow. When it snows here, it’s pretty and it’s fun, (usually) not enough to seriously snarl things up, although to an eight year old, I think the snarling is part of the fun. I’ve explained how more snow in Seattle wouldn’t be a good thing, but I guess I’ve not been terribly convincing. I’ve made some effort to explain how months of snow might not be fun, …

Caitlyn, homeschooling, Seasons

Field Trip: California, Coast, and Cousins

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Welcome to March! I’ve got little daffodils blooming in the backyard to remind us that it’s not going to be cold and gray forever. It can rain some more, though. I’d feel better heading into summer with more snow in the mountains first. Back at the beginning of February, to help my grandmother celebrate her 90th birthday, we took a week off from the chill of Seattle and trekked to California. We had a lovely birthday dinner with family, and Caitlyn got to spend time with her cousins, whom we don’t see nearly often enough. The adults managed to pry …

Caitlyn, Seasons

Snow Day

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Despite our general northiness here in Seattle, we don’t generally get snow. Thanks to Ye Olde Pacific, we get rain, wind, and cold, but not much snow. When it does, everyone celebrates (at least as long as it hasn’t shut down the city – we’ve done that, too). Last weekend we had perfect Seattle snow: just enough to make it pretty, not enough to cause problems. Although perhaps a half inch more would have been good. Just so Caitlyn’s snow angel wouldn’t be full of wood chips. She did make a grand effort at getting in some sledding. There was …

Caitlyn, Seasons

Snowshoeing

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For the first winter in three years, it hasn’t snowed in Seattle. Caitlyn takes this as a personal offense. We’ve been meaning to try snowshoeing for years. Somehow planning the outing has never bubbled to the top of the list. So, thanks are in order to Eldan for providing a sufficient nudge and to Melinda for joining us! (Maybe next time, we’ll get both of you!) It was quite a bit easier than I thought it would be. Sure, we wore ourselves out, but no one got tangled up in her snowshoes unless she meant to. This being March in …

Caitlyn, Seasons

It’s Ice Cream for Breakfast Day!

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Or, it was. And, yes, it’s a thing. Our local ice cream place has hosted an event for International Eat Ice Cream for Breakfast Day for the last three years. It’s seems to still be a small thing, though, so if you missed it, I won’t tell if you have a slightly delayed celebration. The story is that it’s cold and dark and dull in the Northern Hemisphere, post-Christmas and pre-daffodils. So, someone declared a fun holiday right in the middle of it. There’s a long tradition of marking this point in the year: Imbolc, the pagan Gaelic festival celebrating …

in the kitchen, Seasons, sewing

All wrapped up

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Remember this project? Want to see what it became? These bags are officially tradition now. I made about a dozen (some of last year’s bags were returned for refills) of the tutorial size of Jeni‘s Drawstring Bags, which is the perfect size for several bundles of homemade candy. This year, the fabric bags contained the required caramels and English toffee (from Grandpa’s recipes), as well as salted caramels (which might become a staple), peanut brittle and chocolate dipped marshmallows. I was hoping to also include opera cremes, but that didn’t work out so well. And I ran out of time …