the squibix family blog

We visited on a chilly wet day, with rain and snow falling intermixed, and the main part of the museum was pretty crowded. But when we headed over to the Woods area, we found that we had it all to ourselves. Maybe the closed doors on the house building kept folks away; maybe it was the fact that, when we went inside, the cold air seeping up through the gaps in the floorboards made it just as chilly inside as out. But it was significantly drier! And I don't know how anyone could resist a place like this.

Never mind the fact that we could see our breath, the warm materials and clever design made the space feel wonderfully welcoming. We built block towers, played hide-and-seek, and experimented with the periscopes. Then the boys cuddled under the pile of sleeping bags someone had so kindly left in a corner while I read them a story.

In my mental "ideas book" for our current and future home improvement projects, this space is right there on the cover. We're a little sad to hear that the management will soon be closing the original, iconic victorian house that currently holds the "Children's" part of the museum, and building a new structure to house the same sorts of exhibits; but given how perfect a job they did on Discovery Woods I'm prepared to give them the benefit of the doubt.

The last couple of days have been warm enough that Harvey and Zion have been rocking shorts and t-shirts, at least by mid morning—the weather has caught up to their expectations. Still, it's that in-between time where they have trouble, for example, getting in the side door of the house: tucked against the north side it's still snowy far past any other part of the yard, and they're mostly not fans of snow on bare feet. Still, they'll do it, such is their commitment to feeling summery.

Me, I have the opposite problem. Once I start wearing my long underwear and wool cap in November or whenever, I have a hard time giving them up. It's been well established that I love the cold, but that doesn't mean I enjoy being cold—on the contrary, my enjoyment is predicated on being well-equipped to sit around outside without feeling any discomfort. So lots of layers. Now that it's spring it's probably time to pare down a bit, but as I say—it's hard. For one thing, our house is pretty chilly in the morning, and the inside of a pair of jeans isn't what I'd call cozy first thing! And then there's always the haunting notion that I might suffer a chill at any time: better safe than sorry.

Of course, when it hits 55° and I'm playing tag with the boys on the playground in my winter get-up I'm pretty sorry anyway! But at what point does the risk calculation swing conclusively towards worrying about overheating? I don't know... but I will say that, this afternoon, I traded my winter hat in for my High Mowing Seeds ball cap. That feels like a seasonal inflection point...

We had friends over by then so they got to join in too. It was lovely, and the boys were totally ready to enter into the spirit of "tea" as a meal: "Take tiny nibbles," Harvey said, recalling instructions from some book or other. Then he kind of spoiled the effect by knocking over his teacup reaching for the tin of scones after the little boys didn't pass them quick enough. Luckily the cup only chipped rather than shattering—I was letting them use our finest Crate-and-Barrel wedding china—but the puddle of milky tea was mess enough. The little boys—Lijah and his friend Liam—didn't spill a drop, and so would have been within their rights to complain that I only trusted them with plastic cups, but they're more polite than that. They weren't huge fans of the tea, either, come to that, and much preferred the sliced mango to the scones.

Which I don't understand, because they were some tasty scones. I brought the rest of them to work this morning, where they were again properly appreciated. This batch was with orange zest and chocolate chips; the original recipe is from Joy of Cooking and is for raisin scones with cinnamon, like this:

In a large bowl, whisk together:

2 cups flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Cut in:

6 Tbsp butter

Stir in:

1/2 cup raisins (or orange zest and 3/4 cup chocolate chips, or lemon zest and 1/4 cup chopped candied ginger, or...)

Add and mix until combined (you'll have to knead it against the side of the bowl with your hands to get all the flour up):

1/2 cup cream
1 egg, beaten

Shape the dough into a disk maybe 3/4 inch thick, cut it into 12 wedges, and put them on a baking sheet. Brush them with cream or milk and sprinkle them with cinnamon sugar (for the raisin ones; or plain sprinkling sugar for the others).

Bake at 425°F for 12-15 minutes or until they're golden brown.

And if you want to replicate our experience, serve with decaf Earl Gray tea with cream and sugar, milk, and mango slices.

There are lots of ways this book plays on fairy tale tropes—some of them quite explicitly—but it stands out because of the convincing characterization. Smallbone is an evil wizard by trade and crotchety old Mainer besides, but besides that he's not a bad guy—as long as you put aside the time he turns Nick into a spider. And Nick is just as grumpy, plus stubborn and cursed with a lack of fore-thought. They make a good pair. Then there's the perfect Maine village where things are starting to go wrong, and another evil wizard, this one a naturally magical shapeshifter with a gang of were-coyotes. It all sounds like a bit much, but it comes together into a wonderful story—one of the best and most convincing tales of what it would be like to learn magic I can remember.

Kate Milford's The Left Handed Fate isn't as good. Set in a sort of steampunk version of 1812, it's about a young privateer named Lucy and her scientist friend Max who are trying to assemble the pieces of a mysterious ancient device—weapon?—in order to bring an end to the seemingly endless wars against Napoleon. There's some interesting world-building: "philosophical iron" that moves on its own, a mad-house that you need a passport to enter, fantastically skilled confectioners and weavers, jacquard loom cards containing programing information from a civilization older than the Egyptians... But it's all just a little too much.

The first part of the book takes place on shipboard—the Left Handed Fate being the main characters' privateering schooner—and it's clear right away that the author owes a huge debt to Patrick O'Brian. Then, after some battles and tragedy, they reach the port of Nagspeak, where their famous vessel can be hidden in the half-floating Flotilla district while they search the byways and "hacker's markets" of the town for the piece of the device that's eluding them. There's a lot going on, and most of the time the ornamentation overwhelms the plotting, and the characterization, and... everything else.

Worse, despite the lovely originality of some specific settings and scenes, the book as a whole feels vaguely derivative. For anyone who's read the Aubrey-Maturin series, the echoes of it in this book are overwhelming—and early scene with a dropped watch and sweet oil is obvious it feels like a deliberate call-out. I like—love!—O'Brian's stories (though we hated that movie) but I don't need someone else doing his writing. Especially since, unlike O'Brian, Milford lets the 19th century mask slip a few too many times. Besides the O'Brian influence, I couldn't help also noticing a heavy debt to Joan Aiken—besides the alt-historical fiction setting, this book shares with many of hers a feeling of strange darkness around the edges. It's not only the ominousness of the scenery (and literal darkness lots of the time too) in the story, but also the sense that nothing beyond the characters' experience really exists: like it's all being called into being for them as it's needed. Which isn't always a bad thing: most Joan Aiken books are delightful. But it's more of a flaw in a book that's notable mostly for it's world-building. (Also Left-Handed Fate picks up like it's in the middle of an existing story, just like Black Hearts in Battersea, which also felt to me like a deliberate call-out; but I'm probably overthinking there.)

Of course, The Evil Wizard Smallbone also has nothing but gray haze beyond the boundaries of the action. But the action—and the setting and characterization—is so concise you don't mind, or even notice, the lack. The Left-Handed Fate tries to do too much; The Evil Wizard Smallbone tries less but does it perfectly. Read them both if you have time; if you want just one, well, you know what I'd suggest!

Besides the town companies, there were also four fife-and-drum corps: the regular three—Middlesex, William Diamond, and Middlesex 4H—and, new this year, the Piscataqua Rangers down from Portsmouth. The reenactment is great, but I do think the music is my favorite part. Not that it's one or the other—they're all wearing tricorn hats, and some of the towns turn out very respectable bands along with their musketeers. Lincoln is good; Sudbury, though small, is very music-heavy and my favorite of the companies.

But it's the reenactment that gets most people there, and I agree it's fun to see all the outfits as the everybody mingles on the green before the parade steps off. Folks work hard to make their outfits look good; seeing one reenactor taking snaps with his phone I wondered if his attractive brown leather case was chosen specifically to make the phone fit in with the rest of his attire, or just because he appreciated fine workmanship. Even the tobacco usage was historically appropriate.

That particular gentlemen took well over a minute to get his pipe lit; I'd make a comment about that doesn't reflect well on his general ability to be ready quickly, but I think that's just how pipes work.

The chilly weather sapped the boys' energy—that, and a late night Friday—so they were more than ready when the parade finally got going. My camera ran out of batteries before then, but Harvey—the official parade photographer of the day—was willing to settle on shooting with my phone. Here's a picture he took of the British Regulars bringing up the rear of the parade.

They were on their way to break up the pole capping, which they apparently did in delightfully non-traditional fashion. We didn't see it—all the days crowds are down at the pole end of the parade, and with the cold wind the boys were about done with being outside. So we headed in to the library for the other focus of the day's festivities, the library book sale. I picked up maybe a dozen books; I count it a success that when we got home I found there were only three of them I already owned.

There's more Patriots Day coming next week. We've warmed up—we'll be ready.

Surprisingly, no one needed them; we had some wet feet, but nobody was inspired to take any great risks (or to straight up jump in the water). Maybe we were having too much fun hiking together and seeing what was around the next bend. Lijah can't always keep up with his brothers, but when he does manage it he's delighted.

We saw some wildlife: there were geese and swans on the pond, and I spotted four turtles basking on a log.

We didn't see any beavers, but there were plenty of signs of their presence. Here's one of maybe 50 downed or partially chewed-through trees we saw.

We were particularly delighted at the new outflow at the north end of the pond: it now runs through a two-foot diameter plastic pipe under a wood bridge, and the boys loved putting their hands in the icy water as it burbled out the lower side. (If you ask me the whole thing looked a little tenuous; if the pond bursts its banks next spring and washes away a segment of Springs Road just there I'm going to say I called it.)

Besides the water, there were also other amusements. Zion was very proud of himself for climbing this rock—twice—and then we made it our pirate ship and spent 20 minutes attacking the swans. But the water was the main draw. That's what happens when it feels like summer!

We sure enjoyed it. The water was super cold, but with the air hitting hot-for-summer levels there were lots of people there in swimsuits, even if it was only preschoolers and college kids that showed any real interest in playing in it for long. After about two hours in the sun I finally got hot enough to brave full immersion, and it almost stopped my heart. Sure made the air feel a whole lot nicer afterwards, though!

With no ropes and no lifeguards, the boys were free to roam and play to their heart's content, and they did. Harvey and Zion headed off right away; Lijah was a little slower to get started, but after a bit of sand-piling with me he too was off to join the fun.

So I read a book. It was delightful, but I couldn't help thinking of all the other things I could be doing while my children were playing independently, if I could be somewhere else. One problem of modern parenting is the need to constantly provide our kids with entertainment. When I read the Little House books I don't see Pa trying desperately to interest his girls in one thing or another so that he can have ten minutes together to plow the field!

Still, if I had been off cutting wood or whatever I wouldn't have been there to help when Zion tripped and fell headlong into the deep water. As it was I was right where I needed to be to yell at Harvey to go bring him a towel (delegation is the best parenting).

I was also there to hear Zion's pride, which he was ready to share as soon as he got the water out of his eyes. "I swam!!" he exclaimed (he can't properly swim yet). "I flapped my hands like this and I flapped my head out of the water! Like a fish! Maybe my totem animal is a fish!"

"Great!" I told him. "You'll have lots more chances to swim this summer." Too bad there's no swimming holes they can walk to by themselves. Oh well, the work will all get done somehow...

In my case, it totally makes sense that I'm busy this season. That's what happens when you work for a church—even a non-liturgical church like ours. Well, I say "non-liturgical"; but now we've got a couple of Episcopalians in charge of the families program—me being one of them of course—so Good Friday and even Maundy Thursday events are happening annually. Today was my job. We had a little over 40 people for a pot-luck with communion and foot-washing, so I think it was a success... but for one thing: very few adults were willing to be part of the foot washing! Leah says it's because they saw it as a kids' event. Maybe. I think they need to pay more attention to John's gospel. Oh well, there were plenty of kids who knew what to do.

Now that that's over with, my stress levels will drop by at least 50%. For Easter proper, my only role is making sure everyone has enough food and seeing that the trash is taken out. True, calling donut shops to try and order 15 dozen for Sunday morning is a terrifying experience, but at least it doesn't last long (for the record: so far, no luck). I can't promise that I'll be ready to have a transcendent spiritual experience come Sunday, but I think at least I won't have a nervous breakdown before then. Then Monday is Patriots Day. Tuesday? Tuesday I'll finally relax.

I'm always interested in the transition from winter to spring, as the green comes back. You notice it in the trees, as the bare sticks start to grow green and yellow fuzz before filling in with baby leaves—it's not just the color that changes, it's the shape of the skyline. The grass is more subtle, and more interesting to me. At one point the grass is grayish-yellow; later it's deep dark green. You can't see it happen. One year I want to do a photo project, and take a picture of our yard from the same angle every day so I can put the images together and finally see the greening in action. The only problem is I won't be able to know exactly when to start the project. When does the grass start greening? You never know until it's about done; that's when you finally notice anything's happening.

The grass is in a hurry too this year. It's definitely green now, and starting to grow. The chickens are loving it, and doing their best to keep it short. The improved diet shows up in their eggs, which are noticeably yellower of yolk than they were last month. Yup, we all love the warm and the green—and we appreciate it all the more for having missed it in the winter. I love having seasons.

Unfortunately, the rising sun was in the subjects' eyes, but you get the idea. At least they weren't dirty. This is the first year since Harvey was born that Leah didn't make new clothes for the boys the holiday—she's a little busy—which meant that they had to make due with hand-me-downs, or, in Harvey's case, awesome African duds from Auntie Nelly. They still looked sharp.

At church we all got right to work either setting up an awesome, welcoming service, or freaking out at all the rush and business—as appropriate for the age or general coping skills of each of us. When it was apparent that there was going to be enough food, and enough eggs hidden, and enough greeters, I could relax. Leah couldn't quite as much, since Lijah's freak-out was only magnified by the above-normal crowds. So he had some quiet time. Then there was the egg hunt. Sadly, due to its early start I missed seeing Harvey and Zion hunt, but I did make it in time to see Lijah at work (he was drawn out of seclusion by the prospect of candy).

And, of course, I caught up with Zion afterwards to get a load of his haul, as pictured above (he made a mockery of the eight-egg limit, but he was their early to help hide them so maybe it's ok..).

There was another service after that but everyone was exhausted, so Leah and the boys headed home to set up for our egg hunt and party. I was on the clock so I had to stay. And I enjoyed the second service; then enjoyed the hot bike ride home, an hour when I didn't have to talk to a single person. The boys had a more conventional rest, so they were raring to go when 4:00 rolled around and our egg hunt opened for business.

It went well; I think there's not more than a dozen unfound eggs littering our yard today.

We didn't have many kids join us this year—just six hunters counting our three, and three babies—but there were lots of us old folks, plus one special guest.

The second-graders there were glad to share their obsessive sorting and categorization of prizes; I think they made some trades too.

Zion is in that picture too, but he also played; the other two sorted for like, an hour. Maybe more. They love sorting. In their defense, there were lots of cool things in the eggs this year: dinosaurs, Peanuts dog tags, Squinkies (if you don't know, don't ask). Not so much candy, but that was fine—we had plenty of treats available.

The party ran on cheerfully until darkness, light rain, and too-far-past-bedtime drove our guests away, and we went to bed dreaming of the next adventures. Today was just as full and exciting; maybe I'll manage to write about it tomorrow.

Our ride up was almost a perfect success, with the children 7 and up leading out at a blistering pace and two new riders—kindergarten and pre-K—making their longest effort to date. Unfortunately one of them (it was Julen) wrecked mere yards from our destination and busted his lip, but his enthusiasm was only dimmed for half an hour or so. It did kind of spoil his appreciation of our picnic lunch though! There was lots of food to delight the rest of us, and he did manage a popsicle.

After some energetic freeze tag—why do I always have to be it?!—we headed over to our traditional viewing spot. I don't think we were ever all there at the same time, but if you total us all up there were 23 people associated with our party, spanning three generations (six of the kids had grandparents present!). Never mind the giant picnic, we needed slush to ease our wait (Nathan needed fried dough).

Then we watched the parade. It's a big one. I've long realized that all my parade photos over the years look pretty much the same, so I eased up considerably on the photography. Still, there are some sights I just had to capture.

Last year's parade friends were more peripherally interested in the proceedings—this year I was sitting next to friends who enjoy parades as much as I do (and who were attending in Lexington for the first time) so we watched and commented with keen attention. It was lovely. And long... we were all sated with excitement and ready to head home when the last tank finally rolled past.

The ride home went just as well as the ride up. Julen, recovered in body but not in spirit, chose to join Zion and Lijah in the blue bike; it made a heavy load, but I could manage it downhill. More serious was the heavy crowd of walkers on the bike path through Lexington Center, but our kids only hit one elderly pedestrian hard enough for anyone to notice. Then the crowds thinned out and we were rolling free.

Leah, who had stayed home working, was ready to greet us on our arrival with veggie straws and ice water. Just the thing—the kids were hungry despite eating constantly for the past four hours, and we were all hot and tired. The weather wasn't actually that warm, but shepherding—not to mention carrying—all those kids is hot and thirsty work!

Then some of the crowd headed home, one additional child joined us for a sleep over with Harvey, and we all had dinner together.

It was a tiring day, on top of another tiring day, capping off a tiring week. No wonder Lijah fell asleep before he could finish his dinner.

I was pretty wiped out too—yesterday I couldn't hold my head up to type by evening, so this story went unwritten. But I couldn't leave it too long. I'm sure there's lots more adventure coming this vacation week, and I don't want to get backlogged!

As it happens, so were a great many other people, many of them kids. Why did they pick us to single out—with a not-technically-accomplished photograph, no less?! Is it just because we're locally famous for getting around town on a ridiculous bicycle? Was it Lijah's tiger pajamas? Realistically, it was probably Zion's musket that did it; nobody else thought to bring their guns to town this year. On the next page the only kid in attendance wearing ear protection also gets a photo, so it could be they were looking for uniqueness rather than beauty. And there's no denying we're unique! Sometimes even more than I'd like... but mostly I'm just proud. There are worse things than having people pay attention to you as a result of your strange life choices.

Modern life and media makes it easy to use up a lot of time on things we might not care that much about, objectively considered. I sit down at my computer and impulsively check out Google News... why?! I don't care, particularly, about what's happening in the world—at least not at that arbitrary moment. And beyond the news there's an endless galaxy of writing on all kinds of topics—fantastic writing, about things which would expand my understanding of the world! (also, for the record, lots of bad writing about stupid things). But when I have concrete tasks to work on—tasks I want to work on!—reading for enjoyment and vague self-improvement isn't the best use of my time.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no sort of Puritan. Reading is awesome, and just about any reading is self-improving. Watching TV shows too, if you're into that. The question is one of time management. And I'm trying to think more explicitly about it this week. To that end, I've set myself some goals for the week—high-level ones, rather than to-do list items. My theory is that, with them in mind, I can look at what I'm doing at any moment and see if it lines up with any of those goals. If it doesn't, do I have a good reason for doing it?

It's Wednesday morning; so far, so good. It does mean that this blog post, which I started Monday, is only getting finished now. Every other point when I though about sitting down at the computer I prioritized something else—sleeping, largely. But this morning it's too wet to work in the garden and the rest of the family isn't up yet, so it's prime writing time. So here you go!

You can't deny puppies' appeal. They're little and fuzzy and race around like maniacs until they get tired and fall over all of a sudden. Plus they bump into things. Bumping into things is very cute. Our boys, Zion especially, would love a puppy of their own. maybe one day. But for now, we have a perfectly wonderful dog of our own already.

Sure, Rascal is getting on in years. He can't hike like he used to, and he has to think a little about jumping up onto the couch—but he still loves taking walks interesting places and menacing squirrels and, most important, hanging around with us. On a recent rainy afternoon I was doing some work outside and he very companionably came out to with me, establishing himself comfortably under a rhododendron away from the drizzle.

Puppies are fun and exciting, but lets not ignore the virtues of being calm and relaxed! Plus as big as he is Rascal is great at warming up my feet in the bed; it would take a puppy months to reach that point. So sorry Zion, we're all set for now!

We do too; two in fact. The one I bought all those years ago and one I got for free from a friend. Right now they're both broken—I got the second one in hopes of fixing the first. And I will, someday: there are good uses for power mowers. Composting leaves, for example. But for mowing our lawn, which really isn't that big now that we've reclaimed so much of it for garden and muddy play space, so much internal combustion isn't really necessary.

I used to think it was, because for ten years I didn't think the push reel mower worked. It turns out I just needed to use it for a little while and it would sharpen itself. Now it works like a charm, at least on the tender spring grass. And worrying about clippings laying on the lawn? I haven't bagged the clippings for years. So few downsides, and a couple nice advantages—mainly that the sound is a pleasant whir rather than a deafening mechanical whine. With the beautiful spring weather we've had to endure two straight days of mowing and blowing from the neighbors' yards, and it is horrible. Down with gas power! Up with human power! Push reel mowers for all!