Walden, late August
cool and inviting
Summer seems to be winding down, but we don't want to let it go so yesterday we headed out to Walden Pond. We haven't been there as much as we could have thanks to paying up for Springs Brook, but with the exodus of college students that local swimming hole is closed, so we get some more chances at our real favorite pond. This particular time we invited our Small Group friends along.
"wheya da mama hoassie?"
Of course, before he could get into any beachy activities Zion had to go check out the State Police Mounted Unit horse barn. The horse was out, so we only stayed to look at the barn for five or ten minutes. Back at the beach our attention turned to trying to catch fish—the boys have done much playing with their birthday nets at home, but they haven't really been used for their intended purpose so far this year. But with Harvey's big kid friend Lucy to encourage him—she's going into kindergarten and has all kinds of skills—he was able to concentrate on the pursuit. Some said netting the minnows that swarm the edge of the beach was impossible but we proved them wrong! Here's proof:
they're in there, I promise
(I say we because every time I added a fish to the bucket Lucy ran to show it off, shouting "Look, we caught another one!")
The smaller children enjoyed the fishes' company. (Not Zion though; at that point he was mostly enjoying his Mama's company.)
playing with the fishies
It wasn't really warm out, and certain of the children were starting to shiver, so I thought it best to get them involved in an activity out of the water. We had plenty of awesome sand toys to use, but while the structure below started off with elegant square walls the pure kinesthetic excitement of trying to keep the water in trumped any pleasure that might have been obtained from tool use.
not a castle, but a pool
Sadly, not everybody can hang around the beach idly as long as the Archibalds, and our friends all eventually departed. Despite all rational expectations the boys weren't at all cold, and would have stayed in the water til it got dark if we had let them.
in their element
We tempted them out by promising to play in Henry's cabin, which is always fun.
they don't even charge the park service
And then eventually, if you can believe it, we went home. Was that the last swimming of the season? Time will tell.