Catching up, again: Crazy Kids and Sugar Shacks

Well, it has been a long time.  I keep having ideas about what to post, and then I don't seem to find the time.  I'll be brief in order to catch up (again).


One post I was collecting pictures for was something like:
The Wacky Things My Kids Do!

I'm sure all kids do lots of weird things, like make alien hats for themselves and their bird, or impromptu art exhibits in the dining room, but it makes me happy to see these little endeavors.  Currently Willa is the main engineer of these physical products, whereas Cal is great at telling stories.  According to him, he's got another family in California with 2 brothers (both named Callahan) and a baby.  They have 2 black dogs.  He's always telling us what happened in this other family, like fights with his brothers or that their grandparents came over.  He easily comes up with lots of ideas for stories with a few prompts, a game we often play when trying to distract him at a restaurant or doctor's office.  You can't take pictures of the stories, but here's just a few interesting projects they've undertaken in the last few months.

Alien hats mentioned above.

Willa cut up a mylar balloon and taped (lots of tape) it on the rocking giraffe for a night cap.

Willa discovered MLPs have a magnet in their feet (I'm not sure why?) long ago.  Every now and then I come across them defying gravity somewhere.

I think this is a pig necklace.

She attached lots of scraps to this crab, just for fun.

This isn't crazy, but they made it themselves.

Collage art?

Glitter glue splotches as dining room exhibition. 

One Sure Sign of Spring

Willa checks out syrup

Cal's turn

Greta and her dad. 

Silly boy.

Our annual trip to the sugar shacks around the area is always fun and looked forward to, but this year it was especially good because it heralded the end of a long and extra snowy winter.  Sugar shacks (otherwise known as a sugar house, sugar cabin or sap house) are essentially where maple syrup is made.  In this day and age, people have added dining rooms where you can eat yummy pancakes, etc. and watch the syrup being made.  It's a lot of fun! (Can you tell I like breakfast?)  These places are kind of rustic, but always warm and inviting, full of people and good smells.  This year we went to Pomeroy's one weekend and the Nick and the kids went to Steve's on a weekend I was away.  Above are pictures from Steve's last year and below from Pomeroy's this year.  I guess we were too busy eating to take pictures of the syrup in use.

An infamous Aieta artsy shot.

 Bonus pic:

From Earth Hour (an hour on a March night when you turn off the lights for the environment).  We made it Earth Night and lit the fireplace for the last time of the year.