january 4
We spent the morning making cakes with our new playdough and building elaborate train stations. Rigel taught us all the difference between “steam trains and electric powered locomotives” :)
Then, we headed outside for more fun in the ice and mud. We visited the mounds again in hopes of finding the “big ice” to skate on — and we were in luck! There was plenty of ice for us to slip around on. We also found tracks in the mud! We followed the tracks as far as we could before they mysteriously disappeared. We think they might be fox or dog tracks.
When our legs felt tired from all the climbing and skating, we rested on the mounds and pretended to sleep. We asked Deidre to tickle us to help us wake up :)
A while later, we made our way to the bird sanctuary where we found some really big chunks of ice and lots of leaf stems coated in ice. Autumn enjoyed sucking the ice off the leaf stems like a lollipop.
Sylvie discovered a small patch of ice and frozen bark in the sycamore tree. We all worked together to collect sticks and then stacked them against the tree to make a little step so we could get up into the tree for a closer look. It was hard work!
After rest, we made hot chocolate from scratch. We started by adding water and cashews into the blender. Then we added in honey that was recently harvested from the backyard bees, cacao powder, and cinnamon. Once it was all blended, we poured it into a saucepan and let it warm up on the stove. Rigel and Autumn were so excited they said “CHEERS!” and clinked their cups together at the playdough station. We all gave the hot chocolate two thumbs up!