Harvesting at West End Farm

Friday was set to be a fabulous day.  No school which I will explain further in the next post.  To start the morning (because the fair does not open until 11 am), we headed down to West End Farm.  A small farm run by recently graduated college students investigating their path's in life and feeling a need to get a connection to agriculture.  The farm is owned by a Whitman staff who also hosts the Organic Garden on campus.  Jessie and Sarah, 2 of the folks on the farm had invited us over for a wonderful farm dinner earlier in the week and we decided to come back for harvest day.  

Wren is in love with chickens.  We have nick-named him the chicken whisperer.  He would have spent our whole time in the chicken coop catching, petting and just watching the chickens.  Dakota also liked being in the chicken coop but had a harder time understanding the rules about which doors needed to stay closed all the way.  I asked Alice, one of the farmers, if it was okay if the boys just hung out in the coop because I was worried that they were harassing the chickens but she said that it was good for the chickens to get socialized to people and she was happy to have them in there chasing and catching them.

About 20 minutes into the coop time, one of the doors got pushed open by a lot of chicken flapping and about 15 teen-ager chickens got into the adult pen.  We had a great time catching them all and putting them back in their pen.  Compete silly chaos.  Super fun!  Heidi's secret: I really like chickens too.  I just have to build the coop in the back yard, order some chicks and convince Stuart that we should have some. 

We were there to help with the harvest and chicken coop time was fun but time for some work.  Here we are picking tomatoes.  In Walla Walla, you can grow tomatoes like a ground vine because it is so dry they don't mold.  It is amazing just stick them in the ground and let them go.  Harvesting is like a treasure hunt because the vines grow all over the ground like a big giant mess.  I also learned that tomatoes sometimes produce more if they are distressed during the growing process so "be rough" not gentle. We just picked up the whole big mess of vines and throw it over to find the tomatoes underneath.

These next two photos are taken by Dakota.  Sweet Dakota.  Harvesting for him really was just about being on the farm enjoying the freedom and fun of being there.

Next we headed down to pick green and purple beans and then potatoes.  The beans were beautiful, especially the purple ones.  But potatoes are fun!  It really is like a giant treasure hunt when you are digging for potatoes.  There is just this big mound of dirt and you stick your hand in the dirt wiggle your fingers through the until you feel something round and then dig some more until you reveal your treasures.  And when you are digging for ruby red russets you really feel like you have found rubies when you are pull one out of the dirt.   Sorry no pictures of the potato harvest as it was too fun to stop and remember to take photos.  Here are the potatoes we received in trade for our hard work.

Lovely morning!  Home for lunch and then the FAIR! (See the next post!)

Kayak Touring on the Palouse River

 Last weekend, we had an amazing overnight adventure.  We loaded up 2 tandem sea kayaks.  Headed north to the Palouse River.  We unloaded the boats and packed them full of our gear.  Then with a parent in back and a son in front, we headed upstream.  The Palouse River is part of a "lake" sitting behind a dam.  This allows for easy travel with little to no current in either direction.  The temperatures were very hot, probably 95 degrees.  But the slight breeze, the cool water, and the shade offered by the steep cliffs made for a lovely afternoon of paddling.  We moved at a nice pace moving about 3 1/2 miles upstream in about 3 hours.  We of course stopped for some lunch, chased fish, gathered floating sticks and rescuing drowning dragonflies along the way.  Below you will see some of our favorite images from the weekend with some explanatory captions.  We did not have the camera out until we got to our campsite in the evening of the first day.


Here is Stuart returning from scouting for our camp.  

Dakota and Wren spent the time while Stuart was scouting for camp, finding endless forts, sticks (swords, guns and bows) and enjoying using their imagination for extended camp play.

Stuart and Heidi (really Stuart) were determined to try a tandem role in one of the kayaks.  We were amazingly successful when we had a plan!  So we did that twice... Then we tried pretending that we did not have a plan and Heidi swam after 2 tries.  But that left Stuart in to role the boat by himself.  So success all around because Heidi could easily have just hoisted herself back in.

Here is Heidi drying off after swimming out of the kayak.  It stayed hot until very late in the evening so it was easy to dry off. 

As the sun sets, we made dinner of yummy tortellini and pesto and set up camp under the stars.  This was Dakota's first time to sleep out with no tent.  He really enjoyed seeing the stars as he fell asleep.
It did finally get cold and so in the morning we were happy to have hot chocolate.  Here is Dakota enjoying his morning hot chocolate as the sun rises on the cliffs behind.

  Here the Stuart and Wren are relaxing in the kitchen.  Altogether spectacular.

Here is the morning sun rising on the cliffs behind our wondrous boats.

The boys really wanted some bows and arrows.  So, we made them from some sticks and cord found in camp.  These bows and arrows occupied the boys all morning as we packed up the camp and the boats.  Practicing Leave No Trace (LNT), we did not take them with us but rather broke them down, left the sticks and packed out the "trash" (i.e. the cord).  The boys are learning a ton about being great LNT campers.  If you are really interested, ask us about Blue Poop Bags. 

Wren really enjoyed learning about kayaking and paddling with his dad.

Dakota and Mom really enjoyed exploring and making up so many wonderful stories.  Often the stories were based on our guesses on what was floating in the water up ahead.  (Could be hippo, alligator, stick, fish, dragonfly...who knows?)  Here Wren jumps off a cliff into the water.

Altogether a wonderful trip.  Something that would be fun for ANYONE WHO WOULD LIKE TO VISIT and go overnight camping.  After paddling back to the car, we unloaded, and headed up to see the Palouse Falls, a 180 ft. waterfall just a mile or so upstream of where we paddled but needed to drive around in order to get a chance to see it.  Next time we will try to stay 2 nights and day hike up to the falls on the middle day.   FUN FOR ALL !!!!!

Dakota Goes to School

Dakota goes to Kid's Place on Monday, Thursday and Friday mornings.  He is "falling into friends" with a few kids there each day and really enjoying his time.  Though it is hard to get him to leave in the morning, when I pick him up at 12:45 he is never ready to leave.

Method of Transport for Dakota to and from school:

Stuart hooks up the trailer and takes Dakota to school.  I go down to Kid's Place, pick up Dakota and the trailer.  Lucky for us Stuart's work and Kid's Place are right next door so the transition is pretty easy. 

Here is Dakota's Sweet Ride!

 

School Starts

Wren had his first day of school this week. 5th Grade. Getting older, more mature, and taking awesome responsibility. We are so proud of him. Here he is with his walking buddies from the neighborhood headed down the street to school on Day 2. (Forgot the camera on Day 1, silly me.)

He walks to school with 3 girls, lucky Wren. They are Rachel (5th grade and lives just around the corner), Lulu (4th grade and next door neighbor) and Melody (4th grade and part of the family who will be leaving this fall on the sailing trip). Lulu's brother, Henry, is in 6th grade and has to leave a little be earlier so he can make it over to the middle school on time.


Wren has a great teacher, Mr. Crouter. We met him during the Open house/Watermelon feed. We are very happy with his school.

As Wren starts school, Dakota is going to Kid's Place. A wonderful pre-school right next to Stuart's office. He goes 3 mornings a week giving him a chance to make friends and giving me a chance to breathe. On Tuesday and Wednesday mornings and every afternoon, he and I get to hang out, play, go to the library and enjoy some beautiful time together. I will have to take some pictures of our time. I am guessing we will do some great art, bake, garden, make shadow boxes, storytelling and play. I am really enjoying Dakota's stories. Yesterday he told me one that he had heard from Wren with his own sweet twist. Here it is dictated word for word.

"Rain is dinosaur pee. When dinosaurs are alive, they pee on the ground. And when they go extincto, the pea washes all up to the clouds and spits up into the clouds. And when people are alive, the clouds spit it down on to the people. That's why it's yellow pee when it rains."

I think that when a science teacher, either myself or my friend Laura Federico, taught Wren about the water cycle we were explaining that the water that is around today is the same water that was around when the dinosaurs were around. So...water today is dinosaur pee from millions of years ago....

Harris Park, Blueberries and a Salmon

We headed south this weekend to a Milton-Freewater, a little town in Oregon about 10 miles south of Walla Walla. Just out of town along the Walla Walla River about a mile is an amazing Pick-Your-Own Blueberry Farm. They average about 70,000 pounds of blueberries picked each season...Yes really 70,000 pounds. On Saturday when we picked, they had 750 pounds leave the property between 6AM and noon. We landed about 21 pounds or about 5 gallons.


Here is Dakota picking blueberries. He is a very decisive picker, picking only the biggest, ripest ones. So his bucket was full of big juicy sweet berries. Wren was also an amazing picker being decisive on quality as well. Stuart and I were a bit more for quantity but ended up with a few more less-ripe berries in our buckets.



After blueberries, we headed up river to Harris Park. This park is a linear park along the Walla Walla River. We parked, grabbed lunch and swimsuits and hiked up river at a nice pace. We did manage to cross the very cold river twice before realizing that a side trail avoided the crossings. Though I have to say Wren did a fabulous job crossing the swift stream. The hardest part to deal with was the temperature. By the time we were across our feet were definitely cold enough to be a bit painful. Though all was well after a few moments in the hot sun.

We found a lovely picnic spot by the river. After sitting a while, Wren shouts with pure excitement, "Look at that fish." We all look out at the river where he is pointing and see a golden fish about a foot long. Big, but not huge. We look and say that is a big fish. "No, that's not the one I am talking about. The one I saw was WAY bigger." We nod and watch the fish that we can see. But then all of a sudden a REALLY BIG fish comes into view. It was 2 1/2 -3 feet long. The two fish were surfing a wave right in front of us, maybe 5 feet out into the river. And they surfed that wave for at least 10 minutes while we sat and watched. They finally left after we had taken a ton of photos and we tried to get Stuart out there for scale. We wanted the scale because of course fish grow in stories. We are pretty sure it was a salmon but will have that verified by a local at some point soon. See below....

In this first photo you can just see the golden fish behind the salmon.
In this photo you can see the whole salmon, head to tail. AMAZING.

This photo is here to offer some perspective on the size of fish. The wave that the fish is surfing is just above my head in this picture. Should have had Stuart walk out and just put his hands in where the fish was at least. Oh well, y'all will just have to believe us on the size.

This is the photo that shows the beauty of the setting we were sitting in. So lovely.

Dakota and Stuart looking upstream. (Confession: I told them to look upstream at the bear because Dakota was hiding from the camera...now we had been playing make believe about seeing bears in the woods during our hike, a game initiated by Dakota so I was just playing along but it was definitely to get a good photo)
Wren the perpetual naturalist/investigator found this interesting vegetation, so I asked him to show it to me. He happily obliged.

Farmer's Market Day

Our Farmer's Market is wonderful. I think we live in a local food mecca. Here are some shots from our adventure today. We headed out on bikes. On our way we stopped at the local bakery which uses local (Walla Walla) when possible and if not regional (Eastern Oregon and Washington) wheat for all it's bread. And then headed down to the market.


This is the boys out side the Walla Walla Bread Company (Dakota in the green trailer behind Stuart).
Wren and Stuart picking out veggies!


Some of the wonderful flowers!


Dakota helped me pick out the thyme plant from this plant farmer.


Wren enjoying the flowers!

Around Town Adventures

Stuart headed off for the Salmon River again to teach the "Scrambles" Training. A wonderful trip that was full of teaching and wonderful sandy beaches.


While Stuart was away, we continued to explore Walla Walla finding many wonderful places. Here is our public library. An 8 minute bike ride with the boys from our house. They have a wonderful children's section.

You can just see the boys behind the sign, in the shade, on the grass.


Here is Wren holding his favorite find, original Superman comics, in front of the wonderful sculpture. Walla Wall has an amazing amount of public art and this piece is quite fabulous. It sits just in front of the library.
Whitman Soccer Camp for "Little Strikers" started on Monday for Dakota who was excited to go. He took a while warming up to all the new folks but by the end of the week had made friends with the coaches and a good buddy who also goes to his school, Kid's Place. Wren's Soccer Camp started on Wednesday. He had a blast!!!!

Dakota going after the ball.

Dakota just after a big score: it might be hard to see but he is throwing a fist in the air to celebrate.

Dakota's new Buddy: GUS. Giving each other a high five! Gus invited Dakota over for a play date later in the week and they had a good time playing. Wren going for a big kick!


One day after soccer, while Wren was over playing with the neighbors, Dakota got out the finger paints and decided to have some fun! This fabulous Tummy Painting was the end result. We headed from here directly to a warm bath which turned purple from all the paint!



On Thursday Stuart surprised us, telling us to be prepared after soccer camp with a packed lunch, bathing suits and ready for fun. He took us down to Milton-Freewater, the next town south of here and in Oregon where they have a water park. FUN, FUN, FUN for all!





On Friday Night we got a babysitter and headed out to join a wonderful tradition: The Great Oak Film Festival. An amazing couple in town takes the time to put together a compilation of great short films. Another family hosts the event which is potluck. Everyone brings chairs, food, drink and no kids. We eat together and then as soon as it gets dark the movies begin. What a great time! This festival happens 2 or 3 times throughout the summer and it is AWESOME! You can see the leftovers from the feasting in the foreground of this first photo.




This second photo is an amazing shot with the big dipper in the sky!