A Day with Aliyah

Aliyah returned yesterday after being away for several days, and she is going away again next week. So today, they played together most of the day. They watched movies at her house this morning. They had a picnic lunch together in the backyard. We took her with us to a conservation area nearby which has an Iroquoian village.

After visiting the Seneca Indian Museum (the Senecas were part of the Iroquois Nation) a couple of weeks ago, we have read some books about the Iroquois, so this was a treat to see a village and have some of Kevin's questions answered which I could not answer. From the books, we did not know how they entered their village through the palisades fence. They developed a maze! You entered the village in single file, thus a band of enemies could not rush into the village easily.

Through excavation, we know that a village with longhouses stood in the exact positions where they have reconstructed this village.

The guide demonstrated how to light a fire without a match. Aliyah's Dad is a naturalist, so she already knew many things about surviving without the conveniences we have today.

Aliyah declared she learned much from this experience! Kevin and I did too!

The guide did not know the real name of this weed, but said it smells and tastes like pineapple. The kids had to try it! A bouquet of it came home with Kevin.

We found a cute butterfly mood ring in the gift shop for Aliyah, but could find nothing worthwhile for Kevin. He insisted he wanted a mood ring too, but I insisted they were for girls. I told him I had his Mommy Karin's mood ring at home, and he could have that one.

We arrived home in time for Kevin's swim lesson. He did back floating today

as well as practicing the crawl stroke, AND he began learning to dive!


Today was the first day his hands entered the water before the rest of his body!!!

Once home, he and Aliyah continued to play until bedtime -- mainly riding their bike and scooter.