Our Tuesday: Cooking, Nature and Play

This morning Hazel announced she wanted pancakes for breakfast. In other words, she wanted to cook. So we made some. We had some very ripe bananas that I wanted to do something with so I gave three of them to Hazel to mash. Then I gave her an egg to beat. We mixed with the egg, the bananas, a pureed carrot, 1 cup of skim milk, and 1 tablespoon olive oil. Next we mixed the dry ingredients in a separate bowl: 1 cup whole wheat flour, 1/3 cup ground almond meal, 1/3 cup chopped walnuts, 2 teaspoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 1/2 cup oatmeal. Then we poured the liquid mixture into the dry mixture and threw in a cup of blueberries. Mixed it well and then cooked the pancakes.

Hazel even helped scoop a couple into the pan, though she is very afraid of the hot stove. She really enjoys cooking with me.

Then we headed to Drumlin Farm for our last class this spring. Today we focused on all the senses for the end. This included popping popcorn since all five senses are used: hear it pop, smell it, touch it, see it and taste it. The kids enjoyed eating it. Then the class visitor was brought out. It was an opossum! The opossum is the only marsupial in North America and fifty years ago you would not find them this far north, but they have migrated with their food.

Our instructor, Alex, told us all about opossums. They only have babies inside of them for two weeks and then they are born the size of a bean. The babies then go into a pouch on the mother's stomach and live there until they are big enough. Their nipples are located inside the pouch (this is also true of kangaroos).

They also cannot hang by their tail. Their tails are not that strong. They do use them for balance and help, but they climb and hang by their claws. You can see in the picture below how big their claws are.

This opossum was in some sort of a fight and has a flattened and injured nose, which is why she lives at the Mass Audubon. They also had an opossum skin to pass around for the kids (and moms) to feel how soft they were. We also think she could smell the popcorn we popped. She kept trying to climb the plexiglass and sniff.

Instead of a craft today we got to go on the hay ride. Hazel enjoys this even if she won't smile for a picture. She also wanted to wear her binoculars we made earlier in the class. She came out with them on and said she was wearing them so she could see things better today. After this we took a walk to the top of the drumlin. We had never been there before and had a good time. On our way back we saw the model long house they made during the summer camp last year. The kids loved it.

It reminded me of the fort we want to make for Hazel. Of course this is much bigger than what we are planning. For those who do not know, the long house was the housing of the Iroquois and many of the tribes in New England. (One tribe in Massachusetts is the Wampanoag.) It would be covered with bark or wood and 20-30 people would live in it. They have a really neat complete long house at Plimouth Plantation.

Then we walked by a pond to look for crayfish. We did not see any, but saw a bouncing bug and a neat silver maple growing in the pond.

The kids had fun sitting by the water. They found bugs and just liked watching the water.

Then it was time to say goodbye. A few of us exchanged contact information so we can try to get together this summer. It was really a nice group of kids and moms. We will miss our weekly trips to Drumlin Farm, but will go back again.

After lunch we ran a few errands and then got one of our high school babysitters to play with Hazel so I could have a break and I am using it to write this, but at least this is relaxing.