Southside Sprint

As I mentioned earlier, we've been doing a lot of biking lately. Maisie wakes up and wants to go for a bike ride almost immediately. It's fun for both of us.

Yesterday we all biked up to the Kingfield farmers market - me with Maisie on the tag-along, and Aaron with Ella in the Burley. Unfortunately, Aaron got a flat on the ride home! So I ran up to the nearest open bike shop/art gallery, Bikes and Pieces, to pick him up a new tube and tire.

Much to my surprise, there was a whole bike race going on! It was the Southside Sprint, which I'd never heard of before. They closed off streets to make a 3/4-mile track, and there was a whole festival atmosphere - local bike shops and other businesses had set up booths, and people were having fun and watching the races.

Given Maisie's newfound love of biking, I figured this'd be a lot of fun for her, so the two of us headed up there. We saw the tail end of the kids' race (which was SO cute!) and then watched the whole men's race. I didn't think she'd be that interested, but I was completely wrong. We pulled up a shady section of curb and sat there for an hour, watching the race.

We were really impressed by how fast they went (it was hot out!), and how close they rode to each other. I have no idea how they managed to avoid crashing into each other, at those speeds and with those small distances separating them. Lots of practice, I suppose.

When the race wasn't in front of us, we spent our time taking pictures of ourselves...

 And of each other!

My face looks SO red! It was hot out, what can I say.

We also ate popcorn from the Parkway (as you can probably see in our pics), had snow cones, tried to answer trivia questions that we knew nothing about (how many times did Greg LeMond win the Tour de France? Which American had the highest finish in the Tour de France this year? Which nation has the most wins in the Tour de France? I have no idea.), and just enjoyed being outside together on a sunny summer day.

Maisie's thinking about entering the kids' race next year. Or rather, I'm encouraging her to think about it - she's still not sure. But whether she races or not, I think this is going to become one of our regular summer activities.

Como Town

Yesterday, it was hot. Well, not just yesterday - we've had a heat wave this whole week, and yesterday was no exception. The temperature got up to a steamy 98 degrees, from a low of 79. It was humid out, too. Gross!

But despite the tropical weather, Gramma Liisa took Maisie, Ella, and Dylan to Como Town for the day!

They all had a blast - they rode tons of rides, and played on the splash pad to cool off.

And no Gramma Liisa-led trip to Como Town is complete without face painting...

Not sure why Maisie looks so serious...

Ella's turn in the makeup chair

Check out the finished product!

A tiger, a blue kitty, and a red puppy with yellow spots.

I wasn't home from work yet when they got back, but apparently they were completely wiped right out! (Unsurprising, given the heat.) Ella fell asleep on the floor while Maisie and Dylan played Minecraft. By the time bedtime rolled around, both girls were completely exhausted. They stayed awake long enough to complain bitterly about getting their faces washed, and were practically asleep before their heads hit their pillows.

Thanks for a fun day, Gramma Liisa!!

Biking!

Last year, we got a trail-a-bike from a neighbor whose kids had outgrown it. We never got around to hooking it up, though. Maisie was enjoying riding her bike with training wheels, and her balance didn't seem to be quite steady enough for a trail-a-bike. I didn't want her to pull us both over!

This year, however, we hadn't yet gotten out on our bikes. First we had a long, chilly spring that was not great biking weather. Then it rained every day for weeks. Then when we finally had good biking weather, Maisie's bike had a flat tire! We tried to pump it up but it needs a new tube.

Enter the trail-a-bike! I found installation instructions online and on Saturday morning, Aaron and I got it hooked up to my bike. Maisie and I started out slow, going up and down the alley. She was pretty wobbly and first and kind of uncertain... but before long, she really got the hang of it!

On Saturday, we went to the Midtown farmer's market (4.5 miles RT), accompanied by Aaron with Ella in our Burley trailer. Then in the afternoon, during Aaron's and Ella's naptime, Maisie and I went up to the 48th & Chicago shopping area twice (2.2 miles RT), for a total on Saturday of about 13.5 miles. On Sunday, she woke up and immediately started clamoring for another bike ride! We went to the Kingfield farmer's market (2.5. miles RT) in the morning. We saw neighbors there, hit up a craft fair across the street, and Maisie was impressed by how many bikes were on the rack. There's something about biking to the farmer's market that just feels like the most south Minneapolis thing ever! Then in the afternoon, after the weather had cooled down, we all biked up to Walgreen's (just 1.5 miles RT).

Today, my legs and lower back are pretty sore! With my own solo rides, I probably only went about 20 miles over both days. But that's a lot for me, after a whole winter of not biking! And I know that when I get home Maisie's going to want to go for another bike ride. :) It's well worth it. It feels much safer on city streets than having her bike alone - since I'm in control, more or less, I know she's not going to go shooting out into traffic or something.

But mostly, I like that we're really spending time together and enjoying our mutual love of biking!

Everything I need to know...

So, Maisie's kindergarten year has come and gone.

Here she is, on her first day of school back in August...

so excited! And look how short her hair was!

Here we are, waiting for the bus in the morning and so excited for her last day...

 And here she is, school year complete, now a first grader.

Why Ella's clinging onto her arm like that, I do not know. But it makes for a cute picture!

Aaron and Ella made Maisie a cake to mark the occasion. It was yummier than it was photogenic, which is fine, because cakes are for eating, not for photographing. We also let the girls stay up a little late watching a movie of Maisie's choice - The Secret World of Arietty. It was a nice evening and a lovely way to celebrate the end of the school year.

Maisie's kindergarten year was wonderful. She had a great teacher, and she learned and grew so much. A number of years ago there was a schmaltzy book out called All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten. So, I thought I'd share with you some of the things she learned this year, which I think will serve her well for the rest of her life.

• Love of reading: Minneapolis schools use the Scholastic Leveling Chart to measure students' reading ability and progress. Maisie started the year at level B, and finished at level I, which is a little ahead of the curve. She enjoys reading on her own (she brought comic books in her backpack to read on the bus!), and especially likes to read nursery rhymes to Ella. (Ella likes that too!) We're very happy that she's developed a love of reading.
  
• Love of art: as a Montessori school, Maisie's school incorporates art into almost everything they do. They really encourage the children to be creative and artistic, and Maisie's definitely taken this to heart. She draws all the time - both things she's made up (princesses and fairies are popular) as well as things she sees around her. If you ask her what she wants to be when she grows up, she'll tell you that she wants to be an artist. She's well on her way!
  
• Curiosity about the world: She loves to ask questions and try to figure out why things are the way they are. Her science classes have done a wonderful job at fostering and encouraging this curiosity. Even if her hypotheses aren't always correct, she's putting a lot of thought into them. It's so fun to hear her say, "You know what? I bet this is this way because..." and then to explain her ideas and thoughts.
  
• Speaking and listening: Maisie's a champ at expressing her ideas, thoughts, and feelings. At the beginning of the year, her first reaction to any frustration was to burst into tears, but as the year progressed, she got better at expressing herself in ways other than crying. She does still cry when frustrated, but she's able now to use her words to tell us exactly what's going on. She's also very empathetic; seeing another child upset will upset her, too, and she will do what she can to remedy the situation. These traits combine to make her a wonderful friend and a positive person to have in any group.

So, that's a lot of what Maisie learned in kindergarten this year. There was a fair amount of more academic work, but I think that these things might serve her better, in the long run, than knowing how to tell whether an animal is a mammal or a reptile. (Not that that's not important! But, you know.)

Dinosaurs at the zoo!

First, one note: tomorrow is Maisie's last day of Kindergarten. OMG! So if you see me, I might be a big weepy about it. Be nice to me... and tell her congratulations!

Last Saturday, the girls and I headed down to the Minnesota Zoo. There are two new exhibits there for the summer! One has African animals, and the other has dinosaurs. Yes, dinosaurs at the Zoo! Just animatronic... this isn't a Jurassic Park situation.

If you haven't ever been to the Minnesota Zoo, let me take a second to explain its layout. There's one main building that has customer service/ticketing, a cafeteria, and the gift shop, and several indoor exhibits: Discovery Bay, the Tropics Trail, the penguins, and the Minnesota Trail are all in the same building. Then outside, there's a main plaza with a fountain/splash pad and a lot of trails with outdoor exhibits. Russia's Grizzly Coast, the Northern Trail, and the Family Farm are all outside. Dinosaurs and the African animals exhibits are outside, along the Northern Trail.

We had sunscreen, sunhats, and were ready to walk the trails to get to Africa and to see dinosaurs. Sadly, there were other plans for us! When we got to the zoo, we were told that a bison had escaped its enclosure, so nobody could go outside until it was recaptured. WHAT!

So, instead we spent the morning doing activities to help Maisie earn her Girl Scouts Minnesota Zoo badge. Ella was not exactly pleased about this arrangement.

But, what can you do.

Eventually we did all Maisie's activities (How many species of frogs are in Minnesota? What are three bird on the tropics trail? Draw your favorite fish on the coral reef. Draw a food chain of animals you see on the Minnesota trail.) and got the all-clear to head outside. FINALLY! We were off to see the dinosaurs!!

This is a dimetrodon. I don't know why, but I think its fossil looks much scarier than the robot version. Maybe because you can see the teeth so much more clearly? Or maybe it's the freaky spines... hard to say.

Either way, I'm glad we don't have to worry about running across one of these in the wild.

By the time we got through dinosaurs and the African exhibit (not as great as advertised - one giraffe and a bunch of ostriches was really all we saw), the girls were hot and tired. Fortunately, we went through the central plaza with its splash pad/fountain on the way back. They were ready to cool off and weren't going to be stopped by not having brought swimsuits!

A quick pose on the wolf statutes on the way out...

 capped off a great day at the Minnesota Zoo!

Road trip rules

Over Memorial Day weekend, we headed down to Iowa to help celebrate Maya's fifth birthday at an awesome pirates & mermaids party. We had a blast! I'm not going to recap the party here - Shauna did a lovely job of that already over on The Dieter Family blog. Plus, she and Clare take far better pictures than I do with my cell phone. Look, here's an example:

So, go look over there!

What I want to talk about here is road trips with kids, and how to make them survivable (and even enjoyable) by both kids and parents.

We spent quite a bit of time in the car this weekend getting to and from the party - Friday we drove to Ames (3.5 hours of drive time), Saturday from Ames to Cedar Rapids (should've been 1.5 hours, but was closer to 2 due to rain), Sunday back from CR to Ames, and then Monday back home to Minneapolis. We make the trip down to Ames a couple of times a year, and we've also done some drives recently up to Duluth (2.5 hours) and to Bemidji (4 hours). With all that driving under our belts, we feel like we're getting pretty good at kid-friendly (or friendlyish) road trips. So I figured I'd share what we've learned, and ask for your tips, too!

In our experience, there are a couple of key elements to a successful road trip with kids. If you give these some thought and get them figured out in advance of your trip, you should be able to keep the whining to a minimum. And really, what more can you ask for?

1. Plan your route

At 6.5 and almost 4, Maisie and Ella get really restless after sitting still for too long. They're good for an hour and a half in the car, maybe two hours max. But much longer than that, and they start to get antsy and whiny and crabby, which is no fun for anyone! So when we're planning a trip, we'll also look along the route and plan stops at places where the girls can run around and burn off some energy.

Many of the rest stops in Minnesota have little playgrounds, which are perfect for this - on our trips to Ames, we usually stop at the one right on the Minnesota-Iowa border. When we were traveling to & from Bemidji, we stopped at the mall in St. Cloud, which has a children's play area. In our experience, the break doesn't need to be very long - 10 or 15 minutes is often enough to get the job done.

2. Plan your departure

The right time to hit the road is going to vary from kid to kid and from trip to trip. How long is the drive? Will it overlap with meal times or naps? And of course, you have to consider weather conditions too, especially here in the upper Midwest!

When Maisie and Ella were still regular nappers, we'd try to start our trips right around naptime. After all, a sleeping child is generally a happy child who is not whining, and that makes for a great drive! Now that they're not napping consistently (Ella) or at all (Maisie), we have a little more flexibility with our departure times, so we'll consider weather conditions and when/where we want to make our stops. On Monday, for example, when we drove home from Ames, we left right after lunch. We'd rather not eat on the road, if we can avoid it. And that brings me to...

3. Plan your food

Boy, it's easy to eat a bunch of junk food on a road trip. Convenience stores and fast-food chains are everywhere, and it can be difficult to make better choices - especially if you have a little one who's begging for candy and chips and chicken nuggets. In our experience, that only leads to too much money spent (fast food can be surprisingly expensive, especially for what you get!) and upset tummies. No fun!

We like to pack a cooler with healthy, kid-friendly, car-friendly snacks. This means things that the girls will like to eat, that won't spill or crumble and make a huge mess! Some of our favorite snacks are:

• Cheese sticks
• Hard-boiled eggs
• Bananas
• Apple slices
• Carrot sticks
• Goldfish crackers (less car-friendly, but the kids love 'em)

We try to avoid anything too sugary-sweet. If you're stuck in the car for a couple of hours, you really don't need a sugar rush, or the crash that follows. Plus, our experience is that sugary snacks will lead to upset tummies more often than other snacks will.

We also make sure to bring full bottles of water, so it's easier to avoid sugary fruit juices and pops.

4. Plan their activities & entertainment

I know a lot of people rely on iPads and other electronics for kid entertainment during travel. We don't have much in the way of kid electronics (no iPad or other tablet), and Maisie and Ella are little enough that they sometimes have a hard time with using the electronics we do have (like portable DVD player) without a lot of parental help. So, those tend not to be a good fit for us for the car.

Instead, we've found a couple of other ways to keep the kids entertained and pass the time.

• Word games: I Spy is always fun! But unfortunately, there's not a ton of variety on the drive between Minneapolis and Ames, so we've come up with a few others. The girls like rhyming, so I'll give them a word and ask for rhymes. Maisie's also working on isolating beginning sounds of words, so I might give her a word and ask her to think of another that starts with the same sound. She and Ella can play this kind of game for a surprisingly long time - I get bored with it long before they do!
• Books on tape: This is something new we tried on this trip, and it was a hit! Our library has a great selection of children's audio books. They were especially good when we were in pouring rain with huge wind gusts. The audio book kept Maisie occupied so I could concentrate on driving. On the way home from Ames, listening to the story also let Ella relax enough to take a sorely needed nap. Naps for the win!!
• New coloring books & crayons: This one is probably age-dependent... but it works for now, and is a fairly inexpensive way to keep them happily occupied. Coloring books and crayons can be found for about a buck apiece at Michael's or similar stores. And everyone likes a new box of crayons, right?
• Drawing: Both Maisie and Ella really like to draw. A little notebook and a pen will keep them occupied for quite a while, but pens tend to get dropped. We got them travel Magna Doodles, which have been a great substitute for pen & paper - the attached pen means that it won't get dropped and lost!

So, that's how we've managed to take road trips from a necessary evil to be endured to something that's actually fun. Please share your road trip tips & tricks, too!

Getting there is half the fun, come share it with me!

Marriage Equality Day at the Capitol!

This post will probably be full of exclamation marks! Because I am SO! EXCITED! AND HAPPY!!!!

Last November, you may remember, we here in Minnesota had two ugly Constitutional amendments on our ballot. One was to require voter ID at the polls, and the other was to prohibit same-sex marriage. This anti-marriage amendment created a groundswell of grassroots activism for its defeat. But once the amendment (both amendments, actually!) was defeated, the thought became, "why stop here? why not change the statute?"

As it currently stands, marriage in Minnesota is defined by Minn. Stat. 517.01, which states in part:

Marriage . . . is a civil contract between a man and a woman . . . . Lawful marriage may only be contracted between persons of the opposite sex and only when a license has been obtained as provided by law . . . .

In the current session, a bill was introduced to change that to read:

A civil marriage . . . is a civil contract between two persons . . . .  Lawful marriage may only be contracted when a license has been obtained as provided by law . . . .

It's a small change, but it makes a BIG difference!

Last week, the bill passed the House of Representatives and headed to the Senate. With a pro-marriage DFL majority, passage was as certain as anything in politics can be. So Maisie and I took the day off from our respective school/work obligations, and headed with Ella to the Capitol, to join the celebration.



It was a beautiful day, too - sunny and not too hot!

 We got there around 10:00 a.m. I thought we'd be on the early side - the Senate wasn't convening until noon! - but the party was already in full swing! At this point, I'd guess that the pro-marriage equality "Vote Yes!" folks outnumbered the "Vote No" people by 2:1 or 3:1. It was the highest proportion we'd see all day. (If you can't read the signs in these pictures, the marriage equality people were either wearing orange and blue or rainbow colors. "Vote No" was in pink.)

We met up with my college friend Jo and her older son Tristan, who was carrying a sign he made that said "VOTE YES so that my moms can get married!" We hung out on the steps, checked out people's signs, petted some cute dogs... it was a friendly and relaxed crowd, for the most part.

We had to get off the Capitol steps by 11, because another group had them reserved (Falun Gong, as it turns out). So after a quick peek at the crowd that was gathering in the Capitol rotunda...


hmmm, that's not too crowded...

 ..we headed off to visit the office of our senator, Patricia Torres Ray.
 

Senator Torres Ray wasn't in the office, but we were pretty clear about where she stood on the issue. :) She even had a little snack station set up in her office! The girls picked up some cookies for themselves and for Tristan. They are now huge fans of Senator Torres Ray. Thanks for the Oreos!!


Hm, starting to get a little more crowded...

After a brief lunch break/potty stop at my mom's nearby apartment, we headed back to the Capitol for the long haul. By now, the Senate had convened and all we had to do was wait. We hung out, sang songs... and waited.



Singing "This Land Is Your Land" - probably 5:1 "Vote Yes"

 As you can see, the place was really filling up! And it was getting hot and stuffy in there, too. It's a huge building with a huge open space, but the sheer numbers of people there really managed to warm it up.

Speaking of people, we saw a lot of folks there who we knew! I said hi to friends Brian & Geri, Carleton classmates Bruce, Willy, and Kacia, multiple neighborhood moms with their kids, and Legal Aid director Cathy Haukedahl. I also saw a law school prof (but didn't say hi), and I know there were a bunch of other folks there who I know but didn't manage to run into.

The girls started to get a little antsy and asked to head back to "our Senator's office... you know, with the cookies?"



She changed her door sign.

Sadly, the cookies were all gone! But a television was on in her office, showing the debate, and bunch of people were in there watching. I wanted to watch, so we sat for a minute. The girls complained (quietly) about the lack of cookies until one of her staffers brought them some Dove chocolates.

 I was watching the discussion when I heard Maisie say, "Oh, Ella." I looked over to see Ellie playing with her chocolate, rolling it around in her hands.

After a bathroom stop for washing up, we took a peek at the growing crowd....
 

Pretty much entirely "vote yes!"

  And found Tristan and Jo again.

Tristan and the girls hung out, drew and colored...

Watched the crowd, and sang songs.

We ended up leaving around 3:30. It had been a long day, and the debate was still ongoing. We'd hoped to stay for the whole thing, but the kids were pretty much done (and to be honest, so were we). So we all headed home, listening to the discussion on MPR the whole way.

It finally headed for a vote after we'd gotten home, and we all heard that it passed around 4:30. Tears were shed and all my social media outlets simultaneously went "Woo hoo!" :) And so Minnesota became the 12th state to pass marriage equality. Yes Iowa, you got there first. But we finally caught up! On July 1, marriage licenses will be issued to same-sex couples, and on August 1, those couples will be able to get married.

Governor Mark Dayton has scheduled a signing ceremony for 5:00 this afternoon. We won't be able to attend (ukelele class conflict!), but I'm so glad that we went to the Capitol yesterday. I feel so strongly about the importance of this - I've heard it said multiple times that gay rights are the civil rights movement of our times, and I believe that to be true, and I'm so glad that the girls were able to witness all the love and support behind this movement. People in same-sex relationships, and their children, can now have the same legal protections as Aaron and I do, and as Maisie and Ella. Inheritance rights, tax breaks, medical decision-making... there are so many rights conferred by marriage that can't be won any other way. And not only that, it's a recognition of legitimacy and validation.

I'm so proud to be a Minnesotan most of the time. But yesterday and today, SO much!

Vacation: Duluth

This past Monday, May 6, Maisie had the day off school for one of those random record-keeping or teacher in-service days. I figured I might as well give myself the day off, too. So we headed up north to Duluth, where we'd made a reservation at one of the girls' favorite places - Edgewater Resort & Waterpark. We stayed there Saturday through Monday.

We had a blast playing in the water park! You'll have to take my word for it, though - I didn't manage to take any pictures.

I did manage to get some pictures on Sunday afternoon, though, when we took a break from playing in the water to head down to Canal Park, which is a semi-touristy area right on the waterfront.

 One of Duluth's unique attractions is the aerial lift bridge. When a ship needs to come through that's too tall for the bridge, instead of it breaking in the middle and the two halves pulling up, the whole bottom part lifts straight up!


Ella as "Balance Panda"

So first, of course, we had to watch the bridge go up and down as a ship came through. It was kind of chilly, though, so once the bridge was on its way back down, we headed indoors to the Lake Superior Maritime Museum, which is far more interesting than I thought it would be. It presents the history of shipping on the Great Lakes. So on the top level, there's telescopes so you can watch the ships come in, and some fun hands-on exhibits.

Shipping on Lake Superior is not without its tragedies, of course. The museum displays multiple artifacts that have been recovered from shipwrecks... including this very famous wreck.

Once we'd had our fill of the museum, we went down to the lakeside to climb on rocks and to look for additions to our rock collection!

There's a wooden lakewalk that goes quite a ways down the length of the waterfront, and then these HUGE boulders all piled from the lakewalk to the shore that are oh-so-tempting to climb on.

See? really huge!

Some of the rocks have these holes drilled in them. I wasn't sure what they were from at first, but I think I figured it out.

A sign said that the rocks were from when MN-DOT was finishing Interstate 35's route through the east side of Duluth. So my guess is that the holes were drilled for blasting through the hillsides. What do you think?

As we walked, we all looked at the little rocks, too, for interesting additions to our rock collection. We found a LOT of different rocks (and I emptied a lot of rocks out of the girls' pockets!). Here are the ones we ended up bringing home:

Clockwise from the top: sea glass, gabbro, an agate!, quartz that might reveal some hematite bands if we take a rock hammer to it (a.k.a. stealth agate!!), red & black basalt? rhyolite, and either basalt or flint.

Geology rocks!

We headed back on Monday after a fun, relaxing long weekend. And for all the fun we had at the water park, Maisie and Ella both said that their favorite part of the trip was climbing on the rocks. It was a great time, and we're already planning our next Duluth adventure.

Camp Lakamaga

I think I've mentioned here that Maisie joined Girl Scouts, right? Maybe?

Maisie joined the Girl Scouts this year! She's a Daisy, which is the level for girls in Kindergarten and first grade. She really enjoys it. They meet twice a month and pretty much just do craft projects. Sometimes they do other things, too - there was a trip to the zoo for Scout Day, cookie sales, and caroling at a nursing home this year. This past Saturday, we had another special adventure: all the troops from around Lake Nokomis were invited to Camp Lakamaga for the 2013 "Encampment." (I don't think I'd ever seen the word "encampment" before this past weekend, but Google tells me it's a legit word that means "a place with temporary accomodations, usually huts or tents, typically for troops or nomads." So there you go: encampment!)



"Go Confidently in the Direction of your Dreams" - as you leave the dining hall

 Some troops of older girls spent Friday and Saturday night there, but for us, it was just a one-day activity. We arrived bright and early, ready for our scheduled fishing activity at 9:00.

Unfortunately, the weather didn't really cooperate... so the girls just played outside for like an hour and a half instead.

It was a LOT of playing outside!

Then we had a snack and played outside some more, until we headed up to the dining hall for lunch at 12:30.

There was a little display of old Girl Scouting artifacts just outside the dining hall, which included this little diorama. I liked the gigantic coffee pot and the adorably tiny badger. So cute!

They also had posted the Girl Scout Law. So just in case you were wondering, here it is:

"I will do my best to be:
Honest and fair,
Friendly and helpful,
Considerate and caring,
Courageous and strong, and
Responsible for what I say and do,
And to
respect myself and others,
respect authority,
use resources wisely,
make the world a better place, and
be a sister to every Girl Scout."

Admirable goals, I think.
So - waiting for lunch to be ready, and then waiting for our turn to eat, was booooooring.

We passed the time by making faces and taking silly pictures.

After lunch, the girls had a dance class, which was going to be followed by an arts & crafts activity. But by 2:00, mid-dance, it was pretty clear that our Daisies were starting to wilt. It was a long day!

The camp staff had told us to each bring one item of clothing that they'd silkscreen the camp's logo on. So while the troop was dancing I headed over to the Old Lodge, which had the arts & crafts studio, to pick up our troop's silkscreened items. They weren't quite done, so I hung around for a few minutes while they finished our silkscreens. I saw some cool things posted in the cabin, and asked the staffer about them and about the camp's history.

She told me that Camp Lakamaga has been around since the mid to late '50s. The Old Lodge, the cabin we were in, was one of the oldest buildings at the camp. I'd figured that out from this piece of birchbark nailed to the doorframe... it's older than I am!

If you can't quite make it out, it says "Troop Stay Staff 1965" and then lists names. They're mostly silly nicknames - "Cutter" and "Needles" and "Sparky" and so on. (Cutter and Needles? Man, that is one tough Girl Scout troop.) But I think it's really neat that it's still up there from 1965.

The cabin is also ringed with these square tiles that have designs in the middle of them, each with the name of a country. The staffer said that they're also from the 1960's, and are Girl Scout or Girl Guide insignias from the different countries' girls who'd visited Camp Lakamaga.

Obviously I had to take a picture of the Suomi Finland one!

Anyway, after dance class, Maisie and I headed home. A few girls stayed, but I think most of the other Daisies in her troop left then, too. It was a long day already, and almost an hour's drive back to Minneapolis. I was pretty wiped out, and I hadn't even danced or sledded!

Maisie had a lot of fun, and proudly wore her silk-screened Encampment shirt to school on Monday. I don't know how long she's going to want to stay in Girl Scouts, but for now, she really loves it.

Weekend update - Salolampi edition!

This weekend we did something different from our usual trips around town to the zoo or to the museum. Along with several other families from Suomi-Koulu, the Finnish language school, we all went to Salolampi, the Concordia Language Village's Finnish language village, for the weekend!

This was in our cabin. Love it!

Salolampi is just outside Bemidji, about a four hour drive from Minneapolis. And while I thought that we had snow... I had no idea just how much snow they still had! We had plans for nature walks, and Ella wanted to climb trees... instead, the girls spent a ton of time sledding and building a snowman and looking for animal tracks and just generally having as much fun in the snow as possible.



Spring in Bemidji

So, I have two stories to tell from the weekend. The first is kind of scary. SPOILER ALERT: everyone is fine.

So, some of you know that Maisie's had allergic reactions to tree nuts before. We had her tested and nothing came up, but her pediatrician advised us to err on the side of caution and avoid nuts, so that's what we've done. She knows that she's allergic to nuts, and we put it on all her health forms. So when we were preparing for this trip, I told our group's leader about her allergy, so it'd get passed along to the kitchen staff. Well, there was a slight communication breakdown, and at dinner on Friday night, Maisie turned to Aaron and said, "this cake is making my mouth all itchy." I went to the kitchen to ask about ingredients, and turns out the cake had ground hazelnuts in it. GAH!

Fortunately, there is a nurse on-site whenever there are kids at the camp, so she came over from Waldsee (the German village) right away with some Benadryl, which took care of Maisie's itchy mouth, tongue, and throat. Also fortunately, the reaction never got worse... there was no swelling or trouble breathing. The nurse gave us another Benadryl just in case (never needed it), and we checked with the staff about any other food items on the menu with stealth nuts (Maisie had to skip the apple cake Saturday night, and the muesli on Sunday morning).

I talked to our pediatrician this morning, who said that allergy panels can be inaccurate, and this third reaction pretty much confirms the allergy. He called in a prescription for an epi-pen in case of a severe reaction (like trouble breathing), and confirmed that Benadryl's a good choice for the milder reactions (itchy mouth but no swelling). So, here we are now, in food allergy land! Friday night was scary, but it's not the end of the world, and it definitely could be worse. Tree nuts are pretty easily avoided, as opposed to allergies like egg or milk protein, and we're now prepared just in case she does get accidentally exposed. And the lovely camp nurse said that a lot of children outgrow allergies, so this might not even be something she has to deal with her whole life.

(I seriously wanted to hug the nurse. She was so good with Maisie, and very reassuring and calm with panicky me. Yay for nurses!)
Now, here's the fun second story. All day Saturday, the girls were clamoring to go SAUNA! Salolampi has two saunas: an electric one in the main building, and a more traditional one with a wood-burning stove out in the woods. On Saturday afternoon we heard that the wood-burning sauna was hot, so we put on our swimsuits and made the trek through the woods to go sauna!

Whoever said it was hot wasn't kidding - it was up to 160 in there, and they kept throwing water on for lisää löyly (more steam), making it even hotter on the top bench! It was a nice, big sauna - we had five adults and six kids all hanging out in there, relaxing and being kind of silly. We started talking about jumping into and rolling around in the snow, as you do when you're in a steamy hot sauna in the snowy woods. Eventually, Maisie and I decided to take the plunge! We stood on the bottom step of the porch, held hands, counted 1, 2, 3... JUMP! We landed on our butts in the snow.

We were the first to do it, and that was my only snow-jump, but eventually all the grownups and all but the littlest kids did it too. Maisie and one other mom made snow angels, and one mom rolled and rolled around. It was hilarious and so fun! Maisie went in the snow four times, for which everyone said she was rohkea (brave). The walk back through the snowy woods was lovely, too. We'd gotten cold on the way to the sauna, but we'd gotten so heated up that the cold air and snow just felt nicely cool and refreshing. It was wonderful!

So those are our two big stories from our Salolampi weekend. When we weren't going sauna or having/panicking over allergic reactions, the girls were doing crafts (Maisie's now a REAL weaver!), and playing with other kids, indoors and out. Maisie and Ella each met and bonded with a girl just about her own age, which was quite sweet. We also ate a TON of yummy Finnish food, marveled at all the stars, and just generally enjoyed being together, out in the woods and off the grid for a weekend.