Tag Archives: kids

Free Family Fun! The Salem Maritime Festival

Tomorrow is the Salem Maritime festival at the Salem Maritime National Historic Site!

Participation is a long-time tradition in our family, as my husband has coordinated parts of it since it began in the early 90s.

There are knots to tie!
The Friendship will be open for tours.

You can explore the beach,

listen to great music,

and visit with animals.

There’s  kite making

and flying!Last year Blackbeard visited!

There are historical re-enactors

and kayakers!

It’s always a wonderful day!

My focus is on the kid’s activities, but there’s  also lots of traditional crafts people who adults can visit with and learn from.

It’s a wonderful celebration of maritime tradition!

And, if you need a quiet moment, be sure to check out the Derby Garden (right behind the Derby House)…

Hope to see you there!!

Michele

Early Morning Helpers

Early Sunday morning I went out to find my little guy taking care of the chickens. He’s heading over to tend to the babies, poop scraper in hand!

Here he is hard at work, but if you look closely to the left you’ll notice an escape is underway.

Uh oh! We have church soon and they can’t be left to wander safely yet.

Winnie the Wonderdog wants to help!

This photo doesn’t exactly fit in to the story but my son enhanced it himself, and it’s a cute shot, so here it is!  I think he did a great job!

Getting back to what was happening… here’s little sister to the rescue!

She’ll help round them up again!

“Where should we go? How do we get back in there?”

“I’ll save you!”

She’s a great little chicken handler!

On to the big girls… it’s a tough life for these urban chicken kids!

Enjoy Everything!

A Big Pot of Potatoes!

I tried to plant potatoes in a raised bed a few years ago with  no success at all. My memory of the failure is that we thought that raccoons might have dug them up.  We found the seed potatoes scattered around the garden. Since it’s been a few years it seems like time to try again. I’m hoping that if we plant them in a container and keep them outside the back door, we’ll have greater success. So in the middle of all the rain yesterday my youngest kids and I did some potato planting!

 I sliced the potatoes in half early in the day. The owner of our local Agway recommended this when I bought them. Everything that I read said that drying the potatoes out for a few hours would help prevent rot.

Before we started we gathered up our materials:

  • the cut potatoes
  •  a bag of organic potting soil
  • A great pot that my Mother-in-Law painted for me (I love this, it’s so cute!)
  • A trowel
  • A kid, ready to dig!

We filled the bottom of the pot with broken up clay pots and rocks to help with drainage. Ideally, I would have put a layer of screening on top of this but I couldn’t find any and I knew that my husband was busy at a conference this afternoon. So, we skipped that step. I think it will be okay.

The kids added soil to the pot.. of course they loved this!

When the pot was half full it was time to add the potatoes. We placed them in with the sprouts facing up.

We added another two inches of soil and moved them outside, then we watered them in with rainwater that had fallen throughout the day.

And now we’ll watch them grow! We planted them halfway up the pot with the idea that as the potatoes form we’ll keep mounding the soil over them so that more can grow. I’m looking forward to seeing how this goes. We’ll keep you posted!

I can just hear them growing in there! I think the cats can too!