Counselor at Work

For the last 3 weeks, ending Friday, Abby has been serving as a counselor in both the Buford Engineering Academy and Dr. Shield's engineering camp for rising middle schoolers. Here she is hard at work on Zoom:

A/V Equipment

Benji's passon for all things technical has been on full display these last few weeks. The first week of summer, he took a middle school filmmaking class with Lighthouse Studio. When we picked up his professional quality camera (on loan for the week), he was beside himself with excitement. In the middle of the camp week, we were treated to his monologue as part of Stage Left's "Scenes from Quarantine" production. He most enjoyed getting to use a virtual background. And then, to top it all off, we bought an outside projector to have movie nights. He could not wait to set it up (and was exploring it in the house before we had time to take it all outside. Oh, the excitement):

Cherry Picking, masked version

We headed out to Spring Valley Orchard after being assured that they had "cherries for weeks." Turned out to be true and the trees were bursting with fruit. There were a good number of people there, but the orchard is huge and it was not hard to keep our distance. Not sure how we'll eat/use up all the cherries we got:

Our Baby Birds

We noticed these birds building a nest in our azalea bush. After consulting our "Birds of Virginia" book, we determined that they were catbirds. The male and female build the nest together (check), the mother lays 4-6 eggs (check), they hatch in 12-14 days (check), the male and female both feed the babies (check), and the babies fledge in 11-12 days (check). The birds left the nest a few days ago and we spotted a couple in the yard at various times. It's been fun seeing them all the way through.:

Masking Up

We've gotten a few sets of masks from craft friends and are ready for our rare trips out:

S'more Night

Benji had a little trouble not setting his marshmallows on fire:

New Patio Furniture

Since we'll be around home a lot more this summer, we decided to buy a set of patio furniture. Benji and Kevin excitedly put it together when it arrived:

Blueberry Picking

Our traditional end-of-school year activity, we headed out to our favorite - The Berry Patch in Free Union. Sadly, although we are usually there alone or with one other family, they have had a huge demand this year as one of the few safe activities for families to do.  There was plenty of space to stay socially distant, but it was hard to find pickable berries. We were just able to eke out the two cups we needed for Nana's blueberry cake:

SpaceX Launch

We almost forgot, but ere able to pull it up quickly on Kevin's computer to watch history in the making:

Tower Building Contest

Had this on our bucket list last month (before we knew that Holly would be hosting her fun event on Zoom). Abby was the clear winner, even when we tried it twice. Benji couldn't get his up off the table and did not even want a picture of it:

Minute to Win It Games

Last week, our friends Holly and Dylan invited the kids to play some minute to win it games with them over Zoom. Holly sent me a list of needed items in advice and then she MC'd the event (with Dylan playing on her own computer in a different room):

Bubble gum blowing (Benji struggled with this)

A shot of the Zoom screen

Penny stacking

Drawing snowmen. Holly said the only requirements were a hat, scarf and arms, so that was all Benji drew (no snow balls) and he won

marshmallow stacking

Trying to move a cookie from forehead to mouth with no hands.  We did not have Oreos, as suggested, but shortbread squares. I suggested they nibble them into circles, which was a *terrible* idea. They ended up with crumbs in their eyes (and eyebrows, eyelashes, etc.) and could not continue

Pennies on popsicle sticks

Transferring grains of rice from one bowl to the other using only the ring finer one one hand and the pinky of the other. As you can see from the picture, Benji used his two fingers to lift the bowl and dump it over in the other. Holly decided that was technically allowed, making this the only other game he won (so, his lawyering skills are up to par)

Jam-Making

This was a bucket list item. We made strawberry jam, and then scones to go with it:

Celebrating Shavuot

Shavuot, celebrating the giving of the Torah at Mt. Sinai, is one of the Jewish harvest holidays and is typically celebrated with the eating of dairy foods (and blintzes or ice cream in particular, but I have no idea why). We had cheese blintzes, baked fruit with whipped cream, and ice cream for dessert. Good thing none of us are lactose intolerant!: