Bonsai and art at Botanic garden

Summers are filled with outdoor activities at the Discovery Garden. This was one of the last art Tuesdays and Jeremy came with us. Sonia and Jeremy are making book marks with autumn leaves and learning about shapes, tree names and colors.

Later we went to see bonsai trees and play in the puddle. Sonia loves stuffing it with rocks and makes all sort of splashes. Some of the trees on the background are more than one hundred years old.

Two turtles laying in the sun. There is a great song about it in Russian.... so we just hang out in the sun a little bit.

A day on Lawrence Farm

Two hours by car and we were in upstate New York, a heavenly farm... they've got everything one can wish for. Sonia stopped for lunch and made friends with a local pumpkin guy.

First we headed to pick the remnants of concord grapes.

Then we got some sweet peppers off the vine. Nearby I saw hot peppers, they reminded me of habaneros I have seen in my cook books. So asked Jeremy if they were habanero. "No way," he said. "These peppers can't be that hot. It is New York." So I picked one up and asked him to try it. Jeremy bit furiously into one. "Yeah, it is hot." Two seconds later he continued: "I ate some seeds and it is really hot." All the while he was making terrible faces. Then he stopped talking and kept gasping for air. I didn't know what to do... it looked like he was going to die for a while but he kept very quiet. Then he asked for Sonia's milk. Later we found out that those peppers were habaneros or the hottest peppers on the planet. Jeremy said "it burned my mouth, my throat and then my stomach but it is good for you, right"? I could only hope so.

On the steep hill farm goats and sheep roamed quite freely. They could climb up a tree house. I put some hard corn kernels in the can and tried lifted it up to the house. This goat really wanted it.

We fed some white swans at a lake and played with an old mastiff.

Apple picking was fun too. We got a big bag of Granny Smith, Wine Sap, Empire, and Golden Delicious.

We wandered onto a pumpkin patch and when Sonia saw it, she started jumping up and down and making "boo.." noises.

She ran around the field picking up pumpkins and throwing them down.

There was a cute little village with a church, school, stables, village cottage, ice-cream parlor, post office and fire department. Everything was made perfectly for children. Sonia loved the school with little tables for kids, chalk board and a desk for a teacher.

She climbed in a truck, rang a bell and went of a slide at the fire station.

Sonia loved the village and didn't want to leave. When she saw big pumpkins, she also tried picking them up.

Sonia found a hot pepper while I was feeding horses. She bit into it and then tried wiping her mouth off with the wipe. She was as courageous as her papa and didn't cry. We finished our day with apple cider made on the farm and more than a dozen delicious donuts (mini donuts says Jeremy).

We ended up with lots of grapes, sweet and hot peppers, three pumpkins, winter squashes, apples and fun memories.

Geese and ducks

We stopped at Key Foods and picked up a loaf of Wonder bread. It is a nice stroll down to a lake at the Prospect Park. To get there with Sonia in the stroller can be tricky. It takes about fifteen minutes.

It paid off!

Sonia loved feeding the ducks and geese. Jeremy was wooing them back into the water. Big geese were obnoxious, they snuck behind you and tried to get bread right out of your hands.

When Jeremy left us to get more bread out of a stroller, geese lost their fear and started to creep unto us. They made sh sh noise and I got afraid of them. Jeremy would make lots of noise and wave his arms to get them to behave.

Soon Sonia joined the fun. She was making the funniest noises trying to chase the geese back into a pond.

Later the same day Sonia walked to the Brooklyn library from out home, about a mile there and back. She really wanted to get books and didn't believe that it was too late. Big iron gates closed for the day.

Last week we got to the aquarium when the petting pools were open. Sonia didn't want to touch a star fish but she poked this scary horse shoe crab with her finger.

Brave little girl! Okay, she didn't know how these creatures looked on inside ;-)

Sheep and carousel

At the Prospect Park zoo we fed the sheep and Sonia bravely handled everything.

The sheep were gentle and Sonia would pretty much put her whole hand inside their mouths.

I almost kissed this alpaca. They are cute and Sonia calls them "Moo."

Sonia wanted to try this carousel for a while now. I told her we would go with papa. The day has come and Sonia picked her horse. Well this was no ordinary ride. It was built in 1912 for Coney Island's first in the nation amusement park. It is antique and has a pipe organ with real drums and cymbals without any electrical stuff. However, this carousel is not for the whiny. It was built in the era of excitement, no regulations and it goes super fast. Sonia got a bit scared and I had to take her off the horse at some point. Our camera couldn't handle full speed.

Sonia had a Brazilian day. She loved wrapping herself in the flag and marching with it in circles.

Underhill Park

Sonia just started walking a couple months ago but this doesn't slow her down. She is already trying out scooters. She saw two boys riding them and wanted to try one. Jeremy said she is smart because after seeing how it is done only a few times, she figured it out.

Mama was helping Sonia at first and then she took off. She even took her first fall and didn't whine about it, got up and kept riding the scooter.

Smart little cookie... we need to get her a scooter soon.

Manhattan Children's Museum

The cost is $30 and Jeremy has vetoed our trip many times. I once declared that we must visit Children's Museum in Manhattan before leaving NY City. Today Jeremy decided to look up a free night. It turned out it was a free Target night so we went.

If you've never been to a children's museum like this one (I haven't) and you wonder what it's like... the theme was ancient Greece for the older kids and New York with its Upper, Lower and many other parts of the city for the little ones.

Sonia was playing, running and exploring nonstop. She went from one thing straight to another. First area of her exploration was fun glowing pegs. She sorted them out by color.

A work table with plates, pots and pans. Sonia spent a good amount of time measuring out sand from a small cup to a pot.

Her hand is strong and she is very precise in her action. No spills! She filled up her pot many times before going to a next thing.

Ball throwing.

Climbing a talking dragon. Jeremy wanted to help Sonia up where older children took their photos. I made a new rule. Let Sonia achieve goals on her own. Even if it takes time, is a bit frustrating and is a trivial act of climbing a silly dragon.

Sonia couldn't get on top. After many tries, she was getting rather impatient about it. She didn't stop trying and made it this far. Dragon's tail was a victory!

Sonia's most favorite part became the Manhattan Upper West side with the kitchen her size and fun scale. First she gathered all the food items and put them on shelves.

Then she seated her mama and papa at a little table, gave mama and herself yellow plates and made a dinner.

Sonia used a chalk board for the first time. She liked erasing better than drawing. Probably because she has never done it before. She rode a Dr. Seuss train, not knowing what it was since I haven't read it to her.

She had a blast with this interactive jazz choir. The birds and giraffe each sing its own melody when a child pushes on them. The birds sing rather low and a giraffe sings surprisingly very high.

zoo trips continue

A polar bear jumped in the water, dove in to get his toy... and hooray, this time I had a camera and a fresh battery. It is great to be a zoo member. We stop by at the Manhattan zoo for a couple hours and see if the bears are having a good day.

The bear enjoyed himself in the water and then decided to take a rest by the window. We were thrilled to get a nice family photo.

Sonia sized up his paws. They were huge.

A polar bear kept looking at the crowd (it got pretty big) and enjoying himself so we took another family shot.

The ducks decided it was a diving day as well.

Sonia loved watching them go under the water.

Ducks would dive in, stay under the water for a while and then come out. Two of them would also do it in sync.
Three of us by a beautiful tree.