Field Trip

The kids went on their first field trip this week. (I tagged along.) We went to a farm in Queens, the only farm in the city from what I was told. I would describe it as less of a farm and more of an assembly line forcing hundreds of kids through various stations of viewing/riding/feeding animals. Sometimes I felt like we were being treated like animals more than the actual farm animals. They were constantly being fed and petted and groomed, while we were shoved around and corralled like sheep.
It was chaotic and torturous for the adults, but fun for the kids.

The kids were very excited about their first school bus ride. Arthur and his partner started out happy (pictured here) but were flicking and punching each other the whole way home...I finally separated them. I'm not sure what would have happened if I wasn't there because the kids are all too short to see what's going on in the seats. The majority of the kids fell asleep on the way home. Not mine.

Adaline and Arthur were the only kids in the class who would hold a chicken. Their teacher saw them and said, "So the Galts are brave." Their classmates were very impressed. City kids.

Apple Pickin'

Adaline has added a new impersonation to her repertoire: a Southern accent. She enjoys imitating her new Southern friend at school (who just moved here this fall). This would not be odd if Adaline's own mother was not from Mississippi and recognized immediately as being Southern by every person she meets in the city. It is surreal to hear your daughter speak like everyone you grew up with, but she is merely trying it on for fun.

I never really thought about whether or not my children would have a southern accent--being raised in Brooklyn by one parent of southern speak and one of a...? neutral? variety. They hear every accent imaginable in their little worlds. Their current teacher is Puerto Rican from Spanish Harlem. Adaline's teacher last year was from Trinidad and Arthur's had a stereotypical Brooklyn accent. Who knew what kind of accent they would have? I do know for sure now, though, that it is not Southern...at least not, Southern Southern. (I qualify in case some Northeasterners disagree.)

Arthur has a vibrant imagination himself. He doesn't stop at just imitating accents. He loves to "speak" other languages for fun. Usually this is just silly talk, but he has had his convincing moments. Last school year he tricked us into thinking that he could count to ten in Arabic and Chinese. This wasn't a huge stretch because one of his teachers and classmates spoke Arabic. (The Chinese was random.) He made each "number" distinct with different syllables that sounded authentic to the language in question. It wasn't until we asked him to repeat the numbers that we figured out his creativity.

He hears a lot of Spanish in class now, so he walks around the neighborhood speaking to his sister in "Spanish." Of course in this city, people hear foreign languages constantly. I'm just not sure how "foreign" they think we are--some unidentified nation with a Southern/British-accent English-speaking girl and a Spanish/Arabic/Chinese-speaking boy. Honestly, it doesn't turn any heads in our neighborhood--I'm not sure anyone has even noticed :)

Planting a Tree

We benefited from one of Mayor Bloomberg's million trees donated across NYC. The kids and Jamison planted it in our backyard (with our landlord's blessings). Hopefully we live here for a long time and get to watch it grow.
Also, here are a few pictures from a street fair that occurred every Sunday in September a block from our place. This is where the free trees came from. I wish I had captured the random trees floating down the middle of the street on skateboards, carts, any wheeled device...it would have made a beautiful image.

Hula hoops for everyone!
There were several live bands playing at various stages. Arthur was serious about checking out the different bands. He got his groove on on more than one occasion :) Video forthcoming?
The kids also got to participate in painting a mural. A building collapsed a block from us and they decided to beautify the barricade that covers the empty lot.
The street fair also had a roller skating "rink" that the kids used for scooting/biking. There was chalk drawing, block building, food and clothing vendors...lots of fun in the street!