Monday, August 02, 2010

Herding Cats...

Otherwise known as chaperoning your preschooler's field trip to a local hiking trail for a nature walk.

Today, Ethan's class went here and it was awesome, when I wasn't saying, "be careful!" "stay with the group, honey, stay with the gro---are you hurt? okay, stay with the group. Do you need a bandaid? honey, stay with the g---FOR THE LOVE OF G-D, STAY WITH THE GROUP" to other peoples' children (and make no mistake about it, interwebs, someone was undoubtedly saying the same thing to my child).

I'm kind of relieved to find out that my kid isn't the only one who fancies himself a protege to Dora the Explorer; there were loads of kids speculating as to the whereabouts of the grumpy old troll as they crossed over a quaint little bridge between a couple of redwoods. Phew! Such a nice feeling to know that I'm not the only mother rotting her child's brain with all those Spanish words and problem-solving skills. Feels good!

I have to say, no matter how many times I find myself in the presence of redwood trees, I am always breath-taken. They are like the tree equivalent of the Grand Canyon as far as I'm concerned, in terms of just flat-out awe-inspiring majesty. As much as I am thrilled for Ethan to grow up here (which is hilarious coming from a woman who cried herself to sleep for months two years ago at the prospect of moving to California), I am also a little worried in the back of my mind that he will grow up feeling complacent and blase about being near such incredible beauty. I'm not sure how that's possible, though. I mean, seriously. Look at this:





They are just amazing.

I'd love to show you a million pictures of Ethan and his classmates frolicking amongst the redwoods on their nature walk, but whenever they go on field trips they don t-shirts bearing the name of their school. Obviously internet-safety rule #1 would be seriously violated if I were to post pictures of the kiddos wearing those. Can't have any of you psychos showing up at their school, now, can I? (I kid, you wonderful interwebs people; I lurve you. *kisses*)

But I can show you these:


my boy is some serious cute


Ethan wearing my friend's Ergo; the next generation of baby-wearers, ready to go.

Shady Shakespeare theater amongst the redwoods. Um. Had a big old nerdgasm.


okay, there was a little bit of awe at the redwoods; that's good!

Face Rock. This rock, according to the teacher, is one of many that rolled down the mountain during an earthquake, possibly 100s of years ago.


Where is that grumpy old troll?

Did I happen to mention an earthquake rolling rocks down the mountain 100s of years ago? Yeah, that's because the park is on the San Andreas fault. Super!

5 comments:

SeeJaneDrink said...

LOVE the grumpy old troll reference- Penny would have done the same

Hyacynth said...

Your Ethan is so cute! {I have one, too.}
Also, your title made me laugh out loud. For about a whole serious minute.

cicadalady said...

love the treetops photos. gorgeous.

Anonymous said...

I'm not a psycho or anything, but if you are worried about the name of their school being out there I'd take out or photoshop the two photos where you can see the front of the shirts. You can read the name of their school.

Becca said...

My one experience in Northern California was a taxi ride from the Monterrey to the San Jose airport, but I still was in awe of the landscape!