Grass fire

I have added you to my blog post list if you are receiving this email for the first time in your inbox. If you would prefer not to receive my blog updates, please reply back..thank you!

It may sound too rigid but I have a routine that includes a nature walk every Wednesday. If I don't plan it, then it won't happen often around here. I find myself buried in laundry and dishes and discipline and pondering nature is something I need and want to make time to do with my children. Today I used our backyard. It seems too simple but for my age group here, keeping it simple and really, really looking with concentration is quite a big thing. I focus too with them instead of them just going out to play alone, I play and observe with them. With all of my duties, once a week is all I can manage at this time and I treasure it. We draw with watercolor pencils. Make leaf rubbings with crayon or leaf prints on paper with ink. Talk about the changes in the plants and trees and grass that is so lush and green in the summer as opposed to dead and crunchy now. We pick up and identify insects. We have field guides that we turn through and study. I really enjoy it and think that they do too. Even T1 uses the little binoculars and walks around looking up with them. So cute.

Today, I was drawing a leafless Crape Myrtle. The boys watch me observe and draw from what I see rather than what I think I see. They dapple in drawing too but today, G6 was fascinated with another pursuit, one that I taught him. Starting fire with his magnifying glass. For about 30 minutes after I had come in to prepare lunch and even after lunch was on the table, he continued to try to ignite leaves, pine needles, sticks and even some pine cone fire starters we made a couple of weeks ago. In total, he tried for at least an hour to get a fire started. I thought it was fine...we have had so much rain. Just yesterday we had rain and plenty of good soaking rain.

After lunch and after story reading/crafting time and, while his little brother and sister were napping, he told me he wanted to try again. I said sure...I was piddling in the kitchen contemplating making cookies with him for 'math' time and, what to do for dinner. He was out there maybe...FIVE minutes and then came running into the back door with an excitement and thrill of accomplishment in his eyes..those blue, blue eyes. (Don't you see the thrill in his eyes??) He said, " I started a fire mommy!" I gracefully and not too quickly put on my shoes...not suspecting the swell of fire that you now see as a burned patch in our dead yard. I panicked for a moment and tried to get his sweatshirt off to smack the flames then realized...in my mind,....'get the hose ding-a-ling!' We dashed for it (mostly me) and put out the flames.

My heart was pounding a bit. I was thankful his little sibs were not out there. I was thankful he is a cautious one and came to me immediately. If this had been W3, I just don't know how soon he would have come for my help. I witnessed an accidental multiple acre field burn sparked from a welder a few years ago...man, they spread fast! Lots of good questions ensued. Questions about what could have happened. Questions about what to do if it had been the oven. How to build a controlled fire in a fire pit with rocks surrounding, how the grass and ground we thought were wet enough..were NOT. How farmers deliberately set their fields on fire to enrich the soil and start fresh. Good, good lessons here to ponder for days to come. We called his father whom he hoped would not be mad. He wasn't. He added to the discussion with stories of Africa and setting fields aflame to awaken the soil and begin new growth. G6 even noticed how the burned grass was now like the charcoal we draw with on charcoal paper. Yes, yes, he is right. Charcoal is burned wood and it is used to make marks. I love to watch/listen to him making those connections.

Thank you Lord for your protection and,.....a natural and awesome home school lesson I would not have deliberately begun myself.

Scripture memory verse for now (the weekly verses always apply to our lives in anything we do..I am constantly amazed!):

Cast thy burden (my worry!!) upon the Lord, and He shall sustain thee. -Psalm 55:22a