Day 297, Year 10: Playground Demolition and Fairy Houses
Date: Monday, August 3, 2015
Weather: Temp in the 80’s, Partly Sunny and a Little Humid
Location: Brewer Fiddler’s Cove Marina, North Falmouth, MA
Today was planned to be low-key with no beach time to give Jonah a day to recover from his tummy bug. He rallied around dinner time last night and was fine today, but probably best that we weren’t out in the hot sun for long periods. I walked and the boys rode their bicycles to the bank on the corner to pick up information about the summer reading program they sponsor. For every book you read and then write something about it and draw a picture, you get $2.50 put into a savings account. You have to read at least four books, but they encourage reading ten books for a $25 savings account. The boys have been reading all summer, so we will start writing the book reports tomorrow. You have to be able to read the books yourself, so Ollie doesn’t qualify. But we won’t tell him that and we’ll put the $25 in a savings account for him. Jonah reads books to him, so Ollie can do his ‘reports’ on those books. It’s a great deal all around.
East Falmouth Elementary where Sam and Jonah go to school is just beyond the bank, so we headed there next to ride bikes around the track. Sam got a new, fancy bike last week and he sped ahead to the track. When Jonah, Ollie, and I reached the school we saw two men taking the triple slide off the playground. One of the men turned to us to say that it would be the last time we’d see that slide. The whole playground was being dismantled to make way for a new one. This is the kindergarten playground. The older kids got a new playground last year. A machine something like a backhoe with a special attachment for crunching up wood and steel started to work demolishing the playground equipment. Both boys were fascinated and there was no way I was going to get them to move on. I knew Sam would be concerned, but I figured he would backtrack and find us. He did and he enjoyed watching the playground demolition derby as well. The equipment no longer met safety codes, but I found it difficult to watch it being destroyed. I guess we’ll just all have to look forward to watching the new equipment being installed.
We got home just in time to eat a bit of lunch and get Sam to Woods Hole for his School of Science class. After delivering him, I took Jonah and Ollie back into Falmouth to Highfield Hall. This now public venue was once the beautiful summer home of the Beebee family from Boston. The mansion was built in 1878 and over the years went through a succession of owners. But by the 1990’s it was on the docket to be demolished. A group of citizens worked to save the old mansion and had it totally renovated. Today it stands as a lovely home surrounded by fantastic gardens. And this summer the grounds are home to 32 fairy houses. There are three in the mansion and 29 out and about on the grounds. We only had time to find 17 of the fairy houses and Sam didn’t get a chance to see them at all. So hopefully tomorrow morning we can return to finish the fairy house scavenger hunt. But this afternoon after picking Sam up, the boys were anxious to get home to build fairy houses of their own. They saw some fairy houses in Maine last summer and spent time building some of their own there. So they launched into the activity with a little experience and had a great afternoon.
Heather and Jed invited us to stay for dinner tonight. We had local Bluefish, salad, fried green tomatoes, and grilled fingerling potatoes. And then we walked to Smitty’s to get ice cream. A summer dinner doesn’t get any better than that.
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| 150803 Day 297 Cape Cod, USA–Playground Demolition and Fairy Houses |
