Okay, So it Was REALLY, REALLY Cold!

Whoa. Can you say 12-degrees? Remember those days when the snot would freeze inside your nostrils when you breathed in through your nose? There's a nice physical image for you. That's what it was like out there this afternoon, for our first anniversary shindig at Ridge Road Park. In light of this, the first thing that absolutely must be said without further ado is THANK YOU! to all of you brave souls and your wonderful children who rallied today to come out and celebrate with us. For the sake of posterity, the first anniversary celebration just had to fall on our official first anniversary, however, for the sake of our communal health and sanity, all further anniversary celebrations will be held on the 6-month mark of Kids Unplugged's anniversary, subsequently allowing us to have future parties in lovely June.

My very devoted husband headed outside this morning at 8 o'clock (the temperature was a balmy 8-degrees at that point) to start gathering and chopping firewood, loading his car with charcoal and digging out our camp stove. At 10 a.m. he and a friend, a fellow Kids Unplugged enthusiast with his own wheelbarrow-ful of wood and camping gear to tote, headed to the park to light grills and make the fires before the festivities were to begin at 11 a.m.

As my mother-in-law likes to say, "no good deed goes unpunished" and my absence at 10:30 soon alerted them to the fact that they had started a gorgeous, roaring fire at the wrong picnic pavilion. Thankfully, for everyone's sake, it was their discovery and not mine and they quickly broke down camp and relocated to the correct pavilion to start firing things up a second time. They soon had several fires going around the octagonal fireplace in the center of the enormous pavilion where we'd set up a circle of picnic tables laden with bagels, s'more-making goodies, Coffee Labs coffee, and camp-style hot chocolate.

Parents soon began arriving with their bundled broods. Shortly after 11:00, when the cries of "my hands are cold" became a bit too much to bear, it was time to for a hike to get warmed-up and find some marshmallow-roasting sticks. The trail here is unblazed, however it is lined on either side by a low fence/wall of woven sticks that I believe was a scout project of past. It's a very pretty and natural addition to the trail and obviously a great deal of work went into its making. The kids speculated on the number of hours it took as we walked--8? 1,000? We made it a good way down the trail and our bodies did start to thaw a tiny bit from the walk before we decided to head back to the pavilion for the cocoa that would hopefully be hot upon our return. A few more ambitious members of the group decided to forge ahead to see if the trail was a loop. A good time later they approached the pavilion having hiked to another picnic area located on the opposite side of the park. Needless to say, they were ready for something hot when they got back!

The rest of the time was spent huddling around the fires, eating s'mores and hot dogs and, eventually, semi-frozen Kids Unlugged birthday cake. My husband started a hip-hooray for the success of Kids Unplugged's first year and concluded by saying, "So thanks to Gina for dragging us all out here today when we could be snuggling up in front of the warmth of our flat screen TVs." Hardy, har, har.

When we got home, our girls spent the entire afternoon in the living room, fire blazing in the fireplace, buried among the quilts and blankets they used to make tents on the sofa and chairs while I popped them big bowls of popcorn and didn't give them a hard time about getting it all over the rug. I think they earned it.

Next time--June. I promise.

Fishing for Ice in Swan Lake

January has definitely been the month of ice! If you look back through our recent adventures you'll see ice-play in all of its various incarnations. Kids have spent a good deal of time sliding on, chopping at, spinning on, tossing, cracking, skating on, poking at, fishing for, stomping on, and smashing--the ice. Frozen puddles, bits of icy brook, thickly covered ponds and lakes--each variation has had its own appeal. But I think that the most fun to be had has come from simply thwacking away at it with a stick. There's something very satisfying about finding a good, strong stick, one that doesn't break with it's initial sharp contact with an unyielding, frozen surface, just going to town trying to get through to whatever water might lie below.

I can remember doing this as a kid, poking through the thin sheath of ice on a puddle to the street below at the bus stop or breaking through the icy edge of the frozen swamp in the backyard woods and using the stick like a crowbar to hoist broken sheets from the murky water and then hacking away at the retrieved pieces with rocks and sticks to break them further. The ice was fascinating. Clearly it still is.

Our hike today at Swan Lake lent itself perfectly to this favorite winter past time. As we've been hanging on to the light a bit longer these days, I figured we'd have no problem getting all the way around the lake before the sun began to set. What I didn't plan on, though I don't know why, was the magnetic pull of the ice. So while we made good tracks on the beginning of the trail as we headed clockwise around the lake toward the stepping stone bridge, we didn't get too much farther than that. The lake's frozen edge beckoned. The bridge begged to be crossed and then crossed again, and again. Fallen branches were collected and the thwacking commenced. A great team effort ensued to pull a large sheet of ice to the shore, which was nearly successful--parents were treated to a chorus of groans and shrieks when it slipped out of hands to crash onto the ground below.

A couple of our families had forged ahead and we spotted them across the lake when we decided to take a cue from the waning afternoon light and begin our hike back. Racing them back to the trail kiosk was the only way to pull the kids away from their icy endeavors.

With several more weeks of winter ahead, I imagine the ice-adventures are going to continue!

Kids Unplugged First Anniversary Celebration & Fundraiser

Kids Unplugged is Turning One!

Join us as we celebrate our first year's success!

Saturday, January 30th
11:00 a.m.

Ridge Road Park, Hartsdale
Octagonal Picnic Pavilion
(with a big, cozy, fireplace!)
(click here for details & directions)

*Hiking & Exploration Kids Unplugged Style*
*Make Your Own S'mores*
*Yummy Hot Cocoa*
&
*Birthday Cake*

Suggested Donation
$10/family for members
$15/family for non-members

B.Y.O. picnic lunch & hot dogs for the grills and water. All of the above treats will be provided by us.

Looking forward to seeing everyone then!

Please dress for the cold weather--boots, snowpants, warm mittens and hats are best!

A Hike for Haiti at Rockwood Hall

As we all know, Haiti was struck by a severe, 7.0 magnitude earthquake which struck approximately 25-miles outside of the capital city of Port-au-Prince on January 12, 2010. The subsequent devastation the people of Haiti are suffering is emotionally overwhelming for all of us watching on the news and wanting to do whatever we can to help. In this spirit, Kids Unplugged sponsored a Hike for Haiti this morning at Rockwood Hall in Rockefeller State Park. We raised close to $200 which will be donated to UNICEF for their recovery efforts in Haiti. Below are some photographs of the morning's hike. Many, many thanks to all of you who participated today!

East Irvington Bushwhacking

We returned today for Wacky Wednesday to one of our favorite local spots--the East Irvington Nature Preserve. Jane & Walt Daniels, in their incredible book Walkable Westchester, list the preserve under their section of "tiny treasures," and that is indeed what it is.

The preserve is split into two areas for walking, a wide dirt road that leads straight uphill from the initial access trail to a water tower and the Wecquaesgeek Trail that abuts the road in a semi-circle. Hiking along the dirt road you can enter the Wecquaesgeek Trail early on and exit it back at the road near the water tower. You can also hike up to the water tower and take the Wecquaesgeek back down, which is what we did.

The kids spent a lot of time today bushwhacking off trail. It seems to me that more and more of that is starting to happen, especially among the kids who have been joining us for a while. Our earlier hikes were spent covering more ground with the actual hiking, but now it seems there is a lot more off-trail exploration happening. Today, a couple of fallen trees were one of the big draws, and the kids spent a bit of time climbing and balancing on the trunks and branches. What fun to climb a tree that is horizontal! You get to explore limbs and areas of the tree that would be completely inaccessible if it were in its traditional upright posture. Other draws were, of course, the huge boulders bordering the trail in the woods, stick collecting, dirt drawing, mud digging and general rumpus.

The kids love the destination of the water tower and the mystery that surrounds it like the chain-link fence that is actually there. I love to listen to their speculations. Can people get in? Do they climb it? Is that what that ladder is for? What if they fell in when they got to the top? Is there a door? How do they get the water out? Is there water inside? How do they get over the fence? The questions go round and round.

I use the lure of the Wecquaesgeek Trail to lure them away from the water tower. Several kids run along ahead while being reminded that they need to be in the sight-line of their grown ups, and hit the trail pointing at the faded brown blaze-markers they see affixed to trees. They feel confident following the blazed trails. There is a mountain to climb, a large, icy puddle to explore, stumps to sit upon, sticks to break and whack and wield.

We're losing light and we need to move the group up on the "mountain" back down to the trail and along toward our cars and homework and dinner. As the kids load in, shedding boots, clicking seat belts, one mom calls out to me quoting her son, "That was the funnest Kids Unplugged yet!" Cool.

Shelter Building at Teatown

Teatown Lake Reservation in Ossining is an 834-acre preserve featuring 15-miles of trails running through a variety of habitats from forests to wetlands, a nature center which is home to numerous live animal exhibits (both indoor and outdoor), and an educational facility which offers myriad fantastic programs for children and adults alike. Teatown's educators work with school groups, summer campers, weekend naturalists, scout troops and environmental stewards to further their mission to, in a nutshell, conserve open space and sustain the diversity of wildlife, plants and habitats for future generations. It is an incredible place to learn and explore and have fun on the trails and we spent this past Saturday morning doing just that.

The initial plan was to hike around Teatown Lake on the Lakeside Trail, a 1.5 mile loop around Teatown Lake. It's an easy trail for families, with a level grade and pretty scenery, and at only 1.5 miles it was definitely attainable for a morning hike. The trail-side diversions, however, were plentiful, and it soon became apparent that it was more important to go with the adventures provided by those diversions than to stick with the plan for making it around the lake!
The first stop was the boathouse which offered the kids nice access to the ice-covered lake from its cement foundation. There is also a series of railroad-tie stairs leading off the trail into the woods where there are fallen trees and boulders for climbing and exploring. The biggest sticks were collected and brought lake-side to chop at the ice and to use to try to fish out the chunks of ice they managed to break off. Limbs that jutted out into the lake provided even better access a bit further out along the ice. Parents chatted in the warm January sun, the mild 40-degree day a welcome reprieve after several weeks in the low 20s, drinking coffee and watching as the kids did their thing. After a while we encouraged them to head along the trail, their groans of protest over having to leave the boathouse quieted by the promise of the upcoming waterfall and brook.

It was this location where their play really began to flourish and I realized that we probably wouldn't make it any further around the lake. Upon reaching the waterfall the older kids made a beeline down the Northwest Trail which runs parallel to Bailey Brook in a beautiful wooded area. A natural bridge of logs and rocks traversed the brook between the trail and a glorious tree with a cave-like hollow in its trunk. The kids were quickly drawn into this magical setting and went to work gathering sticks from the forest floor and building a "house" by the cave in the tree. They worked together collecting the sticks and passing them to one another across the bridge. The helped each other to cross the brook, the older kids showing the younger ones where to step while parents helped the smallest ones to find their way. Instructions were being called out about which kinds of sticks were needed and where they were to go as the shelter began to take form. Some of the children spent lot of time simply going back and forth across the brook, both with and without the assistance of the grown ups, while others were diligently working on the shelter. Several kids brought their lunches across to eat with pride upon the table-of-sticks they constructed inside their house.

For the most part, the parents sat along the bank of the brook near the trail watching as the kids' adventure unfolded. We talked about the fact that many of us spent our childhoods playing like the kids were today. In those days, however, we were out in our own woods, without parental supervision, building forts, mucking about in streams, finding our own brand of unplugged fun. The kids engaged in this morning's play intrinsically, the natural environment offering the canvas on which their play took shape while they imagined and created and lost themselves in their world of fantasy.

For a while longer we ate our clementines and tossed rocks into the waterfall and watched the ducks swim along the brook as the kids played on this sunny afternoon. And then we headed back down the trail to continue with our Saturdays, wondering what adventures we'd find next time. Until then...

Winter Wednesday Along the Pocantico River

Today's Wacky Wednesday Walk was spent along the Pocantico River Trail in the Rockefeller Preserve--only the very beginning of the Pocantico River Trail, however, because the kids were so busy playing and imagining that we just didn't make it down the trail at all! At one point I said to some of the other grown-ups present that we were going to have to have a Kids Unplugged adults-only hike sometime so that we could actually make some tracks! I was partly being facetious, firstly because the kids have really become fantastic hikers and secondly because what happened today is what I always envision happening--parents hanging back as the kids' play just evolves on its own and we may as well not even be there at all (except perhaps to keep someone from splooging into the icy water!). Our youngest member was our farthest hiker today and at 2 1/2 years old he lead his Mom around the trail the entire time in search of the helicopter that flew overhead when we first arrived!

It was cold this afternoon again, 29-degrees when I pulled up to the trail, and everyone arrived suitably bundled. The kids headed straight to the little creek near the trail head, though the bank there is pretty steep and the snow made it a bit dicey. We redirected their attention to the little beach-like spot of shore along the Pocantico (which is a small, but swiftly moving river along the trail) where they could play freely.

Along this section of the trail there is a small meadow between the little shore-area, a huge, old tree with an enormous cave-like opening in its trunk, and a big stone bridge which crosses the river. The kids' play centered upon this area and they moved around in little packs. Some playing tag with an enthusiastic Mama for a while, some holing up inside or barring the entry to the cave in the tree, others working diligently to build a "dam" in the river along the shore.

After a long while, the dam-builders won out and the rest of the crew was drawn into their activity. Kids were moving around ant-like, gathering and breaking sticks and old reeds to add to the growing structure on the river's edge.

Amidst moans and groans of "but we're not finished yet," and "I don't want to go!" the grown-ups announced that our non-hiking toes were frozen in our boots and it was time to start heading for home. The kids carefully laid down their final additions to the structure and, grabbing a saltine from a generous Mama, bounded back up the trail.

Same time next week!

The Tarrytown Lakes are Open!

Just a quick announcement to let folks know that the Tarrytown Lakes opened this afternoon at 4pm for skating. The skating schedule is as follows:

Monday - Thursday 1 p.m. - 8 p.m.
Friday 1 p.m. - 9 p.m.
Saturday & Sunday 10 a.m. - 9 p.m.

Can't wait to get out there!

An Icy Halsey Pond

After our month(or so)-long holiday hiatus, Kids Unplugged was back on the trails today with a Wacky Wednesday Walk at one of our favorite venues, Halsey Pond in Irvington. With a high of about 31-degrees today, I was pleased to see a nice bunch of families at the trail head, bundled up and rearing to go.

The big draw today was the ice that was everywhere. Covering the pond and spilling over the path in spots like miniature rinks, the kids were in their glory digging, poking, and whacking away at it with sticks. Watching them it seemed to me such an instinctual behavior, taking up a stick and trying to poke one's way through an icy surface. I can remember doing that as a kid, wanting to see if I could get through, trying to guess the depth of whatever surface I was digging at. The girls and boys each seemed to have their own approaches to the ice, and though it irks me to play into typical gender-related play stereotypes, their approaches were decidedly different. While the girls spent the bulk of their time lying on their stomachs, leaning out a bit over the pond from the shore a looking for vulnerable spots to poke their sticks through, the boys favored a more commando-like style, lifting large sticks over their heads and bringing them down forcefully in attempts to break through. All of them, however, enjoyed sitting along the shoreline and thwacking away at the ice with their boot heels!

They were also all equally enthralled with spinning and sliding on the large ice-puddles we found along the path and most of them, boys and girls alike, toted large sticks for the duration of the hike. There were continual forays off the path toward the edge of the pond for more digging and poking and there were continual reminders from the grown-ups on hand not to lean to far over the ice and to keep their bottoms on the shore.

In this vein there was also a lot of talk about ice-safety, why you should never, ever try to walk on a frozen pond or lake unless you are with an adult who is very familiar with reading the ice. We talked about warm spots in a body of water that may not freeze and why it is difficult to judge whether or not a surface is safe to walk upon. We talked about being careful near the shoreline when there is snow on the ground because you may not realize that you are standing on the pond rather than on the ground when everything is covered with snow.

But mostly we just walked and the kids whacked at the ice and skittered broken pieces of ice and small sticks across the pond's surface. We listened to the quiet of the afternoon and listened to that echo-y blub-blub sound of the water bubbling up below the ice. And then we hiked down the trail with the setting sun.