Grandchildren – Page 4 – Valerie's Voice

Libraries

I like libraries. I like the looks of them. I like the smell of them. I like their offerings…books (and more). Our library in Northfield is wonderful. I walked out of the library the other day with an overwhelming sense of gratitude for our city library.

The updated entrance to the library (2016).

I go to the library often…to borrow books, and CD’s, and even DVD’s for myself. My husband does too. I am in the habit of making my request online, then having the librarians find the item -at our library or another connected to the library system – and put it on hold for me until I go pick it up.

When the grandkids lived with us, we went to the library weekly for story time. Now I get to be the storyteller over Zoom. So now, I go to the library weekly to pick out children’s books for my story time. The children’s librarians are always willing to help me and I usually leave with about 10-12 books. I come home, read them to make sure I like them, and then let the kids choose which ones we’ll read. It’s great fun.

Inside the original part of the Northfield library.

The other day I checked out an audio book and knew I wouldn’t be able to return the CD’s on the due date, so the librarian extended the due date for me.

A corner view of the original library building.

The library in Northfield is a Carnegie library. A Carnegie library is a library built with money donated by a Scottish-American businessman and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. A total of 2,509 Carnegie libraries were built between 1882 and 1929.* So Carnegie libraries are older, and usually beautiful, brick buildings.

This is the original door to the Northfield Carnegie Library (no longer in use).

The Northfield Carnegie library was built in 1910. A large addition was added in 1985. Another renovation was completed in 2016. The 2016 renovation included many large windows that let in lots of natural light and it is lovely. There are some nice sitting areas where I sometimes go to write or read.

The newest addition to the library…bringing much natural light into the lovely space.

I remember during renovation the library moved to the city hall, yet they still were able to provide a limited, but wonderful, service to the community.

I like books. I like to read. I like the variety from the library without having to purchase. And, the library is available to anyone. I am grateful for our library system…a gateway to the world of reading.

*Wikipedia

A Poem: Mama Bear

This is a fun poem I wrote for an assignment to write a personal poem with metaphorical meaning, and an animal as the central figure. Poetry stretches me. It is not my favorite writing style, but it is good to be challenged.

 
Mama Bear

Mama Bear is a nickname for my grandmother status.
It is fitting since I have always been the protective sort.
Don’t get between me and my offspring, and their offspring - my grandchildren,
For then I will get aggressive and grumpy.
I may look cute and cuddly but I can take a stand
And when I stand, I am very tall and noisy.
I do like honey and berries,
And I love rambling through the forest and mountains and by rivers. 
I have learned to take life more slowly
But watch out, I still have what it takes to roar!

Story Time

For me, one positive impact from the pandemic was learning about the communication app Zoom. I’m grateful for the Zoom business to allow me free access to family members across the country, and close to home, during the restrictions of meeting in person.

Grandma enjoys reading the library books.

One result has been a weekly story time over Zoom with my grandchildren who live in Colorado. At each session we; visit, read books, and then sometimes, they read to me. Lately, our oldest granddaughter is attending in-person kindergarten, so it’s just me and Ezra…and Grandpa joins in occasionally.

A favorite memory from when my boys were little was reading to them. And now, I love reading to my grandchildren. I have always enjoyed children’s books, and have several on our bookshelves around the house. One sweet gift a daughter-in-love gave to me, early on in our relationship, was a children’s book. I treasure that thoughtful gift.

During our weekly story time I lay out books and let the kids choose which ones they want me to read. Zoom has yet to cut us off at the free forty minutes deadline…we typically go for an hour so we get to read several books. I love the children’s books I own, but it is always good to find new ones at the library to add to the mix.

I go to the Northfield Library to look for new catchy titles and book covers. At my last visit to the library the children’s librarian, who presents the library’s children’s story time each week (pre-Covid), was there. I asked her for suggestions and she was very helpful. She actually remembered Zoey & Ezra from our weekly visits to her story time when they lived with us. Even now, when the kids come to visit they still want to go to story time at the library. YAY

The interaction I had with the children’s librarian that day was extra special. She told me of a book she really liked about “an overnight at grandmas”. The library copy was checked out so she went and retrieved a copy from her story time materials. When I went to the automatic checkout I noticed the book didn’t have a bar code, so I went and asked her about it and she told me this was her own personal copy and “just return it when you’re done.”

How special is that?

Time to Say Goodbye

The time came to say goodbye to our son and daughter-in-love and two beautiful grandchildren.

They were here and enjoyed decorating the Christmas tree.

They were here and enjoyed rolling out and cutting out and decorating gingerbread cookies.

They were here and enjoyed decorating graham cracker houses.

They were here and enjoyed playing in the snow and building a snow fort.

Peeking through the windows in the fort.

They were here bringing much joy.

Now the cookies have all been eaten.

The tree trimmings have all been put away.

We have been “charged” to take care of the snow fort as they head back to their home.

But the wonderful decorated houses will remain on our dining room table to remind us of the fabulous time we had together.

It was hard to say goodbye.

So grateful for our time together.

Our Snow Angels

Snow Angels
All bundled up
Almost unrecognizable
Skipping down the snowy sidewalk
Stopping to take it all in
Noticing squirrels
And planes, and dogs
Squealing with delight
Then falling into the snow
Beautiful snow angels
Disguised as Grandchildren

01/2019 vb

Snow angels sliding down a snow mound without sleds.

A Christmas Festival

Christmas Festival took on a whole new meaning this year… when I hear those two words together “Christmas Festival” my mind immediately thinks of the 100+ year old annual Christmas concert at St. Olaf College. But this year the Bollinger Family held its own Christmas Festival…created because of the pandemic as a safe way for celebrating Christmas together with multiple families and young energetic children.

My daughter-in-love came up with this great idea and it was fun planning it with her. She worked hard to make it happen. We helped where we could ahead of time.

The day of the festival we gathered together early one December afternoon, which ended up being a very mild day…almost 40 degrees and no wind…a beautiful blessing. The weather was tolerable for staying outdoors for five hours! We had propane heaters in one area to warm up if necessary… the adults used it a few times but not the kids – they were active enough to stay warm the entire time!

The yard was decorated with garland, lights and lanterns, and a Christmas tree which came to life at dusk…on one of the shortest days of the year.

The table was covered with a red tablecloth and decorated with lights, mini-trees and ornaments for the crock-pots of chili.

There was games and activities and a very special Nativity Story Walk all planned out for the children, which they hardily enjoyed.

Painting a Happy Birthday banner for Jesus.

Find the stars – a Story Walk to the manger scene.

Towards dusk we started fires in two fire pits. We enjoyed eating our chili dinner from compostable bowls around the bon fires.

We brought along our roasting sticks to roast marshmallows and make s’mores for dessert…all with Christmas music sounding through speakers in the back ground.

The grandchildren (and grand-dog Charlie) had a good time celebrating together while social distancing and masking up. I trust the grandchildren will remember this Christmas Festival for years to come. I know I will. The adults had a great time too!

Merry Christmas!

Frosty the Snowman

We took a drive down to Faribault MN to see Faribault Frosty. Even though we do not have any snow on the ground Faribault’s Frosty still came to be – and is a wonder for us all to see.

Frosty is an oversized Snowman and one that has been created every year for 17 years by a wonderful family giving this gift to their community in Faribault. Employees from Shattuck- St. Mary School’s ice rink shaved ice with their Zamboni for this family’s tradition to carry on in spite of the fact there are no students at the school practicing their hockey skills or ice skating.

We took our grandchildren to see Frosty standing tall. As we drove up the master creator was on a ladder tying Frosty’s red scarf around his neck. He told us we came just in time – that the kids could help him patch up Frosty by adding snow to some holes in Frosty’s body. The kids had a great time doing so.

This is a great tradition this Faribault family has built. Frosty’s creator, was so kind to our grandhildren and he made their day.

And mine too…every little act of kindness these days really means a lot.

Leaves, leaves and more leaves…

We have enjoyed unusual November temperatures – in the 70’s – these past few days and they have been stunning. It has been great for working in the yard – raking up the leaves that were covered under eight inches of snow that fell in mid-October.

We live on a corner lot, downwind it seems. Along with our own leaves, a lot of our neighbor’s leaves are blown into our yard, and stop there. Most of the snow has melted so it was time to rake them up. It’s a big job.

We used these black buckets as scoops to load the pick-up truck.

We took six loads to the compost site in Northfield. Four times we filled the pickup bed to the max.

We also filled 30 big black bags and two garbage cans full of leaves. That took another two trips to the landfill.

I decided to shovel two small, leftover snow piles to get to the leaves underneath! A comic twist.

Last fall (2019) our grandchildren were visiting and enjoyed jumping in piles of leaves.

But I’m grateful…for the beautiful weather to be working outside, for our health to be able do the work, for trees to enjoy, and a good night’s sleep!

Story Walk

We entered Forestville State Park into the GPS system in our car and ended up on a dirt road in the middle of two tall cornfields with the system declaring we had “reached our destination!”

Following the red truck down the gravel road.

We pulled over and as we got out our map, a red pick up truck pulled up along side us and stopped. We rolled down our window and he asked, “Are you looking for the state park? “ We said, “Yes.” He said, “Follow me.” So we did. He stopped a couple miles up the road at his farm and gave us directions from there to the park. He laughed and told us he meets the nicest folks at the end of his driveway… every weekend. They find themselves where we did, in the cornfields looking for the state park.

The beautiful golden cornfields under an interesting sky.

Along our route that morning we saw colors of autumn. Yellow, red and orange leaves on the trees and stunning golden corn stalks in the fields so we didn’t mind this beautiful detour… and we did find the state park.

Once there we met up with friends. They greeted us with a campfire. We planned to do some hiking.

The park has set up a wonderful Story Walk along one park trail. I had seen this Story Walk idea in Faribault. I had checked out a few storyboards downtown. The title of the featured book in Faribault was Eric Carle’s, From Head to Toe.

(That morning in Faribault has a side story… I left our house and drove 25 minutes south to Faribault to run some errands. When I got out at my first stop I realized I had my slippers on! It was too far to go back home and change shoes so I ran my errands in my slippers!)

Back to Forestville State Park. The book featured on the Story Walk was One North Star by Phyllis Root.

Look for “Eight yellow pond lilies float, seven great blue herons…”

Each page of the book was placed behind plastic on a sign staked to the ground, spaced several hundred feet apart on the trail.

Look for “Nine mosquitoes whine, eight small cranberries…”

As you walk along the trail you stop to read another page of the story. This book is a beautifully illustrated, counting book featuring Minnesota animals and flowers. We stopped at each page to read and count. It was fun!

I enjoyed the book so much I bought a copy at the park office.

I can only imagine how much fun this Story Walk would be for children. It is engaging. We were wishing our grandchildren were along, hiking this Story Walk trail with us.

Red Rocks Park

While in Colorado we looked for outdoor areas to explore. Red Rocks Park came to our attention so we took the grandchildren along for another adventure.

Driving into the park, through a red rock.

Red Rocks Park is known for it’s naturally formed, world-famous open-air amphitheater.

Looking down from on top of the amphitheater.

This amphitheater is surrounded by huge, beautiful red rock outcroppings which provide natural acoustics and amazing ambience for the amphitheater.

The natural outcropping on one side of the theater.

The other side of the theater lined with red rock outcroppings.

We had not heard of this gem and little did we know how famous it was for its concerts (including big name bands and orchestras) and how long it has been in use. It opened in 1941. The Beatles performed there in 1964.

On stage, looking out into the bleacher seating.

A natural shelf in the red rocks behind the stage area.

The grandchildren wanted to walk down the many flight of stairs to the “stage area”. We did, and then hiked back up.

There were people sightseeing, and some locals were using the rows of stone bleachers for their exercise routine. The capacity of the theater is 9,525 seats!

It’s hard to get perspective of the vastness of this theater that has 9,525 seats.

Another look down to the stage, and beyond.

The amphitheater is in the Red Rocks Park, which also has hiking and biking trails.

When I mentioned how we enjoyed Red Rocks Park to a friend who previously lived in Colorado, I learned she and her husband had attended a couple of concerts at the amphitheater. I hope to attend some day, when concerts can resume in this beautiful outdoor venue.

Looking up from the stage area into the bleacher seats.

While on a different hike in the foothills near Boulder, Colorado we came upon another outdoor amphitheater called the Sunrise Amphitheater. This was not nearly as elaborate but it was built in a beautiful setting facing east and meant for folks to come and watch the sunrise.

Sunrise Amphitheater overlooking Boulder, CO.

Another thing to do next time we’re in Colorado…