Earth Day

Today was Earth Day, but we celebrated it yesterday as well with a play date with some of our friends. It was a morning play date, so we made some yummy apple and carrot muffins. They were made with whole wheat flour, applesauce instead of eggs, maple syrup instead of sugar, and organic apples, carrots and cinnamon. The toddlers loved them...I think Meo had three or four of them. We also had Pirate Booty and I made some "ants on a log".

Tim and Leah arrived first with Grace, which was great because we hadn't seen them in such a long time and they had never been to our new house. So we got to spend a little time showing them around and playing in Meo's room before the rest of the attendees arrived. Grace is so sweet, and the two of them got along really well; I'm glad they had they got to spend some time together.

The others that came were Noel and Charlie with Noah, Mara with Charlie and Christina with Greyson. We had fun playing with Meo's toys and working on an art project I set up while we were indoors for the first half of the play date.

Meo wondering if he can fit up on the tower with Charlie

Pi in the middle of everything taking a nap

Charlie and Noel

Christina and Greyson

Grace with the Fraggles

I made some homemade finger paints the night before and drew tree trunks with colored pencils onto paper for each toddler. For the toddlers contribution, each was asked to pick a color and put a hand print on each of the trees. The idea being that not just one hand print can fill a tree, it takes a whole bunch of hands to make a difference.

Tim, Leah and Grace

Mara and Charlie

Noel and Noah

Christina and Greyson

Outside, I had set up a little planting station on the deck. Turns out, you really need to hang out and supervise seed planting with toddlers if you want it to go as planned. Nonetheless, the kids had a blast filling Meo's dump truck with dirt, stacking pots, and Charlie even planted the peas in the big bowl of soil! I'm glad that they had fun. I think a couple of them actually planted seeds into the pots too with help from their mommies.

Mara and Charlie planting seeds

We hung out in the back yard for a little while playing baseball, climbing, and going for wagon rides. Meo and Grace were trying to play pass which was adorable. Grace was doing a pretty great job, but Meo still doesn't quite understand the concept and was having fun collecting the ball and running it over to Papa Dada to throw it for him.

Grace with all the yard tools

Noah playing truck

Noah, Meo and Grace

Charlie and Noah taking a walk on the rock wall

Grace throwing the ball to Meo

Noah giving Meo a ride

Greyson

Then we all went for a nice walk down the road and onto the trail in the woods by our house. We brought the wagon and they all took turns going for rides. It was cute to watch the toddlers running around and exploring in the woods. I think they enjoyed themselves, and I am glad we had such great dry weather to go out there.

Charlie running with Robbie who was pulling Meo and Noah in the wagon

Charlie running with Robbie who was pulling Meo and Noah in the wagon

That week, Meo and I had spent some time in the woods ourselves collecting treasures to make "Earth Day sensory bags" for all of our friends. We gave these to them before they left the play date. Christina also brought some great "Mother Earth" bumper stickers for people to take home.

Robbie, Meo and I had a lot of fun seeing all of our friends and are so grateful that you all made the trip over to play and celebrate with us. We had a wonderful morning and hope you did as well!

Meo and Noah enjoying some mini muffins

Meo and Noah enjoying some mini muffins

Meo and Noah enjoying some mini muffins