Tahoe

This past week we spent in Tahoe with family.  The weather wasn't great for a lot of the outside activities, but we did get to see the salmon spawning at Taylor Creek.
If you are thinking of visiting South Lake Tahoe around October, this is something you really shouldn't miss.  They have a room underground where you can see a profile of the stream and some great trails that lead you through some local vegetation and by the river.  If you time it right, they have some beautiful Indian Paintbrush blooming.  Other than salmon, you have the chance to see various ducks, birds, and possibly even some bears getting ready for winter by stocking up on fish.  She read The Legend of the Indian Paintbrush, The Legend of the Bluebonnet, and The Bird That Loved a Mountain to prepare for some of the fun sights she might see.

Genevieve took her grandparents and aunts and uncles to Bijou Community Park, which is a nice small community park with some playground equipment.  She enjoyed the swings and slides.  She also played at the park in Zephyr Cove, where we saw some horses and later spent some time checking out the tide pools on the beach.  She found some great shells to add to her nature collection and the exoskeleton of a crayfish to explore under her new microscope.  Tobias explored the textures of the rocks on the beach.  We found a nice little "cave" in the rocks, which reminded her of the book We're Going on a Bear Hunt.  She'd been looking for a bear all week.

She had lots of fun each night taking out her new telescope to try to look at the stars.  She would take it out on the porch during the day to look for bears, birds, and pine cones.  She had great fun dancing in her new tutu and putting on puppet shows and puppet parades with some handmade puppets from grandma.





One of the highlights of the week was when she got to carve a pumpkin with her aunt and uncle.  She had been planning this for awhile as this was her first carving.  She had a book with four patterns to choose from and some crazy eyes to put in the pumpkin.  They traced the patterns and then used the tools provided to carve a bat.

Genevieve really enjoyed checking out a local yarn shop with Grandmum and Grandy.  She has been practicing to knit with pretend needles and loves to help pull yarn out for both grandmothers.  She had to help host Grandmum's yarn podcast too.

Tobias has loved having all these guys around to play with.  Often he is stuck at home with mom and sister, so the opportunity to play with dad, Grandy and two uncles was great.