Summer Blues…

It’s been an incredibly difficult summer. Following a magnificent spring, our summer turned south with a day after day menu of temperatures in the 100s. We swim as a group twice a week…just getting there was impossible on some days. It’s just too hot to expect very young children to say, “I’m in trouble…I’m thirsty…I’m going to faint…” Field trips have had to be canceled because the lakes are soupy and even closed, the temperature in the bus for hours is just too hot, and snakes are “on the lose” because of the drought.

With grateful thanks to a fantastic staff, we have solved most of our problems with quick thinking, fun substitutions and lots of on premises extras that have turned out to be a grand exchange. But it takes a dedicated staff to not only come up with the substitutions, but the energy in this heat to take charge and lead on…McDuff!

We have four more weeks of summer trips, and three trips have been planned…looking for something exciting for one more trip. I’m not thrilled about repeating a summer trip, so I’m looking for something new and sure and doable if the weather is back into the 100s. It’s a challenge, but I am sure we will rise to this occasion.

Planning summer -out of city-out of state- trips is always a challenge. We don’t want them too long, but there is really nothing exciting to do within a 120 mile radius…so we have often gone to St. Louis, Louisville, Nashville, to explore those cities, and it’s been enormously successful. The kids love the St. Louis Zoo, Bush Gardens, the Arch…Nashville’s Science Museum, Mammoth Cave, the Louisville Zoo, The Exotic Feline Rescue Center near Terre Haute.

What I would love to do, and I can’t find this…is a real train ride. The one in French Lick is as dull as it comes. I would also like to find a boat ride…but that has been limited to the Blue Springs Cave…might try that again this year. I would love to get the kids out on the Ohio…but finding a possibility has not been achieved yet.

Field trips at the Garden School are not meant to entertain as much as they are meant to teach. I want the learning and seeing and exploring new things to be the fun part. I want the questions children have to be their entertainment. So we plod on…

Hoping the end of the summer makes up for the beginning…