The Fire by Bennett

(See entry here for what this is)

We went camping at Timothy Lake Campground near Mount Hood in Oregon in 2013.  It was our family (Mom, Dad, Carter, and me) and the Mace family (Eric, Frannie, Nina, and Nate)  (Laura had to go home early).  Carter thought of making a big fire on the last day of camping.

We made the structure for the fire during the day.  It was about a foot and a half tall and in the shape of a teepee.  Dad was chopping wood and me and the other kids stacking wood in the middle of the fire ring.  We put a mini cereal box filled with moss and paper in the middle for an extra treat.  We knew the moss and paper would burn really well and make the fire really big for a few seconds. It was hard work that was going to pay off.

We are just about to light the big fire.  We are all excited.  We light it.  The fire goes out.  We light it in a few places and wait.  It slowly started and then got really big.  At its peak the fire was about two feet tall.  When the mini cereal box caught fire, it turned the fire green because of the chemicals.

The fire was great for s’mores.  It had hot fire to soften the marshmallow, some hot parts to get the marshmallow brown, and some warm parts to get it puffy.  After we ate our s’mores, we sang camp songs around the fire.  My favorite song was Little Spaceship.

I loved the gigantic s’mores fire because it made delicious s’mores and because we were with some really nice friends.

 

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The Porch by Carter

(See entry here for what this is)

I see trees some small, some tall.  They’re all green, bright green. The trees are the same color as the grass.

On the porch where I am sitting, there is a tub full of water, inside the tub full of water there is some Coke, and beer.  There was a party here before we arrived.  There are three chairs and two outdoor couches.  I feel the fabric of the couch on my legs.  I don’t feel every individual stitch though.  It feels sort of scratchy, but not scratchy enough to be irritating.  There’s also a round table on the porch with five dining room chairs.  On the table there’s an oil lamp, a basket of bread, and a pepper grinder.  We ate at this table last night and it made me feel relaxed.  Behind me there are some small, purple flowers in a planter box.  I can’t smell the flowers because my nose is clogged.  It seems like my nose is always clogged.

Across the lawn Bennett and Aunt Elsie are talking to each other about who knows what.  On one tree I see five birdhouses are hanging.  Two birdhouses are pink, one is yellow, and another one is blue. The last one’s white, but they are all empty.

At the bottom of the yard, there is a line of evergreen trees and then a lot of cars.  The cars are there because of the swimming pool that’s just out of my sight.  Occasionally some kids with pool toys and swimming suits walk by in the far away parking lot.

I hear lots of kids from the pool.  There’s shouting and yelling.  It sort of makes me feel like I want to be with them.  I also feel very hot because the temperature is at 80 degrees.  I think they’re playing a baseball game down there because I hear a bat hitting something and I hear “get it, get it” and “I got it” and “throw it to me.”  I feel tired because last night I was up until 10:00 and I got up at 7:00.  I got up at 7:00 because I wanted to read on my Kindle.

It really is a great and comfortable place to be out here on Aunt Elsie’s and Uncle Al’s back porch in Washington, Pennsylvania.

Writing Homework by the Boys…

The next two entries are the “final” from our reading of the book “Writer’s Notebook” by Ralph Fletcher.  In the book he describes all the different ways that you might use a writer’s notebook.  The chapters vary from creating lists, recording snatches of conversation, remembering memories, creating mental pictures, stories you can’t forget, etc.    The boys were tasked with trying each of the ways at least once in their own writer’s notebook.  Some were easy like creating lists of movies they wanted to see or jokes they wanted to remember.  Some were difficult such as writing about something deeply personal (I let them keep that one private if they wanted.)

The final exam was that they had to pick one of their notebook entries to publish – going through editing, teacher review, etc.  Carter chose to publish a new mental picture where you take one moment in time and try to capture it in your writing to use at some other time.  He has actually published one of these before on the blog.  Bennett picked a memory entry.  I said that memories had to be over a year old because I wanted the memory to be old enough to mellow in his brain.  A year is a long time in the span of only 8 years of life – a few of which you have no memories from!