Esther's Week 3/ Blacks Creek

Hey everyone!! I’m back with a whole new blog!

Teamed up to catch the crab!

& the winner is....
This little angel right here! ❤

This week I worked in a new site (Blacks Creek). As usual I was excited to see what this site was like and I was wondering how those wonderful kids were like. But also, I a little bit nervous because that was my very first time ever at that site.

At Blacks Creek the kids went to an adventure where they were exploring for creatures. Since they were so excited and competitive,I gave them a challenge which was that the one who find the most creatures would win, would get to keep them in another touch tank. The kids found Hermit Crabs, Snail Crabs, Sea Snail, and Rock Crabs. The winner was a little girl who found 6 Sea snail and around 8 Snail Crabs.

Princess ❤

Also, we can't forget about the little princess who say that exploring is not her type, but yet she decided to construct her own little castles using water and sand as cement and the little buckets as a container of her own model. But hey, we can't forget about the rocks she uses as designs. This little princess spent most of her time perfecting those castle and adding as much details as possible. Few minutes later, her friend introduce the little princess, all the creatures that she caught. At first, the little princess didn't wanted to hold her because she was scared of them. But after she let the the Sea Snail and the Snail Crabs "live" in her castles but with the condition that they had to protect her castles.

Jimmy's Pool!

Reinforcing the walls!!

Beyond explorers and princess, among the kids there was a builder of pools who decided to build one for all he's creatures that he found, but specially for his crabs who he loved the most out of all. With the help of the princess and myself, Jimmy built his pool with the same material that the princess used. As the the pool was coming along, the other kids were getting attract by his creation, that they decided to join us. They all contributed by building the walls or carrying the water. They were all excited and even myself because they all worked together without complaining or arguing. They also give each other a try to do the fun part which was to throw the "magic water" (that's how they called it) to the broken red bucket, making the water flow to the broken part of it.

Wednesday it was a little bit different. Instead of going to the office at 12, we went to Curley Community Center. The receptionist had us walking back and forth trying to figure out where we supposed to give our session. Imagined a huge bucket filled with water and tons of crabs with someone holding it, as that person walks without knowing their destination, under the hot sun. Now, that right there my friend is what I called a tough situation! As the kids finished introducing themselves they grab their nets and searching for grabs and snails. The water was freezing but that didn't stop them from exploring. Getting their clothes wet didn't bother them either. They enjoyed every single time they found a creature. It didn't matter if they had 6, 7, or 10 Sea Snail, They would not stop searching for more and more.

Sea Turtle ❤

On Friday I worked at Constitution Beach. Were we was teaching the kids how to Fish print. Also we brought a Lobster real so that the kids can touch it while we explain some characteristics of the it. There were two things I enjoyed the most. The first one was that when my co-workers went to get the crabs from the Crab Trap, even thought it wasn't a lot, there was 3 perfect size of crabs. A baby crab, medium crab and another medium crab without a claw. The other one was the Sand Ranking. I really enjoyed it because the kids were able to think and demonstrate their skills and art true the art of Sand Raking. They thought of different species and things that can be found in the sea.

Stay tuned for my next blog!! See you later

~ Esther 

Messy Mondays

It was another great day at Carson on Monday. Between our hula hoop contest, and the kids trying to build the biggest sand castle, it was a close call for highlight of the day. Many of the kids from this program had never built a sand castle before! And for a few of the foreign kids it was their first time on of of Boston's beaches. It was a day of many first's at the beach. These kids were in the middle of constructing "the biggest sand castle ever" as one of the kids called it. They were determined to make it bigger than themselves, until it was time for them to go to lunch. But the fun didn't stop at launch time. After the kids stuffed their faces with pb&j sandwiches, the kids were back on the beach. This time they started a hula hoop contest. Personally, my hula hooping skills are sub par at best. But some of these kids would still be twirling the hula hoop on their waist if their camp didn't have to leave. It was fun seeing little kids between six and eight, hula hoop better than the staff. Both of these girls, Sasha and Tonya, were named the best hula

hoopers in their camp. They both kept the hoop spinning for about two minutes! I can't even keep the hoop up for fifteen seconds. These two girls kept going and even when it was time for them to leave they still wanted to stay and hula hoop more. Guess I need to brush up on my hula hoop skills. Until next time, keep saving the harbor, Preston.

Cartwheel Workout Routine

Welcome all to another blog post!

The girls this week were very into gymnastics, especially Leila, Michaela, Kylie, and Johanna (in the picture above)! When we would transition to the sprinkler area, these girls constantly had me doing gymnastics with them. To my surprise I learned the proper technique for a cartwheel and I improved my hand stand! This all started after Johanna was fed up with bored during Monday and Tuesday's park time; on Wednesday Johanna took initiative to make herself, Hannah, the second Leila and I judges for a gymnastic competition comprised of all the kids who were eager to do cartwheels, back bends and other tricks. 

I role played as a Urban Farmer this Friday and one of the videos from my MLK Friday sessions with John Hancock left me tearing up a bit. The video that had me tearing up was on how folks from Boston see themselves and Boston in 2030. This week I had turned twenty years old, and I did not come to realize how fast time was starting to go by for me. It was during the video that I got a reminder that you really should make the most out of every day! 

On Saturday Save the Harbor/ Save the Bay had a great opportunity to do fish printing at Revere Beach's annual Sand sculpting event. I really enjoyed seeing the kids who tried fish printing for the first time. I tried my best to offer up alternative designs for painting the flounder versus the usual monochromatic flounder and ended up with some cool stripe patterns!

I can't wait to tell you guys and girls about next week!

Raymond Chai