we walked a block to the hudson river park to observe pine trees today. the pines grow in an area that little children like to use as a sledding run when it snows. 
through our observations we concluded that the tree on the left is an eastern white pine, and the tree on the right (along with the one behind it which you really can't see in this picture) is a parry pinyon. (the parry pine is native to california . . i don't know why the gardeners decided to plant it here. i suppose just because they thought it was pretty . . or hardy . . )
the eastern white pine has beautiful white branches and twigs with dark scars. 
chanda's eastern white pine drawing. her description says it all. our fingers froze as we tried to draw!
it's needles are three to five inches long.
morgana's journal entry for the white pine's needles and cone. there weren't many cones. we didn't see any hanging on the tree, not even at the top. we found this one nestled in the crook of a branch.
now this is where i got confused. most eastern white pines have long vertical ridges along their trunks, or large rectangular blocks. maybe this tree is a teenager . . kind of in between the young smooth bark, and the ridged rectangular blocked bark.
in this picture the bark looks very smooth.
this is the parry pinyon. you can see how it's branches grow in whorls round the tree, making it easy for a little girl to climb.
my journal entry . .
the parry pine's needles are one to two inches long. 
chanda's parry pinecone and needle drawing. the shape of the needle cluster reminded her of the fan-shaped gingko.
the parry pine usually has needles in clusters of four. however, they can also have three or five, which is exactly what we found . . needles growing in clusters of three, four and five!
here is an old needle cluster of four.
the bark is grey and smooth . . indicating that the tree is rather young.
in the few pictures that i found online of the parry pine, it tends to look like a big overgrown bush. 
we took our samples of needles and cones home to draw.
it was much more comfortable recording our observations inside where it was warm and our fingers weren't freezing.
we used several books for information. one of them was anne ophelia dowden's the blossom on the bough. the other was discover nature in winter, and also anna comstock's the handbook of nature study.
since morgana went off to see a film about doris humphrey, chanda and i took a walk along the river to observe and sketch trees. we chose this tree as it's branches were different from the surrounding deciduous trees. they were more sharply angled, with little twigs sticking out along the ends.
chanda's tree silhouette.
and mine.
the bark was also very rough, with deep ridges. lichen also seemed to be growing in tiny patches.
the twigs were more smooth, with terminal and lateral buds. we didn't observe any seedpods or fruit.
besides being smooth, the twigs were white, or a very, very whitish grey.
we thought the tree was very "witchy" looking! we also observed a bird's nest in it's branches.
if you look very closely in this photo, the branches are similar to the bark: rough, with ridges.
when we got home, we put our twig in a glass vase, in the sun. hopefully, our buds will open, eventually.
we skipped the constellation chapter in discover nature in winter (i hope to do this chapter in a few weeks at my mom and dad's house on montauk), and moved on to: birch trees. luckily, we have birch trees right near us on the high line! we threw on our coats and grabbed our sketch books and skipped over to the park. the snow on the pavement, these days, is sparse and grey and very dirty!
chanda is walking funny because she stuck the book she is currently reading into her snow pants.
on our way to the high line, we passed the cherry pit theatre, which always has a puppet exhibit. this is their current one. i thought it was cute. some of them are a little creepy, but the bears in this one look very friendly.
up on the high line, the birch trees were the first things we saw coming up off the stairwell. without all the greenery of their neighbor plants, they really stand out!
their branches and trunks looked so beautiful in the winter bareness.
i love the multiple trunks: "the grey birch is the small birch that grows in fields, and it frequently develops in clusters of several stems that grow from one root system." (lawlor, page 70.)
chanda and i were both enchanted with it's black eyebrows.
"you can also identify the tree by the black 'eyebrows' that develop below the base branches." (lawlor, page 70.)
the gray birch produces flowers each spring, long, pendulous male catkins . .
and short, stubby female catkins. if you shake these catkins, winged seeds fly out. gray birches produce seeds when they are about ten years old.
chanda and i were cold and sketched quickly. morgana always takes her time, and makes sure she has her sketch just the way she likes it. i like how she did the whole tree so you can really see it's shape.
betula populifolia, the gray birch, one of five native species that grow east of the mississippi and across canada to alaska. included in this family (white birch, yellow birch, river birch, gray birch and sweet birch) is the american hornbean and the hophornbeam. they all produce catkins and seeds which feed squirrels and songbirds during the winter months. deer will browse on the leaves and twigs.
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we also enjoyed reading the poem by robert frost, birches. morgana and chanda are both working on a recitation of a favorite part of the poem.
we've been working with our discover nature in winter book, by elizabeth p. lawlor. a few days ago we read chapter one and focused on observing colors in winter. all of us wanted to draw something . . red. we looked in the courtyard and found several red berries (as morgana pointed out, it was the only red object in the entire courtyard). i think it may be an oriental bittersweet vine. (in october we found the american bittersweet out on montauk.)
chanda's book . . 
mine . .
and morgana's . .
yesterday we read chapter two, about snow, and also read about snowflake bentley.
morgana and chanda collected two cups of snow from the courtyard: one was fresh, new fallen snow; and the other was a week old. they also took pictures of places where it seemed to be warmer, and the snow was melting more quickly (showing how the objects take in the sun's rays, radiate the heat, and melt the snow):
around plants,
and potted plants,
and trees (with little squirrel footprints, i believe).
the snow melt was very interesting. the fresh snow yielded only a little less than a third of a cup of water. the old snow yielded almost a full cup, and it took double the time to melt. the ice crystals were much more compact from having melted and frozen into each other.
today, they recorded everything in their nature journals before we ran off to tech rehearsal.
here's a funny picture of korrina and chanda at tech rehearsal. korrina is stage managing the show for ellen, and she needs to wrap chanda up in the silk that chanda rolls out in for her dance piece. i took this while she was making faces at me backstage before wrapping chanda. unusual for me, i didn't take any other pictures. but then i'm just getting over the flu myself (my worst day was wednesday) . . korrina, thank goodness, is all better. (actually, you can see a bit of chanda's and and her friend tessa's dances here, from the spring recital).
i don't consider myself a very good bird observer . . but we purposely went on a walk today to do just that: observe the birds. and we didn't do too badly. our very first bird was a black capped chickadee. i truly adore these little birds. they are so sweet and so pretty. i also have an affinity for them ever since our trip to a park in sag harbor where they landed on our hands to say hello and snatch a sunflower seed. i feel so lucky that they like to live here in the city with us. you can see the little fellow about an inch above chanda's head, just slightly to the right. i was so pleased with myself for getting this shot. they are so fast!! if i'm going to continue observing birds, i really would like to get a different camera! mine just doesn't zoom in close enough.
we also saw (all in our courtyard, as a neighbor has two bird feeders and a birdbath): a male cardinal, several sparrows, a blue jay, pigeons, and a mourning dove (they coo so "loverly" in our courtyard trees). we then went to the river park where we saw several seagulls, and heard sparrows twittering in the bushes (but we couldn't see them!)
we saw and heard and smelled so many signs of the earth awakening and spring approaching. the buds seemed bigger on our "witchy" tree,
the sea grass had all gone to seed . .
the snow was gone from the lawn and . .
the gardeners had been out pruning the dead branches from our parry pinyon and eastern white pine.
and everyone was outside enjoying the warm breeze.
