Homeschool History Days

Whenever we go on a field trip or other educational activity, I try to make a page to summarize it for their portfolios. I also *try* to assign the kids some sort of follow up, but with our already full school schedule it doesn't always happen. Thus being the case for this trip. I worry, too, that field trips will turn into groans of "oh, no! Another field trip. This means we'll have to write a paper." So rather than have them do something on paper, I let them make more butter. Fun. And tasty. Though admittedly it is much easier to buy sticks of butter from the grocery store.

Anyway, we try to go to the homeschool events at the Charleston Museum as much as possible. It is a wonderful museum and we've learned so much about local history.

Here's our portfolio page for October's homeschool day.



I should credit my brother and sister-in-law for gifting us last Christmas with a family Museum membership. I didn't know about this museum or its homeschool program but thanks to Doug and Barbara we have this wonderful membership which we have enjoyed all year long!

Working for Peanuts

I like to inject a little fun into our homeschool routine. I keep several file folder games handy for each of the kids. Logan was learning about compound words so I pulled out Working for Peanuts, a game that allows him to put compound words together and then write them using a dry erase marker. They enjoy opening their workboxes and finding a fun game to break up the routine.

Click to see larger.



I find most of my file folder games on this site: File Folder Fun. They are free to print out and easy to put together. I did invest in a laminator for $20 which makes the games reusable. I hope to pass them down so that is important to me.

A taste of our favorite place on earth...

...in October. The Galloping Grace Youth Ranch Pumpkin Patch. For the past 2 years we have been blessed to be a part of it. But not this year. Oh how painful it was to buy pumpkins from the grocery store. That is just wrong! I used to walk past the big pumpkin bins at walmart and glance at them with distaste, muttering things like, "ours are better", and "why would anyone buy pumpkins from a store?!?".

This year, I had to actually buy some. From a store. Not from walmart though. I walked past those, muttering under my breath. But when we peeked into the pumpkin bin at Publix, the pumpkins looked okay. Then I saw it. The sticker on each pumpkin. Could it be? Really? Here out in far east South Carolina?!? ?? ?



Heaven sent, those pumpkins were. Kelsey fervently exclaimed that the Wades sold them to Publix for us to buy. Well, maybe not, but close enough. We quickly picked out the 3 best (ie closest to the top) pumpkins and placed them in our cart. Now pumpkin carving could take place. All was (closer to) right with the world. At least our little corner. Which is so far from their little corner.

That was yesterday. Let's go back a few days. Trish asked me for my address in an email. I responded, jokingly adding, are you sending me some pumpkins? HA! Little, oh how little did I know. They did better than that. They sent me the pumpkin patch!

When the mail truck came by, we were eating lunch. I saw it from the table. Thought nothing of it until I noticed the mail lady walking up the driveway. I got to the front door and was greeted by a huge box on the porch. I saw Koester and suddenly remembered that she asked for my address. That was fast, and what in the world...?!?

Much excitement ensued as I grabbed a knife and opened the box. As soon as I saw what was inside I just started crying. No warning, nothing. Just lost it. Those girls do that to me every time. I was really missing them and missing the time we used to spend at the patch. Especially since we just bought our pumpkins and decorated for Fall.

They literally sent us a taste of the patch! The new country store is apparently offering a variety of local (NM) goodies to complement their usual offerings of thousands of pumpkins, gourds, and other Fall items. I have enjoyed the privilege of being a small part of it through designing their new website, brochures and signs. I also came up with a simple shirt design, which they are also selling. Fun!

Anyway, here are some of the treats in the box:



They also threw in shirts for each of us, and a cozy soft sweatshirt that I am wearing right now <3





Kelsey is wearing the one I designed. I love how it came out! That is our neighbor next to her. Grant is checking out the jalapeno jam and wondering how spicy it is. I think we'll find out tomorrow morning!

There was some local cherry cider.


Which I am enjoying right now.


I must say, it is yummy. Shhh, I didn't tell the kids I opened it. LOL.

Coffee. Cannot. wait. til. morning.


Local jams. I've had Heidi's before from the Corrales farmer's market. I already know how good that is. I'm guessing it will be perfect on toast with a cuppa pinon coffee. Oh and the pinon cocoa. The kids noticed that right away. Grant opened it and it smells wonderful! Might have to hide it.



There were gourds, Indian corn, stickers, and candy. Sopaipilla mix...OMG! A sweet note from the bestest friends anyone could ask for.

Thank you so much, Trish, Michelle & Max, and Melissa. I love you guys. So much! Thanks for sharing the fun with me. I wish I could share some of the hard work you guys are doing too.

Fit for a princess

My favorite sight after a 6 hour drive south:

What a monster! What a shark!

SO the kids' main goal (besides riding lots of rides and spending all of our money) at Disney World was to meet as many characters as possible and get their autographs.

We met Mike and Sully at Disney's Hollywood Studios.



My main goal was to snorkel with sharks. And rays. And various colorful fish. And I did. So did the boys. Kelsey would have done it. She is a strong enough swimmer this year. However, the mask would not fit on her face tight enough to make a seal. She was a good sport about it, and patiently waited for me as I selfishly proceeded into the water without her. And then did it again. Next time we'll bring her own mask. Disney's masks are one size fits all.

Wanna know a secret? I literally hyperventilated in my snorkel the first time I attempted to do this. The cold water, the {DEEP} lagoon, the sharks (no, I don't even think the sharks bothered me). It was the fact that I have never put my entire life in the hands of a small rubber tube. I freaked out trying to breath through it and had to turn back. On my second try I did great. And then I went back for more. I was just a little shocked and ashamed at my little anxiety attack. The boys acted like they have been snorkeling with sharks their entire lives. Way to make mom look bad, guys.

IllumiNATIONS

We saw fireworks nightly- we could see Epcot's nightly show from our hotel, and if we were at the Boardwalk, we could see both Epcot and Magic Kingdom. We went to both shows at the parks, but only once. The crowds are unspeakable during fireworks.

For Epcot's show, called IllumiNATIONS, the fireworks are best viewed from World Showcase, looking toward the lake. My camera stinks, but you get the general idea.

Some more adventures

Besides rides, shows, parades, fireworks, and food, there are some "hobbies" that are easy to get sucked into while visiting the world. Fortunately for us, our kids were into the free one: character meet and greets. The competition was fierce: Who could get the most autographs? Logan and Kelsey got the upper hand almost immediately: on our second park day, while Grant was at his homeschool class at Animal Kingdom, the 2 conspirators were at the front of the crowd at morning rope drop. We quickly made our way into Camp Minnie Mickey and met up with at least 6 or 7 characters (pictures to come later). Within a few days, Grant had found those characters and caught up.

Since we mainly travelled in a pack, they continued to be neck and neck. The autograph books were filling up fast, along with our photo pass and my memory card.

Then came the turning point. One evening at Magic Kingdom, someone handed us 5 fast passes for Space Mountain. We thought we were done with Space Mountain, as Kelsey's very first experience at Disney world was to be whisked unwittingly into this vortex. She came out crying, we made nice and promised never to go near it again.

Fast forward to the fast passes. This was pretty amazing to us, because about a week earlier, we handed an unsuspecting, adventurous looking family of 5 our fastpasses to Expedition Everest, because while 4 of us thought that ride was the best thing around, one certain little girl decided she was NOT going to ride it a third time. So when we were randomly chosen to receive someone's fast passes to Space Mountain, well we had to accept them. Guess who started crying at the thought of being dragged on that ride once again? Yup you guessed it. And Kelsey cried too (I kid, I would have done it again!)

We decided to split up. The boys would get hurtled through space in pitch blackness, while Kelsey and I had girl time. We headed straight for the princesses. 3 princesses and 3 fairies later, Kelsey was the undeniable winner in the autograph category.



The other hobby that many get into? Pin collecting. We abstained until Jason bought Grant a safari type hat with several pins on it. The only problem was that Grant didn't really want to wear the hat. I think it was one of those things Jason really liked so he used Grant as the excuse to buy it. The cool thing about pin trading is that most (if not all) of the Disney cast members wear pins, and will trade with you. If you see a pin you want, just trade with them for one you have but don't want. They will take anything and they'll let you trade for any of their pins. Next time, before we go I am going to try to find a bunch of Disney pins on ebay for trading. They are just too expensive to buy in the parks.

Besides the theme parks, we also visited Disney's two water parks, Blizzard Beach and Typhoon Lagoon. Here the kids are posing for me as we entered Typhoon Lagoon.



I'll have much more on the water parks. We had so much fun at both of them.

Disney kicked our ...uh, rear ends.

I haven't done much scrapping since my last post. I have done ALOT of:

walking
riding rides
waiting for busses
walking
fighting crowds
waiting for boats
spending money
getting some sun
getting wet
riding more rides
walking
waiting on line
taking pictures
meeting some real "characters"
waiting on more lines
did I mention walking?

4 more days of magic and then we head home.

Needless to say, we are all completely and utterly exhausted. I did one scrapbook page... I couldn't resist snapping this picture of L and K sleeping peacefully. Click to see larger and read the journaling:)