Laughing, Lace and Legos

Thinking about Holiday Cards

2011-10-23T18:57:00.000-05:00

Normally, I wouldn't be thinking about Holiday Cards before Halloween, but Shutterfly sent me an offer that I couldn't refuse. They said that if I would blog about their awesome holiday offerings, they would give me free Holiday cards! How could I refuse this?
Honestly, for the past few years, I have put holiday cards on the back burner because I tend to want to outdo myself every time I make them. There are so many choices available now that I will have a hard choosing a style!
We have continued to create an annual Calendar and we always use Shutterfly for it. The quality is always great and we can add in all of the important events so that they are printed on the calendar. The kids love flipping the calendar each month and remembering the events pictured from the previous year. Since I am not into scrapbooking, it is about as close as we get to having our pictures in a format other than digital.
We have also used Shutterfly to create gifts like a personalized mug for my dad with his beloved Daisy on the front of it.
Are you a blogger? Want a chance at 25 free cards this holiday season? Register here: http://goo.gl/DDw7Q

One of those things that I did this week....

2011-10-22T19:36:00.002-05:00

Yeah, yeah...there was that homeschooling thing we do. This was BESIDES that. About a month or so ago, I ran across a Facebook post about Katwise sweaters. Here is her Etsy shop.
I fell in LOVE with them! So did the girls. I picked up a few sweaters at a thrift store in McKinney for about $2 each. I used the Katwise tutorial (found at her Etsy store) and made Caroline a modified Katwise sweater. We are calling it a Pixie sweater (I have one in mind to make for Joseph, who feels left out and will call that one a Gnome sweater ;)).
Caroline's is made out of 3 mid-weight felted wool sweaters and 2 cashmere sweaters.

A couple of days later, I made one for Libby. However, Libby is an Anti-Woolite. Her sweater is made out of a cotton Fair Isle print sweater plus a TON of tshirts. All of Libby's pieces we had laying around the house.

A Halloween sneak peak

2011-10-16T19:24:00.000-05:00

The kids had a big meeting a couple of months ago, complete with pencil and paper. They brainstormed ideas for what they could do for costumes this year. They all agreed that they wanted to have a theme because they like the attention that it gets them. ;) After much discussion and crossing ideas off the list, they decided they were doing Angry Birds.
I have a few criteria for Halloween costumes. It has to be wearable and it has to be layer-able. Therefore, this year's costumes are NOT the big, stuffed circular felt variety of Angry Birds. (Joseph and Ken were on a scout camping trip, so we will have to wait a week to see Joseph's costume.)

Alex, it's Angry BIRDS, not angry PIGS. (Did I mention that the kids decided that the adults would be the pigs?)

Much better.

Dallas Heritage Village

2011-10-15T19:11:00.000-05:00

One of our favorite places to visit is the Dallas Heritage Village. We go to all of the homeschool days that they host there. The kids also enjoy dressing the part when they go. ;) We go to go this year with our friends (especially helpful when you don't have a car to get you places.

State Fair

2011-10-10T18:58:00.000-05:00

The kids had their annual performance at the State Fair of Texas today. After a gorgeous day yesterday, we had a huge front come through and it POURED all night long. We headed to the fair anyway to wait and see what the weather would do. We did end up performing. Libby, again, did a boy part and was such a good sport about it. Joseph recovered and joined us (although he got sick right as we got to the car. bleh. Better the fair ground parking lot than my car though.)

Dance season

2011-10-09T18:51:00.000-05:00

I ran into some glitches with storing photos on blogger. I think I have it figure out now so that it won't take me hours and a bunch of crazy gymnastics to get my pictures to post. I am going to backtrack a bit and fill in the last month or so.The Oktoberfest dance season has almost come and gone this year. I thought I better get some pictures on here before it completely gets away from me. I didn't get as many pictures as I have in past years because I spend a lot of time coordinating kids between dances and making sure we have everyone that needs to be there. I did get a few though.These pictures are from the German American Society luncheon in October. Joseph was sick, so none of him. Libby is wearing lederhosen. We were so short of boys this year that we had to ask some girls to dance "boy parts". Libby said she would, but only if she could wear lederhosen. Doesn't she look cute though?

Ballet

2011-09-06T13:00:00.000-05:00

Today was the first day of ballet class for the girls. (Joseph opted out.) A friend of ours started a ballet studio that has class at the Old McKinney Courthouse. The girls had a blast. Libby said, "I didn't know it would be that much fun!" Whew.

Mesopotamia

2011-08-31T18:44:00.000-05:00

We have moved on to our new level and units for the new school year. Joseph and Caroline will now be using Moving Beyond the Page 11-13. The first units are on The Pearl by John Steinbeck, the Hydrosphere and Mesopotamia. Today, they worked on virtual archaeological digs (they loved this! We need to find a real dig for them to see), learned about Hammurabi's Code and got to create a cuneiform with clay and a chopstick.

Poetry Unit

2011-08-31T18:28:00.000-05:00

Here we are, finishing up our first unit of the 2011-12 school year. Two year's ago, we were finishing up our first unit of the year and it was poetry. I said at the time, that it was NOT a good way to start a school year for Joseph.http://laughinglaceandlegos.blogspot.com/2009/08/poetry.htmlThis year started out with poetry, also. What a difference two years can make! Joseph LOVED poetry this time around. I don't know if it is a general switch in attitude or if having a poetry book that is all about nature and science can change one's attitude that radically. Both Joseph and Caroline loved The Tree That Time Built. It's a great book for kids who are impressed by electrons and Darwin or anything else scientific.Joseph's reaction to Haiku two years ago was less than enthusiastic. He is still not in love with that form of poetry, but he is more willing to try and understand it. One of the first assignments that Joseph and Caroline had was to write a poem about an endangered species and then create a sculpture of it. Our car was out of commission during most of the month of August, so we had to use what was on hand. We had used up the air dry clay a few days previous and the celluclay was almost empty also. But, we did have several packages of sealed fondant on hand! So, a blue and yellow panda it is for Caroline. Joseph made a manatee, but then promptly ate it.

During the three week unit, they were required to write several different pieces. The requirements ranged from subject matter to poetry style. The end of the unit project was to pull all of this together in a lapbook. This is Caroline's. Joseph, apparently, has inherited my opinion of lapbooks and he would not assemble his. All the parts are there though.

Here are Joseph's poetic creations of the last three weeks:

and, last, but not least, the Haiku:

These are Caroline's:

And Caroline's Haiku:

It's that time of year again...

2011-08-14T23:19:00.000-05:00

We had our first performance of the year! This past week, Ursula got a call for a last minute performance for the kids at Mansfield's new festival, Mansfield's Wurst Fest. Joseph wasn't able to perform because he was at a Boy Scout camping trip at Lake Lewisville.

We ALL lucked out though. We got a break from the insane heat that we have been having on Saturday morning. I woke up at 4 am to the sound of a very nice downpour. The rain cleared off pretty early, but it helped to keep the temperature down all day. The girls didn't even mention being hot!

First day of school

2011-08-09T12:56:00.000-05:00

We have started our school year! Because everyone else will be posting pictures of their first day (new backpacks, new outfits, new teachers, etc.), I thought we would take some pictures of what our first day looks like.
No new outfits here. Well, Caroline IS wearing a new pair of hand-me-down jeans and a shirt that our friend Emma gave her. They were all very excited about their new school supplies though. I bought them each a crate and a box for their own school supplies. Hopefully, we can all keep a pencil longer than one day if they have a place they can put them.
We are starting the year for Joseph and Caroline by finishing up a couple of units that we didn't make it through last spring. Joseph is doing a science unit on cells, a literature unit (Moving Beyond the Page) on poetry and beginning algebra (Life of Fred). Caroline is doing the same science and literature units and she is starting 5th grade math (Teaching Textbooks).
Libby started her new level for everything. She is starting a unit on the fifty states and she also has poetry (different unit) and fourth grade math (Teaching Textbooks).
So far, so good! Joseph is very excited to be doing Algebra this year and he loves Life of Fred. We will work hard to finish these units quickly so we can move on to the 11-13 level for Joseph and Caroline.

Looking over assignments for the day.

What Joseph does during his down time.

Reading.

Reading poetry.

Math on her own computer (with last year's literature stacked in the background).

Lab time.

Wanting to have lab time.

Caroline is home!

2011-08-02T21:10:00.000-05:00

She is home! Julie called me at 7:30 this morning (when I was in the shower) to tell me that Caroline could get on the flight to Oklahoma City at 9:00. That meant I had to haul butt out of the house and start driving to OKC because the flight was quicker than the drive!
So, Libby and I left at 7:45, we slid into place at the gate (after getting the gate pass and going through security) at 11:17. Caroline arrive at 11:25. Whew.
We ate lunch in OKC and drove back home. We got home about 5:30 this afternoon.
She has talked nonstop and LOVED her camp experience.
My little girl left on the quiet side and a bit shy around people she didn't know. She came home very talkative and very self-assured. I am amazed that she was at camp for two weeks and then "stuck" in another state for 3 days more before she got home and none of it phased her. She was just as happy and chatty as she could be when Libby and I got her at the airport.
These are the pictures that came home from camp on the Caroline's camera (ok, Libby's camera that Caroline borrowed.)

Joseph and Libby are both so happy that she is finally home. Me too!

Update on Caroline

2011-07-31T11:35:00.000-05:00

Caroline's camp ended yesterday. Everything went as planned...she made it to Minneapolis on the camp bus and was picked up by our friends.

She was exhausted! We were supposed to do a video chat with her last night so that we could all see her before she got home today. At 6 pm, she asked Julie if there was a guest room. When Julie answered in the affirmative and then asked her why, Caroline asked if she could take a nap. That was the last anyone heard from her until 7 this morning!

This morning, we ran into a snag. Our plan was for Caroline to be on the 9 am flight out of Minneapolis/St. Paul and be back in DFW at noon. She is flying stand-by though and the flight was full. Blaine is monitoring the flights and it looks like tomorrow morning is our best shot for a flight. So, Caroline gets an extra day in the much cooler Minnesota weather!
She is doing fine though and enjoying her extra playtime with Emma.

We have such wonderful friends! Thank you Blaine, Julie and Emma for welcoming our Caroline into your home!

We have pictures!

2011-07-28T22:52:00.000-05:00

We hit the jackpot today! We got a letter AND we get to see pictures!
1. Look at that smile!!
2. Someone is doing her hair!
3. She is holding the camera, so we may actually get to see pictures! :D

Correspondence from camp

2011-07-28T18:30:00.000-05:00

I am sure that my children are the only ones who leave me in a vacuum when they leave for a week or two. Both Libby and Caroline were able to receive emails (Libby's for a fee, Caroline's free) at their camps. I, dutifully, emailed every day to let them know the status of important things like how many library books we checked out and how hot it is.
With both girls, I sent note cards and envelopes. I pre-addressed them and stamped them. And, I truly did not expect to receive anything. But, it was there should the muses move them.
Libby's camp did not move her to write home.
Three days before Caroline comes home though, we have received a letter!
Never has a letter generated such excitement in our house (especially, with Libby).
Dear Mom,
How's things going at home? Things are going well here. I'm having LOTS of fun!
From:
Caroline

At the surface, it doesn't seem to say much. But it DIDN'T say that she was miserable or hated it or homesick. And, that says it all.

Libby, immediately, sat down and wrote her (via email) back:
dear Carly,
we were very happy to get mail from you! And we got amon carter books today. I miss you very much I can't wait to see you again! You know that flower thing I got at camp we took it out to see it shrink and after a week or so it shrank. And when you get home I will give you a BIG HUG! Libby

And, when you know that that is the same child that would hardly tell us good-bye when we dropped her off and the same child who said that she would be fine for three weeks without Caroline because they "always fight anyway", that speaks volumes.

Sen Lin Hu ZhiLu

2011-07-28T18:19:00.000-05:00

This is Caroline's camp singing one of their songs. You can see Caroline (sort of, barely) in the front row. She is wearing a brown shirt and hot pink pants?

Sen Lin Hu Free Time

2011-07-22T20:29:00.001-05:00

The camp posted some pictures yesterday showing an after dinner free time. Caroline appears several times, but her back is always to the camera.

She is wearing navy blue capris and a light blue shirt. Doesn't she look little? This camp is for 9-14 year olds and she won't be 9 until September, so she is probably the baby of the camp.

Sen Lin Hu Chants

2011-07-22T20:21:00.000-05:00

Here is a video from the camp blog from the first night of camp. Caroline's group is the first one after they stop singing the John Denver song in Chinese.

Caroline is at camp now

2011-07-20T19:23:00.001-05:00

After we got Libby home, Alex, Caroline, Libby and I were home for a whopping 12 hours before we left for Minnesota. We completely missed seeing Ken and Joseph because they didn't get home until later that day.
This was our schedule:
Friday: Pick up rental car, drive to Camp Bette Perot in Athens, pick up Libby and drive back to McKinney (stopping to eat at Gloria's at Libby's request) and pick up tamales to deliver to Julie in St. Paul.

Saturday: Leave McKinney at 7 am bound for Kansas City. Arrive in Kansas City at 3:30 pm

Sunday: Leave KC for St. Paul, MN. Arrive in St. Paul at about 4 pm. We spent the night with my friend Julie and her family.

Monday: Julie and I drove Caroline 4 1/2 hours to Sen Lin Hu and then drove back 4 1/2 hours to St. Paul. We spent 2 hours at the camp helping Caroline to get settled and go through all of her check in stuff. Alex, Libby and Emma (Julie's daughter) spent the day at Mall of America.

Tuesday: Leave St. Paul and head back to Kansas City, arrived about 5 pm.

Wednesday: Leave Kansas City for McKinney, stopping to see Big Brutus in Kansas. We arrived home around 7 pm.

I drove over 2600 miles in six days. Did I mention that I have a killer case of poison ivy right now?

Here are some pictures that Julie took of Caroline checking into camp.
When we arrived in Minnesota, it wasn't terribly different than Texas. The temperature was in the mid 90's and the humidity was 80%....that's actually WORSE than Texas. We were a little wilty.
As soon as we arrived at the camp, everything was in Chinese. Caroline had to check in, go through customs (they check for contraband....ipods, cell phones, English books, food, etc.), she had to exchange her currency (She was very impressed that her $100 got her 700 Yuan), check in with the nurse for a lice check, make her name tag, unload her stuff in her room (she has an awesome room!) and go through a little language evaluation.

Her cabin is called the Norwegian Log Cabin
The camp is a cross country ski resort the rest of the year. This is a picture from their website. The loft above is Caroline's "bed" and the couch and chair below are hers. Her roommate has the same thing on the other side. The loft floor was large enough for her to have all of her stuff up there and still be able to move around.

Julie and I wanted to stay at camp too! What a cool place! We left Caroline after the check-in for the drive back to St. Paul. She was getting ready to go change into her swimsuit and take a dip in the lake to cool off.
As soon as we got back to Texas, the heat left MN (and their government decided to start operations again after three weeks of shutdown). So, hopefully, Caroline is enjoying some milder Minnesota weather now.

Girl Scout Camp and Boy Scout Camp

2011-07-15T19:09:00.025-05:00

It was a really quiet week here this week. Joseph AND Libby (and Ken) were all at summer camp. Caroline and I spent the week getting ready for our trip to Minnesota and packing for her upcoming two week Chinese immersion camp experience. So we were pretty busy.
I didn't hear from the boys at their scout camp, but I was able to kind of keep track of Libby via their photo site. Although, there were no pictures of her posted until Thursday and we had to go get her on Friday. :p I was a little concerned about Libby being at camp since she tends to HATE heat and it has been over 100* for days now. And she doesn't tend to suffer in silence.
When we picked her up on Friday, the head counselor told us that she had a rough day on Monday (the day after she got there), a minor issue on Tuesday and after that she was fine. WHEW. They got off easy. She is saying that she doesn't want to go back until she is MUCH older (not next year), although she did say that the homesickness would not have been as bad if she had had Caroline with her.

She was so happy to see us. She hugged and hugged and hugged Alex, Caroline and I. She even said she missed Joseph!
I am so proud that she made it through without any major issues.
Here are the two pictures of her from the Camp Bette Perot site.

Sea Life Aquarium

2011-07-08T20:21:00.025-05:00

Libby got to attend a VIP tour of the new Sea Life Aquarium in Grapevine because she was one of the Young Environmentalists chosen in their contest. Libby and I got to go on a tour before it opened to the public with the other Young Environmentalists and the media. It is such a cool place! I can't wait to take the other kids back there (once we have everyone back in the house again from all of the various camps!)

All of the Young Environmentalists received a tshirt.

We had to wait a few minutes for the doors to open for our tour.

Once they let us in, they had giant muffins from Corner Bakery for us to eat.

Here are all of the Young Environmentalists together.

This giant stuffed stingray was very snuggly.

Giant stuffed seals are also very snuggly.

Gaufest

2011-07-04T13:49:00.000-05:00

Manatees.....finally

2011-06-30T20:57:00.002-05:00

Day 3 in Florida and Manatee day is finally here. I was worried all night long because rain started the night before and it thundered all night long. When we got to the dock, it was still dark. Captain Mike had been watching the radar and he felt confident that the storms had moved past us. In fact, it did clear up. When the sun starting peaking over the horizon, we were treated to a beautiful rainbow. The rain stayed away until the exact moment that we pulled back into dock at the end of our tour.
We got to the dock very early so that we wouldn't have to worry about time again. When we did arrive, Captain Mike had clearly had time to dwell on what had happened the day before. He was very contrite about the problem and gave all five of us t-shirts of our choice, the kids got stuffed manatees and we got two disposable underwater cameras. We all felt much better about the screw up after receiving all of the stuff. ;)
The excursion was incredible. I really recommend it. Manatees are incredibly amazing and HUGE. They are very gentle and do not have an aggressive bone in their bodies. Some were very curious about the humans on their turf and some were a little shy.
The kids did not last very long in the water. With the combination of wearing the wetsuit, snorkels and masks (that were not their own), admonishments to NOT kick and to do the dead man float AND cool water, made it trickier for the under 12 set. I do think, in retrospect, if we had had the opportunity to let them practice getting on and off the boat, floating, not kicking and acclimating to the temperature before we reached the manatees, the outcome might have been different. However, the kids were perfectly content to watch from the boat and take pictures from above.
Alex and I were able to master being calm in the water though. ;) At our first stop, the manatees were very friendly. There was one that was particularly bothered by algae growing on her back. She was very appreciative of a good back scratching.
Our boat captain (a different Captain Mike) was an awesome tour guide. He was a certified diver and EMT, plus he had worked for NOAA as a marine biologist. We felt like we were in pretty capable hands. He recognized all of the manatees and knew their names. Joseph asked if there was a manatee named Hugh (get it? Hugh Manatee? Humanity?) and there was. Obviously, there is a marine biologist out there with a Joseph sense of humor.
The water was VERY murky because of the rain from the previous night. You can tell by how close the manatee is to the camera that I couldn't see her coming. All of a sudden there would be a manatee six inches from my face.

Homosassa, FL....Day 2

2011-06-29T21:53:00.002-05:00

Today was the day we were supposed to wake up early and go swim with the manatees. I made the reservations MONTHS ago and had an email confirmation that said:
Hello Theresa,

     This e-mail confirms your reservation for 4 persons Tour A June 29h.
Please bring swimsuit and towel and meet at 1 Southwest 1st Place Crystal
River,FL 34429 at 7:30am.

   See you soon and thank you for choosing my company.

          Cordially,

               Captain Mike

So, I got the kids up early and we were there 30 minutes early, more than the website suggested. We get there, only to find out that the boat had already left and that the time is actually supposed to be 7 am.
I had printed out all of our confirmations, but had neglected to bring this one with us on that day. It was sitting back in the room.
While Captain Mike is telling me, over and over again, that the time has ALWAYS been 7 am and he has been doing this for ten years and NEVER had someone tell him that the time was wrong on the confirmation, I am trying to pull up my email on my phone with my hands shaking and thinking to myself, "Oh, crap. I really screwed this up."
Alex helps me with the search and I finally pull up the above email. I show it to Alex to make sure that I am not just plain nuts. Alex confirms that it says 7:30, so I show it to Captain Mike. He was stunned. He offered to let us come the next day, which happened to work out ok, so we did that.
Because of this little change, we had the entire day ahead of us!
We are on the Gulf Coast side of Florida and along a part of the coast that is not known for beaches. However, we had passed a sign on the way to the boat dock, so I decided to take the kids to the beach. Because it was so early, we had the beach to ourselves. I think this was the kids favorite part of the trip. They were ready to move to the coast!
After a couple of hours there, we left and went to the Ellie Schiller State Park where "our" manatee is a resident. We finally got to meet Ariel!

Homosassa Springs, FL

2011-06-28T21:00:00.002-05:00

We had a fabulous trip to Homosassa Springs, FL as part of our Orlando trip for Gaufest. A couple of years ago, the kids adopted a Manatee from the Save the Manatee organization. Ever since then, they have asked to "go visit" their manatee. When the Orlando trip came up, I decided that making this side trip would be a great alternative to an Orlando theme park. ;) We loved Homosassa Springs. We had beautiful weather (how many people go to Florida in the summer to escape the heat?!) and a wonderful experience.
We stayed at the Riverside Resort on the Crystal River. It was an older "resort", but perfectly comfortable for our purposes. The kids had a lot of fun finding scallop shells in the river. In fact, we brought home about 10 lbs of scallop shells.
After checking into the hotel and having our fill of finding scallop shells, we went to eat and then finished out the day at the pool. We all wanted to get a good night sleep for our manatee excursion the next morning....

YE Competition on Facebook

2011-06-23T14:15:00.000-05:00

YE Competition on Facebook (1)

Libby is one of the winner of the Young Environmentalist competition for the new Sea Life Aquarium opening up in Grapevine! She will get invited to VIP events and a pass to go to the Aquarium for a year. She has to miss the first event next week while we are in Orlando. The event is welcoming the fish to the Aquarium. We figure that swimming with Manatees in Florida is probably an acceptable reason to miss. ;)
The following week, she gets to go on a VIP walk through of the aquarium before it opens to the public. SO COOL!! Congratulations Libby!

Nature Challenge-LLELA

2011-06-03T14:30:00.000-05:00

The kids and I ventured out this morning to do a Nature Challenge at LLELA. This is one of our favorite places, but it is starting to get hot early in the morning and we got a little toasty. It was a fun challenge though! We were supposed to find birds and butterflies. We saw a lot of butterflies but we only heard the birds. They were, apparently, hiding out in the trees.
We saw lots of spiders, evidence of beavers and a living bridge. :D

Chemical Change Unit

2011-05-25T14:36:00.001-05:00

Joseph and Caroline are finishing up their "Chemical Change" unit for MBTP. Their final project was to create a poster or a power point presentation about Chemical Change in Digestion. Joseph asked if he could a webpage because he is teaching himself HTML. Caroline also asked to do a webpage (but not HTML).
Here is what they came up with:
Joseph's Chemical Change Page

Caroline's Chemical Change Page

Getting Caroline to Minnesota

2011-05-14T12:42:00.002-05:00

We have started a fundraising campaign to try and get Caroline to Minnesota. If you have a few dollars or AA miles to spare, we will be forever indebted!

<p>&amp;amp;lt;br&amp;amp;gt;http://www.indiegogo.com/Get-Caroline-to-Minnesota?a=145504&amp;amp;amp;amp;i=wdgi</p>

JoeFest (AKA Joseph is 11!)

2011-05-09T22:16:00.001-05:00

Joseph turned 11 today! Joseph is the same age that Alex was when he was born.
We started out the day really living on the edge. We had Joseph's La Madeleine Ann's Cake for BREAKFAST! This was a first in our family, but there wasn't too much push back on it. ;)

Then it was time for our long awaited trip to Legoland Discovery Center in Grapevine. We got there a few minutes before they opened.

It starts out with a mock tour of the "factory". Joseph got to turn the crank because he was the birthday boy.

There there as a ride that had shooting involved. This is a picture of the screen of our "action shot" during the ride.

The other ride at the Discovery Center was one of those that goes around in a circle. You go up and down by pedaling.
Because of the indoor lighting, lots of yellow and the speed of the ride, the pictures might make you sick. :p

The kids did some building. There was a racetrack to test cars on and shaking platforms to simulate earthquakes for lego buildings.

The coolest thing there was the miniature Dallas/Ft. Worth made out of Legos. They had all kinds of landmarks. The big ones like Ranger and Dallas stadium, but smaller ones like Granada Theater. Also, historic ones like Union Station and the Book Depository.

Most of us made it through the morning with just the cake, but Caroline did need a little pick-me-up of cantaloupe. The food was typically high priced and mostly snacks. I did see some people in the center eating from brown bags, so I guess they might allow outside food. You can get your hand stamped, go to the food court and eat, then come back. It wasn't worth it to us. We were ready to leave after a couple of hours.
One thing that threw us was when we were in the store and trying to buy some things, Joseph couldn't use his Lego gift card that I bought for him because Lego Discovery Center and the Lego Store associated with it are not the same company as the Lego Store in the other malls. So, after a lunch at Ritzy's, we made a stop at Stonebriar Mall to spend our Lego gift card.

Joseph and Ken are joined by "Bananas", Libby's new monkey stuffed animal that she got the other day as a gift from Alex.

Carter Jr.

2011-05-04T14:04:00.000-05:00

I believe I have posted before about the amazing grant that I received from National Endowment for the Humanities, Picturing America. They gave away thousands of grants to schools and homeschools for an American Art and History program. They sent gorgeous 24"x36" prints plus a teacher guide....all very well done. That was amazing by itself.
Our co-op has enjoyed the prints for multiple classes and semesters, especially during our last semester which had an America theme.
Even better was when the Amon Carter Museum in Ft. Worth offered an additional grant to those that had already received the prints through NEH. I was lucky enough to have been selected to participate with about 50 other teachers, including public, private and homeschool educators. Through this grant, we received a lot MORE benefits, including a stipend for me to attend, a special planned field trip for our co-op (including mileage reimbursement!), access to special materials and then, today, I received a box with books, posters and note cards in it.
We already love the Amon Carter Museum. They do an amazing job with their educational programs and my kids love going there. We just did their latest book club and adored the selection. I highly recommend The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate to all of my friends, whether you have kids to read it with or not.
So, to the point of this post. After the box arrived in the mail today, the girls were very excited. They decided to create "Carter, Jr." in our school room. We hung up the posters we just received (the other prints will be added after we receive them back from co-op) and they displayed the books that the museum sent, plus a few select ones they thought would fit in.
Currently, they are in there, conducting their own Carter, Jr. Bookclub. :D

Chera's Bluebonnet Pictures!

2011-05-03T08:30:00.000-05:00

We got them! They turned out incredible despite our eccentric outfits. :D

She won!!!!

2011-05-01T10:01:00.000-05:00

Super Summer Giveaway

Congratulations to Caroline, winner of the Super Summer Giveaway Video Contest!!!

Log Cabin Village and Pioneer School

2011-04-28T10:03:00.001-05:00

We had an awesome field trip to the Log Cabin Village with our homeschool group.
What a great addition to our America semester at co-op!
Almost all of the kids dressed up, which really added to our experience. They were all super good sports about sitting in the one room schoolhouse and enduring the "lessons".
We had school during the morning hours, a lunch break (with our authentic lunches) and then a tour of the village in the afternoon.

Eggs

2011-04-24T20:40:00.000-05:00

Dying eggs!

Bucket Bonnets

2011-04-23T15:54:00.000-05:00

This week, we will have a field trip to the Log Cabin Village in Fort Worth with our homeschool co-op, Homeschoolers EXCEL. This is one of our final events to wrap up our America Semester. The first part of our field trip will be a one room schoolhouse experience (hm...that will be different :p) with some of the moms as teachers. Log Cabin Village encourages participants to wear costumes and pack authentic lunches to help enrich the experience.
I posted a couple of weeks ago the dresses and bonnets that I made for the girls. This is one of the events that those were made for. The kids decided we needed metal pails for our lunches...and, no, one large pail would not be sufficient. We EACH need a pail. We found the perfect buckets at Home Depot last weekend for about $3 each. Joseph, however, thought that we needed covers for the pails so that they weren't exposed to the elements and bugs. He thought something like a shower cap would be good. So, we made bucket bonnets and matching napkins.

Earth Day!

2011-04-22T23:17:00.044-05:00

We had a very busy Earth Day!
(First, I will give Alex credit for all of the following pictures. Adobe has figured out that my trial period has ended and I can't edit the pictures that I took. I guess it is back to a very old version Photoshop Elements for me!)
We started out the day at the Heard Museum doing one of our Nature Challenges. Bonus! Alex was with us all day! :D
Oh! We faux tie-dyed tshirts and then put Earth Day iron on transfers.

From there, we met some friends at Twisted Root for some awesome burger goodness and then we tried to walk over and see the Wyland Gallery, but it closed down. We did play giant Checkers for a little while though before lunch.

After lunch, we headed over to catch our annual Disney Nature Earth Day Film. This year's movie is African Cats and it was wonderful! The landscapes alone are worth watching the movie.

After the movie, we headed home for an hour and a half so that Alex could take a nap and then we headed out again to the Zoo for Frog Club. On the way, we made a quick stop at The Disney Store at Northpark to trade plastic bags for reusable Earth Day bags. Score!

We had another great Frog Club meeting, although we still didn't hear any frogs during the listening times. We did have an awesome Metamorphosis Lab. Jessie and Lucy had all kinds of amphibians for us to examine in all stages of development. Way cool!

We were in the Amphibian and Reptile building for our lab, so we go to visit some of the other residents. This Cobra was quite agitated and actually attacked the aquarium three times while we were watching him. There was venom running down the sides of the glass.

Happy Earth Day!!!!

Bathing Beauties

2011-04-19T13:50:00.009-05:00

Our pool is open. The kids have been asking since February to go swimming so they have been relentless in the pursuit of outdoor water since they found out that the season has begun. So, we had our first swim of 2011 this week.
Oh, and Alex fixed my Photoshop! Yay!

Sneak Peak of Chera's Bluebonnet Pictures

2011-04-17T06:38:00.000-05:00

Chera sent me a couple of pictures to tease us! We were, obviously, in rare form yesterday!

Bluebonnets 2011

2011-04-16T22:43:00.000-05:00

Tonight, we met our friends Chera and Cassidy at the JC Penney headquarters to take some bluebonnet pictures. These are my pictures. Chera's will be WAY better!

Nasher Homeschool Class

2011-04-15T22:07:00.000-05:00

We had one of our favorite events this week....the Nasher Sculpture Center. They always have amazing exhibits and their educational staff does a phenomenal job of make it accessible to the kids.
The class this time was about Conservation of art.
The kids are examining this painting to look for things that might have happened to it since the artist painted it.

Here, the kids sketched out one of their shoes and did a damage inventory of it.

We also talked quite a bit about before and after in art. The kids sketched out drawings to make their projects, which were shrinky dinks.

Joseph's was quite involved. :p (It didn't look like this when we shrunk it.)

One of the pieces of art that is on exhibit is a room that is half filled with balloons....all yellow. It is meant to be interactive, so they let you go in the room. There were 3,000 balloons in the room. I learned that it is difficult to take pictures of people when you are surrounded by balloons. :p

Chinese Commercial

2011-04-12T09:15:00.002-05:00

Since Caroline has been taking Chinese now for two years, I started researching language immersion camps. Ha! There is no way that she will be doing that is THIS lifetime without being adopted by Donald Trump. I did find Concordia Language Villages who offer contests and scholarships to help send potential campers to camp.

Caroline decided to do an entry for their Commercial Contest. The commercial is supposed to be in a language other than your own and in the style of the target country. It is also supposed to be about a Chinese product. We didn't exactly fill that requirement, but all of the Chinese products that we could find commercials for were American things (like McDonald's and Coke). There are some really funny ones out there for American things in Chinese. And we got quite an education in Asian commercials. They are very different than American ones.
The company that we are imitating did this commercial during the Beijing Olympics and they helped pioneer the Asian style of repeating things three times in a commercial.
Here is the commercial that we imitated.

Here is their original commercial which is really kind of painful to watch.

And here is our version.

Keep your fingers crossed for her!!

Girl Scout Day at Dallas Heritage Village

2011-04-09T20:27:00.000-05:00

This is another "girl" weekend here. Ken and Joseph are on their second Boy Scout camp out and Alex has been busy working.
Today was the annual Girl Scout Day at Dallas Heritage Village and there was a Laura Ingall's theme. We are all over that one.
I made the girls dresses and bonnets and their dolls dresses and bonnets with fabric that I had laying around the house. They looked pretty stinkin' cute!

All of the activities directly related to the Little House books.
That afternoon, when Carrie was asleep, Ma beckoned Mary and Laura. Her face was shining with a secret. They put their heads close to hers, and she told them. They could make a button string for Carrie's Christmas!
Making button strings....

Washing clothes on the washboard. They each earned a penny for their hard work which they then went to the general store and used to buy a piece of chalk for school.

Then Mary saw a red bead and Laura saw a green one, and they forgot everything but beads. Pa helped them look. They found white beads and brown beads, and more and more red and blue beads. All that afternoon they hunted for beads in the dust of the Indian camp.

Writing on the slate with our hard earned piece of chalk.

Hand "tinting" photographs

Churning butter

Mary sat beside Ma and sewed another block of her non-patch quilt, but Laura mixed another bucketful of mud.

Listening to music from the Little House books.

Trying out the plow (with a little help!)

Is it just me, or does Caroline look like she is dancing with the hoe? ;)

Tuckered out. It should be noted that it is the first week of April and she was "hot". It may be a long summer.

A picture of the girls and their outfits.

Blog Pirate

2011-04-09T19:47:00.000-05:00

Since the kids all got netbooks about a month ago, I helped Libby set up a blog on my account. She has been surprisingly good at updating it and it has been pretty amusing to read. Then I realized that she had gone into my profile and changed the picture to HER and the description to HER and the signature to HER.
I am still trying to figure out how I can get her an account so that she can have all of that without completely derailing my blog. :p

Zoo Birds

2011-04-05T20:30:00.020-05:00

This past week, it was homeschool day at the Dallas Zoo which we were supposed to attend. However, on Monday we had a thunderstorm when we woke up, followed by very chilly weather and gale force winds. We decided that we would wait and go on Tuesday when the forecast was sunny, warm and light breezes.
We had a great day! We spent a lot of time at the Children's area with the birds.

Nature Challenge-Trinity River Audubon Center

2011-03-19T07:49:00.000-05:00

Nature Challenge - Windows Live

We have started doing the Nature Challenges again. On St. Patrick's Day, we headed down to the Trinity River Audubon Center to check it out. It's a haul from McKinney, but it was totally worth it!
The facility is beautiful and we had a beautiful day for it.

More snow pictures

2011-01-09T19:28:00.000-06:00

These are the pictures that Alex took. (While doing his best unibomber impersonation)

Snow!

2011-01-09T12:59:00.000-06:00

The kids woke up this morning singing "Snow!" from "White Christmas".
You know, the one that goes like this:

Snow
It won't be long before we'll all be there with snow
Snow
I want to wash my hands, my face and hair with snow

Snow
I long to clear a path and lift a spade of snow
Snow
Oh, to see a great big man entirely made of snow

It rained and rained and rained while they sang.
FINALLY, at about 11:00 big, fluffy flakes started falling and rapidly accumulating.
Our lives are complete.

New Year's Eve

2010-12-31T12:13:00.011-06:00

The girls and I headed down to the Dallas Museum of Arts for their annual Kids New Year's Eve celebration....at noon.
No pictures, but the girls won a creativity contest for the "best wrapping of a mom". (No pictures because I was wrapped up.)

Christmas Eve

2010-12-24T12:12:00.000-06:00

I gave the kids their dolls on Christmas Eve....early. I didn't want the really cool things to overshadow my efforts. ;) The kids were in absolute awe. Especially, Libby. She kept saying, "You actually made ALL made all of this?!"
I also had the girls put the dresses on that I made them so that they would match the dolls when they were opened.

I finished the dolls!

2010-12-23T18:27:00.000-06:00

In the middle of November, I decided that it would be a good idea to make dolls for the kids for Christmas. A month should be PLENTY of time, right?! I finished the last seam and button last night. Two nights before Christmas Eve. If I had a bit more time, I would have been more elaborate with the costumes, but I did all six outfits this week, so I couldn't do too much. I can always add to the wardrobes, right?
So, here they are:
My favorite, Alaric (oh, I named them for the kids, so they don't end up being called brownie, blackie, Mr. Curly, etc. :p). Alaric means Ruler of All in German.
His shirt is made from a scrap of gingham that I had and a sweater of Ken's that had shrunk. I washed it in hot water to felt it even more (boy, is it thick!).
The first two are Joseph's.

This is Zuri (Swahili for "Good Looking")

Libby is getting Darby (Free in Gaelic)

and Marisol (Sunny Sea in Spanish)

Caroline is getting Erin (peace in Gaelic)

and Meiying (Beautiful flower in Mandarin)

Ginger Cookies and Berry Ink

2010-12-06T22:08:00.000-06:00

We have been studying the Civil War and today we talked about what a soldier's life would have been like.
After we finished our reading, we had a couple of fun things to do.
First, we made ink out of leftover raspberries (how lucky was that?!), vinegar and salt. Did you know that raspberry ink is blue when it dries? We didn't have any quill pens handy, so I snipped the end of straws to make a point. It worked great!

Then, we made gingerbread cookies. We had an assembly line going....scoop, roll in sugar, place on pan (we rotated so that everyone got to roll the balls in the sugar. ;)) The cookies are really yummy.

Dance Party-House Party

2010-11-30T21:32:00.015-06:00

Last week, we got to host another House Party. This one was for Wii Dance Party 2 and what fun it was! We hosted our Girl Scout Troop's Holiday Party and the girls danced for 3 hours!

Here is our fearless Scout Leader, Sally, joining in the fun

Midsummer NIght's Dream

2010-11-18T18:57:00.029-06:00

I can't believe our fall semester of co-op has ended! We had such a blast with our Renaissance themed semester.
My class was called "Shakespeare Shorts". The kids spent the entire semester working on an abbreviated version of Midsummer Night's Dream. The entire play was 15 minutes long! We had 10 weeks to get our act together, so to speak.
All three kids were in the play. Joseph was Oberon, the Fairy King, Libby is Helena and Caroline is Titania, the Fairy Queen.
A few of the kids braved going scriptless and did fabulously. Most of them could have done it without their scripts (I know that I have been hearing lines spontaneously for weeks from my three!) However, with 10 weeks of 1 hour per week to get it all together, I didn't push memorizing lines.
The kids DID gain a really thorough understanding of their character and the language of Shakespeare.
I had my kids watch the movie version at the beginning of the semester and then again at the end. Their comprehension of what was happening in the story was completely different by the end of the semester.
Yay for "Shakespeare Shorts"!
Here is Helena, talking to Hermia and Lysander and learning of their plan to leave Athens and marry.

Here is poor Helena following Demetrius around (and annoying the heck out of him) while Oberon watches.

Oberon, sprinkling the flower into Titania's eyes.

Curtain call

IESI Recycling Day

2010-11-17T22:41:00.027-06:00

Our trash and recycling company sponsored a "Recycling Day". Who could pass up an opportunity to see a recycling plant in action?!
They had a lot of different exhibitors. This one is demonstrating worm composting while Libby snuggles the earthworm.

The medical center demonstrated some first aid and had cool hats

The fire department had badges AND hats.

This table is a demonstration of erosion. The kids really enjoyed predicting which houses would fall into the river and when.

We also got to see where our recycling goes when it leaves our house. It was like a giant Rokenbok set!

Finger Knitting

2010-11-12T15:46:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, at co-op, I professed my absolute boredom with knitting. I just can't sustain my attention on it. Maybe that is partly because I have never learned to do anything other than just knit. I would not have a clue how to begin making a recognizable object.
But after making this loudly known yesterday, today Libby asked if I could show her how to finger knit again. She was quite the expert when she was about 5, but she hasn't done it in a long time. Then Joseph and Caroline thought that sounded like a really fun thing to do today, so we headed for a quick trip to the store to buy some yarn (because Ginger has found our yarn box and likes to take off the lid and remove the yarn from the box...not good for yarn.)
Libby is finger knitting. Joseph and Caroline are using spool knitters. They are basically the same technique...one uses fingers and one uses little posts.

We had to give Ginger some of the old yarn that we had. She must be part cat. She really wanted to steal the yarn that the kids were working with.

Halloween!

2010-11-02T15:34:00.000-05:00

This year, we ALL dressed up in some form or fashion.

We had Alice

The Mad Hatter

The White Queen

The Cheshire Cat

You can see the Jack of Hearts in this picture (walking the White Rabbit)

Some places we didn't spend much time at...

North Texas Family Expo

2010-10-30T20:03:00.000-05:00

After our volleyball game this morning, the kids and I came home and got their Halloween costumes on and headed over to the North Texas Family Expo for some Halloween fun. Ken was at school and Alex had to work, so we were on our own.
I intended to stay for just little while, but the kids ended up taking part in the costume contest.

Then we had to wait about an hour before they revealed the winners.
and guess what?!
Our very own Mad Hatter WON in the 9-11 boys contest!

Congratulations Joseph!

A couple of pictures from the Fashion Show

2010-10-24T22:16:00.001-05:00

A friend of mine got some pictures of the girls! Yay!

American Girl Fashion Show

2010-10-24T19:13:00.000-05:00

Today was our much anticipated American Girl Fashion Show. The girls were even MORE excited this year because they got to be historical characters (vs. Bitty Babies or contemporary fashions). It's a huge milestone in AG Fashion Show world. ;) )

We got halfway to the show before I realized that I didn't have my camera, but I did get some grainy video with my phone.
Libby was Molly. She has braids with red bows and she is wearing red and white striped pajamas.
Caroline was Rebecca. She wore a low ponytail with a blue bow, white pajamas and a blue robe.

I have to tell you this because the picture may not be clear enough to see.

BFF?

2010-10-18T19:14:00.000-05:00

Who would have thought that Grumpy Old Lady would put up with THIS?!

Bumper Starz

2010-10-16T19:49:00.008-05:00

The girls are playing volleyball again this season. We are having a lot of fun. Caroline actually got a serve over the net today! (This has been eluding both of them this season). Both girls are right there when it comes time to bump though!
Libby is #9

Caroline is #8 (this was taken right as she bumped the ball)

Nasher Sculpture Center

2010-10-15T19:21:00.039-05:00

We had one of our favorite field trip destinations...the Nasher. Not only do they give you a pencil and a sketchbook when you go there, they also have awesome exhibits and really cool projects to do. ;)
Today's class was on innovation in art...how artists use different materials that might not always be considered art material. Some of it really reminded me of my grandfather. He never met a piece of junk that he did not get along with, I don't think. He would have fit right in at this exhibit.
I think that Libby has something that she wants to contribute to this discussion...

One of the really cool sculptures that we saw.

Libby had a lot to say today.

Working on our projects. The kids had to decide whether to build a weather machine, time machine or machine to do their chores. Then they were each given a lunchbag full of stuff to use to build it. Everyone had different stuff. (Caroline, Libby and our friend Ben)

Joseph and our friends Alex and Alia.

Caroline's weather machine.

Joseph's invention.

Ben contemplating what he should do next.

Alia and her machine.

Alex and his innovation.

Frisco Sci-Tech Discovery Center

2010-10-13T18:54:00.017-05:00

We came across a deal for a family membership to the Sci-Tech Discovery Center in Frisco. And we can't pass up a deal! The kids and I went over there and spent hours (after spending hours at the car dealership on an $800 car inspection :p). Their exhibits, right now, are about Math and Coordination. The kids loved all of it and we spent an entire afternoon playing. The place was empty except for a few other families. Coincidentally, we ran into someone that I went to high school with and someone that Caroline went to Chinese school with. How bizarre is that?
They had a crazy tricycle that had square wheels but rode smoothly...

There were lots of coordination activities (Joseph was really good at these).

And then.....BONUS! They had a COW EYE dissection! (Caroline had ZERO interest in touching a dissected cow eyeball, but the other two were really into it.)

Birdseed Wreaths

2010-10-05T13:29:00.000-05:00

Check it out....a birdseed thing that actually turned out the way it was intended. We made these to go with one of the stories in our Short Stories unit. They were very simple, too.

1 packet of unflavored gelatin

2 T. cold water

6 T. boiling water

2 c. birdseed

3 mini-bundt pans

Dissolve the gelatin in the 2T of cold water and let sit for a minute. Add the 6 T. of boiling water and stir until dissolved. Stir in birdseed until all seeds are coated. Let sit for a minute. Stir again.

Spoon into bundt pans and let set (we put in them in the fridge for a couple of hours).

We, also, only 1/2 filled the pans because the "hole" didn't go all the way to the top of the pan.

I wonder if the birds will appreciate them!

Ginger

2010-09-30T19:19:00.000-05:00

We have a new addition to our family.
We have added a one year old Dachshund to our mix. That goes perfectly with an 11 year old Greyhound and a 10 year old Jack Russell, right?
She is adorable, mischievous, funny and smart and has had us all giggling at her antics.

People of Sparks

2010-09-26T21:40:00.000-05:00

We finished People of Sparks last week, one literature unit down, 11 to go! The kids really enjoyed this story.
The final project they were asked to consider what would have happened if the citizens of Ember had emerged from under the earth in a different location.
They were supposed to make a flag, do a Venn diagram, make a map and write an essay. Somehow, NONE of them wrote the essay. They kept making more pieces and avoiding the writing. :p Joseph ended up with the first three components, a diagram of the government color coded to go with the flag and the map.

Joseph's Budthorn

Libby's Green Mountain (the "characters" are actually buildings. Apparently, the people emerged in a Disney World that was in Vermont. :p)

Caroline's Opportunity
(Her picture is of the beach and the ocean. There are doors all over both of them where the people can go to get everything they need to live. )

Rock Festival

2010-09-26T21:21:00.000-05:00

The kids started a new unit on Friday and it is on The Changing Earth. By coincidence, Brookhaven College had a rock expo thing today and it was a great way to kick off our new unit.
Alex took some great pictures of our morning! (The kids got free arrowheads if they came in their scout uniforms.)

Looking at one of our free rocks with a fancy camera/microscope set-up

Showing the guys at the Trinity Audobon table where Dallas is on the map

McKinney Oktoberfest

2010-09-25T21:16:00.000-05:00

What a difference from last week to this week!
Last weekend was extremely hot and muggy for Addison Oktoberfest. This week, we had McKinney Oktoberfest and it is about 25* cooler and very overcast (we were lucky that it rained when we were NOT supposed to dance).

The Almost Twins

2010-09-21T20:12:00.001-05:00

Libby FINALLY lost her front tooth! It had been hanging there forever and today I just helped it out. ;)
So, we have two 8 year olds and 2 missing teeth...how close to being twins can you get?

Caroline is 8!

2010-09-21T20:02:00.000-05:00

We had a little party for Caroline's birthday courtesy of House Party. It was so much fun! I applied for a Beyblade party, but didn't really have a clue what it would all be about. They sent 5 battle tops, an arena, cd's, posters, coupons...
We set up a tournament at the pool and invited some of our friends over to swim and battle. The kids had a blast and we may have created the new obsession at co-op. ;)

It's Oktoberfest time again!

2010-09-19T22:03:00.001-05:00

Yes, it is that time again! It is still extremely hot here in North Texas, but the calendar says it is time for Addison Oktoberfest. The kids performed on Thursday night at 8:00 pm (we had a mandatory two hour rest period on Thursday afternoon and the performance went surprisingly well!). Then they performed twice each on Saturday and Sunday.
Libby has a plantar wart the size of a quarter on her big toe. That coupled with the extreme heat and a loose tooth was enough for her to refuse to perform on Saturday. So, no pictures of Libby yet. She did perform on Sunday and redeemed herself.

(yes, it is Alex!)

And, here are the 2010 Alpine Dancers

We do it again next weekend in McKinney!

Arboretum

2010-09-17T20:33:00.002-05:00

This school year is already flying by! The kids are finishing up their first unit on geography. Their project involved going to a park-like place, taking pictures, sketching, documenting some facts and drawing a map.
We took our outing to the Arboretum, which is always a popular destination for the gang.
The kids took their cameras...

Made sketches of "wildlife"

The wildlife ;)

Studied the map and looked for landforms

Posed...

More wildlife

And a few more

And it IS the arboretum, so here is a flower.

Zoo

2010-09-10T20:20:00.000-05:00

We took advantage of our zoo membership last week and had a fun day at the Dallas Zoo. We finally go to check out the new section they finished earlier this year called Giants of the Savannah. It was really really awesome. I wish the entire zoo was like that.
The kids enjoyed feeding the giraffes huge leaves of lettuce. The giraffes obviously understood the drill. ;)

Westfest

2010-09-06T08:43:00.001-05:00

The Alpine Dancers busy season has officially started with Westfest. The adults have danced at this annual festival for 25 years (the kids don't make the trek to West for this one).
I rode with Alex and took a few pictures of the group then we stopped by to see Nanny and Hoppy on our way back to McKinney. :)

Image hosting, free photo sharing & video sharing at Photobucket

More geography.....contour maps, relief maps and measuring mountains

2010-09-02T15:33:00.002-05:00

This was one of those super hands on kind of days! Continuing on with geography, we started out talking about contour maps and made one of a sweet potato.

Then we moved on to relief maps (they need to dry and then be painted). The kids picked their "favorite" countries. Joseph chose Greece, Libby chose Germany and Caroline opted for Japan instead of China due to size. ;)

Then we talked about how mountains are measured and tried it out on a tree down at the park (mountains are a little scarce in these parts).
And, Joseph is apparently Captain Shanghai today. :p

We are back in full gear....

2010-08-31T15:12:00.002-05:00

OK, summer is over and it is time for me to get out of this blogging slump.
We started our new school year last week, a little later than usual because, well, we didn't have the curriculum. :p
Our first unit is Geography. It's actually supposed to be the second unit, but the materials were on back order, so I decided to start with #2. It's worked out really well. Who knew that Geography would be a topic that they were all so interested in?
The novel (as you saw in my last post) that goes along with it is "The People of Sparks". The kids loved the movie "City of Ember" and they are also really enjoying this second book in the series.
Joseph has really upped his output on projects so far this year. He has gone above and beyond on several different things. It started with the video in my last post, then he made a map of our neighborhood that is worthy of Mapsco. It is completely to scale and full of details (I would upload a picture of it, but it is MIA at the moment.)
Today, we were going over some landform terms (isthmus, peninsula, island, fjord, bay, strait). As we were finishing writing the definitions, drawing a picture and giving an example, Joseph announces that he is going to make an island with all of these features. (Little did he know that this was an extension activity suggested in MBTP ;)). So, I said, "Go for it!"
This is what he came up with.

(Yes, everything has a "car" theme to it.)

Joseph's movie review

2010-08-23T14:23:00.000-05:00

Here is Joseph's movie review of the "City of Ember".
Caroline hasn't done one yet. She got a little nervous about being on camera, even though she wrote it out her review.

CIty of Ember Movie Review

2010-08-23T14:21:00.000-05:00

This is Libby's review of the "City of Ember". This is movie is the prequel to the book we start tomorrow "The People of Sparks".
We are so lucky to have a big brother to film and edit for us!

Cover Girl

2010-08-03T20:12:00.004-05:00

Apparently, I take summer's off for blogging purposes. :p
We finally got to see Libby's Cover Girl shot for Connections Kids. We got a whole box of them in the mail, for anyone that needs one. :D
Oh, and Libby is just beside herself that she is now "famous".
Gotta love a green eyed, freckle faced cover girl!

4th of July

2010-07-05T12:14:00.004-05:00

We had great fun on the 4th celebrating with our best friends. We enjoyed bbq ribs that Ken spent all day long smoking and we played Wii Beatles Rock Band before we hit the fireworks display. Fireworks were a little on the sparse side at the McKinney show this year. We still had a lot of fun. Ken bought the kids glow sticks and that was money well spent!

Rockiology

2010-07-03T15:52:00.004-05:00

The girls have been classifying our fossils that we found yesterday. Caroline announced that they are "Rockiologists".
I realized that I didn't post many of our actual fossils, so here they are:

Pete Patterson Fossil Park

2010-07-02T19:38:00.002-05:00

Today, Ken, the kids and I all went to Ladonia, TX to visit the Pete Patterson Fossil Park. Don't even TRY to google it. There is very little in the way of information out there on this place. You can hardly find Ladonia, TX on Google.
Ladonia is a small town in northeast Texas, about 15 miles north of Commerce. It's claim to fame is the North Sulphur River which runs east/west just north of town.
When you drive through the town, you go a few miles until you cross over the river. Then you see this sign on the left:

You park in the parking lot and walk down the steps....

This is what the riverbed looked like for us

It was very odd. You could lift off pieces of this and it was about 3/4 inch thick and sort of floating on top of the next layer below it with water in between. It had really cool patterns though!
This was under water, but there were a TON like this.

Did I mention it was a RIVER?!

We weren't the only ones down there today. Notice the child size footprints in the bottom center of the picture. We couldn't decide if this was a pterodactyl or Big Bird.

And there was mud...

Did I mention that the riverbed looked cool?

and a few more of the kids...

LLELA

2010-06-06T18:28:00.002-05:00

On our second day of no girls, we had a field trip scheduled with Webelos at the LLELA. As luck would have it, LLELA is also a Nature Challenge destination. We met our den (and some extra friends), completed our Forester Badge, had a snack and then stayed for a little while longer to complete the Nature Challenge.
We ended up being there from 10 am until after 2.
During our Challenge hike, Joseph and Cameron got hot, so I dipped them into the Trinity River to cool off. I know, I know...it's the Trinity, but it is very clean and briskly flowing up in Lewisville. ;) The part that was not planned was when the bank gave way under my feet and *I* went into the river. Oops. It did feel good though.
Here is my little birdwatcher trying out the binoculars

Before I dunked Joseph, we tried filling his hat up with water. Hence, the grin.

Texas Nature Challenge

2010-06-03T18:21:00.001-05:00

This summer, one of our goals is to participate in the Texas Nature Challenge. We are off to a pretty good start.
On Thursday, I took the kids and met my parents to pass off the girls for a few days.
Joseph and I headed over to the Museum of Nature and Science and completed our first challenge. It helps that he would live at MNS if given the opportunity.

This was an important item on the challenge....the Delta Duckpotato.

Exploring the sculpture at the lagoon.

This guy was very curious about the intruders.

Joseph making a sketch of the sculpture.

Nature Challenge Man

Recital

2010-05-28T21:30:00.003-05:00

Last night we had our piano/percussion recital. It was a very small event. Joseph and Cameron and one other girl named Amanda all take lessons from Mrs. Ferrito, a junior high band director. This was the culminating event for their year of lessons.
Since Caroline and Libby have been taking piano lessons since January, they also performed a few little pieces.
We had the recital at the Dalton's house and it was PERFECT! It's not often that you get to go to a recital that lasts a total of 30 minutes. ;)
Joseph doing his keyboard solo

A picture of all of the musicians and Mrs. Ferrito.

Crossover

2010-05-08T22:12:00.005-05:00

The day after graduation, we had Crossover for cub scouts. This year wasn't too big of a deal because Joseph is already a Webelo, but he is now officially a Webelo II.
The Crossover Ceremony happened in conjunction with a family picnic.
Some of us brought some light reading along to keep us entertained.

Joseph and Ken down by the pond

There were a lot of ducks out!
Here is a mama and her babies

a mama still waiting on her babies

and a couple of empty nesters

It's not often that Joseph, Cameron and Alex are all this close together and not moving.

Even the sisters noticed that they were being still

Alex crossing over

Cameron crossing over

Joseph crossing over

Libby and Alia

Caroline in the sunset

It was a beautiful night for a picnic and playing with friends!