Day trip to a local wild life preserve

Today, we took a little day trip. Something totally out of the norm for us on a Saturday, but we were invited and gladly accepted. We may have to do this more often. We had a great time.

We went to a wild life preserve's "duck daze" where they had lots of fun activities for the kids to do, including a petting zoo, which is always a hit with my kids. Of course, I am the mean mom that doesnt like to go "in" with the animals....stepping in poo is not my idea of fun ;) But they don't know any different and had fun feeding the animals through the gate ;)

The Oldest and the youngest in our family so far....(notice the sweet hand holding)

Feeding the Sheep. Reminds me of how God takes care of those little details from feeding the animals to keeping us fed and taken care of.

The first borns of our family actually getting along today...must be the fresh air.

Wondering if we will get some of these Mama.....they're fun to pet.

It really was beautiful and a nice change of scenery......be blessed this weekend.

More pics of the Revolutionary War Trip

Here we were at the Admiralty Court. Ds volunteered to be arrested *giggle* He was pleading his case to the judge in this picture.



The Judge here was the judge, jury and prosecuting attorney (to show unfairness in the system without all of its parts) and of course, he was arrested due to the monetary gain by the Judge..lol.




Dd learning basic etiquette. She was learning to Curtsy.





*Sigh* All of these pigs were *spooning*..too cute!


Ah..isn't he just a handsome soldier? He was dead serious in his role...lol.





Here was the battle and the end of the trip. If you get a chance to experience something like this I would highly recommend it! There is nothing like hands on, living history to peak a child's interest!

Revolutionary War Field Trip

What a great starting point for our American History study!
This was the best field trip I think we have ever really been on. It was hands on History and something we all enjoyed. It was a long trip and holding my over 20 lb baby in a sling for 4 hours wasn't easy, but it was well worth it! We are looking forward to going back again.
If you live out in So Cal check out their website RileysFarm.com and go...you won't be disappointed :)

Here's basically what was learned on our trip: Games of the 18th Century, The Quartering Act, The Admiralty Court, Etiquette, The Stamp Act, A Well Regulated Militia, and Weaving.
That's alot to learn on one field trip!

Here are some pics of our first hands on experience: Weaving...







And here are some pics of my ds playing I think it was called "Ball and stick" but don't quote me on that ;p







And here I got pics of both kiddos making bread and butter :) You know this one was my favorite! They learned how wheat is ground, how to make a dough of out it and how to churn your own butter to put on the bread. This was Dd's favorite. She loves to help me bake bread.





Here is my ds with one of his buddies. Two boys churning butter...this will be a good one to keep for their future wives, dontcha think?



And here's a view of the mountain that we were on..it was beautiful and it made us look twice once we left realizing how far up we were!



I'll be posting this trip in a couple of posts....I have lots of pics to share :)
Have a blessed day!

Week In Review

This week has been a fun week for us :) Ds has been breezing through his Math, English, and Spelling!
He finished his Rod and Staff Bible Reader and has moved onto reading "The Story Of Davey Crockett" (pub in 1952) and narrating it back to me (telling me the story in his own words). He is doing well with naration and we will comtinue with it over the summer with his summer reading. I LOVE our library..I picked up that book (among others) for only .25 cents!

Science:
We have been doing a tomato seed project from Tomatosphere for science this week. He is responsible for the graphing/charting and watering of the seeds. I am happy to report that we have had some germinated! Here what they look like, although the pics aren't showing them at a great angle :-( They are about 3-4 inches tall!

The tomato seeds are on both the far right and left sides and in the middle we are growing watermelon (the biggest ones so far!), eggplant (this hasn't germinated yet), Dill, and bell peppers. This has been a great way to show how wonderful and yet so delicate God's creation is :-)

History:
Ds has been just reading though his BJU textbook about the Explorers and Early America..I have him do vocabulary and some of the comprehension questions. This was an add in after ECC didn't work for us and so far he doesn't mind just reading through it. It's also been a nice overview of American History before we start in with Ancients next year

Nature Walk:
Today we went to a real working dairy as a field trip and who woulda known it was goign to turn into a nature walk? We sighted an oil that is on the endangered species list! It is called the Burrowing Owl. I really loved reading up on these owls after finding out they are monogamous! HEHE....
Here's a couple of pics that I was able to catch..they aren't that great but if you look close you'll see it :-)



And here's a pic of it's burrow:


Like I said we went to the Dairy and the kids were able to feed the baby calves, learn about how the cows and milked, processed and packaged, and they also had a petting zoo with goats, chickens, peacocks, and rabbits (among other things too long to list..lol)
Here are a few pics of our day: (it was chilly out!)

This is a pic of Eeyore, His friend "Sky" and Tigger :-)

I think this peacock was trying to impress the females cuz he kept shaking a tail feather ;-P

Notice how "snug" my lil piglet was? It was pretty cold this a.m.

Eeyore really enjoyed feeding the calves :)

So did Tigger :-)


Isn't she just absolutely a doll....(gushy mom moment)


Hope you all had a blessed week as well!

Week in Review..

This has been a very busy week for me and I haven't been around much :-)
Our week started off pretty slow....Wed came and then it just zoomed by! One thing that has kept me busy is baking..I decided to stop buying store bread and have been making my own all this week..that has been a chore in and of itself..my hubby likes white bread and I like wheat..so I have been making double batches most days :-)

We also went to Sea World on Wed with our homeschool group, Thurs was spent catching up on cleaning, and today was parkday/errand day....I also managed to make some homemade deoderant tonight....ha....hope it works or hubby will have some angry co workers...lol! He's so good for trying out my little concoctions...There some good stuff in it and no chemicals like aluminum. It has cocoa butter, olive oil, and also tee tree oil which is good for alot of uses :-) Anyways..I'll update you on it's ability to keep away the "stank"!
Here's a few pics of our trip to Sea World:

Here's "Eeyore" watching the Sea Lion show...he really enjoyed it..

This is my step-mom and Tigger..she REALLY loved the sea lion..she was the loudest in the crowd..hehe:-)

Here's a pic of my little piglet being held by my friend Kristi

OK...All I am going to say was shark was over my head and that is not cool!

Why does my 8 yr old look like he's already 13? *sigh*

Tigger really loved seeing the turtles :-) We have one at home and she was wondering how he got there ;-)

The kiddos and I :-)


SO I kept thinking about Steve Irwin while my ds was petting this thing...I kept imagining it jumping out of the water and stinging us...am I the only one that thinks this way?

Ds and I acting silly right before we head home :-)


Hope you had a great week as well!