Fiber Fest!

We spent the morning at Fiber Fest and even went back for a bit in the afternoon. What could be better than perusing beautiful fibers with dear friends? For the record, peeking into a classroom to catch a glimpse of your favorite designer does not count as stalking! : )

Once she got her wheel to wake up, this lady really got her spinning groove on!

Beautiful roving that the girls' just couldn't stop touching by Two If By Hand!

 

These are handcrafted spinning wheels made right here in Texas! I love the Celtic design on this one.

Another demonstration on how to weave a beautiful shawl.

Decorative drop spindles and shawl sticks were tempting us at every turn. We oohed and ahhed to our hearts delight.

For the cousin who loves piggies!

Science Museum

Photos courtesy of The Professor...

He says he took this one for his sisters because it's pink but I think he took it because... it's a Stang.
He is a twelve year old boy, ya' know!

For all you Civil War buffs...

I was meaning to post this after we returned from Alabama and promptly forgot. On our way home, we decided to spend a little time in Vicksburg, MS and tour the battlefields. Some of the monuments were breathtakingly gorgeous. The Professor was ecstatic to see a real ironclad warship, the U.S.S. Cairo, up close and in person. I thought that the Cairo museum did an amazing job of showing off the artifacts found on the wrecked ship and I really enjoyed the short movie about the recovery efforts. You can watch the beginning of a similar video here.

I took a ton of pictures. Some of our favorite sights...

some that we thought our family would like...
(this one was for the boys cousins in Ohio!)


some for nature study...

and some just for fun!
...to be continued.

Log Cabin Village

subtitled: Field trip! Whoo hoo!

"On this day we plant acacia~
Pile bright flowers on grassy mound,
Dropping tears of kind remembrance,
Where a soldier's grave is found.
And, with reverential spirit,
To the God of battles pray
That our sons may proudly cherish
This our San Jacinto Day."

Today was a lovely day for a field trip and the perfect jump start to our history studies. Since the girls have finished up with their American Girls history studies, I think we are going to spend the remainder of the year with Texas history and what a great place to begin but the Log Cabin Village in Fort Worth! These log cabins were all built in the mid 1800's, disassembled, moved and put back together like giant jigsaw puzzles in this location to create a village of history.

And... today being San Jacinto Day, we couldn't have asked for better inspiration. We came home and read from one of our favorite Texas history books about the Battle of San Jacinto and will peruse our more detailed map of Texas later to find the locations of these historic events. But for now, we are content with looking at pictures and making plans to return with Daddy who is our resident history nut. Hope you enjoy the montage below.

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

*And to my sweet friend who wasn't able to join us today, you name the date and we will meet you there with lunch pails in our hands and bonnets on our heads!

Sea World 2008

So I was telling my MIL about our trip to Sea World and when I mentioned that they advertised "Holiday Shows" during the week of Thanksgiving she asked, "Which holiday would that be?" Really, who can blame her? In today's world where people refuse to sell Christmas trees or Christmas gifts, Christians feel like our holiday is the elephant in the living room. Everyone is celebrating it, but we're not allowed to talk about it. So, I was pleasantly pleased to be able to give my MIL a positive report regarding these holiday shows. They were Christmas shows! And they even said so!!!

While the sea lions were trying to help their trainer find her Christmas cheer, there was a Miracle being celebrated over at Shamu's stadium. They opened the show with Christmas caroling singing a mix of religious and secular songs. Then we turned our attention to the JumboTron to see the wise men seeking the newborn King and to listen to the announcer talk about the miracle of the child born to save us all. Wow. It really was a beautiful show.

But, the dolphin show was a particular favorite.

Due to the heavy acrobatics and diving skills in this show, it was the same one you can see year round. There is no way a Santa hat would survive a 30 foot drop! There is a man who performs a funny water skit before the show starts and then acts as a "silly master of ceremonies" throughout. BigBoy dubbed him the Chicken Man since he pretended to be too scared to dive into the pool at one point.BigBoy loved him! He wanted his picture taken with the Chicken Man afterwards so we made our way through the crowd in order to snap a shot. While they were smiling for the camera......this little baby beluga came up to the glass to say hello. BigBoy, when telling the story later says, "That's the baby beluga that wanted to be in my picture! I love him." We waved and signed "whale" at him (I am assuming "beluga" has to be fingerspelled) and even taught the Chicken Man how to sign whale (he asked).

Actually, thanks to Signing Time #9 The Zoo Train, we signed to the penguins, the dolphins, the star fish, the ducks and the sharks from a distance though (too scary for BigBoy and too far to walk for Mom and Grammie!) Hey, we're not wimps! We had just been walking since 9:30 that morning and thought 7 hours was plenty!

Thank you Grammie for a lovely Thanksgiving memory that is threatening to become a tradition!


P.S. That plug up above for Signing Time is my gentle reminder that awesome, educational Christmas gifts are just a click away!!! We have been so blessed by the two sets we own and I know they would benefit so many other families! I don't get a commission, I just really love their products!

Guess what I forgot to take on our field trip...

...the camera. : ( So here is a big ol' boring bunch of words!

I didn't mean to be mysterious about our field trip yesterday but I wasn't sure we were actually going to make it there so I kept it vague. Also because I am a super secret mom of mystery or so my kids like to think! Now I can tell you that our field trip yesterday was to an out of town college where another homeschooling group had arranged for a presentation on the election process, electoral college and some presidential trivia. Following that, the kids were invited to attend a rally for Ron Paul's 2008 presidential campaign which included a speech by the man himself and was supposed to be followed by a press conference. Now, I freely admit that we went for the opportunity to see the process in action. I am not any kind of political junkie and while we did read up on him before we went, it was in the car 20 minutes prior to our arrival. I liked some of what I read, but this field trip was not about supporting a candidate as much as it was just an experience.

Now, that said, back to your regularly scheduled blog post....

There was some confusion with the parking situation and not enough assistance to go around, but once we were frustrated beyond belief parked, we made it to the room where the homeschoolers were supposed to meet just in time for the presentation. The mom who talked to the kids had an incredibly creative way of teaching them about the electoral college and making it easier to understand how a candidate could loose the popular vote but win the election. She created a fictional United States that only consisted of 3 states and using the correct percentages to determine electoral votes for these three states she was able to show them three different scenarios and who would win in each case. For some reason, my kids kept getting confused by the fact that the word "vote" was being used for the people and the electoral college so on the way home I told them to think of the electoral college votes as marbles. Whichever candidate won the state of Texas would get the number of marbles assigned to Texas and that the ultimate winner was the person who had the most marbles at the end of the race. (Husband just piped up as I was writing this with, "Yeah, the guy who doesn't win usually loses his marbles!) That seemed to help them understand it a little better especially when we talked about the reasoning behind the system.

Back to the field trip... when the presentation was over, we went into the room where the rally was being held and lamented how the kids wouldn't be able to see anything all the way in the back but excited that they could still get to see it happen first hand. The next thing we hear over the microphone was a call for the homeschoolers to come to the right of the stage up near the front. The room was filled with mostly college students and adults connected with the university. Our little minority was just that, but after that announcement, the crowd began cheering for the homeschoolers! Shouts of joy and applause from the whole room! The Professor was even clapped on the shoulder by a kid no more than 10 years his senior who told him, "You keep it up, man! You stick with it!" I guarantee you that back when my MIL first started homschooling she never would have imagined that someday her grandchildren would be cheered and applauded at a campaign rally for being homeschooled! It was amazing and such a nice moment for the kids!

Well, up front things were great and not so great. People were packed in pretty tight and BigBoy was afraid of the man on the stage holding a trombone because he just knew that thing was gonna blow and blow loud! The girls were right in front of me and right in front of the place where I guessed Ron Paul was going to enter the room based on the number of policemen on both sides of the door. It looked like they might get to shake his hand. After about 15 minutes, The Professor was given a sign to hold and BigBoy was being entertained by some nice college guys behind us who were making faces at him and then looking away when I turned my head. He thought it was great fun and was even starting to forget about the threatening horn. The crowd was told to push back away from the door and make some room. Everyone was getting their cameras ready and holding them up over their heads. And then, BigBoy says...

I have to go potty!

Seriously. Sigh. I would have asked the kid if he really had to go except I had already used that trick back in the presentation room but there hadn't been time for a potty break on the way to the rally. So, although it is true that sometimes he thinks he has to go when he really doesn't, I couldn't be sure this time. I thought about asking the nice policemen if there was a bathroom behind the door they were guarding but thought I'd better not chance getting on the 10 o'clock news. Mother rushes presidential candidate with a three year old covered in an unidentified liquid. Film at eleven! We pushed and squeezed our way to the back and out of the room.

Yes, I did consider looking for an empty cup in my bag. Yes, he really did have to go. And yes, Ron Paul entered the rally while we were in the bathroom.

What can I say. When ya gotta go... ya gotta go!

Love,