Labor Day

We spent about 4 hours at a cool new playplace at a park near us, and had a picnic lunch. There were several contraptions that required body motion to get them going and stay going. Our children LOVED this and had such a blast. Thanks for the tip Amy!

Then we came home, grilled hamburgers for dinner, had baths, and went to bed early in preparation for our first day of school!

Fort Building

Fort #1:

Fort #2:

Ready, aim, FIRE! (their ammo was little green "berries" from the crabapple tree).

Oh to be a kid during the last week of summer break!

Parade!

Hotel Rwanda

My hubby and I watched this movie last night after the children were in bed. Wow. If you have not seen this movie, put it on your must-see list. It is the kind of movie that everyone should see at least once. It is the true story of a Rwandan man who worked as a manager at an up-scale hotel in Kigali, and when the genocide of Tutsis began in 1994 he eventually gave refuge to 1268 individuals inside the hotel and finally was able to get them all to safety. My hubby and I commented that it was reminiscent of Schindler's List in that it shows what one man can do to protect others, but it was much less graphic (rated PG-13). There are several themes in this movie that could provide rich discussion. When we get to 20th century history, this is a movie we will definitely show the older children.

Date

Today daughter G and I went on an impromptu "date" to the mall to buy soap. Yes, soap. There are a couple soaps I just love at Bath and Body Works, and we have been out of "pump" soap in our house for a few weeks now. While at the mall we bought a large cinnamon pretzel to share, G tried on some clothes, we talked about the high price of clothing ($39.50 for a pair of jeans for her!! Nope, not gonna happen.....), looked at nail polish, and bought 7 bottles of soap for $20. Hopefully that will last until Christmas.

It was a great time to share together. I love spending time with my daughter!

Strangest thing we saw.....a sign that said, "Back to school special, $4.50 margaritas". Ummmm.......I'm pretty sure that school children shouldn't be drinking margaritas!

Tapestry of Grace Virtual Co-op and Dam Building

This morning was our daughter's first virtual co-op class. It was amazing!! We have had a blast this past week, she and I, doing her reading and discussing every day how all that she is reading ties together. Since she is a new dialectic student (dialectic refers to the age roughly equivalent to the middle school years, when students can think more abstractly and begin to make connections between different threads or streams of thought) I am walking her through the process of reading, filling out her SAP's (student activity pages) and noticing things that are similar or that happen at the same time in different parts of the world.

Tapestry is ALL that we have done for the past week (due to my hand which is now in a splint rather than the soft cast) and it has taken us a good two hours most days! Yikes! But I know that as we learn better how to learn this way, it will go faster. And the cool thing is that G has totally gotton into it and not complained at all. She has, in particular, loved having me to herself for at least an hour each day. Something which I need to keep in mind!

The class was amazing to listen to. An experienced co-op mom is leading the first two discussions so us newbies can hear how it's done. She did such a great job!! (thanks Marcie!!) I actually got tears in my eyes at a couple different points when Marcie was drawing parallels between events in two different countries that were similar, and I could see the light bulbs going on in G's head and thinking, "this is what I wanted all along when we began using Tapestry!" Now that G is old enough to benefit more from the socratic method of discussions I feel that we are finally beginning to reap more from the Tapestry way of learning. It is very exciting to be at this point.

While G was busy on the computer with her virtual class, the four boys were up in my bedroom watching a science video on dam building (thanks Uncle David!! aka "Lava Man"). They were riveted. Afterward, all on their own, they set about constructing a dam. All I had to do was provide them with a tub of some sort, popsicle sticks, and pebbles. They got some sand from the sandbox and set to work.



The video below shows our first dam test. Did it work?? Watch it and find out!