Posts
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Friday, September 25, 2009
Friday Update
Well, another week has gone by since I posted last. We had the Cub Scout Campout last weekend and started back up with school activities on Monday. Now, I don't know what happened to our school schedule, but our progress has slowed down considerably! 
Monday and Tuesday we had school pretty much the entire day. :( First of all, we got started late. My fault as well as the kids not getting ready. That is the major factor. But I've also cut down on some subjects (cutting in half the number of days we cover particular subject). But I'm not seeing any of the benefits of that just yet.
Anyway, we got better by Wednesday. We had to because that was our last day of book work for this week!
Thursday was a big day. We got up at 6am, hit the road by 7am, and got to SeaWorld for Home School Day by 9am. Now keep in mind that it has been raining a lot lately. So the whole day was drizzly with some dry spells punctuating the day. We followed the self-guided tour and walked a LOT! We saw the dolphins, the Coral Reef Aquarium (with lots of wonderful coral reef dwelling creatures like jellies, butterfly fish, eagle rays, eels, lobsters), sharks, sea lions, seals, Asian otters, puffins, murres, a variety of penguins, alligators, red-eared slider turtles, Japanese koi, flamingos, killer whales, and a walrus!
After lunch, we watched two presentations. One was at the Shamu Theater and featured the Shamu Family of three killer whales. As always . . . awesome! The second presentation was at the Sea Star Theater where we saw the walrus, three sea lions, and an Asian otter. The Transformer wanted to sit in the front row at the Sea Star Theater with some friends. He got to see one of the sea lions perched on the railing directly in front of him!
My two favorite parts of this field trip were (1) the per person ticket price of $8 and (2) the rain starting to come down heavily immediately AFTER the final presentation when everyone was clearing the park!
Although we were already tired from this outing, I had decided to go check out the Witte Museum for a brief time while we were in San Antonio. They have an HEB Science Treehouse, and I wanted 
to get an idea of what the museum was like--if it was worth it to drive down to San Antonio just to go to the museum. We are members of the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum, so we have free admittance to the Witte Museum under their partnership program.
Well, the Witte Museum is primarily south Texas history. We walked through certain areas, but I had given us a time limit of one hour in order to get home in time for dinner and Cub Scouts. We had to walk through a courtyard to get to the Treehouse and saw some log cabins off to one side there. The rain was coming down pretty steadily so I didn't want to explore them yet.
At the Treehouse, the kids had a great time. There was hardly anyone there (it was about 2pm) so they had free run of the place. It has four stories total with an outdoor area on the top level. Also, the Treehouse is named for the faux treehouse that is attached to the building and is two stories. Each level had something that held either both or one of the kids to it for some time. We ended up spending one and a half hours there before we could all feel good about leaving.
It is definitely worth another trip, but I'm not sure I want to drive 1.5 hours to get there and another 1.5 hours to drive back. On our next trip to S.A., though, I will definitely want to take the kids there again.
We got home around 5pm, had dinner, and headed out to the Cub Scouts pack meeting at 6:30pm. It lasted less than an hour, and we headed home. I was exhausted.This morning, we met up with the Austin Home School Nature Explorers Club and hiked St. Edwards Park. The sky lit up with the sun around 11am, and it got hot! The hike was easier than last week's and muddy in places. The creek was high and looked so fresh and clean! The sound of the water falling over the rocks was just musical. We stopped at an open area on an incline and sat
down to listen to Ms. Carrie read a story about a box turtle. Then the kids drew in their nature notebooks--some more than others. In the meantime, my son found a frog and was showing it off to everyone. It was tiny. Okay, I admit, it might have been a toad. It was hard to tell. It was brown and looked dry (like mud had dried on it). With the boys handling it and with it trying to escape, it was hard to focus on the hind leg length and to see if it had warts. And it was tiny.
Our return trip home was uneventful. But I realized how t-i-r-e-d I was and decided to take a nap. The kids were gracious enough to allow that, so our Park Day plans were necessarily cancelled. Now I need to get them in gear to go to their KinderGym class at the YMCA. They are supposed to have a routine that includes a jump, roll, and balance prepared for the teacher. They just came up with it now. :)
Off we go!*********************************
We just got back from KinderGym. I've posted some video of each of my children doing his or her "routine."
Saturday, September 19, 2009
Tent City
Announcements
Friday, September 11, 2009
Thursday, September 10, 2009
School!
Okay, so I haven't posted much in the way of school lately. After our trip to Galveston for the Kitty Cat's birthday and Labor Day weekend, this week went into high gear. We got back Monday night, so there wasn't much we could accomplish other than unpacking.
Tuesday morning I got back into my workout schedule. Yay! I had actually missed working out---who'da thunk it? I scrambled to get prepared to lead AHG Pathfinders next week as well as gathering all of my information to finalize the curriculum for the day and contact the parents. I also had the kids back in school. With only Tue through Thu to do our book work, they were long days. Tuesday night I went to the Austin Charlotte Mason monthly meeting to meet with other CMers and discuss "Masterly Inactivity." It was a lot of fun, and I stayed late. :)
Wednesday brought the Kitty Cat to her annual well-child visit. She asked me point blank if she was going to get shots that day. I don't like to lie to my children, but "yes" blurted out of my lips before I could stop and consider another answer. Then I said "maybe," but the damage was already done. She threw a huge fit, screamed, cried, pouted, told me to "Shut up!" and so on. Anyway, long story short, she did go to the doctor's office and ended up not having to get any shots. In fact, no more until she turns 11! You should have seen the smile on her face! :D
Today brought in our last day of book work for the week. Then we went to the Transformer's first den meeting with his new Cub Scout pack. Okay, 2nd grade boys are crazy. Oh my gosh. I am glad that they want the dads to lead. And I can understand why all the meetings are limited to one hour's duration. In fact, the den leader told me that the last 15 minutes of each meeting is spent with the boys playing outside on the trees or in the playground! So that's really only 45 minutes spent working on their scouting activities. Our last pack's den meetings last 1.5 hours. The first 1/2 hour was with all ranks. The last hour was within each rank. However, a lot of the younger ranks ended up playing/wrestling during the last 15 minutes of each meeting. Yet they lasted for 1.25 hours! Granted, it was during the day too. Our meetings with the new pack are in the evening.
So, tomorrow, we are supposed to meet with a new group of Nature Study homeschoolers for a hike and study session. However, it rained today for the first time in forever with a 50% rain forecast for tomorrow and Saturday--so the hike may not happen. Keep our fingers crossed! The topic for tomorrow's meeting is Animal Tracks. Should be fun!
After the hike (if it happens and it isn't soggy), we may start going back to the local Friday park day for a few hours. We were really erratic about our attendance last year. I am hoping to be more consistent this year so that the kids can really make some good local friends.
Then the kids start a gymnastics class at the YMCA (for 5-7yo, just perfect for my kids!) at 4pm. By the end of Friday, the children should be nice and worn out. After we get home, I get to wrap up preparations for the Kitty Cat's 5th birthday party on Saturday. Her actual birthday was last Friday, but we didn't want to compete with Labor Day weekend for guests. We are expecting a total of 13 children as guests, and about 12 adults. She is having a Princesses and Knights Tea Party, so we'll see how that goes. I'm doing all right setting up the Princesses and Tea Party part, but the Knights part isn't coming along so well. The biggest difficulty is being on a tight budget. I've already spent more than I had intended to.
Anyway, it doesn't end there! On Sunday afternoon, AWANA starts up, and the Transformer wants to go check it out to see if he wants to join. So we'll go there and see what this one is all about. Both of my kids had done AWANA for a year in CA, but did not join last year.
Monday night is the first AHG troop meeting, during which I will lead the Pathfinders. Eek! And on the week goes, leading up to the first AHG service project at a nursing home on Saturday, along with the first Cub Scout pack's campout Saturday through Sunday. So this week and next are pretty crazy. But by then we'll have a new rhythm, and our schedule will feel easier. (I hope!)
In the meantime, the kids are keeping up with their studies! Whoo!
Tuesday morning I got back into my workout schedule. Yay! I had actually missed working out---who'da thunk it? I scrambled to get prepared to lead AHG Pathfinders next week as well as gathering all of my information to finalize the curriculum for the day and contact the parents. I also had the kids back in school. With only Tue through Thu to do our book work, they were long days. Tuesday night I went to the Austin Charlotte Mason monthly meeting to meet with other CMers and discuss "Masterly Inactivity." It was a lot of fun, and I stayed late. :)
Wednesday brought the Kitty Cat to her annual well-child visit. She asked me point blank if she was going to get shots that day. I don't like to lie to my children, but "yes" blurted out of my lips before I could stop and consider another answer. Then I said "maybe," but the damage was already done. She threw a huge fit, screamed, cried, pouted, told me to "Shut up!" and so on. Anyway, long story short, she did go to the doctor's office and ended up not having to get any shots. In fact, no more until she turns 11! You should have seen the smile on her face! :D
Today brought in our last day of book work for the week. Then we went to the Transformer's first den meeting with his new Cub Scout pack. Okay, 2nd grade boys are crazy. Oh my gosh. I am glad that they want the dads to lead. And I can understand why all the meetings are limited to one hour's duration. In fact, the den leader told me that the last 15 minutes of each meeting is spent with the boys playing outside on the trees or in the playground! So that's really only 45 minutes spent working on their scouting activities. Our last pack's den meetings last 1.5 hours. The first 1/2 hour was with all ranks. The last hour was within each rank. However, a lot of the younger ranks ended up playing/wrestling during the last 15 minutes of each meeting. Yet they lasted for 1.25 hours! Granted, it was during the day too. Our meetings with the new pack are in the evening.
So, tomorrow, we are supposed to meet with a new group of Nature Study homeschoolers for a hike and study session. However, it rained today for the first time in forever with a 50% rain forecast for tomorrow and Saturday--so the hike may not happen. Keep our fingers crossed! The topic for tomorrow's meeting is Animal Tracks. Should be fun!
After the hike (if it happens and it isn't soggy), we may start going back to the local Friday park day for a few hours. We were really erratic about our attendance last year. I am hoping to be more consistent this year so that the kids can really make some good local friends.
Then the kids start a gymnastics class at the YMCA (for 5-7yo, just perfect for my kids!) at 4pm. By the end of Friday, the children should be nice and worn out. After we get home, I get to wrap up preparations for the Kitty Cat's 5th birthday party on Saturday. Her actual birthday was last Friday, but we didn't want to compete with Labor Day weekend for guests. We are expecting a total of 13 children as guests, and about 12 adults. She is having a Princesses and Knights Tea Party, so we'll see how that goes. I'm doing all right setting up the Princesses and Tea Party part, but the Knights part isn't coming along so well. The biggest difficulty is being on a tight budget. I've already spent more than I had intended to.
Anyway, it doesn't end there! On Sunday afternoon, AWANA starts up, and the Transformer wants to go check it out to see if he wants to join. So we'll go there and see what this one is all about. Both of my kids had done AWANA for a year in CA, but did not join last year.
Monday night is the first AHG troop meeting, during which I will lead the Pathfinders. Eek! And on the week goes, leading up to the first AHG service project at a nursing home on Saturday, along with the first Cub Scout pack's campout Saturday through Sunday. So this week and next are pretty crazy. But by then we'll have a new rhythm, and our schedule will feel easier. (I hope!)
In the meantime, the kids are keeping up with their studies! Whoo!
Sunday, September 6, 2009
Saturday, September 5, 2009
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