Unschooling Snapshots

yorktown

2011-10-03T18:40:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

halloween crafts by maya

2011-10-03T18:31:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

halloween crafts

2011-10-03T18:29:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

riley

2011-10-03T18:26:00.003-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

hiking at england-idlewild trails in burlington, ky

2011-10-03T18:26:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

animal tracking & atlatl throwing

2011-08-31T15:08:00.001-04:00

Homeschool programs at Big Bone Lick State Park

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

Elk Lick Indian Mound

2011-08-29T16:29:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

Matt & Maya, painting their shoes

2011-08-18T18:40:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

daVinci Exhibit at the Frazier Museum in Louisville, KY

2011-08-18T16:41:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

Cincinnati Museum Center: Cleopatra

2011-08-18T16:40:00.001-04:00

No photography inside the exhibit, so here are a few pictures from the fountain outside, the gift shop, the virtual video game in the children's museum, and beside an exhibit sign.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

after the daVinci trip: testing out daVinci parachutes

2011-08-18T16:32:00.001-04:00

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

learning tastes good

2011-07-29T08:42:00.001-04:00

Baking with my kids always makes me smile. Besides the joy of making (and eating!) something together, there's the joy of playing around with fractions, measurements,doubling, and dividing. I think this always catches my attention, how interesting & useful calculations can be, because it is set against my memory of sitting at a school desk agonizing over trying to understand these same concepts removed from real life & placed instead as symbols on chalkboard & paper.

I hated math. I don't know that my kids would say they love or hate math. It isn't a "subject." It's just a tool that they use to figure out real things. If they aren't sure, they ask. If no one around is sure, we look it up. No one is going to sit back & withhold information or help in order to test them. It wouldn't be a very nice thing to do and the cookies might suck.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.4

Seth's Turn at Farm Camp

2011-07-01T17:06:00.001-04:00

Had we known how much fun farm camp would be we could have planned for all three kids to go the same week. As it happened, Maya was initially the only one interested. After hearing about & seeing how much fun she had, Riley & Seth decided they wanted to give it a try. This week was Seth's turn, and he loved it just as much as he thought he would. Maybe more. In a few weeks, Ri will be going to the veterinary-themed camp for the older kids.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.2

Sewing Class, 2

2011-06-28T21:06:00.001-04:00

Maya did her second sewing class Monday. She learned machine sewing basics & made a pillowcase.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.2

Packing Lunch

2011-06-25T21:20:00.002-04:00

I've only had a handful of occasions to pack lunches for my kids before. The novelty of doing it every day last week for Maya's camp made it kind of fun, especially with the added challenge of her deciding very recently to eat only vegan foods.

Her favorite lunch was refried black bean tortilla wraps. For sides, she had things like red peppers or carrots with hummus, strawberries, peaches, cashews, orange juice & vanilla soymilk smoothies, or a handful of peanut butter pretzels tied up in a bandana.

Published with Blogger-droid v1.7.2

Farm Camp

2011-06-25T20:25:00.001-04:00

Maya had so much fun this week at day camp at a local farm. She truly loved caring for & playing with the animals, meeting new friends, making crafts, having new adventures (like getting caught out in the fields in a downpour, crowding into the shelter of the barn with the animals & all the other campers during the thunderstorm complete with power outage!)

She has always been quite a night owl, often up until 2 a.m. and sleeping until noon. She usually doesn't enjoy early morning activities, & we mostly avoid them. She was determined to get up early for this camp, though. In the 2 week s or so before camp, I helped her back her sleep routine up. We talked about things that might help, like turning off the computer/tv earlier, me lying down with her & talking ourselves to sleep, & opening her beloved room darkening curtains in the mornings. Those things plus her excitement about camp each day made mornings flow incredibly smoothly.

I heart unschooling!

Matt's office

2011-06-18T17:06:00.001-04:00

Passenger seat of a rental car

Sewing Class

2011-06-17T18:54:00.001-04:00

Maya did a beginner's hand-sewing class at Jo-Anne's fabric store today. They made monsters out of T-shirts. She (and I) learned about pinning & cutting from a pattern, how to do a running stitch, and how to backstitch.
My Mom loved to sew, but I never was interested at all. Bet she would've loved helping Maya learn.

It was fun. I'm still not all that interested in sewing (fine motor agitation!!), but I loved hanging out & learning & laughing with Maya all morning!

Atlanta, GA

2011-06-15T12:20:00.001-04:00

Attempting the Blogger Android app again. Hoping the pics will look better this time.

Here are some pics from our trip to Atlanta last week.

We were sad to not be able to work out a get-together with friends who moved to Atlanta recently, but we did have a nice few days of swimming (and meeting new friends at the pool), skateparks, playgrounds, yoga under the big GA pine trees, & checking out various local vegan restaurants:

one with standard vegan cafe fare,

one with traditional southern food & an owner we adore & visit everytime we're in town,

and one authentic Caribbean with both cooked and raw options and lots of Caribbean & Rasta culture & feel.

New River National Park, West Virginia

2011-06-14T21:08:00.001-04:00

This is my first attempt at blogging from my phone...

Here are some pictures from New River National Park. We had been enjoying the view of the gorge as we drove across the bridge on our way to Pittsburgh, PA. After the bridge, we saw a sign for a park with a scenic view of the river & thought it would be a nice place for a picnic. Once there, we ended up touring the interpretive center & taking a short hike for a better view of the gorge & of the bridge we had just driven across. Riley was especially interested in learning about the gorge bridge history & construction. Maya did the Jr Ranger packet & interviewed the park ranger about her job. Seth was absorbed in an imaginary Transformer battle. :)

Baltimore, MD: Inner Harbor, Maryland Science Center

2011-04-16T21:18:00.006-04:00

Riley at the earthquake table

Me with the veggie woman

Learning about the connection between smell and taste

Nothing like a hands-on exhibit of the large intestine that makes bowel sounds as you push the pretend food through! :-)

Antarctica exhibit

Trying to walk like a penguin carrying an egg

Back outside to look at the Harbor and wait for Matt to meet up with us after work

Baltimore, MD: Inner Harbor; tour of the USS Constellation

2011-04-16T20:52:00.004-04:00

Listening to the audio tour

Captain's dining room

Captain's bed

Crew's sleeping area

Baltimore, MD: first, the hotel

2011-04-16T11:45:00.005-04:00

This is the hotel we stay in most of the time when we visit Baltimore. It's just a few blocks from Inner Harbor, so we're able to walk there while Matt has the car for work. It's a Holiday Inn built inside an old bank.

Downstairs checking out the old safe door

View of Baltimore from our window

Closer view of the mural on the health clinic wall. The monument at the top center of the photo is the first Washington Monument. We managed to make our way there from the hotel on foot during one of our trips, planning to tour inside, but the gates were chained and locked up. We later found out that it was closed due to safety issues.

Carnegie Science Center:

2011-04-16T09:22:00.002-04:00

The Sports Works building at the Carnegie Science Center is a regular stop for us each time we are in or near Pittsburgh. Love this place!

Sorry for the smudgy cellphone pics. :)

Matt and Maya on the climbing wall

Seth on the human yo-yo

The Body Cam: A virtual ride through the human body

Inside the Body Cam

Checking and comparing heart rates

This shows examples of what can be viewed from different kinds of imaging machines (x-ray, CT, MRI, etc)

learning about the various types of joints in the human body

giant hockey table

Riley in the baseball pitch cage

Basketball high jump

Timed sprint

Seth flipping on the trampoline

Maya on the trampoline

Matt on the trampoline

Riley 20 feet up on the counterbalanced unicycle

working on Maya's room

2011-03-26T12:31:00.006-04:00

Maya building the chair that will go with her desk. The picture instructions that come with Ikea furniture reminded us of Lego instructions books.

Matt and Seth building Maya's bed.

Crafternoon program at Boone Co. Library

2011-03-26T12:29:00.001-04:00

Making windsocks and other crafts.

Ancient Egyptian style animal drawings from Homeschool Mondays at the Museum Center

2011-03-26T09:56:00.002-04:00

Hogwarts

2011-03-20T16:46:00.003-04:00

Playing along while I read Prisoner of Azkaban out loud earlier this week -- wand practice & pretend spell books.

3/14: Happy Pi Day!!!

2011-03-15T16:25:00.005-04:00

Celebrating Pi Day with circle measuring, websites, funny youtube videos, and pies while following interests wherever they go...

We love this book. It's an interactive pop-up. We started with the section related to circles and pi but ended up also learning about the Pythagorean theorem and ancient Egyptian mathematics (Egypt has been an ongoing interest for a little while now: there are Cleopatra and mummy movies, exhibits, and activities at our local museum right now; plus we all watched the Egyptian People's Revolution unfold recently, and Riley and I are still following that via an English language blogger/tweeter there and via the Global Voices website, even though it's no longer in the regular news much here).

Another side project we came across was making homemade balance scales. We used a hanger, two extra pie plates and the string that we already had out for measuring circumferences and diameters.

Comparing Bart and Kenny

Comparing Bioshock toys

Comparing Kenny & different numbers and size combinations of YooHoo friends toys

And, of course, what would Pi Day be without the other kind of pie!

Making pie crust

Veggie potpies & shepherd's pie

Welcome, March!

2011-03-02T10:47:00.003-05:00

After reading the Aragog chapter (Seth's favorite HP creature) in Chamber of Secrets yesterday, we spent the afternoon roller skating with some local homeschoolers. Afterward Seth went home with a friend to play, Riley and a friend went to the skatepark with Matt, and Maya and I took a walk/scooter ride in our neighborhood, looking for signs of Spring and whatever else we happened to find.

Here are some pictures from our walk.

From our yard -- spring flowers are not too far away!

Our front yard tree.

Check out those thorns!

Collecting these for "fairy hats" for the fairy garden we're going to plant later in the Spring.

Cincinnati Museum Center: Homeschool Mondays

2011-02-28T21:41:00.004-05:00

checking out an HMS Endeavour display at our library

2011-02-23T21:00:00.003-05:00

Playing Dinosaurs, Researching Dinosaurs

2011-02-21T22:35:00.004-05:00

Maya and Seth were playing with some little dinosaur toys a few nights ago and had stopped to consult a dinosaur reference book to clarify some things they were wondering about.

Newport Aquarium trip

2011-02-10T18:39:00.006-05:00

We visited Newport Aquarium today with our friends Susan & Zach, and Amie, Sam, & Eric. Riley was there, but he was off with Sam and Eric so I have no pics of him. :-p

Zach, Seth, and Maya

Maya and a liopleurodon

Japanese crab

ray shark; Maya's reflection

Susan, Seth, and Zach at the shark petting pool

making buckeyes

2011-02-09T10:01:00.005-05:00

OMG!!! These were a soooo good, especially for this vegan Mom who has missed Reese's Cups!

puzzles

2011-02-09T09:49:00.006-05:00

spiderman, smart phones, and fairies

2011-01-29T18:45:00.011-05:00

It's been kind of a quiet week here. I have a bit of that post-beach-vacation-returned-to-the-snowy-north funk. I spent the early part of the week planning some cool stuff for a possible 3 week trip from Atlanta to Kansas City to Dallas to Memphis. I was really excited about that, but it's kind of in limbo right now and may turn out to be a smaller trip or not even happen at all. It was a tag-along trip with Matt for his work, so it's dependent on that.

Seth has been all about Spiderman since we got home: games, books, cartoons, story boards, pretend play, and making lots of paper characters:

Maya makes a lot of things every day. Here is a bow and arrow she made:

We watched and talked about what's happening in Egypt this week, what happened in Tunisia, democracies, dictatorships, people powered movements:

I turned 39! How did that happen?! Matt made me this vegan chocolate cake that turned out amazing!!! (We did end up tossing out the Tofutti cream cheese icing and made vegan buttercream instead)

With 39 candles you can make a whole peace sign!!!

Riley has been really wanting a newer smart phone. He reads all the updates and researches information about different ones and had been waiting for his current phone contract to end so he could get a new one. Turns out a friend had a Blackberry and *gave* it to him this week (and gave me a case for my phone, too!!!). How cool is that?! So, here's what Riley has been doing the last couple of days:

Maya made me this picture of my dream RV: an Airstream

Riley had also been researching how to make beads for his dreads. We picked up some polymer clay and wire and he, Matt, and I made some:

And, finally, Maya's great love this week has been all things Fairy. She made a fairy house and has made lots of paper fairies. We read about them in the Fantasy Encyclopedia, and she's been playing Disney fairy games online and reading a book about Tinkerbell.

evening at the beach

2011-01-22T22:52:00.005-05:00

A stormy day at the beach makes for an evening with great sandcastle conditions and a beautiful sunset.

Ponce Inlet nature walk

2011-01-22T21:51:00.006-05:00

Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse

2011-01-17T20:32:00.011-05:00

Ponce de Leon Inlet Lighthouse near Daytona Beach, FL

203 steps to the top!

View from the top

Breezy!

Maya, trying to travel by flue (Just a few more days, M, and we'll be at Wizarding World!)

Reading about the lives of the children whose families lived and worked at the lighthouse over the years

Found out about this lighthouse in our home state on Kentucky Lake

Real shutters on the windows.

chocolate factory tour

2011-01-17T20:14:00.005-05:00

Free chocolate factory tour with free samples!

playing with reflections in the window

Maya in her Harry Potter glasses (we're going to Wizarding World of Harry Potter later this week).

some pictures from this week

2011-01-15T21:17:00.006-05:00

side-by-side online multiplayer gaming

making more paper toys

figuring out how many pages we need to read each day to finish Sorcerer's Stone before our trip

Some of Seth's paper kaiju toys

various things people made or have been looking at this week

making Harry Potter character plaster casts

I cleaned out Maya's closet this week and freed up an extra shelf, which she decorated

balancing hangers

this week, in no particular order

2011-01-07T13:58:00.011-05:00

Entrance to a dollhouse Maya made for her Lalaloopsy miniature

Inside the dollhouse

Our friend Chooj's New Years' Day birthday party

Seth and Chooj

Maya and Hayes

Riley took some of his Christmas money to buy a second-hand airsoft gun from a friend.

Maya playing out stories with a mix of toys and her homemade paper doll characters

Highlights Magazine's Which Way USA: Florida puzzle/activity book and map. We'll be there for real in a couple of weeks!!!

Maya listening to music & working on a picture in the kitchen. In the background: Riley's Eiffel Tower model and work-in-progress K'Next roller coaster.

Climb-a-mountain-do-a-flip. I used to do this with Maya a lot when she was younger and overwhelmed -- she would hold my hands, walk up my legs, then flip over backwards. She loved it, and the hanging by her arms and being upside down seemed to help her re-center. I forget sometimes how much it helped. Here, I was getting really frustrated, but then remembered with Seth just before we both melted down!

Seth's photo of Matt and me laughing over a funny Facebook thread

Hanging out talking

Playing Huggermugger
More Huggermugger (and yes, that's how Maya prefers to hold a pen when she writes)

Making & watching videos with a friend

Lots of experimenting with recipes from these

7 books, 7 months until the final movie

Lego

Riley skating our backyard ramp we built this past fall

Maya

Lots of gaming. Riley and Seth are loving playing with friends via X-box Live lately.

Riley

brothers

2010-12-30T15:07:00.001-05:00

Christmas Morning

2010-12-29T18:56:00.005-05:00

On Santa Claus

2010-12-29T11:15:00.006-05:00

Riley had a pretty unpleasant experience of being "told the truth" about Santa when he was fairly young. He was heartbroken. In addition to being disappointed, he felt lied to. Trust has always been hugely important to me, and I had thought of myself as a fairly authentic, honest, and trustworthy parent up until that point. We had never used Santa or his elves as a way to manipulate behavior: no elves peeking through windows, no naughty/nice lists, no threats of phone calls to Santa or lumps of coal. Still, it felt terrible to have, despite my intentions of playing and making magic at Christmas time, instead broken my child's trust. Over the weeks and months that followed, we talked a lot about what Santa means to people, the stories of Saint Nicholas, love, trust, and wonder.

Since then, even when Maya and Seth were still little, our approach to Santa has been more "Yes, Virginia There Is a Santa Claus" than a literal one. We treat Santa (and the tooth fairy and Easter bunny) as a story, a character we get into when we are gift giving, decorating, wrapping presents, and most especially when we're sneaking around plotting surprises for each other. When any of us shop for surprise Christmas gifts for each other, we don't call it "helping Santa," we call it, "being Santa." It's about making magic for each other, and it's something we all get to enjoy doing.

This year, Riley (12), Maya (9), and Seth(7) talked about maybe wanting us to put out presents on Christmas Eve before they went to bed. In the end, they decided it was more fun and exciting to go to bed with nothing under the tree and leave room for the magic of Santa.

Merry Christmas!

Nashville Parthenon

2010-09-04T13:21:00.009-04:00

One of our favorite scenes in the first Percy Jackson and the Olympians book was the battle scene at the St. Louis Arch. We were really looking forward to seeing that one in the movie. As it happened, that scene was changed. In the movie, Percy instead battles the Hydra inside a replica of Parthenon located in Nashville, TN.

We had no idea this was in Nashville until we saw the movie. It was originally built in 1897 for Tennessee's Centennial Expo & is a full-scale replica of the original in Athens. So, we took a detour through Nashville on our way home from Atlanta to check it out.

Outside our hotel in Nashville, TN, April 2010:

The Parthenon:

Full-Scale replica of the original Parthenon Athena:

Direct casts of original Parthenon sculptures were all along the sides of the main room:

Hiding -- you know, in case the park staff turn into the hydra!

Poseidon and Athena, battling for the city of Athens:

Athena's shield:

Playing outside the Parthenon at Centennial Park:

Dreams Come True

2010-09-04T11:04:00.006-04:00

I've been working on making blog books, one for each year since I started this blog. It's been fun reminiscing through the last 3 3/4 years, and it's motivated me to catch up on posting pictures from this year and to reunite with my SLR camera, which I haven't used since leaving behind its battery charger on one of our trips.

I came across this post from March 2007. I was writing about how much I loved watching the school bus go by our house in the mornings, knowing no one from our house would be dashing out the door to get on it. Matt left a comment that he did still have to dash out the door every morning. I responded that I knew we could change that if we really wanted to. I love looking back on that now that we did change that, and he has this job that allows him to work from home and to travel around, and that we get to travel with him so much. After lots of false starts, job changes (sometimes with much lower income), and frustration, I'm very thankful that we can now spend so much more time together -- all 5 of us -- because he kept not only wishing for and wanting that dream to happen, but also walking toward making it happen.

Stone Mountain

2010-09-04T08:57:00.015-04:00

Stone Mountain Park
near Atlanta, GA
March, 2010

Before our hike we ate lunch at a great little cafe run by Ms. Mimi, who we all loved. She was so friendly and fun! The food was so good and very "deep south," but I was also able to find things I could eat that were vegan. We cannot remember the name of her restaurant. It isn't the "MiMi's" chain. I don't think it's one of the ones on the Stone Mountain Park website. We're going to look for it when we go back to Atlanta later this year, but if anyone reading this happens to know what it is, please let us know!

A short, 1-mile hike to get to the top of Stone Mountain. Here's Maya, getting off to an enthusiastic start.

Trees growing up through the stone

1 mile starts to feel pretty long when you're going up:

Pretty excited, looking like we're near the top:

Then...OH, NO!!!! There's more!

The steep ascent to the very top:

View from the top:

On the edge:

Exploring the mountain top:

Erosion:

"I think I found a giant alien butt print!!!"

Starting the trip down:

Stopping to rest while Maya chats with a friend.

I love the color combination of deep blue sky and dark green treetops.

Look closely at the top of this tree in the center:

Flowers growing in the shallow, dusty dirt:

It's all relative. 1 mile *down* the mountain was fast and easy:

Fountain of Rings

2010-09-03T21:40:00.003-04:00

In Atlanta, it's warm enough to play in the water in **April**!!!!

Centennial Olympic Park
Fountain of Rings
April, 2010

Enjoying the show: fountains synched with music

Martin Luther King National Historic Site

2010-09-03T20:57:00.009-04:00

More from April in Atlanta. This is one of my favorite National Parks sites.

A peace & justice walk of fame.

Here's Riley in Desmund Tutu's footprints:

Maya in Maya Angelou's:

Riley in Rosa Parks':

Me with Gandhi

Working on Jr. Ranger badges:

Zoo Atlanta

2010-09-03T20:08:00.009-04:00

Catching up from April. These are from our trip to Zoo Atlanta.

And here's Maya attempting to look the part:

Beautiful Georgia Pine trees:

Carnegie Museum of Natural History

2010-09-03T19:37:00.005-04:00

Doing some blog catch-up. These pictures are from back in March when we went to Pittsburgh. Our hotel was near the university campus, making for a nice walk downtown to the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

Unschooling this morning

2010-06-07T11:36:00.008-04:00

This morning Maya and a friend went to our neighborhood creek.

They came home briefly and came inside to tell me all about the two salamanders they brought to the little pond in our yard.

After they left again to go back to the creek, I dug out some field guides, the ones with salamanders and frogs and turtles and lizards and snakes, and left them on the front steps.

They came home later with lots of stories to tell about everything they saw and did at the creek. The stories kept growing bigger and wilder, and I couldn't quite tell -- and didn't need to know --where the line was between the objectively real and the imaginary.

On the road: stopping to play in the sunshine

2010-04-22T18:20:00.007-04:00

Port Discovery Children's Museum

2010-04-20T20:55:00.004-04:00

I wasn't sure we would find enough to do here. This is a children's museum and was geared toward younger kids and pretty crowded with school groups while we were there. We did manage to find plenty of interesting things to do, though, and everyone really loved & kept coming back to this 3-story climber.

American Visionary Art Museum

2010-04-20T20:21:00.005-04:00

We loved this place so much! I don't have many pictures, because you could only take pics outside, but this experience changed Seth's mind about art museums. He was really reluctant to go because he thought it would be boring. Not at all. This place was so very alive, unique, and turned out to be a very, very cool trip!

Maryland Science Center

2010-04-20T19:54:00.008-04:00

Exploring Downtown Baltimore and the Inner Harbor

2010-04-20T19:39:00.004-04:00

2010-04-14T19:39:00.003-04:00

Checking out a group of ant hills Maya found at a park.

"This is how I get my stories out." -- Seth

2010-04-01T19:30:00.004-04:00

An epic battle being narrated by Seth (who is also sometimes "the giant") & involving Hot Wheels cars, Beanie Babies, and Biollante (from Godzilla).

2010-03-26T09:51:00.002-04:00

Maya's going to miss this window at our hotel in downtown Baltimore

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-23T15:47:00.002-04:00

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-23T15:44:00.003-04:00

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-23T15:41:00.002-04:00

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-23T15:38:00.004-04:00

Colunbus Zoo

2010-03-23T15:35:00.002-04:00

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-22T09:11:00.002-04:00

Reptile house - Riley's favorite

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-22T09:08:00.003-04:00

Took this picture because Maya & I want to figure out what this bird is. Wasn't listed on the zoo's signs.

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-22T09:01:00.002-04:00

Habitat house

Columbus Zoo

2010-03-22T08:58:00.002-04:00

On the way home

Salato Wildlife Center

2010-03-17T13:14:00.009-04:00

Here are some pictures from our trip to Frankfort yesterday to the Salato Wildlife Center .

Welcome, Springtime! Decorating Umbrellas

2010-03-17T12:50:00.002-04:00

Happy Pi Day!

2010-03-14T13:32:00.001-04:00

Veggie pot pie, apple pie, and chocolate chip. Waiting for Matt & Ri to get home from the skatepark so we can eat!

Pi Day Plot

2010-03-14T12:25:00.001-04:00

Apparently Maya has drawn up plans to break in and steal all the pies for herself!!!

2010-03-14T12:21:00.001-04:00

More pi day pics

2010-03-14T12:17:00.002-04:00

Playing with circles, diameter, & circumference.

2010-03-14T12:10:00.002-04:00

Coloring and cutting out pies!

Pi day!

2010-03-14T11:42:00.001-04:00

Pi day!

Maps

2010-03-07T19:20:00.006-05:00

We have always had a lot of maps around & handy. Placemat maps, atlases, and various wall maps, including my favorite, this south-up map. I still want to sit down with the kids and show them all the states we drove through in the last 2 weeks: From KY through IN to IL, back through IN to OH, back to KY, then on to TN, GA, and FL then back through GA, SC, NC, TN and back home to KY.

*****************************************************************************

The country stickers on this map are from years ago when Riley and I had put them on when we were doing Highlights magazine's Top Secret Adventures packets. Now this map is in Seth's room after he & I mapped all the locations of the monster battles in Godzilla Final Wars.

Maya keeps this smaller map in her room, rolled up for "adventure planning" and things like that. Most recently, while we were reading the Lightning Thief, she was using it to keep track of all the places Percy Jackson went.

And this one is just a cute picture of Seth. :-)

Hanging out in Elk Grove Village, IL

2010-02-23T14:50:00.003-05:00

We were supposed to go to Legoland today. When I looked more closely, our coupon was for "after 3 pm" only, and we would have needed to pick Matt up from work by 5, so we didn't end up going. We've been once before and, with as much time as we spend in this part of Chicago, we know we'll get a chance to go again, but I still felt bad about messing up our plans. The kids handled it much better. This morning we hung out in our hotel room drawing, playing Uno, and reading. We walked over to Quiznos for lunch and then went to the pool/exercise rooms. Riley has started the Couch to 5 K running program that I've been doing, so he went ahead and did week1, day 2 on the treadmill. After that, everyone went swimming. Maya loves floating around underwater in her goggles just watching the water moving. She learned, by accident at first, to do underwater front and back flips today and was so excited about that! Seth's learning to swim a bit but still doesn't like water in his face or ears at all!

When Matt gets home from work, we're going to eat and then to the Lego store. Also need to find some crickets to feed Riley's gecko and replace her warming light. The bulb went out as soon as we got here, so we've been keeping our hotel room very warm. Tomorrow afternoon we head to Columbus, OH and the kids & I will be going to COSI there on Thursday. After that, we head to FLORIDA!!!

Maya working on a portrait of me

2010-02-23T13:41:00.001-05:00

Morning Snapshot

2010-02-22T11:36:00.002-05:00

Percy Jackson Sea of Monsters

Morning Snapshot

2010-02-22T11:34:00.001-05:00

Uno

Morning snapshot

2010-02-22T10:37:00.001-05:00

Playing & singing

Morning Snapshot

2010-02-22T10:31:00.002-05:00

This morning: drawing

Running

2010-02-20T14:58:00.005-05:00

Today was day 2 of week 4 for me in the Couch to 5K running plan. My neighborhood is still very snowy, so I went to the local park and arboretum, where the roadways and some of the walking trails were clear. Hoping to take everyone with me to walk there tomorrow morning before we leave for Chicago because it was just beautiful there in the snow!

By day 3 of next week, I'll jog 20-minutes straight with no walking break. I can hardly imagine that, because I'm really ready for that walking break by the end of the 5-minute jog. I'm trying to remind myself that I felt that way about a 60-second jog the first week and trust that it will all flow as I come to it.

Week 4 running playlist

Warm up song: East to the West by Michael Franti

3-minute jog: Lose Yourself by Eminem

90-second walk: Back Against the Wall by Circle Jerks

5-minute jog: Hello Bonjour by Michael Franti

2 1/2-minute walk: Lost Colors by Firehose

3-minute jog: Tubthumping by Chumbawumba

90-second walk: In the Ocean Blue from Charlie the Unicorn

5-minute walk: Hey-Ya by Outkast

Cool Down: I loop back to East to the West, Hello Bonjour, and then the birds singing!

2010-02-13T00:29:00.001-05:00

Sweet dreams

Shark's Story Time

2010-02-11T21:05:00.002-05:00

Riley's been playing around in his old Halloween costume from a couple of years ago. Mostly they were doing SNL "Candygram" stuff, but here I caught of picture of them trying to placate the shark by reading him board books.

Avatar and Krohn

2010-02-07T14:10:00.007-05:00

Last week we went to see the imaginary other-world beauty of Avatar 3D and afterward went to the Krohn Conservatory in Cincinnati to see the real-world beauty growing there.
I love that first step inside the conservatory from the parking lot, especially on a grey winter day: the wet, earthy smell, the warmth, the humidity, and all the beautiful greenness! My camera lens steamed up as soon as we stepped inside.

Maya, perched and hissing like the Na'vi girl in Avatar.

An unexpected connection back to the movie. The 2nd paragraph of the sign says, "Beginning in AD 1492, Native American populations were reduced by warfare, disease, and starvation as invaders from overseas displaced the Indians from their ancestral lands."

In case you can't read that flag, that is Mount "Jason Voorhees" that my young horror movie fan made.

Playing in the jungle

Pretending to fly through the jungle on a butterfly (again inspired by the movie)

Reading about the chocolate tree & the "food of the gods" and thinking about plans for the next movie we want to see about some other gods: Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief.

Breathing in that little bit of paradise one more time before heading back outside to the cold air and the concrete jungle.

2010-02-03T14:25:00.001-05:00

Having a girl's day at the zoo with Maya, who wanted to visit the meerkats

Running & Running Playlist

2010-01-31T18:41:00.003-05:00

I got some new running shoes and started the Couch-to-5K running program a few weeks ago. As someone who grew up *hating* running, I can't believe how much fun I'm having with this. Not sure if it's that I'm getting outside in spite of the cold, which always is a mood-lifter in the winter, or if it's because of the very gradual progression and very attainable weekly goals. I am having a blast.

I started week 3 this week. I wasn't doing so well focusing on keeping count of my time intervals in my head, so I decided to set up music to cue me when to switch back and forth between walking and running. It is pretty hard to find good 90-second songs, and my 3-minute songs were closer to 4 minutes, but here's this week's playlist:

Couch to 5K-- Week 3, Day 1

90-second run: Back Against the Wall by Circle Jerks
90-second walk: Trogdor by Strongbad

3-minute run: Lose Yourself by Eminem
3-minute walk: Handlebars by Flobots

90-second run: Gimme Gimme Gimme by Black Flag
90-second walk: In the Ocean Blue from Charlie the Unicorn

3-minute run: Hey World (Remote Control Version) by Michael Franti & Spearhead
3-minute walk: Underneath by Alanis Morrissette

2010-01-25T14:01:00.001-05:00

Melting and chiselling ice at the museum center

2010-01-22T12:24:00.001-05:00

On our way to the RV show accompanied by The Lightning Thief, Dr. Seuss, and Captain Underpants.

2010-01-21T14:04:00.002-05:00

just walked into this - the aftermath of some of the learning going on here this morning. Right now, outside this picture, Seth is playing UB Funkeys, Ri is learning a new song on drums, Maya is putting together a book she made, I'm making lunch, MAtt's waiting for his plane home from CA. Sweet, messy, noisy unschooling life.

Lincoln's Boyhood Home

2010-01-17T11:28:00.005-05:00

On our way home from St. Louis, we saw signs on the interstate in Indiana for Lincoln's Boyhood Home memorial. We went to check it out, barely making it there before closing time. Maya was hoping to do the Jr Ranger program there, but we didn't have time for all of the activities. Hoping to get back there again sometime other than winter to do the Jr Ranger program, walk the trail to the home site, and see the working farm.

St. Louis Arch

2010-01-17T11:11:00.006-05:00

Maya has been wanting to work on Jr Ranger badges since she saw Bindi Irwin talking about them on her show. She and Riley did the Jr Ranger activities at the Museum of Westward Expansion at the Arch.

The Mississippi River

City Museum, St. Louis

2010-01-17T09:34:00.011-05:00

Pictures from City Museum in St. Louis. We were introduced to City Museum as a side trip that was part of the 2005 Live and Learn Unschooling conference and have been wanting to get back there since. It is a wonderland -- a work of art with hidden passageways and mazes and tangles of things to climb through, slide down, and explore.

A few pictures from the 2005 trip:

Maya, 4 years old and Seth, 2 years old.

Riley, at 7 years old, is in the grey shirt. Maya is climbing. The two boys in striped shirts are Mason (standing) and Caleb (sitting), our unschooling friends from Lexington.

Matt climbing with Seth

***********************************************

Here are the pictures from this trip January, 2010:

On our way up to the 7-story slide.

Taking the 3rd floor slide down to the lobby.

Ri, Maya, and Seth climbing from one of the planes to the tower.

On the wing

Ri, Maya, and Seth

Shoelace factory

Skateless skatepark

In the Art room

Writing with the giant pencil.

Chicago area trip -- a hotel day at the Holidome

2010-01-12T18:01:00.002-05:00

Hanging out in the gazebo playing the Scrambled States game. I think we could have entertained ourselves all week in this fake-tropical hotel wonderland, but plans have changed & we're heading for st louis tomorrow. The Arch & City Museum, maybe...

2010-01-12T17:53:00.001-05:00