More vacation photos

This morning I was able to scrapbook a few more pages from our June 2008 Vacation. I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

On a side note my oldest son Sport returned from being gone six days at camp. He had a blast. He hopes to return next year. He had a ton of fun stories to share with all of us. He was chosen out of about 160 kids as a tribal chief of the day. He displayed friendliness towards other campers, great attitude, enthusiasm and a few other great things. It touches a parents heart to hear that all what we teach our children at home is being used outside these doors. Praise God!! I give God all the credit for this and not of my doing but HIS!!!! It is with HIS wisdom, guidance and strength that I am even able to raisse and teach my kids on a daily basis.

I will try to post more picture albums soon.... Enjoy!!

Vacation Slideshow part 1

I have been busy the past two day scrapbooking digitally. This is all new stuff for my non techie brain to absorb. I still have no idea what I am doing.

I am going to attempt to publish a scrapbook slideshow of my first installment of my vacation photos. Grant you this was a 16 day trip and I am only on the first few days.


It will be attached to the upper left hand corner and you can view the slide show there. Hey, if I get pretty good at what I'm doing maybe one day I could add music. ..Don't count on that for quite a while. One baby step at a time around here.


Enjoy!!

Road Trip Summer 2008

My kids are really good travelers. We trained them early on. Once each child celebrated their 1st birthday they were ready for their first camping trip. Not just a local one but a family road trip. When our oldest was just one we traveled to the Grand Canyon. When our daughter was about two we traveled to Lassen NP, Crater Lake NP and Redwoods NP. For our youngest we returned to the Grand Canyon once again and the following year we went to Yellowstone and the Grand Teton NP. Each year or so we try to visit a different National Park with the kids. Our family enjoys camping when the opportunity arises.

Sadly on this family vacation we were not able to camp. If you live in Washington state you will totally understand..the weather is unpredictable. Since our trip was so long packing possible wet gear was out of the question.

Back to traveling...friends have asked me if we have a DVD player in the car. My answer is no. My kids have plenty of opportunity to watch movies at home I don't want their attention taken away yet again to miss seeing what life is like outside their own state. Here are a few hints and tips I have gathered through the years of traveling with kids and it varies from age to age with each individual child.
When our children were young we would break up the long drives. We would try to limit our drive down to 200 to 250 miles in the car with a break for lunch at a kiddy park or fast food restaurant climbing gym. Now that they have gotten older our largest day was over 6 hours in the car. Yes, they probably could be traveling longer ( we had in fact our Mexico Mission car ride was longer) but nasty tempers was parents and kids soon follow. I bring lots of snacks and drinks for fussy tummies. We have books on tape, radio shows or I read to them out loud in the car. They enjoy this!! My oldest can read in the car on his own without getting carsick but my daughter can't. He also enjoys playing a hand held game of baseball or basketball. She enjoys playing with her dolls and chewing bubble gum while looking out her window. For my youngest this year I rented some books on tape for him from the library and hooked him up with his own cassette player and headphones. He also loves to draw, doodle and snooze. Sometimes we play games in the car. This year we brought battleship in the car for fun. Another thing my kids enjoy is that I find a few points of interest along the way to break up the trip. Hope this ideas you can use and don't fall victim to needed a DVD player in your car. You don't!!!

We're Back!!!!!!!!!!!

Home Sweet Home! Yes, life in suitcases is not the life for me. I missed my home and my own bed and I think my home missed me. The kids are happy to be home too.

We returned from our big family vacation on July 4th. Yes, what a day to be returning home. Our 4th of July was spent unpacking, washing tons of laundry and lighting a few sparklers and watching PBS 4th of July special. We were gone for a total of 16 days only to unpack, reload and be back on the road to Mexico for a family mission trip. We just returned from that on Sunday.

I am beginning to become a real good packer for a family of five. This week I will be able to reuse my expertise to pack for my son's church camp. He leaves this Sunday afternoon. He is excited and Mom is nervous. So I am containing my nervousness to be excited with him with this new passage in his life.

I will begin to slowly share with all of you our vacation and mission trip experiences. there is just so much to share and tons of pictures to show you. This summer we have traveled through six different states and two different countries. My oldest son is just amazed and has loved every minute of it.

Stayed tune for more.....

Summer Break is Here!!!!!!!!!!

Hello Everyone,

We officially began our summer break from school yesterday June 4th. We have a busy summer filled with trips this year. For starters we are leaving mid June for a 15 day trip that will take us into Idaho to meet up with friends and from their travel to Washington state and stay in Olympic National Park with an overnight stay in Victoria, Canada. I will be waking up this year on my birthday morning in a foreign country this year. What a treat that will be. From there we will head to Astoria, Oregon to visit the Lewis and Clark points of interest and make several other stops along the way back home to California.

Then in July we will be spending a weekend in Mexico on a church family mission trip. This should be a great starter for getting our feet wet in Missions work for the whole family.

Another week in July our oldest will be away for one week at church camp. I'm already having Mommy/son withdrawals and it isn't even yet July. I will probably be a basket case by then.

Then it is VBS in August with school starting just around the corner.

So in between all the packing and unpacking I plan on relaxing, taking naps when possible, reading and crafting when I can.

So what are your plans for this summer?
Blessings,
Amy

P.S. This seems to be the summer of pets. My husband found a tiny bird outside that must of fallen out of a nest. He is not injured in any way but has not learned to fly yet. Today I had the privilege to and feed him with a syringe. Not only did we find a bird in our yard but mu dancing daughter found a small lizard. This lizard is only an inch long. Now our home plate has two cats, two rabbits, a tiny lizard and a temporary wild bird. We did have a few fish just last week but they died. My dancing daughter has been bouncing around all day lovingly caring of them all. She still has a list and a request for more animals. I mentioned to her if we are good stewards with the ones God has given us, He will bless her with more. She feels God is blessing her with an baby bird to care for and a tiny lizard too. This put a giant smile on my face and my heart.

Having Fun with Math

We put away our Math books away last week for the year. I searched my files for an Math idea that would be creative and a bit challenging for my bunch. With a grade level range from Pre-K to 4th this can be a bit of a challenge to please both of my boys on either grade level ends. This we had fun building geometric shapes. I found the large dome you see in the picture from a blog called the Crafty Crow. The geometric dome is made using recycled newspapers. You will need 100 full sheets to accomplish this building task. I had the kids count out 4 large sheets and then we rolled them into 25 rolls. Using 15 of the rolls 5 triangles are constructed and stapled together and joined at the top to connect each one. The final last 5 tubes are made into a tube star and staple to the top. Please search the Crafty Crow site it has a more detailed step by step process with pictures included.
For the the other geometric shapes I had an old AIMS handout from my teaching days in the school system. The handout suggested clay but I used gumdrops to make it fun for the kids. Use toothpicks and the gum drops just like you would Tinkertoy to create geometric designs. We discussed vertexces, edges and faces of a geometric shape. It was a bit of a challenge for my younger two but I offered a hand for my daughter and she caught on real fast. For my Cowboy he had sun with just 1 dimensional shapes.

Have fun with Math this week! I'm not quite sure what I have planned for this next week in Math. I will have to put on my thinking cap for this one.

Alaska & Hawaii 5/12-5/16/08

Here are the activities that we did for both Alaska and Hawaii....

1. Mapping skills

2. Learn about polar bears and life on the Tundra. Last year while we were camping in the Rocky Mountain National Park we drove through and visited the Tundra areas. They are nothing quite like the ones in Alaska but they got the idea that the snow never melts and trees no longer grow at certain elevations.

3. Eskimos The kids made their own igloo out of a Styrofoam ball. After I cut the Styrofoam balls in half I had the kids scoop out the middle with a spoon. Then they cut a door. Dancer is still using it for her dolls.

4. For Hawaii we learned how pineapple are grown and harvested.

5. We tasted some strawberry, pineapple and banana smoothies. Yum Yum!

I know we could of done more stuff for these two states and several others that we didn't do justice for but I was glad to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. This unit was very long this year.

Here is a list of the books that we read for this Region:

- Sled Dogs Run - Jonthan London

- A Polar Bear Journey - Debbie Miller

- Life in the Tundra - Penny Clarke

- Eskimos - M. Wilson

- Tundra - Lynne Stone

- Welcome to the USA Alaska- Ann Heinrichs

- Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you Hear? - Bill Martin