Our Weekly Wrap-Up

I’m thankful to say that our household experienced no near death experiences like last week.

We kicked off the week with our first Charlotte Mason/Nature Study Co-op of the year. I’d selected a nearby park that is scenic, has a pavilion available for the public’s use and has a well marked, easy to follow trail. One thing I hadn’t counted on was the unseasonably cold front that decided to come through- that and the fact that it’s always cooler on the mountain made for a chilly time.

Armed with Ziploc bags and a scavenger hunt list, we set off to see what we could find along the trail.

After our hike, we took a lunch break in the parking lot and returned to learn a dry brush painting technique followed by a simple handicraft project.

After a quiet school day at home on Tuesday we decided not to let the beautiful day pass us by and headed to a nearby hiking trail that we hadn’t explored before. The trail was rocky, well shaded and very pretty. Sadly we had started late in the day and I needed to start dinner so we didn’t finish the trail but any walking that we can fit into our schedule is better than no walking in my book.

Wednesday was an off day.  We just won’t talk about that.

Thursday we were pleasantly surprised to find that my husband was able to spend the morning with us. Since the kids and I had planned to head to the local botanical garden and see a bit of jousting, he decided to go along with us. We enjoyed watching a bit of what turned out to be fencing before taking another look at the scarecrows. Our membership to the botanical garden has certainly paid for itself again and again!

I was excited to run into one of my Facebook friends- that I’d not met “in real life”. I told my husband that I just needed to speak to her and oh my goodness, I could have spent all day talking to her- I swear, Karen is one of the sweetest people that I’ve ever met!  She has an awesome blog called Home School Girls where she shares all the cool things she does with her daughter.  They certainly have a lot of fun times!

After we finished at the botanical garden, my husband headed off to work and the kids and I headed across town to meet some more friends for a park day. I have to admit that I wasn’t really looking forward to hanging out at the park but it turned into a lovely day with incredible company! It still amazes me that critics of homeschooling don’t really think that homeschoolers are socialized properly. It seems like we’ve been doing quite a bit of socializing lately and it’s been really good for all of us because we have been missing our friends at home. I wonder if that will ever cease?

For a couple hours the kids played soccer, football or just hung out while the moms talked about public schools (surprisingly it wasn’t all negative- we aren’t ANTI-public school), our current curriculum or lack of, issues we face with our children and plans for future get togethers. I left feeling incredibly blessed because we really have met some incredible people in Alabama who have gone out of their way to make us feel welcome. 

We had another surprise waiting for us at home, I had a package from CSN Stores sitting on my doorstep which was really fun because I wasn’t expecting it to arrive until next week. And guess what was in the package?  A Thames & Kosmos science kit on Wind Power that I’m eager to review with my kids. 

Friday proved to be another busy day. The Von Braun Center for the Huntsvile Gem and Mineral Society’s Show. I really wanted to go to this because last year we’d met one of the exhibitors and I was intrigued.  Take a look at the table setting in this picture:    Can you believe that all of this food is actually rocks? It is really amazing to see and I plan to write more about this exhibit later because it truly is something.

Back at home, the kids did some of their book work while I cleaned in preparation for our first camping trip since we sold our camper and the first time we’ve actually slept in a tent in years! I’m sure I’ll have a tale or two for you next week. After all, isn’t tent camping always an adventure?

So, how was your week? You can see what others have been up to at Weird Unsocialized Homeschoolers.