Blending A Family of Dorks

Matt, Davis, Tyrion and I all love to spend time outdoors so we typically spend a lot of time in the warmer months exploring local walking trails.  The problem is we tend to stick to the same familiar spaces and while it's still enjoyable, it's not nearly as exciting as exploring someplace new.  So our goal for this year is to explore more of the nearby trails. This goal was inspired by a book Matt was given by a co-worker which has information on a variety of trails in Haverhill.  We plan to work our way through the book this year. Kenoza Lake Trail Map Last weekend we started this exploration process by trying out a new trail around our favorite lake. We've spent a lot of time on the trail around the Basin and on parts of the Castle Trail but it wasn't until we looked at the trail map in the book we received that we realized how many different trails there are around Kenoza Lake (and how long some are). We decided to start off on the other side of the l...

One of the advantages of homeschooling is the ability to really engage in whatever is most interesting to the child being homeschooled. Davis has always been interested in anything to do with science and nature so when I saw a post on a Facebook homeschool group I'm a part of about a class on rocks and minerals, I immediately said we'd be there. This class was planned and scheduled by a fellow homeschool mom who has boys very close to the same ages as my boys so I knew this would be a great one for Davis and Tyrion.  Of course Davis got a lot more out of it than Tyrion but it was still fun for Tyrion to have the chance to touch and pick up a variety of different rocks and just be around other kids learning things at the same time. Between Davis and I we took a lot of pictures so I'm going to let them do most of the talking for us. First up are pictures of the tools used to mine rocks and crystals.  The kids each got to choose a few rocks from this bin ...

Earlier this week, Davis and I attended a program at one of the local public libraries on the topic of Native History and Culture in our area. It was presented by members of the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe, Hoban Sanford (Many Walks), his sister Millie (Mother Wolf) and their cousin Sly Fox. A few things really stood out to me during the presentation, mostly that this is a portion of this country's history that is often overlooked or glossed over in schools. I don't remember learning very much about Native Americans in school beyond the fact that they were helpful to the pilgrims. I think it's important to study all aspects of history, not just the pleasant parts or the parts that make us feel good about our ancestors. The other thing that stood out to me was some thing Sly Fox said about why he no longer calls himself Native American. He said he has had discussions with other people who claim to be Native Americans as well because they were born in America, which sounds re...

This particular experiment was put together very quickly and was not a favorite for Davis. The end result was quite goopy and a little slimy,  he doesn't like handling things with that texture so definitely keep that in mind if you plan to recreate it at home. We found this experiment at Science Fun . They have a lot of fun looking experiments that we plan to try in the future so be sure to check them out if you like the ones we've done before. We'd love to hear what you think and get some new ideas for experiments to try so please leave a comment below.

"Does the Proverbs 31 woman inspire you and motivate you to work hard within your home? Or more likely, does reading her story overwhelm you and make you want to crawl into a hole out of feelings of failure and overwhelm?  No matter your current relationship with her, there are six important characteristics you can learn from reading Proverbs final chapter." --   The Proverbs 31 Homemaker  book description I've been a fan of Jami Balmet's blog, Young Wife's Guide and her podcast, Homemaking Foundations for several months so I was really excited when she started talking about writing this book.  I'll be completely honest and say that the Proverbs 31 woman has always been  intimidating to me.  She's alway held up as this ideal Christian woman whom we're all supposed to be working to be like and the way she's described makes it seem impossible to fit that standard.  After reading Jami's book though, I realized that the descriptio...

As Tyrion is only 2, we are not doing any formal homeschooling with him yet, it is mostly free play. We have begun being more intentional about making sure he has a wide variety of learning opportunities though. We visit several libraries in the area but the one we consider our home library is the Haverhill Public Library, we spend a lot of time there because they have an great selection of books, a variety of programs for both kids, and an amazing staff. The Haverhill library has two different programs for Tyrion's age group on alternating Mondays. One week they do a lapsit story time with books, songs and some fun additions to keep the kids moving and interested. The opposite week they do a program called Little Explorers which is Tyrion's favorite. This program is always something different but it's all based on sensory play. They've done playdoh, textured balls, a variety of car tracks, wrapped things in aluminum foil for the kids to unwrap, water play and many ...