In the Wilderness

 I feel as if we're keeping Moses's pace in the wilderness in getting through our History and Bible curriculum. Maybe we can complete our lessons in less than 40 years! While we're moving slow, I have to remind myself, we've covering important material, the basis for our faith. There is no reason to rush our children learning this material. God taught the Israelites many lessons on trust and obeying while they wandered. He'll teach us as well.

As part of our studies on the Exodus, we had a dress up lunch and tried foods like the ancient Israelites ate. I was as excited to try it as the kids were, But I didn't dress up. We have tried pita chips, hummus, lentils and barley though these studies. Most of our family liked it; Josiah doesn't, but they probably didn't have hot dogs and macaroni and cheese in Egypt. I have tried to add these new foods to our regular meals. In fact, I made a chicken and barley meal last night that was delicious. Barley will probably replace rice for our family because of the nutritional superiority. If you haven't tried it, please go pick up a bag and you can thank me later.

We borrowed costumes from the church. The kids loved getting into character.

 First we played a matching game on hospitality found in ancient customs.

We also read about life during the Exodus and looked at pictures of the area to see what it might have been like to live during those times.

Then we had lunch, lentils, pita chips, dried cranberries and raisins.

My picky eater trying somthing new. 

He liked the pita chips, but not the lentils.
Eden liked it all :)

A Boy and a Box

It's been said, the best thing you can give a kid is a box. That held true for us this past week. This large box eventually became the Mayflower for our homeschool play. But for the few days before she became seaworthy, she was Josiah's tool box. He really enjoyed playing with his tools and creating his own little world inside of the box. I'll have to look for another one.

Our family's first pumpkin carving :)

 This evening I found some cute photos in my draft folder.  I think these are from the fall of 2010. I don't believe these were ever published on the blog. When I saw these I thought, oh how time passed by so quickly. I also can't get over how much Titus and Josiah resemble one another. I've never really seen it until I looked at this picture of Josiah.

Pumpkin carving with Daddy :)

Camo Sunday

 I'm not a hunter. In fact, If you hear that I've killed a deer you should ask to see our mini van, because that's about the only way I'll have opprounity to kill one. However, hunting is huge in our area. One of our church members suggested that we have Camo Sunday and invite hunters who might not attend church to worship with us, dressed in camo. We also hosted a wild game lunch. It was a great success.

 This sweet church member outfitted our whole family in camo, which by the way, our kids love! So while I can't see me climbing into a deer stand in the wee hours of the morning, I can anticipate the day when my children decide they want to.

Windsor Zoo

A few weeks ago our local homeschool group got together at a local park and zoo.

 It was a beautiful day. The kids had a blast! There was a nice boardwalk that ended at a river bank.

  Josiah was able to take a few minutes to study the environment and cross off some things on his scavenger hunt list. I was so proud of him. I was concerned the list would be over his head, but he did really well looking for items and crossing them off himself. It brings me great joy to know that our kids will have the opportunity to learn in a way that will be outside of a classroom and in God's creation.

 Eden was also able to accomplish a first. She crossed the monkey bars all by herself.

She's growing so fast and is truly gifted athletically.

 And my sweet Titus, along for the ride :)

 

A pit stop for a group photo.