Unexpected Greatest Day!

Congratulations if your computer didn't crash! This post has A LOT of pictures....Thursday is our nature walk day and I decided we'd go to Hermann Park. It's not a normal place we would go for a nature walk because it's right in the city, but we wanted to feed the ducks and birds some old bread we had. I had planned not to spend any money which didn't quite happen, but the money I spent was definitely worth it. My kids whined very little and had the best time. Yay! When we got to the park Eaden knew we were by the zoo, so she said she wanted to go. Luckily, my brother got us a membership last Christmas and so I said fine. Besides, we were learning about snakes and I thought it would be neat to see them.

I know that wasn't a snake, but it's a cute picture. After checking out the snakes and a few other exhibits we decided we wanted to check out the new 4D movie theater. We saw Planet Earth.

Naia looks happy here because the movie hadn't started. Luckily we were early to the zoo and the only ones in the theater. She said she was scared and wanted to go home the entire time. The seats shook which I think is what scared her most. Then she was caught by surprise when the wind blew on the back of her neck as the shark jumped out of the water and snatched up a seal. She screamed again when we were sprayed with water as the elephants were swimming. It was really quite hilarious only because no one was in there.

After the 4D movie we went to the carousel. Taven was a little scared at first.

Then he thought hmmm, maybe this is fun.

Then it was oh yeah! This IS fun!

After the zoo, we made our way to Hermann Park. We fed the pigeons and ducks.

We found a squirrel without a tail!

...and decided he needed a friend.

We fed some more squirrels.

Chased some pigeons.

Played in the reflection pond (I'm not sure we're supposed to do that).

Then we headed over to the Houston Museum of Natural Science and the Butterfly Center.

My kids DID NOT want to leave which made me SOOOOO happy. We found this vending machine...

and decided to pick a little something up.

The kids played some more.

Finally, after a long and perfect day, we caught the train (for free) back to the car.

Unschooling

Y'all all know that I'm a pretty new stay at home mom and a new homeschooling mom. So I guess you're kind of witnessing my coming into being. What Is Unschooling? Unschooled, according to Merriam-Webster's dictionary, was first used in 1589 as an adjective meaning not schooled—untaught, untrained. It also has a second meaning of not artificial, natural—as in "an unschooled musician." John Holt coined unschooling as a noun and a verb in 1977 in the first issues of GWS. "All John Holt meant to do with the word unschooling was to find a more expressive and expansive term than deschooling or homeschooling, both of which gave the impression of abolishing or creating miniature copies of conventional schooling in the home. Holt created the word unschooling to indicate that children can learn in significant ways that don't resemble school learning and that don't have to just take place at home. However, now unschooling is also known as interest-driven, child-led, natural, organic, eclectic, or self-directed learning. Lately, the term "unschooling" has come to be associated with the type of homeschooling that doesn't use a fixed curriculum. When pressed, I define unschooling as allowing children as much freedom to learn in the world, as their parents can comfortably bear. The advantage of this method is that it doesn't require you, the parent, to become someone else, i.e. a professional teacher pouring knowledge into child-vessels on a planned basis. Instead you live and learn together, pursuing questions and interests as they arise and using conventional schooling on an on-demand basis, if at all. This is the way we learn before going to school and the way we learn when we leave school and enter the world of work. So, for instance, a young child's interest in hot rods can lead him to a study of how the engine works (science), how and when the car was built (history and business), who built and designed the car (biography), etc. Certainly these interests can lead to reading texts, taking courses, or doing projects, but the important difference is that these activities were chosen and engaged in freely by the learner. They were not dictated to the learner through curricular mandate to be done at a specific time and place, though parents with a more hands-on approach to unschooling certainly can influence and guide their children's choices. Unschooling, for lack of a better term (until people start to accept living as part and parcel of learning), is the natural way to learn. However, this does not mean unschoolers do not take traditional classes or use curricular materials when the student, or parents and children together, decide that this is how they want to do it. Learning to read or do quadratic equations are not "natural" processes, but unschoolers nonetheless learn them when it makes sense to them to do so, not because they have reached a certain age or are compelled to do so by arbitrary authority. Therefore it isn't unusual to find unschoolers who are barely eight-years-old studying astronomy or who are ten-years-old and just learning to read." —Pat Farenga, Teach Your Own: The John Holt Book of Homeschooling Unschooling is not unparenting; freedom to learn is not license to do whatever you want. People find different ways and means to get comfortable with John Holt's ideas about children and learning and no one style of unschooling or parenting defines unschooling, as the following selection of books demonstrates. — PF http://www.holtgws.com/unschooling.html

Yarn Along

Finally! I can link up with Ginny at Small Things for a Yarn Along! It took me quite some time to finish this hat, but it's done. There were so many great shots of my son modeling that I couldn't choose one. FYI - If you think you see yarn hanging down from the upstairs balcony in these shots, you do. Wrapping the house in yarn seems to be the thing to do....and I think those are boogers under his nose. Whatever.

 Blowing me a kiss.

 Here's some of what we've been reading. Eaden made this bag so that she could take her little books around with her. I couldn't find the fabric markers...obviously.

Moments From the Week

We finally made a long overdue trip out to Gramen Farm. I bought a lot of Kombucha in an effort to cleanse. I've never really been into that sort of thing, but I thought I'd give it a try. I haven't been eating all that well and have felt a bit sluggish lately.

We made some money magnets for a simple math activity.

I painted some sticks to look like poisonous and non poisonous snakes. We then hid them in the grass and the kids had to find them. If they brought back a poisonous snake, they had to lay in the hospital for 15 seconds.

We went to Hermann Park for our nature walk Thursday.

I also created a treasure hunt for the girls. We talked a little bit about maps and so I thought it would be fun. The treasure was a new paper doll book for our growing paper doll collection.

Friday we baked an apple pie!

Blogging and Privacy

I'm pretty new to blogging. I started in May. So, I'm still kind of figuring the whole thing out. The other day I was going to post this hilarious picture of my daughter when my sister said no way! My kids have this obsession with running around naked and the other day Naia put an apron on (that's all she had on) and was sitting on a globe. My sister said you have no idea who is looking at that, etc., etc. Now I'm thinking oh crap, I need to go back and delete a bunch of stuff I put on here. My kids are going to kill me when they get older. I'm not going to quit blogging anytime soon. I love having all of these people, who I have so much in common with, to communicate with on a daily basis. I like to share our lives and I like peeking into the lives of others. There's nothing wrong with that, right? I just worry that I go too far sometimes when it comes to sharing my kids' lives. What are your thoughts? I'm still going to share pictures of my kids and what they're doing, just maybe not the naked and/or embarrassing ones. Darn! Those are the best.

Fairytale Skirt

I bought this unicorn and Rapunzel fabric a while back knowing that Eaden would love it. I only had a 1/2 yard of each though and wasn't sure what to make. Today I finally decided on a skirt. The Rapunzel fabric is heavy and the unicorn fabric is light, but I think it works out okay. Eaden loved it, but refused to wear a shirt for a picture. So, I had the always happy Naia to model.

I think I kept cutting off the top of her head because I was focused on the skirt, lol.

Linking up with Fabric Tuesday at Quiltstory, with Crafty Confessions, and with Sew Cute Tuesday at Creative Itch.