Weekly Wrap-Up: The Field Trips and Accidents Edition

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It’s been a roller coaster week. Monday, it was just the kids and I. Nim stayed home with her mom, so it was a pretty laid back day. I’m going to be so spoiled next year when Josh and Megan are able to work mostly independently. I guess I’ll finally find out what bon-bons really taste like…or maybe I’ll actually work on my dreamed-about book.

My favorite moment of the day on Tuesday was when I asked Brianna if she’d read. When she responded that she had, I asked her what she’d read.

“I read about Scotland,” she replied.

“In what?” I asked, knowing that we didn’t have any books about Scotland checked out from the library.

“The encyclopedia,” she answered.

Seriously, only a homeschooled kid would read the encyclopedia for her free reading time.

On Tuesday, we also did a fun science experiment, thank to Mary of Our Quiver is Full. We’ve been learning about the water cycle — except for, our science book has stepped it up a notch and is calling it by it’s highly-educated-sounding name, the hydrological cycle. I think the kids might actually remember the basics of evaporation, condensation and precipitation now, thanks to our experiment. Here are the components:

condensation

(Boiling water, a canning jar, and ice in a tin can)

You put the ice in the metal can. Pour the boiling water into the canning jar and quickly set the can of ice on top. The water begins to evaporate and it causes condensation and precipitation on the inside of the jar:

002

When you take the lid off, if you look carefully, you can see the “cloud” escaping:

003 (2)

On Wednesday, we left the house extra early (for us) so we’d have time to eat breakfast before our scheduled field trip. Unfortunately, this is what we wound up doing instead:

fender bender

Not exactly how I wanted to start my day. *sigh* Thankfully, no one was hurt and the accident was minor. I went this morning to get an estimate on getting it fixed. I’m supposed to drop it off at the auto body place on Monday and pick it up Thursday.

Despite how upsetting having a car accident can be, everyone involved has been incredibly nice, from the other driver to the insurance adjuster. It’s really been a reminder to me that attitude is everything. What could have been an awful experience has, instead, been not much more than an inconvenience. It’s taught me how much my own attitude can impact others, either positively or negatively and has strengthened my resolve to “pay it forward.”

Although I was disgusted and upset, we went ahead and went on the field trip as planned. It was an hour away, so the kids had time to make a breakfast of the food we’d brought to snack on and I had time to have my cry, which I had avoided up until that point.

The science museum that we visited was fantastic! We watched a movie about black holes under a dome with seats that laid back, so it was like you were looking up at the sky. We panned for gems:

gem stones

We sorted rocks according to type (which was really cool since we’d just been studying that):

010

We had a scavenger hunt in the rock and mineral room. Then, we watched another movie about the museum before we began exploring on our own. We didn’t stay as long as we’d have liked since we were all really hungry by that time, but the kids really enjoyed what we saw. There was a hands-on room for kids, the dinosaur room:

dinosaur

Which included fossilized dinosaur poop:

031

And a 250 lb. pendulum, suspended from the ceiling, that knocks over these little wooden blocks approximately every 8 minutes as the Earth rotates, moving the blocks into the line of the swinging pendulum.

025

Cool!

Today, after we took the van to get the estimate, we stopped for lunch at Chick-Fil-A, then, went to the library. I decided to call it a field trip since we’re learning about Connecticut today for our Fifty State Fridays and Connecticut was the home of the first free public library.

Probably my biggest highlight of the day was Megan’s reading time. She’s been reading really fluently, but I figured it was because she has such an incredible memory and was reading books that we’ve read many times before. Well, today she checked out some books from the library and read one that we checked out about two years ago.

She read so well! I was really impressed. And, it made me feel so much better. Being the bibliophile I am, it’s hard having struggling readers. I deserve one kid that reads well. Surely I do.

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Kris Bales is a newly-retired homeschool mom and the quirky, Christ-following, painfully honest founder (and former owner) of Weird, Unsocialized Homeschoolers. She has a pretty serious addiction to sweet tea and Words with Friends. Kris and her husband of over 30 years are parents to three amazing homeschool grads. They share their home with three dogs, two cats, a ball python, a bearded dragon, and seven birds.

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6 Comments

  1. Love the water cycle experiment. We have always done it with a boiling pot of water, and a cookie sheet with ice on it. I like this one better because you can see the “cloud”. Very cool!

    I am so glad that you and the kids are okay. Any accident is scary. And what a cool field trip. I hate that we didn’t go; maybe next time.

    Yeah, Megan!!!!

  2. Yeah to fluent readers and ones that read anything they WANT -even if it’s or especially if it’s an encyclopedia!!

    Thanks for the experiment- I’ve been thinking about introducing the water cycle (after looking at the world book curriculums). This looks fun!

    Glad everyone was okay in your accident!

  3. I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoy reading about your week. One of these weeks, I will do a weekly wrap-up of my own!
    Samantha

  4. That water experiment is great and as always you make learning sound so fun! I’m glad the accident wasn’t serious.

  5. Hey, I’m using that water cycle experiment this coming week. Thanks!! Car accidents – blech. glad everyone is ok. And tears are ok, too.

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