Ok, no sleigh bells really. I did scream as my saucer sled went careening down a pretty sleep slope, but my screaming voice sounds nothing like sleigh bells, to be sure. We did manage to walk around in a winter wonderland, though.
With snow promised for Sunday night, we spontaneously booked a cabin in a North Georgia development where we one day hope to build a home. After church we piled everything one might need if stranded for a week with no electricity in a remote mountain cabin and took off. We waited for the flakes as we drove up, and as we ate dinner in the cabin, and as we sat around the fire telling stories before bed. It wasn't until everyone else was nestled in for the night that I looked up from my book to see about a half-inch on the ground and more coming down rapidly. We awoke to this:
We had the whole unspoiled place to ourselves, since the big snow happened on a Sunday night, when no one was spending the weekend (a benefit of unemployment and homeschooling). It was breathtakingly beautiful, and the sledding was top-notch.
Afterwards there was hot cocoa. And wet clothes everywhere with no clothes dryer. And then they went out and did it again.
Later on, my husband and I did indeed conspire by the fire (I always thought is was perspire when I was little).
When it comes to facing plans unafraid, though, I need some encouragement. Ann Voskamp offered some timely thoughts last week.
One plan we had to face: getting home.
We weren't even sure we could get off the property, but we were running out of whipped cream, so we gave it a shot. I'm happy to report that we arrived home safely, and school's closed tomorrow, too (and our hybrid program with it)! Yippee!
As a former science teacher, I should be leading my children in mind-blowing activities and experiments followed by enlightening and insightful analysis each week, right? If so, I'm in big trouble. You see, I didn't receive much of a history education myself, so I'm enjoying and focusing there. That's where I would sit if I could, and we'd address science in middle school. After all, I've been there and done all that science stuff before. My children, however, have not, and they are fascinated with all things science.
Despite my background, I was struggling with how to teach something like Biology at a level that would be interesting and helpful to my young boys (which is why my then first grader knew, and still knows, all the major invertebrate phyla). So I began to search for a science curriculum, and I didn't care for most of them. I will go into my objections to most of what's out there some other time, but I did finally find something I love. It's called Real Science 4 Kids, and it's written by homeschool mom and biochemical physicist (no, no one knows what that is) Dr. Rebecca Keller.
Even better, one of my homeschool friends was interested in using the same curriculum with her two boys - instant co-op! We've done pretty well at this, but Friday is our science day, and so it's also the day that people go out of town, have relatives coming in, go on field trips, etc.
Real Science 4 Kids has several levels and covers Physics, Biology, Chemistry, and (they're working on) Earth Science. We started with the lowest level Physics for our first 10 week term. We won't quite manage to get everything in within the 10 weeks, but hey, we did succeed at setting up the "Lemon Battery".
Aside from such organized lessons, there are always the opportunistic science activities, many of which involve nature study.
On a recent trip to the Sea Grove beach on the Florida panhandle, dh corralled a crab into a bucket (not without first suffering a small laceration from the cornered crab's claw) and we watched as he burrowed backward into the sand.
We also visited Gulf World in Panama City Beach on that trip, which was not exactly Sea World, but then, I wasn't exactly looking for Sea World crowds. We did learn some interesting things about marine animals, including what they eat:
Yep, I'm raising little biochemical physicists all right. Yes, indeedy.
