Our Journey Westward » Family

Catching My Breath

Cindy — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 17:36:10 +0000

T-ball down, only B-ball and Softball to go! Going from 6-8 games a week down to 3-4 will be more freeing than you can imagine.

Even though I haven’t been around here much, I’ve been around.

Helping with, hosting a booth and speaking at the CHEK Conference. (Thanks to all the wonderful ladies and gents who showed up at the Creative Homeschooling workshop! It was packed to the gills and that made me smile. I hope you were blessed!)

Writing reviews at The Curriculum Choice, only one of which has been posted yet.

TruthQuest History

Having fun on the Shining Dawn Books Facebook page. (LOTS of giveaways lately – hint, hint.)

Setting up bundle pricing on all the NaturExplorers units and other products over at Shining Dawn Books. (A new $6.00 quarterly special will be announced tomorrow, too!)

And, working on revisions for my book with Prufrock Press. I’m SO excited! The fall 2011 release date is close and the cover shot makes it seem even more real!

Now that some of the busyness is winding down, I’m determined to spend the last month of summer break doing what people should do during summer break – relaxing, swimming, canning, reading books on the hammock and enjoying every moment of the sunshine.

Are you enjoying your summer?

Spring Fun

Cindy — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 10:33:28 +0000

April and May were two of the busiest months I think I’ve ever had! Here are just a few of the things that kept me busy… (This isn’t even the half of it!)

A field trip to Old Friends, a retirement home for famous race horses.

A baseball parade kicked off the ball season. All three of my kiddos are playing ball this year!

A field trip to the Lexington Arts and Science Center taught us all about energy.

Homeschool Days at the Kentucky History Museum was great fun.

A tour of our Old State Capital included some reinacting by our kids.

The local post office was a very interesting field trip!

Caleb's Upward basketball games didn't end until April!

Of course, the farm life has been busy this spring, too!

A 14th Birthday

Cindy — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 13:59:42 +0000

The years just keep rolling on! My precious daughter is 14. Wow, how time flies. She loves animals and wanted her cake in the theme of her border collie, Lily. We couldn’t find a figurine of Lily, so this little dog on the cake had to do.

We found a photo of a similar cake after doing a google search for “dog cakes”. It was only slightly difficult, but we loved the way it turned out! I baked the top and bottom of the cake in two different sized pans to make the layers. The bones around the edges were simply a chocolate sugar cookie cut with a dog bone cookie cutter. And the paws are just a warmed chocolate icing that was piped through a medium-sized hole snipped in a baggie. A few extra steps, but really very easy!

A Sign-Making Business

Cindy — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 11:00:39 +0000

It’s been a while since I’ve posted about some of Caleb’s shenanigans, but – believe me – he’s still up to them. This is the entrance to his room where he’s started a sign-making business. Each sign can be custom-made and charges depend on whether or not he has to include drawings and/or needs to look up words in a dictionary or thesaurus.

My favorite…(obviously created in a hurry with b-a-d handwriting!!!)

Eli takes after his big brother.

His latest…”Mommy, I want to have a new name called Krabby Patty. All other Eli’s are called Eli and I wanna be diff’rent.” He’s seriously making me call him Krabby Patty right now!

Making Butter the Old Fashioned Way

Four Years Old!

Cindy — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 18:21:15 +0000

It’s hard to believe we just celebrated the 4th birthday of my littlest!

I love this picture from the party of my three kiddos with their great grandparents. They are blessed to still have three great grandparents in their lives!

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Favorite Games

Cindy — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 11:00:18 +0000

During my workshops about creative homeschooling and living math, I often talk about incorporating games into the school schedule. The question that always follows is, “Which games are your top picks for each subject?” So, for the record, I’m posting some of my favorites for various subjects. Since this is the Christmas gift season, some of these games might be good choices for secretly educational gifts!

You’re gonna think I’ve gone widget crazy!!!! However, this was the simplest and easiest way to put together a post with photos rather than just writing a long and boring list.

I would love to hear about some of your favorite games! We’re always up for something new!

Family Celebrations

Cindy — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 10:00:54 +0000

We’ve been enjoying so many family activities lately from birthdays to campaigning. This is a very random post with highlights from several of our times together. Family is important. Don’t forget to make time for everyday celebrations with them!

Game time at my Daddy's birthday gathering. Anyone else ever played Farkle?

Cousins being silly together.

Cousins who think they're big enough to climb trees. They're not.

My birthday dinner that Mahayla made from scratch - Dijon Crusted Chicken, Scalloped Potatoes Broccoli Casserole and Honey Wheat Bread. Yum!

Precious time spent with my Granny who's 89 and in poor health. Anytime we have the opportunity to see here (she lives in Alabama) we count as a blessing.

Campaigning, campaigning and more campaigning!

This is from our trip to the World Equestrian Games. It was such a great day!

KY State Fair

Cindy — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 19:50:47 +0000

We love the State Fair! This year was our first time being more than spectators and we had a busy, but exciting blast. The big kids showed goats two nights in a row, which left two days full of exploring all the sights and sounds.

Some kind friends hauled our two goats to the fair with them. We just had to unpack our things and check on the goats once we arrived. Bless their hearts – our friends saved us a lot of hassle!

Our goats were penned just inside the stadium, so we had great seats for all the shows. We just parked ourselves right above our goats’ pen and enjoyed the view.

Some of our daytime excitement included exhibits of all sorts. The 4-H experiment stations were the most fun! Below, we’re testing the pH levels of various liquids. We also got to make electrical circuits, extract DNA strands from fruit, and become CSI’s by examining maggots on a “dead body”, among other things.

In the health section of the fair, we were able to have vision, skin cancer and chiropractic screenings – and could’ve had several other screenings ALL FREE if we had wanted to. One of the local cancer hospitals had a robot like they use for laser surgery that we were able to use, and there were all sorts of healthy eating games for the kids to play.

Eli enjoyed a ride through the KY State Police Safety City (even though the officer had to put his foot in front of Eli’s wheel to keep him from taking off as instructions were given.)

Even the livestock barns had a few hands-on things to do.

Our evenings were spent doing a lot of waiting for goat shows, but the time spent was sweet.

Math, grammar, spelling and all the other book work is important, but these are the learning experiences that will really make long term impressions!

Vacation Highlights Part 6 – Charlottesville, VA

Cindy — Sat, 28 Aug 2010 12:08:32 +0000

Our last night of hotel life in Virginia led us to Charlottesville, home to Monticello – Thomas Jefferson’s homestead. We got into town late and were led by our hotel clerk to Charlottesville’s historical downtown mall for dinner. We ate outdoors and enjoyed their weekly Friday night music – this place was hopping and quite fun!

A weary crew with a skinny wallet spent much of Saturday visiting a few of the hotspots of historical significance in Charlottesville. First stop was Monticello. Unfortunately, tickets to tour Jefferson’s house were $22/person (more than Jamestown & Yorktown combined!), so we opted to enjoy the free children’s and adult’s museums instead. Again, these were very nice museums and the children’s section was completely hands-on.

Michie Tavern was a fun stop on the way. As with everything this last day, we chose not to pay for a tour, but enjoyed the outdoor sites and fun gift shop. (I didn’t get a good picture of Ash Lawn-Highland, James Monroe’s home, but we stopped in there for a peak, too. All three of these sites were within a couple miles of one another.)

And finally, an exhausted crew headed back through the Blue Ridge Mountains to arrive home very late Saturday night. If only we had an extra day, we would’ve made one last stop in Lexington, VA to visit VMI and Washington & Lee. For now, we’ll just dream about the next fun-filled vacation – whenever and wherever that may be!

Vacation Highlights Part 5 – Yorktown, VA

Cindy — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 00:35:13 +0000

As with every single aspect of our vacation, we were completely impressed with the quality and child-friendliness of the Yorktown Victory Center. Hands-on exhibits, actors, camps, films and indoor walk-through museums made this yet another wonderful stop.

In the Revolutionary War camp, we watched as a cannon was fired…

plotted our war strategy…

wrote journal entries…

and had to discipline a couple of characters.

On the colonial farm, we washed clothes…

carded wool…

and took some time out for fun.

After the museum, we caught the free trolley that took us on a tour of downtown Yorktown. As with several other stops, if we had more time, we could’ve spent the entire day (or more) meandering through the town and the actual battlefield. Not only did those mean more time, they also meant more money – something we were beginning to run out of at this point on the vacation!

Final stop: Charlottesville, VA