Tag Archive | Mars

Welcome to Our Mid Week

Midweek is always a good day for a playdate. Sadly, our movie date got cancelled with a medical emergency (it has worked out pretty well ok, but still not in time for us to continue with our free movie plan), but our playdate with Quinn and his Daddy went on right as planned. We actually had the house to ourselves for the whole day today, which works well with the goal to continue getting Quinn used to the noise and activity level of our 5. 

It was a day of projected showers so after some inside train time we packed up sandwich fixings and juice pouches and headed out to the park we visited last time (the blue and silver one). 

Food first…

Just the boys

Miss Trinity

And THEN play… which we lucked out with the time we had. It started to sprinkle right after we got done eating and then very quickly everything got slick and VERY slippery. As was evidenced by Zander ZOOMING off the slide and through the woodchips they used instead of sand or fine gravel. 

General park chaos

I did get a few really excellent pictures trying out the setting on my camera for dealing with active subjects.

Swinging

Trinity from below… so silly

And then it was back to the house for some more playing… mainly with the Thomas set. Emanuel and Quinn are both train fiends! He honestly did NOT want to leave at the end of their visit. Apparently our 5 are great fun! 

How dare I interrupt Thomas time with something so trivial as photos!

For schoolwork we decided to go easy… There was an excellent video to watch about the Mars rover Curiosity. 

We lucked out and there was also a brief new blurb on tv before we turned on our movie for bedtime. Apparently a full colour 360 degree image should be up for all to see in a few days. Add to that starting the colouring books their Aunty Holly sent with us on our trip south and the kids were pretty content. We figured with our guests imminent and myself just not in the mood less was really more! 

Movie time… without Daddy who was gone for his gaming night

That is not to say I haven’t been stitching… I am making some definite progress on the butterfly wings… here’s hoping that Ken’s job hunt progresses with the same beauty and speed. 

Progress!

We are still adjusting to forever in this new state/country… and still it is me that falters from time to time. I realize that there is no location to go BACK to in Canada but at the same time, there are moments when I just want to go “home”… I am trying to rearrange my thinking to remind myself that home really IS where the heart is… and my heart is with my husband and children. 

Little miss almost 2!!

NOT a Holiday Monday…

I have to admit I felt my foreign-ness Monday, up in Alberta it was a long weekend (as was greatly reflected on my Facebook feed) – Heritage Day actually. But here in sunny Minnesota it was business as usual. This did work in our favour, as while we could not do our calling up north we COULD do our errands locally… that means that as of the end of Monday we had gotten Ken a haircut (he had also shaved! So if pigs fly do NOT be surprised!), ordered our library cards (with no bills in our names of course, we were able to fill it all out and then to prove that you live locally they mail them out. If you are telling the truth you get it then…), mailed the first of the penpal letters (9 in all!) and opened an independent chequing account at a local credit union (did you know that having a bulletin from the local church you visit is enough for residency? At least for that place… we haven’t picked a church yet). I cannot get my name on it until I get a Social Security Number but it is a start! 

So many envelopes

So not only is Ken searching for that lovely 9-5 job but he is also clean cut and shaved, which means he is ready to interview when need be! So please, positive thoughts and prayers that the process is not a lengthy one and the job all we had hoped! I really do feel that we are finally where we need to be for the time being! 

The smiles on these creative faces (they are making their own boxes out of paper) is proof that we are doing the right thing (Gavin)

There is a major sale going on on Currclick right now! So I bopped over there and with some of my remaining paypal cash from previous surveys I ordered a grand total of FOUR downloadables for 1.80 Canadian! With the Mars rover recently landed and a meteor shower supposed to be in the making asap I figured why not do a quick hunt for lapbooks and notebooks regarding Mars… I chose a quick one day one for the twins… you can find it HERE. And then there was the dinosaur one I came across by accident HERE and finally TWO on Minnesota… a State study and general lapbook. I may just have to go back and think future topics and snap up a few more to save on my desktop. One of the ones I bought was only 30 cents! 

Today we faced a quieter day, or tentative plans to see Quinn and Bree fell through but the excitement of the removal of some trees in the backyard by Baba and Daddy made up for it. The removal of those trees left branches for play. 

Tree removal

Watching Daddy

So of course they did… they made their very own little “tree house”. I love the creativity and teamwork that went on. It was still a rather warm day so the shade was lovely under the other trees and for the kids, the sun deck. 

Tree house

School wise we continued with our workbooks, and added in some time for Gavin with a small cross stitch project that managed to sneak its way into our luggage on the way down here. He actually was quite the go getter on it today. He has pretty much mastered the half stitch, as long as I can keep his attention on the pattern. 

My little stitcher

Emanuel got to try out one of my newest Target purchases… a little set of dry erase ABC cards. 

Who can resist dry erase?

We also added in our Mars items. I have found some wonderful print outs from Education.com. I will share links to those later. We also found a great show on the On Demand on tv here from National Geographic kids called Is There Life on Mars? They were not totally enthused but after watching it we had an interesting talk about what they thought. So I quickly recorded the information so that tomorrow they can draw their own ideas out in some sort of picture form. 

Now to continue on with the themes… keep the kids active in their learning and of course HAVE FUN! After all what sticks better but the things we enjoy, love and accomplish with a smile on our faces???

Dancing babies