April 14-16

Is there a better way to start a week of school than with a series of drawings thanks to Art for Kids (link on right)? I know I am repetitive but CHECK THEM OUT. Their instructions are wonderful!

They really do work for all ages!

We also had an Easter story to enjoy.

With out basic school day out of the way the sunshine called us outside. Time to break out the Big Wheel and bikes and the funky skateboards.

Ken and his dad tried the recipe I found off Facebook for an adult popsicle called a Dirty Pirate. You can find the recipe HERE thanks to Jackie Fo and Tablespoon.

Tuesday marked our second trip back to the Minnesota History Center (MHC). This time we had a longer span of time to enjoy and a plan to go to all the places we had not seen on our previous visit. All on our new family pass to the historical places in Minnesota.

There was lots to see and we were able to time our travels around the areas away from the school groups that were also there. I took the twins in for the Tornado demonstration. It was louder and a bit scarier than I thought it would be but they now REALLY know what to do in case of a tornado.

We spent the most time in the house that is set up so you can walk through and get a taste of each family that lived in that house from when it was built until more recent time when it was put up in the center.

Creepy eyes on these ones!

The kids especially enjoyed the “backyard”.

The afternoon was quiet but Gavin did sneak out to work on his skateboarding skills while Echo worked with some flashcards.

With a wonderful field trip under out belt I think everyone was upset to see that winter had snuck back in with more snow!

From this…

To this in the night!

With a day indoors we once again attempted our yarn wrapped eggs craft… there HAS to be a trick we don’t know about… our results simply are not right!

With Nana and Baba back I was able to join Ken and see all 3 boys in their swimming lessons! So much fun!!! This is Emanuel’s first lessons and the twins’ second. It is so exciting to see them work on this milestone all on their own.

February 22-25

What to do on a weekend when we plan to be home for it? Well… have company! Childhood friend Christopher and his wife Renee who is due any day with their 3rd (boy) and their sons Nathan and Evan. They came over for lunch and playtime. Younger than our boys the kids still managed to have a lot of fun. Of course Skylanders came out and Legos and such. It was nice to have company over where the adults could just sit around and chat (or craft).

Walking Tacos

We ended our Saturday calmly with a movie. Really not much to report beyond a great visit with old friends.

Sunday was totally a crafty day… after Sunday school. I had to get EVERYTHING out and package up my big commission from a friend up north… she requested I make her a variety of critters for her to gift etc this year… I think I covered the spectrum and had a blast honing my skills while doing it. Is it ever hard to wait until she gets it to find out her thoughts!!!

And then for a more local (but still mailing away) craft… one I have not done in ages – an infant knotted tutu. Using glitter tulle so I am on the hunt for the escaped glitter now. Really glitter is EVIL!

Monday was back to work… and back to swimming for the twins. I am really impressed how much more RELAXED they are each time.

We had some more sporty drawing to enjoy. Art for Kids (on right) put up a stick figure figure skating… something Trinity was quick to say SHE wanted to draw.

We decided to create our own Olympic medals. I love the 4 different interpretations… Zander’s all had his name on them, Gavin recreated the official ones for this year… the other two were equally creative. I got our template from Activity Village HERE. We used the 3 sizes of circles to show the different places as I really didn’t want to print out enough that we had 4 sets of large circles!

Emanuel and I are working on our Magic Treehouse dinosaur themed story still. It is so much fun reading one on one with him. His own reading skills are increasing by leaps and bounds!

We added a new animal to our Wild Kratts list – the Meadow Vole. The twins have come up with a new idea along the same lines. They want to watch Dirty Jobs episodes with Mike Rowe and pick one of the jobs of the episode to research further. We have been working on our Google searching and how we type in a specific topic or sentence and then reading through articles… with adult supervision of course.

The weather is just too yuck for the little ones so we pulled out our rainy day fun bucket and did some creative sticker and face shape crafting. Echo especially found this  to be great fun!

Tuesday was a rather special day… of course we still did our basics including some Lego time…

BUT Tuesdays 5-8 pm are free admission at the Minnesota History Center!

There was tons to see and do and not enough time for us to do it all. We had only an hour (5-6) before we needed to be back for Ken to go to his weekly gaming night but we made good use of it. We went straight to the area that was the most hands on for the kids. I want to go back and see the prohibition era limited time display in the following weeks.

There was tons about the fur trade and the Native Americans…

Reproducing bead patterns

A great display about the use of Bison…

And so much more.

The 4 big kids and Ken tried out the mine area as Echo was having nothing to do with the noise and darker ambiance.

It was so much fun to head out and just enjoy learning about the state we now live in. Together time well worth it! And how to end the evening with Daddy gone to gaming? With a late snack food supper and a movie… THOUGH I hasten to say – fun mommy was only for ONE night… the next night we planned bacon wrapped pork and vegetables…

The joy of learning not only at home but out in the open air!