Tag Archive | Wolves

Geocaching is Infiltrating Our Lives!

I swear I intend to catch up but we really followed through on our pledge to make every day count in May as much as possible. Living in the moment and finding the amazing in every second!!!

May 12-17

We are very blessed with our main penpal… Gammie has become instrumental in our writing and letter practice. We get more letters some months than we can almost keep up with but every one is answered! This newest installment came not only with letters but with a rainy day (and we have had a few) fun craft using pom poms.101_7444

101_7445She has added a new incentive for our school work… sending the girls their own work pages to mail back to her. Echo calls it doing her mail and I am happy to say she was VERY interested in doing it. We actually budgeted in curriculum overview books for the kids this month which includes one for her that she will start later in June or July.

101_7446There was also a new card game … whack a mole in card form?? The kids LOVED it!

101_7447Geocaching is going to be life changing for this family! Now even and every day trip to the store could be expanded to include a treasure hunt as well! We quickly are doing up all the local (walking distance) ones.101_7448

101_7450And on these outings we are finding more and more examples of winter being truly done and gone. After such a horrible winter each and every little indication is so AMAZING!!101_7451

Tuesday Trinity was teaching Echo how to concentrate on her pages…101_7453

101_7454Zander finished ANOTHER journal. Each book has higher expectations of the writer. This newest book means he has to have a title for every entry, the date and around 7 sentences! Anything to get the creative writing juices flowing! Well done Zander!

101_7455Another chapter of Treasure Island later…101_7456

And later in the day we made another trek out into the parks of Minnesota to find more Geocaching locations. This time we took Echo and while she and Mommy did not venture into the wooded area we did enjoy our walk. And met a nice puppy.

101_7459101_7460101_7461Wednesday was full of paper work.101_7464

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Osprey

Osprey

With the boys in the pool in the evening. I am not sure when we will sign them up for the next series of sessions but man are they improving. We honestly  cannot afford the large number of sports a lot of kids are in right now but what we do do seems to be so appreciated lately that I feel like as long as we keep taking advantage of what we can afford and maybe create our own opportunities we will do just fine!101_7468

101_7471101_7478On Thursday we were indoors and watching BBC nature shows. The kids made a lovely poster after.

101_7479The boys assembled some amazing Texas mini lapbooks. The links to these will be in my Texas Resource entry at the end of May.101_7480

More Wild Kratts…

Roadrunner

Roadrunner

And reading…101_7482

And a Dirty Jobs about mosquitoes (I had to share Gavin’s picture… that is one HAPPY insect).101_7483

Emanuel learned about South Africa as well.101_7484

On Friday since everyone BUT the kids and I were out and about I snuck out with Ken and brought them home CHOCOLATE DONUTS! Yup we miss our Tim Hortons!!!101_7485

And I mean we REALLY love the geocaching. I would totally suggest it to any family (or person for that matter) that wants something to do that is really on your own terms. We have downloaded an app for our smart phone but you can get a GPS unit (we want one one day). We have been picking an area that has multiple caches to find and do our best to get them all. We have our own special bag of things we need (that is still evolving and I will share the total list in the future I promise) and try to keep the kids as involved as possible.101_7488

101_7490Nature was out full force as well. Amazingly enough all this was close to Sam’s (ok so we combined a  good trip Geocaching with shopping…). A Saturday well done.101_7495

101_7496101_7497Spring has sprung full force here… and this is our best year yet for taking advantage of it!101_7492

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Walk Through a Week With Us

May 5-10

May has marked a definite increase in our book work and math exploration. Multi tasking has become Mommy’s most helpful skill (what you can’t see in the picture below is my fingers at work on a crochet project to steady the nerves!).101_7369

Our first real focus on Texas was the Alamo. A historical look at a location that shaped so many lives and the future of the now state of Texas. I absolutely adored the book we found at the library about it (which is listed in our Texas Resource page that will be posted in the not too distant future). Trinity and Emanuel took the responsibility of illustrating what we felt were some main points from the book.101_7370

Miss Echo felt a need to bring back out the at home assembled Kaleidoscope. She is so gentle with this toy it is just lovely to listen to her explain what she is seeing.101_7371

That night we had a special visitor – COUSIN ROBBIE! He came to play games in the evening (and have dinner) but obligingly came early to play with the kids FIRST! I don’t know that there could have been a better treat for them. He is a family favourite.101_7374

101_7376101_7377101_7375We even pulled out Sorry for the kids to play with Robbie so he had a double game night!101_7378

Tuesday we started our Texas themed stories… After learning about exaggeration and touching on the saying Everything Is Bigger in Texas the story was all sorts of outrageous fun!101_7380

101_7381The boys are showing great strides in their reading… Pokemon cards have been a great incentive… after all there is A LOT of information on those cards to discover and the rule is they have to read them THEMSELVES!101_7382

The kids were just not feeling it. So we did have quite a bit of down  time. I hate how spring always seems to bring in those seasonal change colds!101_7384

Of course on Wednesday we had to take a time out to watch Daddy and Baba move the trailer in the yard. An interesting visual example on how some things turn widely!101_7386

101_7387I love how as  the bigger kids learn Echo is there soaking it in!101_7388

We snuck in another Wild Kratts. I finally had to take them all and put them in a binder… so many animals, so many amazing facts and hand drawn illustrations!

Wolves

Wolves

I found a great craft on Activity Village for mother’s day = a template to make a flower where on each of the petals the kids write why they love their Mum. You can find this by searching Mother’s Day on the site (on right) and look under their designated craft section for that theme.101_7391

We finished up the day with dragging out the spring toys. So many bikes in a row!!!101_7394

101_7398It was back to worksheets and Texas learning the next day.101_7400

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We also had a sheet for Mother’s Day to complete.101_7402

With a break for a magic trick – putting a pin through a balloon without popping it! (hint the trick utilizes TAPE) This was another of Emanuel’s Scout achievements.101_7406

We rounded out our week with a family trip to the mall on Saturday… Grandma and Grandpa Mike had sent Easter sandal money and we had 5 little sets of feet to cover. All of the kids except Zander got sandals. His sneakers were tight so we got him those. Amazingly we walked into Payless and walked out 15 min later (yup THAT SOON) having had our own personal shopper and a 20% off total purchase coupon.101_7408

101_7410Seriously we bought only one pair of shoes (Echo’s) that was not on sale in the first place and Zander’s Airwalks were on super clearance! There was enough left over for Mommy to treat herself to a little spending spree at H&M. Two new dresses and two new shirts and the total cost was under 40.00. (granted had to dip into my special stash of cash but a TINY dip!)

We also stopped in at Lakeshore and did the gambit of craft activities they had with Mother’s Day themes! A bit of a mad house but we managed to enjoy it and have EVERYONE involved. Even Echo got her glitter on.101_7417

Once we got home we noticed a neighbour down the road had a bunch of stuff at the curb for free… suddenly we had two VERY happy girls with a new trike and two new playsets (kitchen and vet) for our backyard structure.101_7413

101_7415101_7416We ended the day with all guys boardgames and it was time for bed.101_7418

Mother’s Day is Sunday and our life cannot get much more busy, fun or enriching. I am so pleased with May so far!!101_7414