A Day at the Lake

We spent a few hours at the lake today with some new friends. On the drive to the lake, E saw some trees that had been cut down. She started talking about how cutting down the trees hurts the animals and destroys their homes. We had a great conversation about logging, ecosystems, forest fires, and sustainability. We talked about how even if cutting down the trees doesn't directly ruin an animal's home, it can still affect it. I used the example of ground squirrels eating nuts from the trees. Cutting down the trees doesn't ruin the ground squirrel's home, but it does reduce it's food source. Then when the squirrels have to go somewhere else to find food, the snakes have less food, and so on.

I reminded the girls that we have lots of things in our house made from wood, so it's a good thing there is some logging. I told them that some loggers do clear cutting, but other loggers only cut some of the trees and plant new ones in their place, and that the practice is called sustainability. They thought that was a pretty good idea.

Then we drove by an area that had been destroyed by a fire years ago. Some of the grass and bushes have grown back, but the trees are still blackened skeletons.

Then E asked me if there was a job that a person could do where they helped animals that were hurt by fires or logging. I told her about wildlife rescues. She said she might like to do that when she grows up rather than be a dancer. I reminded her about Smokey the Bear, since we were driving right through that area burned by fire, and how the firefighters had taken him to a wild life rescue. I also reminded her about our visit to the horse rescue last summer (or the summer before?). I told her that the lady who owns it helps horses when their owners can't care for them anymore or if their owners are hurting them and the police take the horses away.

On the way back home, E asked me about the area burned by the fire again and how long ago the fire was. I said I didn't know what year it had happened, but that if I was remembering correctly that when she was one year old, we had driven that road and we saw that fire damage. So she figured out that since she is seven now and we saw it like that when she was one, that it had been at least six years since that fire.

While we were at the lake, the girls caught a couple of half dead, tiny fish.  We brought them home and they disected them, as much as is possible with something the size of my thumbnail.  They looked at their gills, fins, eyes, and tried to find the heart, stomach and intestines.  That led to talking about human bladders, gallbladders, intestines and colons.    

From allaboutbirds.org

They also pulled up a few different varieties of sea (lake?) weed.  By the time we got it home, it was dried out and I couldn't figure out what it is, but we had fun for a few minutes looking at different types of fresh water submerged plants online.  

E wanted to catch some birds at the lake, so she put out some watermelon rinds to see if they would eat them. Ten or so birds immediately flocked to the rinds. It was a great treat for them! I was trying to remember the name of the birds, which are very common around here.  My friend said they were black birds, which sounded right, but I thought they had another/a longer name.  It turns out they are Brewer's Black Birds.  They have iridescent feathers that the girls love to collect.  We spent some time this evening learning about their nests and what they eat. 

Typical Day

I woke up at 7 and took a bath (shower head broke!). L woke up a few minutes later, and she told me that last night she found a great recipe (maybe she dreamed it?) for strawberry muffins. So we made strawberry muffins for breakfast. I wanted something raw for me, but the cinnamon strussel on the muffins was good, so I made banana "icecream" with strawberries in it, and an oatmeal strussel on top.

We are trying a 30 day free trial of ABC Mouse (online game that E saw on a tv commercial and asked for), and L played that in the kitchen with me while I made breakfast, and we talked and hung out.

Then E and Z woke up. E played ABC Mouse for a while, and L and Z watched Barbie and The Magic Shoes off and on while playing and going outside. Meanwhile, I did yoga, called the insurance company, added the muffin recipe to my recipe collection, took a call from one of the other board members of the non-profit we are starting, and checked facebook and GCM.

E ate a peach and broke open the pit to find a smaller, almond looking part inside. She had discovered the pits have that inside part before, but this time she wanted to find out more about it. So we looked it up and found out it is the part with the embryo and endosperm. We couldn't find quite what we were looking for before it was time to get ready to go, so I posted on the "My Unschooler is Interested In..." facebook page to see if we could get some resources.

E found a frog in the yard, and we put it in a bowl with some water and a rock for it to sit on. It hung out with us while we got dressed and teeth/hair brushed. Then she released it.

E fed the dog, we left the house, and we went to the car wash to vacuum out the car. Then we went to the library's preschool story time. We picked out some books on flowers (for L who wanted to know about roses) and dinosaurs (for E who gets dinosaur books often) and a board book (for Z who liked the picture of the puppy on it), and we had to put some back because our library has a limit of 15 and we already had 8 out.

E had asked me in the car as we were going into the library why her schooled friend had asked me what day we were starting home school. I had told the friend that we home school all year. As E reflected on that, she said, "I'm glad we home school all year. I'm always learning something! I would get bored in the summer if I wasn't learning!" Then the story time was a school theme, with books about going to school. It didn't seem to faze the girls at all though, and the mom who read the stories at least said, "I know there are some home schooled kids here too!"

After the library, we went home and had lunch. L and E played while I sat in the bathroom with Z while she took a bath and I played on the computer. Then L played more ABC Mouse, while I read to E from an American Girl book about Josephina (it's the first chapter book series she has gotten in to). Then E played ABC Mouse, while L and I brushed each other's hair and I read her and Z a book about how trees grow.

A neighbor girl came over and they all played while I did dishes, picked up dog poop, filled out some paperwork to mail, and made half a dozen phone calls for the non-profit. Then it started to rain and the girls all wanted to come in and watch a movie. So I put on Cars, and that lasted about 15 minutes before they were outside playing in the rain. I played in the rain with them for a few minutes, then started making dinner.

L was full of meal ideas today. She had asked for pizza for lunch, but I said I'd make it for dinner. I made the dough and then realized that I was out of cheese. So I told girls we needed to run to the store and we got dressed again and headed out. We picked up a few things and sang "It's raining, it's pouring..." on the way through the parking lot. L cracks me up with her infectious laugh about that kind of stuff!

We came home and I got the chicken cooking. The girls all took a bath and then we ate dinner. I wrote most of this while eating dinner and right after. Which looked like writing, helping kids, writing, putting another pizza in the over, writing, calling my mom back, helping kids, writing, pulling the pizza out of the oven, writing, dressing the baby to go outside, writing, posting about today on facebook, writing, turning the piano on for Z, writing, turning music on for Z, writing, and so on.

At some point in there, the girls were getting snippy with each other and I tried to distract with a fun race of "Let's see who can pick up stuff in your room the fastest!" That one often works, but it floated like a lead balloon tonight.

E and L played outside for a long time, while Z alternated between playing outside, nursing and dancing to worship music. I cleared the counter, put food away, put away the clothes (dress up and regular) in the girls room, put away a load of laundry and started another load.

I found a spider in a jar that they asked me to catch earlier and they set it free outside. A few minutes later I heard squeals that were somewhere between being grossed out and fascinated. The spider lost a leg and the leg was still twitching. They asked me why and I told them it was reflexes/the nervous system. We'll have to look that one up later, because I have no idea how to explain it beyond that!

I sat in the bathroom with Z, reading my Bible while she took a bath. Then E and L came in from playing and took a bath too (Yes another one!), while I posted an interesting verse on GCM. They brushed their teeth and I put on a movie for them. They watched about half of it, Z nursed to sleep, and then I put my tv show on, and E and L fell asleep.

Was the day perfect? No! Most moments were good ones, but there were some bumps along the way. Z, who has been using the toilet since 17 months, peed on a chair at dinner and on the bed right before we laid down. I ended up apologizing to L for being cranky about her being slow getting dressed when we went to the store. After trying to problem solve with E and L (who were hungry right before dinner) over the space they were fighting over in the bath, I ended up pulling them both out so no one got hurt. I probably growled at the grabby handed 2 year old to "stop touching me!" when she was needing my boobs while nursing for the 3 thousandth time today.

 Overall, though, it was a wonderful day!