Field Trip Friday

We spent a slightly chilly, kind of wet day out at a Civil War field trip today.  I really wish they had put on an actually reenactment at least on a small scale but the kids enjoyed what they did have available.  All of the kids enlisted in the Union Army and most of them spent some time drilling for battle.  I'm not sure exactly what they actually learned but everyone says they had a great time.

The Farm Trip

Bryan got his first paying job this year working at a local farm turned tourist attraction.  I have mixed feelings about these sort of places. On the one hand, it's great to see family run farms find a way to keep their farms profitable and in their family.  On the other hand, it's incredibly sad that government regulation of farming has made it so hard for family farms to be profitable on their own.  It makes no sense to either pay farms to NOT plant crops or to pay them to leave a certain amount of their crops in the fields, unharvested until they are no longer usable.  I know in some warped Washington-ese way this is a sensible way of controlling food costs but I just can't get behind not producing and bringing to market as much food as possible and donating the hopeful excess to those in need. But I imagine this shows that I am too soft on those who struggle to make ends meet on their own or something (or so I've been told).

Anyway, this weekend the farm held military appreciation weekend. The weekend started with a 5K run/2 mile walk to support Troops for Trees which is an organization which helps provide Christmas trees to military members overseas.  For the rest of the weekend, military families received free admission. These are the kinds of offers I look for when planning activities for the kids.  Free and discounted admission make things much easier on the budget and keep the family from feeling the pinch of a tight budget. The weather was kind of iffy which kept crowds away and we only had to deal with a few random sprinkles here and there.  The kids had a wonderful time enjoying all of the rides and activities and we used Bryan's employee discount to cut our lunch costs in half (as I told Bryan: you know me, I always ask for any discount possible so of course I asked if they'd give us a discount since you worked here).  So here are a few pictures.  Ellie was able to enjoy her first train ride and go down the giant slide with her big brother.  Even with the cooler weather, everyone had a blast.

The giant human hamster wheels.

Corn Mazes are not that much fun when your kids like to run way ahead of you.

Maybe you can't see Ellie's face but she has the biggest smile in this picture.

Beautiful Ellie

Sleeping in her sister's bed, of course.

Seven Sorrows of Mary Craft

September 15 was the feast day of Our Lady of Sorrows.  I found a rather neat art project a few weeks ahead of time at Catholic Icing.  Even though I printed it out well ahead of time, it still ended up being put together late because that seems to be how we run around here. It turned out fairly well until one of my children decided to jump up to try to smack it while walking through the hall like his brother had just done and managed to rip it down.  Sigh.  At least I tried, right?

Dot Art

Have you seen these Do-A-Dot Markers yet?  I love using them with younger children.  They are perfect for preschoolers working on hand/eye coordination and a great way to allow your kids to paint in a relatively neat manner.  Ok, a determined child can still make a mess with them and any child can use them to paint on themselves but you are less likely to end up with paint on the floor or the walls.

 I love to look for printable activities designed specifically to be used with these markers.  I have a set of print-outs that Gabe is working his way through for kindergarten that help introduce all of the letters and numbers (yes, we go a little slower here now than we used to so kindergarten is more like it was when we were in school rather than an academic thing).  While searching for those, I also stumbled upon a few options for just fun pictures.

I printed out some fall dot pictures from this website.  Wonderful fall themed shapes.  I was able to print both pictures with just a few dots for Robert and Ellie and pictures with a ton of them for Gabe and Abby.  Ellie still has no real clue about putting the dots in the circles on the paper but she did a great job painting her arms.  Robert got the idea behind filling in the circles but wanted nothing to do with using the suggested colors. He went for a more abstract look.  Apparently apples are meant to be blue.  The older two both did a great job of following the directions.  I'm hoping I will stay on the ball and continue to print out activities of this sort this year for the younger ones because the 10 minutes of quiet concentration helps the older ones have a bit more quiet time to do their work.

More Pictures From the Village

We spent all of Friday walking around the village.  The camp presentations are always at the end of the afternoon but rather than come back home, we like to spend the day walking around with the younger kids.

 No trip with the little ones is complete without a stop in the hands-on house.  And just a reminder to all of the adults out there: when something like this is available, let your kids use it and back off.  I've walked into this house with another adult only to have them immediately start yelling at the kids for touching things.  Seriously, some things are meant to be touched and experienced.

The Village now has a permanent Civil War exhibit.  This exhibit showcases a replica of the Intrepid balloon which was used during the war to keep track of enemy troops.  On days when the wind is favorable, rides are even available in the balloon.

When small children need to be occupied, there are two things that are suggested. One is a stop at the grand meadow to run off some energy and another is a stop at the general store to sample a cookie. Yes, it is bigger than her head.  Ellie fell asleep after eating half of it and immediately started looking for the other half when she woke up.

This is my favorite place to visit in the village.  This church used to be St. Feehan's parish in Chili.  I love the old statues.  I love the look of the altar and the communion rail.  The stations of the cross are beautiful.  The entire place just makes you think this is what a church is supposed to look like.  I did have a hard time explaining to the little ones that Jesus was not actually present in the church when they asked if they could say good-bye to Jesus before we left. They knew to look for the tabernacle (which you can't exactly miss) but I guess I have forgotten to explain that when the sanctuary lamp is not lit, Jesus is not in the tabernacle.

We also spent some time in the school houses take drawing lessons and learning the alphabet.

This little guy was the big attraction at the beginning of the day.

And a few of our favorite people caught enjoying village life.