I've connected with some other families who are doing homeschooling this year. This week we've had several group activities that have been very productive. Ethan thinks we're just doing fun stuff. He doesn't think it's school unless we're having his formal one-on-one lessons in math or phonics. I suppose that's good. He's learning and he doesn't realize that it's school because it's rather natural. On Tuesday we did beeswax sculpting at Amy's house. The older girls got frustrated quickly because you really had to work at it to get the wax soft enough to sculpt. The mom's just jumped in and set the example making some really neat things which interested the kids to try again. Elle loved the beeswax and took a little bit of each color home in a baggie. The smell was very unique. It smelled somewhat of honey, but it also had a woodsey, naturalness to it. Hunter didn't like it, but I thought it was very calming.
On Thursday we went to Tilden park in Berkley. There were three moms and one homeschooling dad who all went together. Between the four parents we had 9 boys (including Garrett) and only 2 girls, Elle and Hannah. It was really nice to have the Dad influence on all those boys. At one point Hunter had to be plucked out of a tree because while climbing it his foot got wedged between some branches.
The main attraction was the farm and the nature center. After lunch we went on a nature walk around the lake. It was only a mile, but Elle got really worn out.
It was also amazing to watch the boys go into the pack mode and just start running. Poor Hannah felt a little overwhelmed.
I don't think Elle minded too much, because she's outnumbered most of the time anyway. It was nice for me to have some other grownups to talk to who are of the same mindset. We considered it so much of a sucess that we are planning more fieldtrips together.
Garrett was in the process of going to sleep. He gets very relaxed and just "mushes" in my arms. Michael looked over and saw the expression on his face and HAD to take a picture. Last night Garrett had fallen asleep in my arms so I took him to Michael to hold. Eyes closed, sleeping it didn't take long for him to wake up and protest loudly that Mom was no longer holding him. Apparently babies come with a proximity meter that works in conjunction with a scent alarm.
