Fun Cleaning

Yes, this is what my kids call cleaning when they are working together.  Someone makes up a game and they start "playing" as they clean.  Oh how I love this!  Cleaning is getting done while I hear giggling.  It's not always fun and games, but there are a lot of times where my house is like this.  I love that they have time to be creative and enjoy each other!

Zion National Park

We spent a long weekend. with our good friends the Milam's, in Zion National Park.  We camped in Springdale and shuttled our way to the park everyday.  We hiked in beautiful landscapes, sang songs on the bus and roasted marshmallows.  We attempted to roast my homemade marshmallows, but we did not have success.  They sort of melted of the stick.  I did buy some sugar free marshmallows online that roasted quite nicely. Between the two families there were 12 children and 4 adults.  We got a lot of comments and looks.  One guy thought they were all mine.  Phew!  Can you imagine having that many so close together?  I have a deep respect for my mother in law and the Dugger family.

The Milam's used to be our some what neighbors here in Utah.  We got to know them through our homeschool group and ended up spending a lot of time with them.  While I was going through my 2 years of struggle (hard pregnancy and care giving for Melissa while she had cancer) Sonya Milam really took care of me and the kids.  She would show up at my house with her big van, come in my house and say "who wants to go to my house?!"  Of course all the kids took off running and were in the car before I could say "would you like to go?".  All of our kids get a long like a dream and have so much fun together.  They eventually made their way to Colorado.  It was so nice to be with them last week.  We had a grand time.

 This is the second hike we did called Angles Landing.  It was very steep, but so amazing.  Aaron took Aiden to the very top, while I stayed behind with the others at the first stop.  To get to the very top, you had to go through a series of chain led narrow paths with steep drop offs.  Aiden was very excited that he got to go.

Aaron hiking with Eva to Angles Landing

This picture is a little bit of an optical illusion.  I'm standing at the top of this trail and taking a picture looking down.  You can't see the whole trail.  Do you get an idea of how steep this was?

Looking out from the top

Here is Aiden along the Narrows trail.  We did not do the entire Narrows.  It's a hike that requires a permit because of the difficulty. We just hiked the mile to the beginning.

 Here are all of our kids together, minus Eva, she was asleep on Aaron's back as seen below.

The kids checking out the Virgin River.

Me and Aaron on the Hidden Canyon East Rim trail.

 The canyons were amazing.

This picture turned out a little blurry, but all the kids were looking at the camera!

Sonya was the only adult that could keep up with the kids.  Here she is with all the kids trailing behind her.

Before we all drove away toward home, we took some pictures with our buddies.

Here are Tanner, Sierra and Robyn.

Sierra and Robyn

Sophia, Emma and Savannah

Aiden and Henry

Mosiah and Eva

 

Sonya and me

Looks like we missed a picture of Aaron and Tom...

The Shakesphere Ball 2012

 

Every year my homeschool buddy puts on a Shakespeare ball for kids ages 12-18.  She invites the vintage dancers to come to give instruction and lead the kids in group dancing.  They play games and get to be social.  They are invited to come in costume.  For me, an opportunity to sew something fun!  

 

Getting ready

 

 

As the older girls were getting dressed, the younger girls took the opportunity to go through their dress up clothes and adorn themselves for the ball.  Eva was very sad when she found out she was not going.  We had our own ball at home. Aiden made his presences.

 Emma designed her own head dress.

The girls greeted by some of their friends.

Emma and Robyn with one of their first Utah friends, Raven.  Robyn and Raven call each other "bird friends".

 Beautiful Emma

Dancing...

Emma and Robyn with their friend Savannah.

Sledding

Here we are, sledding the next day.  The great thing about homeschooling: getting to the slopes before the other kids get out of school.  I'm sure it was torture for the school kids that were watching across the street from this park...

Eva insisted on walking up the hill on her own.  She did, without complaining.  It took her about 20 minutes to walk up.  She looked so tiny.

Eva

The Nielby, Kibson Klan  (for those of you who don't know what that means, it's our last names put together using both the beginning and the ending of our names).  They are long time friends of ours.

Aiden's Unit Study: Electricity

My kids are required to study a subject for a month and then report, at the begining of the folloing month, during  Family Home Evening. 

Aiden chose to study electricity this month.  This is his first experiment:

Mom: Aiden, what have you learned so far about electricity?

Aiden:  I don't know.  Just kidding!  It's really really really fun. We used what we had at home to conduct the hot dog experiment.  We only had to buy hot dogs and aligator clips.

Mom:  Would you like to add what you learned about electricity?

Aiden:  Electricity cooked the hot dog because the salt caused the electricity to run through the hot dog.  Salt is a conductor. 

Mom:  What else is a conductor?

Aiden: I have no idea.  Just kidding again!  Copper wire, tin foil, metal and water.

Mom: Any thing else?

Aiden: People, though that would hurt.

Mom: So what happens if you touch the hot dog while it is cooking?

Aiden: I haven't tried, buzzzzzz, woah. 

We found this definition on the internet of what a conductor of electricity is:

The substances which have free electrons(which move freely ) act as conductor while those whose electrons held tightly (which can not move freely) are insulator.

Yard work

Having a large yard has it's benefits and drawbacks.  The amount of leaves that fall from the many trees is amazing.  I raked the part of the yard about three times and there are still leaves on the ground.  I'm grateful for all the leaves to put into my compost pile and for my kids to play in.  Raking is a good workout as well.

This was Robyn's idea of "helping"

Aiden's Creative Cooking Show

One day while mom was out, the kids got creative again.  This time: movie making.

It's fun to see Aiden so outgoing.

Archery

Emma and Aiden got the chance to take a free archery class at our local shooting range.  They are having a great time learn to use a bow and arrow. The fun part, aside from archery, is they are joined by a few of their friends.

 Here is Emma with her life long friend Aeryn standing side by side leaning to shoot a bow and arrow

Here's Aiden giving it a try

Human Body Study Part 1

This year we started a science curriculum on the human body.  The curriculum is great because it is filled with several short lessons in a chapter followed by an experiment.  It take us about 2 weeks to get to the experiment which are very hands on.  Here's a link to the curriculum that we purchased.

 Here are the kids making an edible "cell" out of jello and candy. Don't worry they are all sugar free :)

The finished product

State Fair 2010

Here are some pictures of our Utah State Fair entries. This year I entered in as a amature rather than a professional and found that it was a little more competitive. It's fun to see your own creations at the State Fair. I really enjoy walking around and glenning ideas from all the other entries.

This year my mom was in town to go to the fair with us and my sister in law Monica joined us with of her kids and grand baby. It was a great time.

I got 4th place for Eva's blessing gown

Third place for Robyn's baptism dress

No place for the story coat. I'll have to admit, it wasn't put together well. I got frustrated with it because the lining did not match up well with the outside of the coat. I took it apart and resewed it about 3 times...Gwen loves it and that's all that matters.

Emma's hand embroidered horse got first place!!

Robyn's doll, Johanna, got first place

2 of Robyn's entries both got a first place ribbion!

Gwen's embroidery of her name. Way to go Gwen!!

Aiden's "flying" house. He got 5th place for it!!

Emma and Kali

Robyn and Gabe

Gwen with her cousin, Gabe

Aiden at the "farm"

Monica, my mom Helen and myself

Look at all these kids!!! Kibbie's and the Cassleberry's (cousins)