A corner of my life: Home schooling adventures!

Dear readers,

Being home schooled is a lot of fun! We have so much fun doing it that I would like to share a few of our adventures with you. We are ending our seventh grade year right now, so forgive me as I reminisce. At the start of this year we did a unit about pioneers. First of all - I love pioneers! I enjoy reading about them, writing about them, and yes, visiting museums about them. So, our first field trip of the year was to the Pioneer museum. In the above pictures you see the cute little church and my mom, sister and I in the gazebo. We had a ton of fun learning about pioneers as we peeked into historical buildings, pumped the water pump, and saw wheelchairs from the 1800s. Benjamin was certainly happy to have his power wheel chair and not one of those rickety things! I, remembering the episode of Little House on the Prairie in which Nellie Oleson faked injury and Laura pushed her down the hill, was thankful as well.
Another great experience we had was getting to bake bread. Though the process takes a while, it was completely worth it. My Mom and I (and Cate!) love baking...and even my brothers enjoyed getting their hands in the dough! All week we could only eat food with out additives or preservatives or anything else the pioneers did not have, so in order to eat bread we had to bake it ourselves! We took a picnic lunch to the Pioneer museum and ate some delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwiches! We even made our own peanut butter at the grocery store! I'm not a fan of regular PB&J, but this was delicious! As for the time it took to make...it really wasn't too bad. (I would have waited all week if that's what it took to have the ultimate pioneer experience) But you can't complain about the time-

Amish friendship bread takes 28 days to make!! (I'm making that next.)

Sadly, the pioneer unit is over now. On the bright side, we're still having some fun times! We have a dear friend, Andrew, who is going to school at the University of Arizona. My Mom and him arranged for us to head to Tucson for some one -on -one time with the cows at the University! I got to palpate several cows! It was the most amazing day! The first cow I maybe felt the calf - but I couldn't tell. The first heifer (bovine that has never had a calf) wasn't pregnant. I couldn't tell anything on her either. The second heifer did not want to be there. (Who would?) She put her head down adamantly and did not want me touching her. Well, I did any way - even though I felt awful about it - and BINGO! As you can tell from the below picture...I found the calf! I would go into all the details about how I got there and how the inside of a cow(or heifer) feels, but as I've learned from relating these facts to my family, not everyone wants to know. If you would like to know please comment on this post saying so and I will be more than happy to email you! That sweet calf was on its back and I was feeling its knees. It was about the size of a cat and I can not wait to see it! I'm sure it will be the cutest calf in the pasture when it is born. :) It was absolutely amazing! I enjoyed it so much that when Mom kept saying "Don't worry, honey. We can get you a new shirt." I had no idea what she was talking about! I was covered in the heifer's last meal but didn't notice because I was having the time of my life! I encourage you, if ever you get the oppurtunity, to do the same as me and have fun palpating without worrying about your clothing! You'll thank yourself later!

Thank the Lord for moms like mine willing to come up with the funnest and craziest ideas to make school fun! And thanks for friends and heifers willing to help that idea happen! This was just one corner of my life. I hoped you enjoyed it and the many more to come!