Rock walls, pond, stream, and more

Last Wednesday the kids and I spent 5+ hours at the Waterdale Environmental Education Center. During that time the kids collected macroinvertebrates in a stream and then worked together to identify what they had collected, toured a water treatment plant, went on a tree identification hike, did a chromatography experiment with leaves, and participated in other lessons that focused on watersheds and wildlife. There were five presenters, one of whom is a biology professor at Lycoming College. When I posted the field trip, there were fifteen kids who were signed up for it, which is a smaller group than they typically offer this program to. Thankfully, they were willing to conduct the program with a smaller group. Two days before the trip, four more kids were added to the roster. One day before the trip, one mom informed me that another mom wouldn't be bringing her three kids because one of them was sick. On the day of the field trip, I was expecting that we'd have sixteen kids participate, but only ten showed up. This meant we had five moms, ten kids, and five presenters. For four of the sessions, the kids were split into two groups of five. During the hike and tour of the water treatment plant we were altogether. This field trip was free and was located less than 30 minutes from our home. One perk of homeschooling is that we moms are given many opportunities to learn new things (or in some instances like helping Nadia with Geometry I am relearning things I haven't used for 36 years). I definitely learned some new things during our tour of the water treatment plant. 

In the afternoon on Thursday, we went to Camp Susque for another session of Nadia and Ian's Outdoor Adventure Skills class. They went on a 2+ hour hike up Lookout Mountain with the Camp Director and his dog, Sawyer. Nadia is not a fan of hiking, but she did admit the view was very beautiful at the top. The last three sessions of the class will be focused on climbing a rock wall and doing a ropes course, which is more her cup of tea. Oliver, Milo, and I did some hiking on our own, and Oliver also enjoyed playing on the playground and in the sandbox with two other boys who also have older siblings in the class. 

On Friday we drove to Messiah University, which is a little more than 90 minutes from our home. Unfortunately, Jenna was on fall break, so we weren't able to spend time with my niece, who is a sophomore there. We went on a hike, visited a room where they keep many of the specimens not currently on display in the natural history museum, participated in a lesson on skulls, and then took a guided tour of the museum. Natural history museums are not usually our favorite type of museum. We'd rather see live animals at a zoo or an aquarium than preserved ones, but having a guided tour made it far more interesting. They did have a few live animals on display from the biology department such as a shrew and bearded dragon. The last two activities were our favorites partially because the second activity was FAR too crowded whereas we were in a very small group for the third and fourth activities. I thought it was worthwhile to do once, but I don't think we'll return. I would consider some of the other classes that they offer homeschoolers if we lived a lot closer. We had packed our lunches and ate dinner once we were back at home. We stopped for a treat on the way home. Two of us opted to get ice cream at an ice cream shop we had never been to before that we passed on our way home. I had noticed on the way down that they were selling peanut butter and chocolate twist soft serve, which is one of my most favorite desserts. Oliver and Nadia opted to use a gift card for Auntie Anne's for some cinnamon sugar pretzel nuggets. 

This is the building where Jenna has many of her classes.

The weather was very nice on Friday and again on Saturday. This school year Nadia hasn't wanted to start her school day as early as she had in past years. Since I don't want to take Milo for his first walk in the dark, sometimes the kids sleep until 8:00am. Last Saturday I got the kids up at 7:00am because we were in the van at 7:35am to drive to a service project. We spent six hours at Experience Missions with about 30 other people where we packed 30,024 meals for kids in Uganda, Ecuador, and the Dominican Republic. We plan to return there again this Saturday morning. The goal is that over the course of seven packing sessions 150,000 meals will be packed. After our session last Saturday, there were about 62,000 left to be packed. After we got home from the meal packing session, I mowed the lawn and then took Milo, Ian, and Oliver to a trunk or treat event at a church very close to our home where the kids used to go on Wednesday nights for AWANA. Ian went as Spiderman, and Oliver went as Batman. Oliver asked me to take them to another trunk or treat event last night put on by our local school district. Ian was wearing a Lego Ninjago costume, and Oliver was Batman again. When we saw how LONG the line was, we just came back home. The kids and I are signed up to help out at our church's event this week on Friday night. Hopefully the weather won't be too cold.

On Sunday the only time we left our house was to go to church in the morning. I had invited one of our church's nine pastors and his wife over for dinner at our home. We shared a meal together and played Code Names and Uno. I had set a goal to have 12 different couples/families over for dinner at our house in 2022 (not counting any of our relatives), and I think we will achieve that goal as we've had 9 over so far and I have scheduled three more in November. On Monday morning the only "schoolwork" that the kids did at home was to watch the daily 10-minute World Watch News program and Nadia and Ian took a biology test. The kids and I then spent about 26 hours at our first ever homeschool retreat at Camp Susque, which included eating two lunches, one dinner, and one breakfast there. The kids painted rocks and played outdoors during the opportunities for free time. The classes included a nature hike, a bird walk, a pond study, rock climbing, and a class on reptiles and amphibians. We also participated in a devotional time around a campfire that concluded with roasting marshmallows to make s'mores. The kids found MANY animals in the pond - not as many macroinvertebrates as they had last week but many tadpoles, salamanders, newts, etc. They also found some red efts during the hike. 

Nadia and Ian first attempted the harder side of the rock-climbing wall. Ian made it farther than Nadia did, but he didn't make it to the top on that side. All three kids tried the easier side. Ian made it to the top, and Oliver stopped literally inches away from the top. When the kids camp there in the summer, they stay in a tent or cabin. We stayed in a room in a lodge. Ian was on the top bunk above me, which wasn't the best arrangement for me as when he would move it would move the bottom bunk which would wake me up. Ian and Nadia went up in the observatory to see the stars on Monday night. Oliver and I had already gone back to our room to go to sleep because it was past his bedtime. Paul put one of Ian's pillows on my side of the bed, and Milo slept there with Paul on Monday night. The one downside to us going on more field trips has been Milo has been at home by himself more than usual. Thankfully we no longer have to leave him in the crate when we're gone. We don't have as many field trips scheduled in November, but we do have quite a few planned for December. Hopefully in addition to learning, the kids are making fond memories along the way. 

Fall Field Trips

Some of our plans have fallen through due to the weather, but we've been able to enjoy a variety of field trips so far this school year. One that we backed out of at the last minute due to rain was a school program at the Renaissance Festival. On October 7 we went on a local history tour with the director of Camp Susque in what used to be a mining town in McIntyre. The changing leaves is my favorite part of fall, and they were very pretty at that location that day. Nadia and Ian attended an overnight retreat with the youth group that same weekend. This past Friday after doing some schoolwork and eating lunch at home, we left for an overnight getaway. Our neighbors were camping this weekend, so they were unable to care for Milo. Thankfully the friends who watched him for us in 2021 were able to watch him for about 33 hours this weekend. They had gotten a younger dog since the last time Milo was with them. Both of their female dogs are large, and Tab was concerned about whether the younger dog might be too rough with Milo, but thankfully he and Dublin got along very well. 

Our first stop was ZooAmerica, which is owned by HersheyPark. We were able to visit for free because of our AZA membership. At first, they were only going to let me in for free because my name was the only name on the membership card even though it said "household membership" on the card. We've never had that problem before, and hopefully we won't again. In the end, they let all of us in for free. Oliver had never been to this zoo before, and the other two were so young they had no memories of it. It had been decades since Paul had been there. The zoo isn't large, but it's also not as tiny as the one in Delaware. Ian was very happy to see two large bears, which is something we hadn't seen at the larger zoos we visited in the last couple of months. Oliver also wanted to visit Chocolate World, which is always free, but we didn't end up having enough time to do so. We had dinner at Applebee's and then went to the stadium for a concert. We only had to pay parking because the five of us were volunteers with Compassion. Ian, Nadia, and I have done so multiple times before, but it was the first time for Paul and Oliver to do so. The artists were Cain (two sisters and a brother), Ann Wilson, and Casting Crowns. We had all seen Casting Crowns in concert before. I am the only one who had previously seen Cain, and none of us had seen Ann Wilson before. During the meeting for the Compassion volunteers, we realized that Yami and her daughter, whom we know from church, were also volunteers. They sat with us during the concert. We all really enjoyed the concert although Oliver and I were both very ready for bed before it was over. Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of the five of us wearing our blue Compassion vests. I did get a photo of Nadia wearing a t-shirt I bought her at the concert. 

Usually, the only time we'll stay at a hotel that is less than three hours away from our house is when we are at Great Wolf Lodge. Hershey is less than two hours from our home, but we spent the night at a hotel because the concert went past 10pm and we already had plans to travel farther south on Saturday morning. The hotel had some features that the kids would have enjoyed using such as an indoor miniature golf course and a heated indoor swimming pool with a large slide, but the only things we had time for at the hotel were sleeping and eating breakfast. In May we had planned to visit the C&O Canal National Park in Maryland and the Cedar Creek and Belle Grove National Park in Virginia, but they changed their hours and weren't open on Tuesdays or Wednesdays, which were the days we could have stopped on our way down or our way back from Florida. Paul loves visiting battlefields, and Cedar Creek was one he had never been to before. Once I realized we couldn't go in May, I had decided we'd go during the anniversary of the battle in October when they have a lot of special activities. The kids have now been to 93 National Park sites in person. They each earned three Junior Ranger badges this weekend which puts them at around 160 total (each). While we were driving, we listened to A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. It will take us awhile to complete that book. We finished a biography about Ida Scudder before we began the book by Mark Twain. 

We spent four hours at Cedar Creek and Belle Grove, but Paul still wants to return some day to walk around more of the battlefield sites. There is a large range as far as how long it takes to complete a Junior Ranger badge. This one wasn't the hardest one ever, but it certainly wasn't the easiest. There also is a large range in terms of how carefully the books are inspected when they are completed. Some park rangers literally don't even open the booklets, and others pore over every response. They were stricter at this location. The kids had done enough of the activities, but it turned out they were supposed to do a certain number of particular activities, and they hadn't quite met that requirement. Thankfully, in the end the Ranger gave them their badges. We had dinner at Buffalo Wild Wings, which was a first for all of us. Ian selected a sauce for his wings that was too spicy, but in general we had a good meal. Milo was very, very excited when we picked him up. The poor guy was left at home alone for 6.5 hours today because we were at church for 6 hours straight due to the fact that we helped with a service project for Voice of the Martyrs after the second service. 

Field trip plans for next few weeks include: a five hour program at the Waterdale Environmental Education Center that includes a tour of a water treatment plant on October 19, two more three-hour session of Outdoor Adventure skills for Nadia and Ian at Camp Susque on October 20 and 27, a six-hour program at the Oakes Museum of Natural History at Messiah University on October 21, a two day homeschool retreat at Camp Susque on October 24-25, a tour of the Wolf Sanctuary on November 3, and service projects packing meals at Experience Missions on October 22 and 29. Attending the concert on Friday lead Nadia to ask us to attend a Matthew West concert. There weren't any volunteer slots available, but she has only had one of her three annual dates so far this year. Today I bought two tickets for the Matthew West concert at Lancaster Bible College next month. Probably Paul will take her. I did sign the five of us up to be Compassion volunteers at a For King and Country Christmas concert in early December in Hershey. We enjoy the concerts and also love to assist with getting more children sponsors through Compassion.