Day at the Lake

Yesterday we were blessed with being invited to a company picnic at Lake Lanier Islands Resort and Water Park. My husband has been working long hours, so our whole family was looking forward to spending some time together. The drive to Lake Lanier is almost 1.5 hours from our house, so we took the opportunity in the car to hook up to Pandora Radio and broaden our musical horizons! Well, at least mine were broadened -- I cued up The Phantom of the Opera station in preparation for our trip to the musical in just a couple of weeks. I actually discovered that this station was musical favorites/pop musical favorites, so we enjoyed Beauty and the Beast, The Lion King, Le Miserables, and Phantom of the Opera.

Most of our time at Lake Lanier was spent at the water park, which the kids enjoyed immensely! My husband and I discovered that our joy at these kinds of places comes from seeing our children having fun, not from the actual park itself! Everything is horribly overpriced (thankfully our admission was paid), with admission being $42/person and then all drinks and snacks must be purchased inside the park. We spent a lot of time in the wave pool, and then tried three different water slides - the slides were loads of fun, but the hard part for an adult is actually getting in and out of the tubes you ride in! Sadly, I didn't get any pictures because I don't have a waterproof camera. We also enjoyed a great barbeque lunch while sitting at a pavilion by the lake, then back to the park for more water fun. By 5:00 the kids were worn out and we headed home, with a short detour to see our first house. Dinner consisted of Johnny's Pizza and everyone was showered and snoozing by 9:30 p.m. Not bad.

This week I hope to make some posts about the different choices we have made for curriculum this year. The last weekend in July is the Southeastern Homeschool Expo and my husband and I will be attending. He has scheduled this day into our family vacation which occurs the next week, and I am excited he will be taking part in this with me. Perhaps some of our choices will change after attending the expo. I have learned from homeschooling to never be afraid to change your course midstream if something just isn't working for your children. Anyway, most of our curriculum has been purchased for this school year and I would like to share it here on the blog.

For today I am enjoying my family and looking forward to dinner at my father-in-law's house tonight. He is cooking - what a treat!

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The End of a Fun Week

This week has been a quiet one for me since the kids have been in Vacation Bible School each morning. Normally I would be right there with them volunteering in some capacity, but this year I selfishly needed the time to organize some things around the house and have some time to myself as well. So, while the children were on their High Seas Expedition, I got my van serviced, had a pedicure, almost finished the homeschool room, and deep cleaned the kitchen and organized the pantry. It feels like I accomplished so much more once I put it into writing!

To culminate a week of fun (I knew they would be a little sad when I picked them up today) I packed a picnic lunch and we headed to my sister-in-law's house to swim in the pool for the afternoon. As we pulled up it was storming, but we ate in the screened in pool house and listened to the summer storm - which was so peaceful. After about 30 minutes the storm clouds passed and they were able to swim, or should I say DIVE. I think they spent the entire time going off the diving board. I just LOVE summer! (oh, I and apologize for the image quality - it comes off my dinosaur iPhone -- I think I need a new phone, don't you??

Top Ten Summer Learning Opportunities - Part 2

In my last post I talked about summer learning opportunities for my children. I'd like to continue with that today.

6. Learning new games! My children have been very interested in card games this summer. Two of their favorites have been "Garbage" and "Steal the Pack". Today at swim lessons (where my daughter always plays cards with other kids while they are waiting during siblings' lessons) one of the dads taught the children to play Gin Rummy. Great game! Whatever card game it be, I just see it as an opportunity to make a personal connection with my children and learn some good concepts and rules of sportsmanship, too.

7. Making new friends. Throughout the summer both of my children will go to Vacation Bible School and one other camp. This is a great way to meet some new children outside of our normal circle, which helps them be better "socialized".... because as homeschoolers they are not socialized! ;-) My daughter is very good at just walking up to a new child and saying "Hi! What's your name?". She did this the other night at tennis lessons and struck up a nice little friendship with a new child in the class.

8. Going interesting places. We have put our normal beach trip to the side this year - for two reasons. We usually go to my parents' house because they live very close to the beach, but this summer their house is for sale and it would be a lot to have company and keep the house looking good for potential buyers. Sometimes we also go to my sister's house, which is in the FL panhandle. As of this week she has been seeing oil on their beautiful beach, so a trip there is also out. Well, it is good to have family in nice places, and we are going to my other sister's home. She and her family live in Rochester, NY. We will travel there for close to a week and see The Erie Canal and Niagara Falls. I am so excited about this - will tie right in with our history curriculum!! AND, guess when we are going? The very first week that public school starts in our area. HA! It is so great to be homeschooling! Other side trips will include a day at Lake Lanier Islands and a day trip to Alabama for a family reunion. All of these experiences enrich my children's lives and make the summer fun.

9. Mom get to learn new things, too! I have been doing a lot of research in the past month about homeschooling Kindergarten for my son. I am learning so much! I have also been reading just for fun - I just finished "The Help", which was an excellent book and am moving on now to "House Rules" by Jodi Picoult. One thing I am also excited about is going to see "The Phantom of the Opera" at the Fabulous Fox Theatre in downtown Atlanta. My husband and I will be celebrating our 13th wedding anniversary and I am looking forward to it so much! As I was finding the link for the musical, I also noticed that "West Side Story" and "Hair" will be in Atlanta this year. I'd better start saving my pennies now, because I love musicals.

10. We learn who and what we are thankful for. As I write this I notice that I don't mention my husband very much - and this is because he works long hours every day to make sure I can stay home and enjoy this time with my children. I am very thankful for him, and thankful for all of the luxuries we have in our life. Wow - as I think about what we have done already this summer and will do in the coming months I am blessed beyond measure!