Happy Birthday Shark Boy

 Brother S requested cheesecake and bagel bites or taquitos for his birthday dinner. Of course daddy brought home both for him.

 

 

  He bought a lego set and construction train with his money from the grandparents. Thank you!

 We have decided to do "activities" for the kids' birthday presents from now on. Brother S wanted to go to Bounce-U, but we found a groupon for this huge new jump park and decided to do that instead.

 They had a tube course for the under 9 crowd.

 Climbing walls for all ages

 

  The kids took to climbing like the little monkeys that they are. They flashed several climbs even though they have never climbed (top roped) before.

 I was incredibly proud of their skills... it made me a bit nostalgic for my youthful climbing gym days. And I couldn't help remembering how impressed I was the first time I climbed with hubby on our second or third date.

  Hubby and I raced up the climb with two sides against each other.  It was a tie.

  They had a ninja warrior course. It was sized for teens and adults though -- the kids found creative ways to get through it.

 

  There were not too many people there on a Tuesday night.

 Miss L's climbing was the biggest surprise. She didn't even want to try it at first. 

  Then towards the end of the night she decided to give it a try and did fabulous.  She didn't try to climb back down or anything, just topped out and LET GO!

 She tried all the different walls.

 I am so glad we decided to make memories instead of buying more stuff.  It was a wonderful night of family fun.

Farm Fresh: Special Deliveries, Snow and a High Tunnel

We had our first snow on Thursday. It was only supposed to be an inch or two, but it just kept coming. 

 The kids were in and out of the house all day enjoying sledding, snowball fights, and making a pair of snowmen.

 I showed them how to make a snow fort like Uncle P and I always did.  We made a big pile off to the side of the driveway and then dug out our cave. We had about 6 inches of snowfall all told. I am not surprised given how wet this year has been. We have already had at 30% more precipitation than normal.

Our high tunnel was delivered Monday afternoon.  

 It is mostly just poles and plastic.

 Hubby laid out all the corners on Saturday.

 

 

Family Schooling Summary: Co-op School Week #9

They did sculpture in art class this week. 

 They used wire frameworks to support their creations.

 Brother S made a shark of course.

  Big sister A's fawn.

 In puzzle class we focused on teamwork and following directions.

 The class made a fort together with this great building toy.

Field Trip: Baltimore Symphony Orchestra

This week one of our co-ops organized a field trip to the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. We went to the see the Star Wars Space-tacular performance. We were not allowed to take pictures once the performance started. Luckily, we arrived early and took some pictures before it began.

Fall Fun: Playing in the Leaves

Our beautiful maple tree has finally shed most of its leaves. On Thursday we had perfect weather for playing in the leaves with our friends. 

 We made a huge pile and they did running starts and jumped into it. Then they had leave fights.

 After observing from the side-lines the dogs decided that it looked like fun and ran to jump in the pile.  Icy especially felt that rolling around in it was a treat.

 Shark tried to get into it, but mostly just annoyed Icy.

Icy buried in the leaves.