Well the backhoe just went by..and took out my mailbox@! Well smashed the cover off and broke the wood support beam..lovely eh? Now who the heck do I contact about that???

Well our rod is being redone so there has been lots of activity. Mostly it was on the far end not near us..well yesterday they came closer..much closer and I had about the happiest 2.5 year old ever! Taejan is a motorhead,especially for farm equipment and construction machines..so you can just imagine his joy to see this coming in front of the house!

and the FIVE dumptrucks too!

They made a total of 4 passes by the house..in fact at one point I needed to leave for Ziah’s karate class and was trapped..good thing I’m always early..LOL

I think this was his favorite machine:

I heard so many “mom look at dis one coming” yesterday it was hysterical.. and “mom I so cited”.. he loved every minute of it.. it was a rainy day so this was a nice thing for a kid couped up to watch!

Even Declan and Ziah enjoyed it a bit!

The big machine that takes the asphalt off just went by..they are done near us but have one more section to do, so while we won;t see it working, we do have the signs in our yard, and we should see the dump trucks occasionally! Taejan will be very happy again as we can’t leave the house today my new dryer is arriving!

Jadziah and I have a routine of coffee and school together when Taejan naps ( don’t worry her’s is decafe). Well today we did that then she sat and cut the left over construction paper and used glue etc..she comes over to me and says “See these, they are 2 plates under the earth and I put them together and made the earth”..now I know she really was listening at Travel day yesterday..WOW.. she may not understand the concept of Tectonic plates fully but for a 4.5 year old, I am impressed!!!

Today was the last travel day of the year with our Homeschool group..it was my turn to “teach” it and I tell ya I had a blast setting all this up! I warned the parents it’d be messy and have some sugar involved..LOL

Here’s all the experiments before the kids got there!

Out in Nancy’s barn we had:

Chip Mining: The object was to use 2 toothpicks and “mine” out the chocolate chips..trying to get them out perfect.

Sugar Caves: Object was to build a structure out of sugar cubes, cover with clay ,poke holes in the clay and use the water to watch the way water erodes rock to form caves.

Our Volcano..I made this with playdoh..that was a trip..LOL.. object is pretty self explanitory!

Erosion: object is to fill the pan with sand, add some “sticks” and water with the watering can to watch erosion first hand:

The Sky is Falling!~ object..fill pan with flour, add houses and cars. Now drop salt, then a rock then a golf ball into the pan.. see what damage is done by small meteorites,larger ones and really big ones!

Inside we had:

various coloring and activity sheets:

Plate Tectonics..object..move the graham crackers around on top of the frosting to simulate magma and plate movement.

Earthquake zone:Shows how a seismograph works.

And lastly..Make a Mini Model of the Earth. Object..use either a blow pop or a Tootsie pop ,a marshmallow and chocolate to recreate the inner core, outer core ,mantle and crust of the earth.

I lost track of how many kids we had there..but it was a LOT.. it was so fun to watch them!!

Let the fun begin! Here’s Declan and the Tectonic Plates:

Volcano fun

Chip mining anyone?

Sugar caves!

Declan making the sky fall!

The group!

Missy doing the Erosion activity!

More of the group:

Mini Earth anyone? Yummy!

More fun!

This was such a fun day for the kids.and me..LOL.. I had a blast setting all this up and I hope the kids truly enjoyed it!

Today was one of those Sunday’s where we could sit home, do normal day to day stuff, clean, make messes, clean some more..you know the drill.. well we decided instead to hit the road! We decided to head into NY and our first stop was CMOST .. we’ve seen commercials for it and have been wanting to take the kids. It really didn’t take that long to get there..under an hour and it was only $20 to get in!

Here’s the kids at the door:

Exploring the place.. Declan and Ziah did a scavenger hunt while there..this really help my ornery 6 year old stay happy..thank goodness..he’s not real good at going with the flow…but today he did great!

We got to go to the Animal show..and it was reptiles..Ziah was in her glory let me tell ya! She “dazzled” the young lady who was running the show with her knowledge of reptiles!

here they ar eon the green screen recording their own weather report!

on TV:

More exploring!

CMOST was great..but small..lol.. took about an hour to go through..and since we had no other plans we decided to head back towards Albany and hit the New York State Museum!

It’s been awhile since we’ve been there and Eric didn’t go with us last time. It was a whole new experience though since Taejan walked 95% of the time and now that Declan is reading he enjoyed it even more!

We were hungry so the first stop was the 4th floor for Subway then some looking around:

Then we hit the Carousel.. Ziah and Taejan sat with me on one of the rocking seats and Declan opted to ride a horse. Something I don’t think he’ll EVER do again..I think we went on too close to eating because he was slightly green when we were done!

Exploring:

Taejan found a big Dump Truck and was besides himself..he wanted “dat in my room mommy”..

Ziah is a true female..she loved all the “sparkly rocks”

Hi Dinosaur!

“I want dis in my room too mommy”

On the old Subway car!Last time we were here Declan wouldn’t go near it!

The Discovery Place had a scavenger Hunt too so Declan did that!

Ziah and Taejan played.

After that we took them outside, they had each gotten some rock candy at the gift shop.

Next stop we wanted to check out the USS Slater…but the kids were beat so we decided not to.

We had such a nice day! Good thing too because it’s now a rainy yucky day and I think this rainy weather will last awhile..fun!