I'll start with Friday...

It was one of those mornings to a long day. I don't usually wake the boys up. They sleep till they are done and come out dressed. Jake is a morning person and gets up, gets dressed, runs through his morning chores and chosen studies, and asks for breakfast all before 10am. Tom, on the other hand, is the opposite. He doesn't usually stir until 10am and if you harass him about getting out of bed he will get very ugly and fast. He takes all day to get through the things he had planned and usually runs out of time by the end of the day. But since we had somewhere to be and needed to leave at 8am, I had to wake them and that is when they changed bodies.

Jake woke up teary eyed and couldn't get out of bed. I decided to let him be and see if he got up on his own. Harassing a sleepy boy from bed usually does not end well. Tom heard me wake Jake and got right up and dressed. He ran to his chores, even got some Latin in before breakfast. Crazy. Jake eventually got up, but he was not himself until way after lunch.

I figured since we didn't need to be at our field trip until noon, we could leave an hour early and hit the batting cages on the way down. I really should have researched a location before we left though. We never found one that was open and add to that a bit of traffic excitement, we didn't have time anyway. There was a big rig cab completely consumed by flame on the side of the canyon highway. The boys were all excited because there were Haz-Mat trucks there, just like on 24. We're all going to die!

We did arrive early enough to go to Barnes & Noble before the tour. Yay! Jake got the "Hunger Games" and we are reading it together. He reads at night and then I read the same chapters during the next day so that we can chat about it. I love the story so far, but it is a bit dark and depressing. At least it is only something to keep him until the next three "Roman Mysteries" by Caroline Lawrence arrive. He loves those and they are a bit more uplifting. We also found "Kingdom Keepers" Ridley Pearson about teens trapped at Disney World at night fighting the bad characters trying to take over the world. I don't know how good of a book it is, but when we read it I'll let you know. I couldn't pass it up though, being a Disney nerd. And last but not least "Lots to do in Line" by Meredith Lyn Pierce. You have to have this book if you are going to Disneyland, especially as a passholder. It's a book of trivia and scavenger hunts for each ride as you wait in line. We loved it and now will never go without it!

Jake testing the speed of his arm.

On to the Discovery Science Center for a field trip with our fellow homeschoolers. It was great to do something with our Orange County friends, but I wasn't impressed with the Discovery Center's field trip program. It wasn't really a "tour" but an organized day at the museum. But we did get to see the Star Wars exhibit and loved it. I would have liked to start there and spend some more time, but that is where the tour ended instead. I also would have liked it if they had used the Star Wars exhibit to explain some physics ideas that were presented there. The boys loved it though. They cracked me up when the tour guide did explain a couple physics laws. She began by saying she was giving the 8th grade tour (script) and that some of it may go over their heads. Jake was disgusted that this is what they are teaching 8th graders....seriously. Tom's favorite was a 3D type presentation on the solar system earlier in the day. He said they didn't even mention the magnetic field around Uranus, so he didn't get to use his jokes.

Simulated Rocket Launch

After the tour we got to have lunch with our friends. We were supposed to go to Disneyland all together, but Jake was still in a funk and I thought it might be better if we went alone. He needed time with just his brother and Mom. I felt bad having to tell my friend that, but I think she understood. It wasn't who we were with, but that Jake just wasn't having a "socialize with friends" type of day.

Building Robots

Making a Robot Walk

Highest Parking Spot Ever

The view of Anaheim West of the Parking Structure

At 4pm we headed to California Adventure. We parked on the very top of the parking structure. Cool. The plan was to see World of Color, but by the time we got there the Fastpasses were for the 9:15 show and I didn't want to stay that late, so we skipped it. We went on a ton of rides though. The best was the ElecTRONica stuff in Hollywood. Like a night club or grad nites. Crazy loud. There was an awesome show of a guy that looked like he was moving lasers with his hands. We were all impressed. The boys could not help but dance around. We played some video games at Flynn's. Tom impressed some girls with his knowledge of "Beat It" lyrics and some moonwalking moves. Jake kicked but at Tron and Battlebots. It was a bit disturbing to see my childhood displayed like a museum, but I got over it. I wish Dan were there though. If my Mom were there challenging me at Centipede, it would have been perfect. 

Two New Action Figures

After that we picked up Nikki at Downtown Disney and headed home. It was a great day. I went straight to bed. I had to be up at 5:30am to go to the FATJEF. More about that another time. That's gonna take a couple posts!

Bear Poop

Video Games at "Flynn's"

Playing Tron. It's only a quarter!

Bible Study

Grr....trying to do my morning study and my sweet husband got on the phone to work. Usually he is back in his room to do that, but the boys are still asleep so he's in the living room. The problem is that while the boys are asleep is when I do most of my study time. I need absolute quiet to read. When I hear other things (especially talking) I can't read a word. It's terrible. But I listen to audio classes and such while the boys are up and around because I can listen to something and knit without missing anything. Weird, huh?

This is what jumped out at me during my bible reading this morning. It's 2 Timothy 2:20-21. "Now in a large house there are not only gold and silver vessels, but also vessels of wood and earthenware, and some to honor and some to dishonor. Therefore, if anyone cleanses himself from these things, he will be a vessel for honor, sanctified, useful to the Master, prepared for every good work."

It isn't what the vessel is made of that is important, the fact that it is clean and whole that makes it useful. We are God's vessels in this world. We all look different and have different personalities and talents. But we are all useful to God in some way. Our form determines our purpose but none is less useful than another. We only need to remain clean and whole to useful in this world. And to be clean and whole means to be practicing our morals and knowing our principles, in essence being good people.

I'm sitting here on the shelf waiting to be used by my Master in His house! :)

Ahh...Discussion Questions

This one comes from Week 2 of my Constitution 101 class at Hillsdale College.

"Why is education necessary for the existence of a free government? What kind of education is required for a free society?"

It's kind of obvious that education is "necessary", but a particular kind of education is required. It's not just the ability to read and write that is needed in a free society, it is an education that requires the individual to think beyond himself and his immediate needs. Logic, history, and philosophy should be a huge part of it.

Imagine if, instead of our current system of compulsory education, it was the parents' responsibility to get the children to a particular level of learning. They were in charge of the children's core and love of learning stages, as the Thomas Jefferson Education people put it. This can happen at any age. It would be up to the parents how they could get that child there, be it a school or at home, early or late. Then around high school age, when young adults are really open to new learning and study (if their core and love of learning has been nurtured) they test to attend a high school where they begin to learn the real founding of our system of government, where it came from, who the Founders studied, etc. They learn history, rhetoric, and logic to the point where they can make informed decisions about laws and elected leaders. This would be something each student would work through with a mentor, at their own pace, to get to a place that the student and mentor have agreed upon at the beginning. And you can't vote until you have proven that you have this basic understanding.

I'm dreaming. I'm seeing this begin in my oldest son, but people don't believe me. He has begun to have enough play and is setting his sights higher. He behaves well in public because he is respected at home not bullied and directed.

I think we set our kids in these public institutions which cram them and bore them to death with reading, writing, and arithmetic. They are so bored and dumbed down and defeated by the time they get to high school that all they want to do is escape. When they finally do, they flee from any kind of learning at all, leave the running of the country to those who are ambitious enough to take control and sit back and beg for someone to take care of them.

I'm just now starting to love learning again after all the schools did. I'm finally learning some of what I should have been deep in studying from the start. And I didn't do poorly in school. I did pretty darn well actually. But it never prepared me to make an educated vote. I didn't learn about our economy, our system of government, or why either are important. I just learned who the authority was and to respect it. By the time I left high school, I believed I was done. I had jumped the hoops and was ready to join the work force, never to think again. That isn't how our country works though.

Our republican style of government sets us free to govern ourselves. If we don't understand that, we can't vote to keep it. We can't expect someone else to guard our freedoms. They are unalienable rights, but we give them up voluntarily when we refuse to understand our history, use our logic and reason, and know what our priorities are.

Week One of Hillsdale College's "Constitution 101"

Please forgive my "stream of consciousness" style of writing. I've got to get these ideas out, but haven't had the discipline to create a coherent essay just yet.

My favorite part of this week's reading was from Calvin Coolidge in 1926 about the Declaration of Independence.

"It is often asserted that the world has made a great deal of progress since 1776, that we have had new thoughts and new experiences which have given us a great advance over the people of that day, and that we may therefore very well discard their conclusions for something more modern. But that reasoning can not be applied to this great charter. If all men are created equal, that is final. If they are endowed with inalienable rights, that is final. No advance, no progress can be made beyond these propositions."

I'm also going through "Easy Lessons on the Constitution". Our Constitution is supposed to be simple. Our laws are not supposed to be so long and confusing so that only a specialist can understand them. The idea was that an educated and independent population could rule itself.

How can a population continue these ideals if it is not thoroughly educated in how these documents were created and how it operates? Why is it that now, when I'm almost 40 years old, I'm just sitting down to learn this? How can a person make an educated decision about how to vote if they are completely unaware of how the system works and why?

Oh! And there was a question from a viewer (of the class) that asked if these ideas of liberty and freedom are so natural why didn't they just explode across the middle east when we invaded them. My answer is that you can't spread these ideas by force. It has to come from within. If another country had come to the colonies and told the founding fathers that King George was a tyrant and we had to overthrow him and start our own democracy, the ideas would not have taken hold either. It has to filter in through the people and they have to take the responsibility.

Man, that's completely wild. I really need to work on writing an essay to get my point across. Ugg..more work to do.

What A Weekend!

So, last minute (as is our custom), we decided to take the camper and the bug out to Old Dale for the weekend. Yay! The boys got in lots of driving time. We killed some skeet. Two people had been to our letterbox "Huelle Monument" on the hill. And we explored some areas of the back roads we hadn't been able to get to before. Fun stuff!

Tom and Jake's "sexy" car ad!

An awesome view of the desert.

Backseat Strangeness

A piece of a "winnibego", I just know it.

More awesome desert.

So much stuff!

I have so many ideas, projects, activities, and such rolling around my head and life that I can't keep track! Yikes! I'm thinking I need to schedule some time to sit down and write them out each day, like a "Look what I did!" list so that I realize how much we have actually gotten done each day. I'll start right now, but just about yesterday evening. Arg...my space bar is sticking...

Yesterday afternoon, just before Karate class, Jake wanted me to download "Seterra" on his computer so that he could play with it when he got back. He wants to add ten minutes of study time with this program to his morning routine so that he has a better grasp of world geography. I'm not sure how many details are necessary for a ten year old, but he is concerned that all he knows are countries related to World War II so he figures he should study up. It was fun to watch him trying to beat his own speed score over and over again. The program asks you where things are and then gives you three chances to find it, the it shows you. Pretty cool. It keeps track of who plays and their scores, so he wants us to play as well so that he has someone else to challenge.

Tom is doing amazingly well on his Latin study that he started at the beginning of the month. We bought Lively Latin and love it. I highly recommend it. You print the pages of the book and complete them in order. It has all the instructions, no teacher required. And there are corresponding videos and such to watch online. Very cool. The best is that it is teaching him so much, your typical English Grammar stuff and a boat load of Roman/World history. Not to mention, there is writing on the pages he needs to do and he is balking at it. His penmanship is atrocious and he knows it, so he asked that I print some cursive practice pages to add to his study time. It's already getting better.

My studies are making me VERY happy right now. I'm continuing with my Classic Mom's class at Abigail Adams Academy. It meets online twice a month for discussion. I discovered iTunesU on the iPad and I'm listening in on a seminary class that goes from Genesis to Joshua. Great stuff there. I found audio books there as well, so we've been using the iPad in the car to listen to "Huckleberry Finn" on our road trips. AND I just started Constitution 101 at Hillsdale College. All these classes are for my own benefit, they are free, and I get no "school credit" for them, but damn I feel smarter! I finally started loving learning again!

Karate is being put on hiatus until after baseball season. Sensei is not happy about it, but it just can't be helped. He told the boys that it is up to them to stay in shape. If they look like they have been practicing over baseball season then they will restart right where they left off, but if they look rusty he'll have to hold them back. The boys are fine with it. They aren't real excited about karate anyway. They only go because the like the schedule and activity and they feel better when they get regular exercise. And they like the sparring, which they need to learn to control before someone gets seriously hurt.

Ok, I'm off. I spent the time I usually use to do my reading doing this so now I'm off to start the day and we'll see if I can't find the time to blog more often...again....We have our homeschool park day today and baseball practice this evening!

Snow Day!

This was our first snow this winter! The January that we moved to this house two years ago, it snowed "like sixty" all over and stayed for several days. But we have had very little speak of since then. The night before, it started to snow a lot and we were all very excited, but it didn't stay since it rained all night. BUT! You could see all the snow on the hills surrounding us, so the boys and I went to find it! 

We went to the entrance of Joshua Tree National Park, but the ranger lady said the road was closed and they were plowing it as we spoke. She told us to check Blackrock Campground for snow since it was a higher elevation and the road was currently open. And there was a boat load of snow! Perfect too, wet and sticky.

I was freezing but the boys couldn't contain themselves. Playing in the snow with bare hands is pretty darn chilly! Tom found out that snow, really does "snowball" as you roll it. And they both made a huge snowball and put it in the back of the truck to bring home to Nikki.