Side Trip Post #4-Our Vacation Across the U.S.

I'm taking a side trip away from crafting posts this week to share our vacation across the U.S.  I'll be back next week with the regular crafting posts, but for now come see what we've been up to! 

After our visit at the Laura Ingalls Homestead, we had to put the pedal to the metal and travel through Iowa, Illinois, Indiana and on to Ohio. During our travels through these states we had our first sitings of fireflies – what an amazing creation!!! God is so creative and fun….fireflies are just an example of His creativity!


We used our hours in the car to learn more about the states. Another great resource we used was this book: The Man in the Map.

 It is so cute! It uses the states of Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Arkansas and Louisiana to form a man:

The books uses rhymes and pictures to help you remember the names and location of the states. We learned that Ohio is a drinking cup that is filled up by a never ending supply of water from Lake Erie!

Another neat little tip about learning U.S. geography -  specifically the Great Lakes.  The acronym HOMES stands for the Great Lakes:  Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie and Superior. 

We ended up in Mt. Vernon, Ohio where Jordan competed in the National Bible Quizzing Competition at the Nazarene College. He did wonderfully, placing 12th out of 232 teens ages 13-18 in his age division. A very big accomplishment for anyone, let alone someone in their very first year of teen quizzing.

Jordan's name on the big screen during the awards ceremony.  The top 20 individuals received awards.

During the week of competition, we had a few afternoons to explore the Amish Country. It is beautiful, with lush green, rolling hills. We found it funny that in Ohio most people here have HUGE lawns….actually acres of pasture (I’m not exaggerating) that they mow for lawn and no fences. We even saw a guy mowing the field, where he actually had a horse, with his riding lawn mower. In Eastern Oregon we would fence those pastures and put livestock in them, or at least mow it and sell the hay. But in Ohio, everyone is mowing….all the time….. curious!

Come back tomorrow and see where we go next!

Side Trip Post #3-Vacation Across the U.S.

This is my third post that takes you on a side trip away from my crafting and with me on a vacation with my family where we are road tripping across the US – the ultimate way to learn the geography of the U.S. You can see my first two posts here and here where I showed you some of the resources we used to learn about the United States on the way. I promise to be back next week with my regular crafting posts!


After Mt. Rushmore and the BIG HAIL STORM we traveled through the Badlands:

....... across South Dakota to Mitchell and did a "drive by" of the Corn Palace.  Did you know there was such a place?  Corn is BIG in the midwest!  The murals on the outside of the walls are made out of corn ears.

You may be wondering if this was the big highlight of our trip that I was talking about.....uh....NOT!  Hee!  Hee! 

I talked dear old husband/dad into a detour trip…..out in the middle of no where, in the dark, to DeSmet, SD. Why you ask???? Well, I wasn’t sure how big of trouble I was going to get into because it was dark, driving on country roads, with BIG puddles from the storm. I just couldn’t resist taking the kids to Laura Ingalls Homestead! We woke up in the morning to a BEAUTIFUL homestead with some of the best hands-on living history I have ever seen!

It is one of the highlights of our trip – DEFINITELY! I’m talking – really hands on – you can touch everything….so, so neat. A replica of Laura’s house has been built on the original location. Everything is exactly the way Laura explained it in her books.

The kitchen, including shelf paper:

The girls room (4 girls slept in here):

The Living Room:

The kids got to make their own button necklace/toy and learn about braille.

 Here is the What Not and the China Shepherdess:.

Of course, you've got your washing to do and a rain barrel:

 

Here is the barn made with the hay roof, complete with real animals including a baby calf, chickens and cat with kittens…..all ready to be petted by anyone willing to do so.

Next was the big barn where there were miniature horses to pet and ride……this is a six week old baby named “Quarter Pint”.

Here is Quarter Pint's Mama.  Be careful with her, Lexie found out she bites if you try to pull her away from eating!

The wagon then pulled up to take us all across the prairie for a lesson at the one room schoolhouse. The kids were dressed in bonnets, dresses and straw hats for the boys. They were given a lesson and then allowed to ring the school bell when school was finished.

We then headed to the machine shop where we made our own rope, removed dried corn from a corn cob and made corn cob dolls.

(removing corn off the cob for the doll)

The kids also twisted hay as Laura and her family had to do to stay alive one winter on the prairie as there wasn’t any wood to keep them warm.

We also tried our hand at grinding wheat. The picture shows our kiddos with the owner of the farm. He has done an excellent job recreating the atmosphere for Laura Ingalls fans.

There is even a working pitcher pump that the kids got to pump; an heirloom garden and a wagon wheel – shaped flower garden. Such a neat place – we loved it!

Although, this homestead is not the one where the Ingalls Family lived in a sod house, they had one built here so you could see what it was like- ewe!

Come back again and see where our next adventure takes us!

Side Trip Away from Crafting - Coming Along With Us on Vacation - Post #2

This is my second post that takes you on a side trip away from my crafting and with me on a vacation with my family where we are road tripping across the US – the ultimate way to learn the geography of the U.S. You can see my first post here where I showed you some of the resources we used to learn about the United States on the way.   I promise to be back next week with my regular crafting posts!

After Independence Rock (see this post to learn more about it) , we then headed on through Wyoming to Mt. Rushmore, South Dakota.

Wow – what a neat place! If you ever have a chance to go there, make sure you plan to spend plenty of time. We had the kids do the Junior and Teen Ranger Program which is basically a booklet that you fill out that sends you on a scavenger hunt throughout the park to find out information, including requiring you to talk to the rangers and read/watch/experience various exhibits. We all learned a lot more doing the booklets as we had to “research” to find some of the answers. Even the my little girls (7 & 9) now understand what presidents are on the monument and why. The area around Mt. Rushmore has a lot to do and see…we wish we could have spent more time there but we were on a schedule to get to the quizzing competition. One other neat monument really close to Mt. Rushmore is the Crazy Horse Monument that is being built.

This one is being done with private funds and being built by a family. One of the neatest things we found about the monument is the story of the late sculptor, his wife and his 10 children who are carrying on the process of building the monument. There is a lot to see and do there….the sculptor’s wife is now 80 years old. It was her birthday when we were there…..she continues to run the “show”.

I have to tell you that we loved South Dakota! When we headed from Mt. Rushmore, across the state, we ran into a big thunderstorm! I’m talking BIG! We had never seen hail so big:

We found out later that a few miles away the hail was even bigger…..tennis to soft ball size….which broke people’s windshields! We were blessed enough to be under an awning at a gas station, filling up, when the hail came….no dents for us!

(Braving the elements to collect giant hail)

Come back tomorrow to see where we headed to next…….one of the real surprise highlights of our trip…..any guesses?

A Little Side Trip Away from Crafting - Come Along with us on our Vacation

As many of you might already know, I have been away from my home…..away from crafting….on a road trip with my family. Consequently, I haven’t been able to do many crafting posts on my blog! I thought I would take you on a little side trip away from crafting……and take you along with me on my trip! I promise I’ll be back next week with crafting posts….but come along with me now if you want and see what we’ve been up to!

If you are not a homeschooler, you may not know that we are notorious for making anything and everything a learning experience. Our summer vacation is no exception! My son was fortunate enough to be able to compete in the National Teen Bible Quizzing Competition in Mt. Vernon, OH . Hey, this sounds like an opportunity to travel across country and learn about the United States! The ultimate geography lesson, right?

I thought I would journal our trip for you in hopes of showing you some fun things to do with kiddos, and if you are a fellow homeschooler or just a parent who likes to teach their children, a few fun resources we used to educate our children about the United States.

Our trip started in Eastern Oregon on a Wednesday evening. We traveled through most of Idaho…..mapping our route as we went using a few great resoures. First, a road atlas, highlighting the route as we went. You’d be surprised how this simple exercise can help your kiddos read maps. The second resource we used was this little gem:

 The Star Spangled State Book. It comes with a color reference book and a student workbook and cd with reproducible pages. Each page of the resource book has interesting facts about a particular state as well as information on the 3 largest cities, capitol, etc. The student workbook contains copies of these same pages but with blanks for the students to fill in as well as portion of a blank United States map for the students to find the particular state and shade it in. It also picks a few states for you to review in the process. The bottom of the page of the reference handbook has a fun game to play that gives you clues about previous states you have studied for you to test what you have learned.

I have no idea why this picture keeps rotating this way - sorry!  But you can get the idea of what the inside looks like.

We also used a children’s atlas to learn more about the states we were traveling through and various books about each state that we had checked out from our library. I will also show you another really cool resource we used in a later post, so stay tuned!

Since we had traveled through Oregon and Idaho often, we just put the petal to the metal to get as far as we could that first evening. Our trip then took us through a short jont thru the Beehive State…..can you guess which state this is???? If you guessed Utah you are correct – and no it is not nicknamed this because it has a lot of bees….it was to represent the resourcefulness of the people who live there.

Our first real destination was to stop at Independence Rock (sometimes called Register Rock) in Wyoming.

 This was a common meeting place for the pioneers to stop on their journey west. They would sign their names on this HUGE rock, its mass being equal to an area of 24. 81 acres and standing 136 feet above the ground at its highest point.

The pioneers also would look for friends’ and loved ones’ names who had passed previously. We climbed up on the rock and found lots of names and dates….some new and lots old. Here is a sampling of some of the “signatures”.

Pictures don’t do it justice. Just an amazing place to take you back in time and help you think how the pioneers felt, searching to see if their loved one who had went ahead of them, had made it that far.

Ok, that’s enough for today. Where do you think we headed next? Come back tomorrow and see!