looking ahead...homeschool conference

It's that time of year again...school's out!!  (Actually for us it's not - we go year around).

But most people are out for the summer.  Now I realize that some homeschool moms are glad to see the last of books until fall.  But some of you I know are crazy about anything school.  I've got the solution...the Appalachian Home Educators Conference! 

If  you look to your right you'll find a link to take you to the website.  I encourage you to check it out.  Not only is it taking place in my town (yay!!!), it just happens to be Pigeon Forge (can you say vacation?!) with tons of fun things to do (plus discounts if you are attending the conference!), and they have something that sounds like fun right at the conference - an outdoor adventure tent (find it under the activities tab)!  I know my kids will be going. 

So how about it?  Start your summer off by vacationing in one of the funnest places in the eastern U.S - PLUS - get your curriculum for next year and you don't have to even think about it all summer long.



Until next time...


JenT

the adventure

(Some of the windmills in west TX, as the sun was rising, on the drive back.)

So I looked back over my posts and noticed that I had not updated you, my readers, on all of our adventures.

You know we had to move from east TN rather suddenly. You knew we went to NM. Well guess where we are now? Georgia. See? Rather an adventure.

We headed out from TN in August. It took us 4 days to get to OK, where most of my family lives, to visit them. We even considered staying there, but then decided to stick with our original plan to go to New Mexico. We're glad we did.

New Mexico is aptly nicknamed "The Land of Enchantment". There is something that pulls you there and even if you leave the state, you've carried something out with you. And no, it's not the sand. lol

But the job situation isn't the best out there (is it anywhere?). We had a great house, met some wonderful people, had fun seeing some of the sites, but the job wasn't going to support us for long.

It was a great 5 week vacation!

Back east we come.

One of the main reasons for coming back was our midwife. I'm a pretty private person when it comes to things like giving birth, and I don't like having to get to know someone new, especially so close to the actual event. Our midwife is great!

Since we obviously couldn't go back to the house we were in, we had to find another place close to our midwife. A long-time friend generously offered to let us stay in his house until the baby is born and for how ever long we need to afterward.

So while we are back east we are not exactly where we were. And who knows where we'll go next!

It has been one great adventure. :)


Until next time...

Creation Museum day 3

Saturday - back to the museum.

This time we started in the gardens. Very nice.



The sad thing is...my batteries on my camera died and my extras were dead too! So that was the last picture we took at the Creation Museum.

Arrrgggghhh...can you say frustration?!

We also went to their petting zoo. (But, of course, that was AFTER my batteries died). We all liked petting the animals. They have a Zonkey (cross between a zebra and a donkey) and a Zorse (cross between a zebra and a horse), some goats, alpacas, and other little animals.

And we went back into the museum to see another presentation and visit the planetarium again (that was so cool!).

Over all it was a great trip. And since we did get the year family membership, we can go back! And next time we plan to go to the Cincinnati Zoo also. If you didn't know, we're a zoo going family. :)

I hope you enjoyed this little trip to the Creation Museum (we sure did). And again, if you haven't ever been, I really encourage you to try to go. It's worth it!!


Until next time...

Creation Museum day 2

We spent the night with my brother who lives on the northern side of Cincinnati. (Thanks for putting up with us).

We left his place the next morning and got to the museum again around 11:00. Don't ask me why we got there so late when we were so close this time. I guess since we were so close we were taking our time getting ready.

We went back to the walk through part and picked up where we left off the day before. Wow! So much information!

Watching one of the videos in the walk through.

Riding the Triceratops.

Checking out fossils.

Come back tomorrow for more. Remember we decided to get the year membership and ended up spending 3 days at the museum.


Until next time...

Creation Museum day 1

We left at 6:30 in the morning, Thursday.

Got to the Museum around 11:30. Yes, it took us 5 hours to drive up to northern Kentucky. (We had a 30 minute rest stop on the way).

Bought 2 day passes for the family and found out that for only $11 more we could get a year family pass which includes the planetarium. If you don't have the year membership, the planetarium is extra. We had until the end of the next day to update if we wanted to.

By the end of that day we realized that we would need to update. There just wasn't enough time to see everything!


She was seriously enjoying the toys in the bookstore. :) At one point she had about 20 little stuffed animals on the table. I had taken her to the bathroom and missed going into one of the presentations with everyone else. So we went and enjoyed ourselves in the bookstore. It was nice to spend a little one-on-one time with her. She is so cute!

For lunch we ate some food we had brought from home. (If you go and you are on a budget, I suggest bringing your own lunch. They let you eat in the pavilions out in the gardens. The food in the cafe and grill is kind of expensive).

As we were cleaning up after lunch an Amish couple came over and started talking to us. They were very nice and we learned a few things we didn't know before. There were several plain groups there in the three days we went. I guess it's a nice attraction for them.

The building is really nice.

The main walk through in the museum is soooo full of information, that we had to come back the next day and finish it. They recommend you take 2-3 hours for that part. It winds its way from the top floor down to the lower level. They have another little cafe down there too. My husband did buy a cappuccino at that one(yuck - sorry all you coffee and similar drink lovers out there - I can't stand the stuff).

The Palm Tree Cafe where hubby bought his cappuccino. Very nice. (The decor, not the drink).

More later.


Until next time...

Creation Museum visited

Back from the Creation Museum. If you've never been, I HIGHLY recommend it!

Got to meet Ken Ham.


(Now you know why I don't usually take full length photos of me).

Anyway, more later. It's soooooo humid here. I'm sticky and just want to sit in front of a fan.

Until next time...

vacation

Going on vacation.

I'll be back, when I'm back. :)



Until next time...

Last minute decisions...

...can turn out to be fun.

Such was the case this weekend. We left Kat and her family Saturday night wishing we had more time to visit. But, alas, that was not to be.

As they went back east, we headed west - and then, south. We stopped for the night and started out Sunday on a new adventure.


We love to visit different zoos (can you tell?). Let me tell you, this one was big. 500 acres!!! We really enjoyed seeing all the animals. And I guess the walk was worth it. The tram definitely helped. So did the shuttle at the end of the visit. This is the first zoo I've been to that had 2 parking lots. We parked in Africa and came out in North America. Interesting, huh? So we had to take the shuttle back over to Africa.

Having fun!

Am I camouflaged?

What's supposed to be here, Mama?

Not happy!

Content to have big brother push me around the zoo.

They had interesting sculptures all over the zoo.


This was really cool. Well, actually it was warm, but you know what I mean. It was the Sonora Desert display.


View from inside the bird aviary, where we saw birds from tropical areas. Like this:


Eclectus Parrot
And this:
Scarlet Ibis

Another sculpture.

The one thing we really wanted to see, and didn't get to, was the polar bear. It was too hot for it.

*****************************************************

A bonus when we go to NC is being able to get this.



Cheerwine. It's a soft drink. Ok, so NC is not the only place you can get it, but it is pretty much exclusive to the Southeast. And it started in NC. We have seen it here in TN, but we found the glass bottles in NC and you can't get those here. The formula in the glass bottles is the original using pure cane sugar instead of corn syrup. It tastes a little like Cherry Coke, but not exactly. (Psst...I like it almost as much as Dr Pepper).

Well, that was another highlight from my fabulous weekend. More to come.


Until next time...

where have I been?

Saturday started really early. The kids were out after about 30 minutes in the van.


The Virginia Museum of Transportation. The trains were the main attraction and everyone was fascinated.

Especially the train lover of the family.

A bird's-eye view of their elaborate train village. I think it was supposed to be Roanoke.



Of course I had to take a picture. Notice there is no period after Dr? This is right, there is officially no period in Dr Pepper. But I really wish they had taken better care of this fabulous drink. Come on, people, where's the 'r'?

The old cars were interesting, too.

Oops...sorry...just saw this notice after taking a few pictures like the one above.

The playground where all the kids could run around. See the girls in the background with the blue shirts on? More on them a little later.

Finally, a car we can ride. Hey, there's another blue shirt! Anyone know yet who it is?

And we're off! Umm...not too fast though. Still it was fun for them (I didn't ride).

Still wondering who the blue shirts are? Here, maybe this picture will help.



Now you know! Our family met up with Kat's family in Roanoke, VA this weekend! We had a lot of fun!

As we were leaving my husband said, "You know, it would have been worth the trip just to meet them." In other words, yes, we had fun at the museum and chocolate store, but even if we had not done those things, we still would have driven 4 hours just to meet such a wonderful family.

And if you haven't met them, you need to. Go over to Kat's blog and see for yourself.

Until next time...