July 2001, Newsletter #19 Mount Vernon Homeschoolers
Editor: Suzanne
Student editor: Kathy

Grist Mill Park Play Group Grist Mill playgroup. Let's move this to the George Washington Recreation Center from 1-4 on Wednesday. We will be home celebrating the 4th of July with firecrackers, watermelon, tea and hot corn dogs. See you at the swimming pool at the Rec Center. On the 12th, some of us will be there swimming. The editor has an all day session learning how to entertain and feed and live Japanese for a month. Found a web site with squid pizza in ink sauce. We may try the asparagus in cheese pizza. At the National Children's museum a display of a house showed everything about the homes, the trains, and had rooms for the children to explore. The children came home with lots of ideas. The girls are fixing a bedroom for Jun now. Book Chat for ten and under at Sherwood Library. Bud, Not Buddy is the book. Call the library to reserve a space. Read themselves or read to the younger children. They discuss with the librarian. Call for information if you want to go to this. Meet the mothers in the children's section. 4-H Lots of us are having vacation fun. Lisa and Suzanne will be going on field trips. Okay, fishing. Bowling or whatever off and on. We'll post it to let you know the dates. The sport and field events were lots of fun. We had the usual events. Pillowcase hop, three legged race, egg on the spoon and egg relay. Threw a ball and tried our hands at various sport activities. Awarded certificates with gold seals and came home limp as noodles from the wild day at Ft. Hunt Park. Vacation for our family Okay, I hit something with my car again. AAA says to quit driving when people honk all the time, or you keep having problems. It wasn't my fault. As usual. The tornado ran into me. It left two little snake eyes where the paint eroded from being blasted. And, 1300 miles each way can try the spirit of anyone. I offered to stop, but we get on the interstate highways and become quite mesmerized. We eat three meals at Cracker Barrel of three in a row at McDonald's and nobody wants to stop until we get there and my Mommy pulls me from the car and we go to sleep in our clothes. We prepared snack food, carrots,water, a jar of peanut butter and crackers. Let them read mile markers and boards for gas. Told them my optimal stops for gas stations, restaurants, rest stops. They became quiet good at picking them. We picked up the map of Cracker Barrel restaurants so they know the location of every one of them from California to the Atlantic Coast. Next to MacDonald's, they get our business. Have you ever checked out a book on tape and returned it on down the road? The biscuits are worthy. Mom and four kids crossed the mountain ranges from Virginia to Tennessee to Arkansas to Oklahoma. Anna counted 478 pickups in Oklahoma. That's cowboy Cadillac's. We attended several feasts when we arrived, Aunt June's Brushy Mountain hoedown, Janet and Don's family reunion, Mom's Sunday dinner, Joanne and Merle's Fiftieth Wedding Anniversary (three splendid feasts). All the kin, near kin and new kin came out to meet and greet us in party after party. We went back for seconds and left five pizzas uneaten, two gallons of ice cream in my Mom's freezer, and a lovely new concoction of cream cheese and jelly mix come down the road with us. Elaine made cake and we were stuffed. Nan made it her goal to feed Oleg until he looked like a stuffed rooster. Everyone is tired of our joke about the cows in the Shenandoah's having one leg longer than the other. And, to pass the time we sing "Dead Skunk in the middle of the road" for five miles every time we smell one that didn't make it. Alex dug up an armadillo that met its end in Nan's driveway. Alex had to carry terrapins back to the creek when the dog carried them up to the deck for toys. We tortured the boys with a visit to a pajamas factory, and Wal-Mart has a new drive through pharmacy we much admired. Everyone needs to know the best place to eat when you go to visit. Our favorite is Sonic Drive-In. The waitress delivers on roller skates. They have so much good stuff to eat like the #2 mustard burger. Extra big and loaded. Fried pickles. Giant diet Cherry limeade. In the Route 44 giant cup. Used to have Route 66 trash can size. We went every day to get that. Braum's ice cream with the best we've had. Forget Blue Bell and give it up for the seven gallons we ate in two weeks. Butter to dream about. Eggs $.69 and huge.One traffic light. Five cars at five for the big jam. Four block long limestone buildings and 1920 stores. Kathy played her violin on a flat bed trailer for Aunt June. She learned two new songs. Devil's Dream and Arkansas Traveler. The wind from the Arkansas River blew her papers. The fish we had were taken from the river and they were huge. She played for everyone everywhere we went. We met Cousin Orbin and his family and had breakfast with him and his family. We had so much fun. Grandfather Merle had a stroke on our second week in Oklahoma. Jeff had joined us for the week-end parties. We visited with cousins and Great-Aunts from Pennsylvania and saw cousin Karen's pictures of Alaska. Lightning We saw vertical as well as horizontal lightning on this trip. We drove through rain storms and severe weather going and coming back. Chiggers They have a tiny insect the burrows into your skin and liquefies flesh as it itches like crazy if you brush against tall grass. I personally carried eight of them home. They are nasty. So, if you see me scratching and jumping around....

July Activities Water that garden. Move flowers to better spots. Swim Zoo Beach River Farms to play in Children's gardens Info for Newbies Yes, we have homeschooled for eight years now. Favorite Web sites Va Eclectic VHEA Education\homeschool\Virginia\SOL\ Yahookids (unit studies) VA Eclectic Curriculum Alpha Omega (Christian light headed workbooks) Math Kuman Key to Fractions, etc. ebay key words Science English Language Arts Math geography social studies Read Charlotte Mason Companion : Personal Reflections on the Gentle Art of Learning Montessori Colfax Holt Smarter.kids.com for tests Do this on the cheap. You can spend thousands. It isn't necessary. Engage in conversation. Ask your child what if questions. Let them tell you what they want to learn. So, one of mine wants a video education. One watched Animal planet and Nature shows. One loves Teletubbies. Listen to great music. Smithsonian lectures. Buy the best books on subjects with the latest information at Barnes and Noble or sales for cheap. Read. Read. Write journals. Draw, paint and have fun Portfolios go in soon. Thinking about a video this year of the children in a play. Next year we may go classical. How would you prove or disprove Aristotle? Want to drop an apple from a tree? Crash and burn chemistry, hike the Appalachian trail. Ride a steam engine, catch a ferry. We don't need walls to have a classroom. We aren't teaching school. We are teaching life skills. In this world we live in we are outside the box in the thinking. Be prepared for the heat. Get your answers ready and let your product speak for you. Homeschooled kids may seem different. Mine think about the answer. They don't reap benefits if they don't perform. My husband laughs, "Homework in homeschool?" Time for feeding the natives. See you all next month.