Field Trip to the Oregon Gardens

This has become an annual event for us and I am so glad I decided to do it again this year.
This year I decided to add a more organized activity to the mix by giving the boys a scavenger hunt to notebook as they made stops at the various activity stations. I found a wonderful full color printable scavenger hunt at The Taylor House blog. I printed copies half sized so they would fit inside the boys' composition books and add a pencil and crayons to their backpacks and off we went.

Cameron was excited to take his backpack and add his Gtuzy Gear straps just for the occasion.
We headed into the garden knowing that we would have at least 8 or 9 stations with activities to try plus exploring the garden. I knew we would likely run into some of our homeschool friends as well. My plan was to be to the garden by 11:00 and heading home by 1:45 at the latest. The idea being, that we would be there when our friends were there and we would be done before the local school let out as to miss traffic.
Ready , Set , off we Go!

The boys found a larger map to look at the figure out their plan. Since this was our third year attending this activity we already knew where most of the stations were located. We decided to only do the upper level activities in an attempt to combine our scavenger hunt and keep our timeline.

Nathan was very excited about the scavenger hunt and made a point to stop and draw in his notebook often.

Cameron found one of his homeschool friends and they checked out the insect station taking on the sorting activity to test their knowledge.  Watching Cameron do this activity reminds me that I want to print and laminate some sorting cards for various activities.

Nathan couldn't help himself, he surveyed the crossing  for several minutes before deciding he had to jump it.

Nothing but air!
He is such a dare devil, no fear!

This is just one of the plants we decided we want to find and plant in our yard. I'm dreaming up a plants unit study for the boys and maybe a landscape design project for them.

If you would like to see the rest of the pictures I took on our field trip, check out my Google+ album

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Favorite Field Trips

Do you have a favorite Field Trip?
I do!

During the summer we had the amazing opportunity to spend the day at Evergreen Wings and Waves waterpark. You might be thinking that isn't a field trip, oh but it was. Wings and Waves has an amazing upstairs room filled with stations that teach about the water cycle, submarines, the Mars rover, the moon landing, tidal waves, and the various states of water. There is also a serious of symbols about energy efficiencies in the building that kids can see out the windows.
Downstairs in the waterpark itself there is a wave pool, a wirlpool , a hottub, 4 tube slides that start inside the 747 on the roof, and a kids play area that includes a helicopter that dumps water on the forest.  Of course this is the fun area of the field trip, but as you are waiting in line for the slides you learn about the 747 and when you get to the top of the stairs you are actually inside the 747 where you can watch a video of the lifting of the plane onto the rooftop.


Admission and Schedule, you can also contact them about group rates.
The water park as well as the Air and Space Museums on the same campus have educational programs and scouting programs available

Sleep off the grougies...

Sometimes sleep is a necessary, but sometimes I feel like I need to "no sleep" grougies (I think that is the word) to do my best work. It may sound like ramblings when I write but if I don't start somewhere I won't have anything to edit and work with...

Hey, hope everyone remembered to set the clocks forward... I did one of the clocks (my night stand clock) It looks like the computer reset itself so we are ok there... I will go around and set them all this morning.

I'm sitting in my office (It is choas) while my younger son (2 1/2) plays his Easy-Link game. If you haven't seen this thing in action, go check it out. I love that he can play games and not mess up the computer... He is learning his ABC's and counting and is recognizing colors and shapes as well as order... We have most of the characters (decided against the Barney/ Wiggles set since we aren't Wiggles fans)... Today he is playing Lunch o Matic with Arthur... he is actually making good food choices... It lets me do my blogging and know where he is at the same time... Glad we rebuild the older machine for the kids...

Life journey's

Life is a journey, wow that was about as cliche' as it gets.
Anyway, this weekend has been a crazy ride and along the way I have seen sides of my life and inside myself on a new level. I really need to get focused and simplify this journey or I'm not going to make it to the end.
I am slowly moving in a new direction as far as my business. I'm taking a break for a while. I need to find out what I am really doing and treading water and sinking fast in a business that take more time and energy than it reaps doesn't make sense. I love my hobby but see my other journey suffering desperately. I know I will always love the underlying aspects of the business and the people I have encountered because of the business but my other passions need me more.
I see so many projects laying around that are screaming for attention. I have stories in my head that need to be told. And, I feel like I need to give myself more deeply to my faith and family.
My writing and photography are things I can include in my faith and family. My hobby, while it does produce lasting outcomes, it seems to be conflicting with my faith and family right now. Someday, it may not, but now it is causing more of a strain than it is worth. I know that I can continue to inspire, but can not commit the money or the time that my customers deserve.
I also feel pulled toward my summer projects in faith so passionately that my business would only be a hinderance.
I will continue to post examples of my hobby as I am not quitting the art just the business.

Random thoughts...

random thoughts on nothing....


So here is another installment of randomness (is that a word???)

We took the boys to Chuck E Cheese's today as their reward for getting things cleaned up... Let me tell you as a Mom of 2 young boys it is WAY easier to enjoy the games and such on a weekday afternoon... We used a coupon of course and all 4 of us played games. It was fun and not at all the chaos of our last trip to the Cheese.

Take my advise , download the coupons from their website and go during the week!!!

Cameron and I worked on the Sunday School office ( think Mission Organization) today as well as several of the unused classrooms. Our little church now has 2 classes (I'll blog at blogspot about that blessing) and needs a little help in the organizational chaos department.. Monday, the pastor's wife and I worked in the office for about 30 minutes and managed to sort a lot of stuff. Today we managed to unload a lot of that stuff along with a lot of other stuff. I now have a better idea of what we actually have and what we need. Wish it was that easy to get ahold of my own office... of course that seems to be the never ending battle (but that is another blog all together)



Have you have palyed with Google Earth... It is kind of fun, and a little weird... Try it some time...

Any way, I guess that is enough ramblings....

Welcome to my enchanted journey.

So as I am reading through some blogs and doing house work today, I realized I hadn't posted in a while and my blog was looking pretty dull... So I'm fixing it up a little. I hope to share some o f my passions along the way...

I love living in the Willamette Valley! This was a couple of weeks ago (it looks like snow, but they had just sprayed the orchard up the street.... We actually didn't get any snow this year, so far... But the beauty of nature is so pure out here that I had to share...