This Moment

It's a beautiful, warm day today, perfect for playing outside.  In fact, it's that down time of day when they can do whatever they want and my kids have asked to go out.  I've even given permission.  They went out for a few minutes and then wandered back in for some reason I'm not aware of.  Perhaps someone needed to use the bathroom.  They were sidetracked on their way back out, though.  Books.  New ones from the library today.  They'd been looking at them for hours before requesting to play outside.  They're back it.  I love moments like these.   

University Museum Field Trip

A few weeks ago we went on a field trip with another homeschool family that we are friends with.  I'd heard about a museum at our nearby university that was free, so I wanted to check it out.

Just driving onto the campus and finding a place to park was an experience for me.  I felt so out of place, but at the same time so excited to be on a college campus!  (I have very fond memories of my college days.)  I think I finally feel older than a typical college student, though.  :)  I felt very conspicuous walking across campus with three little kids, and I'm pretty sure I was right in my feeling.  I heard a lot of remarks (not addressed to me) about 'those cute kids'.  I'm glad we charmed a few hearts!

Anyway, we met up with our friends inside the museum.  It wasn't very big, but the price was right and we saw some interesting things.  Since I'm so behind on blogging this, I've already forgotten most of it unfortunately.

Logan, Annie, and Hannah in front of ????  See, my memory is poor.

This is Simon and Logan with the giant sloth.  It's hard to believe they are the same age.

Polar Bear; I know at least one animal!

There was this neat room with all sorts of skeletons.  It was really interesting to note the similarities between such different species.  This one is a whale (I forget what type).

A goofy picture of most of the kids under the whale.  Clockwise from the top: Rachel, Caleb, Logan, Annie, Hannah, Simon.  

Another goofy picture.

The littlest ones came too: Alex and Ammon.

There was also a large exhibit on the natural history of Iowa, and another full of birds.  That one was interesting to get to.  The only access to it was up several flights of stairs, or through the middle of a large auditorium.  We took the elevator upstairs and walked through that auditorium (full of students getting ready for a lecture) to get to the bird exhibit.  We carried the strollers down the stairs after!  I don't think either of us moms wanted to have all those eyes on us and eight kids a second time.  Hehe.

After the museum, I wanted to enjoy the BEAUTIFUL day and I saw a sign for a lake we've never been to.  So I took a detour. 

It was worth it.

We picnicked...

We played on the playground for a while...

I have turned this picture several times...hmm.

And we dug in the sand.

Afterward we drove around and discovered lots of camping, hiking trails, fossil beds (which we went back to last week...awesome), great fishing, a visitor's center, and several playground/ picnic areas.

Article

I know I'm WAAAAY behind on posting for both my blogs and I've posted a lot of articles recently (because I can do it quickly), but here's an interesting one I read today:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/amanda-moreno-phd/post_3023_b_1285135.html