Creve Coeur Lake
2019-20 School Year–Week Nine
Let’s do something different this week, and recap all the special activities first!
We attended Legends and Lanterns in St. Charles, MO, last Saturday. If I was going to count a Halloween event as a field trip, this would be it. In addition to being a lot of fun, there’s also a lot to learn about characters from history and literature, and it’s become one of our family’s favorite annual events!
We took a four-mile walk around Creve Coeur Lake last Monday when Moose had the day off. This is another favorite annual event, but we missed out on it last year due to my broken ankle. We may actually repeat this activity later in the fall, when the fall foliage is at its peak!
And Thursday after school, we visited Braeutigum Orchards to pick a pumpkin (or two!):
Now on to the normal “stuff.” Turkey and Bunny worked on proving trigonometric identities in pre-calculus. In writing the practiced drafting questions without bias. They finally started “The Paradiso” in their study of The Divine Comedy. In physics, they learned about the parabolic motion of a projectile.
Ladybug worked with English and metric conversions in pre-algebra. She finished the chapter on simple machines in science. We started Anne of Green Gables, a book I really enjoy…I hope Ladybug will, too! She wrote a 600 word essay about horses using the brainstorming map she created last week.
Chickadee reviewed telling time in math. She also practiced counting by sevens. She continued to read about Venus in science. She started memorizing her fourth poem in First Language Lessons. She has also been doing a great job with her memory work in catechesis!
I don’t think I have anything particularly exciting on the schedule for this week, which is ok…we could use a couple of quiet days!
Wordless Wednesday
2017-18 School Year–Week Twelve+
Two weeks ago, I mentioned that we had a busy week ahead, and I wasn’t sure how much school we were going to get done. We did have school, but only for a few days, so I’m going to combine that with this week’s wrap-up.
In addition to a couple of days of regular school work last week, we did a few fun things, as well. We celebrated the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, and three of the children even got to participate in a mass children’s choir at Concordia Seminary in St. Louis. It was very exciting to be part of that historic event!
We started on one of my favorite November traditions last week…we’re assembling our yearly “Thankful Tree!” As far as I can remember, the first year we did this was 2009, and that tree had handprints for leaves. We’ve also done some other variations on it over the years, including a Thankful Wreath, and maybe a Thankful Turkey, as well. Since at least 2011, though, we’ve used the current format. Laminating all those leaves was a pain at the time, but they sure have served us well!
We also went to the St. Louis Public Library Central Library to see the “We Are Shakespeare” exhibit. I almost ran out of time on that one, because it closed last weekend. It was a really cool exhibit, and I’m glad we made it!
We also took advantage of the nice weather on one of Moose’s days off last week to take a nature walk around Creve Coeur Lake. We saw snakes and birds, lots of cool leaves and fruits/nuts, and tons of other people out on bikes and boats enjoying the beautiful day.
This week was a little more standard. We got back to our regular religion lessons, after taking a break for the Reformation. Turkey and Bunny wrapped up another unit in their books, but not before they learned about the Tabernacle, and the positions of all the different tribes when the set up camp around it. Ladybug read a story that was not too familiar to her…the tale of Gideon. Chickadee learned about Elijah and the prophets of Baal.
Ladybug is working on long division in math. She does not enjoy it. She is good at it, though, which is important. Turkey and Bunny worked with regular polygons. They found out how to find the measures of the interior and exterior angles of various shapes. Chickadee is still working on counting larger numbers, and she’s getting pretty good at it!
We had a lot of fun in science this week. Turkey and Bunny have been learning about diffusion and osmosis, and they got to do a few cool experiments to see how they work. Their favorite experiment involved an egg. First, they soaked it in vinegar to remove the shell (which they’ve done in the past). Then they soaked it in syrup, to see which way the liquid moved (out of the egg into the syrup). After that, they soaked it in water, again to see which way the liquid moved (from the water into the egg). They took measurements along the way, and were very impressed with the differences they recorded! Ladybug watched every step of their experiment and was fascinated by it, even as she was learning about Old World apes in her science class.
History has also been interesting. Even though they’re using different texts, Turkey and Bunny’s and Ladybug’s lessons have overlapped again. They’ve all been learning about Babylon and Assyria. We’ve talked about rulers such as Tiglath-Pileser III and Shalmaneser V. We’ve also made some connections to Bible history, even though our religion lessons haven’t gotten there yet.
The girls had a fun little activity this week. We’ve been anxiously awaiting the release of the Lego Ideas “Women of NASA” set, and we finally received our copy. I decided since there are exactly three vignettes in the set that the girls should be the ones to build it. Turkey still enjoyed reading about the women depicted in the set (I love that Lego included that information in the instruction book) even though he didn’t get to help build it. It’s a great little set, and looks right at home next to our Saturn V rocket!
Next week, we’ll be starting on our annual Thanksgiving study…I can’t believe how quickly that holiday is approaching!
Fall at Creve Coeur Lake
We took advantage of the beautiful weather and Moose’s day off on Thursday to visit Creve Coeur Park and walk the almost four mile loop around the lake. We saw some beautiful fall color (although not as much as I would have liked), a couple of different kinds of snakes, and some gorgeous herons. We also saw runners, bikers, a few people in kayaks, and even a sailboat…apparently we weren’t the only ones who wanted to take advantage of the lovely November day!
Chickadee Thursday
Just like we did last November, today we visited Creve Coeur Park, where we enjoyed time on the playground, had a picnic lunch, and walked the 3.7 mile trail around the lake. It was a beautiful November day, and Chickadee had a great time!
2016-17 School Year–Week Ten
I’m pretty sure the first week of November is always a little crazy, but I’m not really sure why!
We made it back to Lutheranism 101 this week, after our study of denominations in One Christ, Many Creeds. We also reviewed the events of the Reformation on Monday, which included watching The Reformation Polka.
Math was pretty easy this week. Turkey and Bunny have been working with solving inequalities, as well as graphing them. Ladybug has continued to work on finding the factors of numbers, and is also working on multiplying three digit numbers.
Ladybug finished the chapter on aquatic herps in science. She really enjoyed learning about aquatic toads and frogs! Turkey and Bunny also finished the chapter they were working on in science, about water. They still have to take the test before they move onto the next module.
In history we have been learning about South America, Africa, and Australia in the late 1800s. I’m really enjoying learning about some of these events with the children. While I did learn a lot about history in junior high and high school, I didn’t learn as much about what was going on in some of the world’s more far-flung locations as we are learning about now.
We finally made it to Creve Coeur Park for a fall field trip. The weather wasn’t as nice as I was hoping, but we did get to see some good fall color and some interesting animals, and we enjoyed the 3.7 mile walk around the lake.
We’re going to do things a little different next week, to try to spend as much time as we can with Moose, who only has two days of school (and a birthday!). We have plans for two different field trips…I can’t wait!
Chickadee Thursday
We finally made it to Creve Coeur Park for the fall field trip I’ve been planning. We walked the entire 3.7 mile loop around the lake, and Chickadee did a great job…she kept up with us the whole time! Her legs may be little, but she’s fast!
Cakeway to the West–Creve Coeur Lake
Park Day 2013
Today was our annual-ish “Park Day.” We did this two years ago, and decided it should be a yearly event, but last summer was so hot, we never got around to it. Today was absolutely beautiful, so we got out of the house for some playing (at eight different playgrounds!), and a picnic!
Park stop one was at Creve Coeur Park. We found three different playgrounds at this one location (and one of them was a complete surprise, even to me!).
Playground one had a splash pad (or sprayground, or spray park…whatever you want to call it!):
Turkey tried to get Ladybug under this bucket before it dumped, but she’s pretty scrappy, and wouldn’t stand for it!
Chickadee wasn’t too sure of the swing at first, but she warmed up to it pretty quickly!
Ladybug got right to work on her monkey bar skills, which she practiced at pretty much every park we went to:
Moose liked these “rock, paper, scissors” spinners:
We also saw some evidence of the storm damage from over the weekend:
Playground two, still at Creve Coeur Park, with some completely different equipment.
This is also where we stopped for our picnic, since they have a fantastic pavilion:
It had an amazing view of the lake:
Playground three, again at Creve Coeur Park:
There was a cool braille alphabet and puzzle (which was on the back):
Plenty of new stuff to climb:
And a slide built for three, which was great for races:
We drove past the lake before we left, and saw just how flooded it is right now:
The fourth playground we went to was at Faust Park. This was one of the most popular stops we made!
More swinging:
Then Chickadee got to try something other than swinging:
Turkey loves rock-climbing walls:
After a stop at the mall (that was for me!), we went to Central Park in Chesterfield, which is always a favorite.
Even more swinging:
And bouncing:
We drove by “The Awakening,” which is always kind of weird to see.
And the fairly new Amphitheater, which looks really nice!
Playground six was pretty small, because it’s just a little park adjacent to the North Pointe Aquatic Center in Ballwin, and yet it was surprisingly popular with the children!
What I learned today? My children would rather climb on top of the monkey bars than swing across them!
Something else Chickadee could do:
The tire swing was a lot of fun!
This dog statue was very cute:
The seventh place we visited was Vlasis Park in Ballwin, and it is one of the best playgrounds in the area (I think), because there’s just so much to do.
Everyone wanted a turn riding next to Chickadee’s little sidecar…she was very amused about the whole thing.
We found another sprayground (even I can’t decide what I want to call them!). I’m always the most fun mom at any park, because I play in the fountains, too!
One last stop, at another playground we used to frequent way back when Moose was a baby: Millennium Park in Creve Coeur (back where we started):
All parks should have signs like this!
They’ve added a lot of stuff in the years since we were there last, including yet another spray park:
There’s a bonus playground 8.5 here…it’s within sight of the main playground, unlike the ones we played at at Creve Coeur Park, which are spread out quite far apart, so I don’t count it as a whole other playground. Still fun, though!
Bunny had fun with the telescopes and binoculars at every park that had them!
It was a great way to spend a beautiful day…hopefully, the children sleep well tonight!