Homeschool Field Trip: Conner Prairie

Conner Prairie is an interactive living history museum in Indiana, near Indianapolis. William Conner lived there in the early 1800s, getting stinking rich off of fur trading with the Lenape Indians who lived near there for a time. Conner Prairie includes his house and homestead, a recreated Lenape Indian village, a recreated pioneer-era prairie village, a recreated Indiana village in the process of being raided by Confederate soldiers, and the recreation of an 1859 lighter than air balloon flight, and last week we all went to see it with one of our local homeschool groups.

The barn at the Conner homestead, with sheep and their lambs, goats and their kids, miniature horses and their foals, a few cats, and a calf or two just walking around and waiting to be petted

chopping wood at the prairie village--as a souvenir, the younger kid tried to haul away a chunk of wood as big as her head

playing games

doing chores

lots of stuff to look at

the older kid's two favorite exhibits were the general store, where she spent ages playing with a scale, some weights, and some nails, and the telegraph station, where she spent ages with a telegraph machine and a computer program on Morse code

experimenting with models of helium balloons

and, why yes indeed, riding in a giant helium balloon ourselves

As you can see, it was VERY exciting while the balloon lifted off. Once we were fully aloft, everybody got a good chance to look all around and the ride was quite peaceful:

with, of course, a lovely view

Interesting fact: the original 1859 balloon flight after which this attraction is modeled was not done using helium, nor hot air, but a lighter-than-air gas made from coal byproducts. I also learned that the Conner family sent away to South America for the spices that they used to dye their wool, and that the schoolchildren in that area used soapstone instead of chalk on their tablets, since soapstone was readily available and chalk was not, and when we happened upon a woman who had just finished making a salve good for cuts and burns, I called the older kid over and forced her to let the woman rub it on the knee she had just skinned, and the older kid didn't complain about that knee again for the rest of the day, either because it didn't hurt anymore after the salve or because she was afraid that if she did complain, I'd let another stranger rub weird-smelling crap on it.

the Lenape Indians were happy to let the younger kid use their mortar and pestle

and to let the whole family set off in their dugout canoe

back at the edge of the Conner homestead, the girls were rendered simply giddy at the sight of all that space!

Gift shop purchases=two new quill pen sets (I was supposed to ask my uncle to set aside some feathers for me during pheasant hunting season, but I forgot), one McGuffey's spelling book to add to the McGuffey's Eclectic Readers that my grandmother bought for me as a child, three sticks of candy (Matt ALWAYS buys candy in gift shops!), and one set of Melissa and Doug fuzzy horses.

I handled this field trip differently from most previous ones--instead of having the kids do a lot of prep work beforehand to establish context, we just...went! Although I'd still rather have done some reading and writing about the time period first (for some reason, this long-planned field trip snuck up on me!), I was pleased to see that the kids were so absorbed by the material on offer that I think that they'll be able to draw on it during our summer-long pioneer unit, which we'll begin bright and early next week.

This week, it's all about the International Fair, and the kids' project covering the continent of Africa. And then...a little break!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, dog-walking mishaps, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

Dolphin-Shaped Birthday Cake

Her daddy made her a dolphin cake for her birthday:

The cake is based on this dolphin-shaped cake, in that I baked the two 9" cakes that the tutorial calls for, then froze them overnight per my aunt's instructions that this would make them easier to carve (it did!), and attempted to show the tutorial to my partner so that he could duplicate it, but he had his own vision by that time, and the little kid adored his dolphin cake just as well, even if he didn't frost the sides. 

In the future, however, unless I have an actual template to trace, I'll likely just bake this kind of cake giant-sized in that giant cake pan right there, and then let my partner carve it out--easier, and we'll just have to deal with having all that extra cake, poor us.

Since the cake was irregularly shaped, it was quite amusing to cut:

And it fully met the approval of the birthday kid!

I've got our other dolphin birthday party ideas organized in my Dolphin Party Pinboard. Next up for July: Pirate Party!!!

P.S. Want to follow along with my craft projects, books I'm reading, road trips to weird old cemeteries, looming mid-life crisis, and other various adventures on the daily? Find me on my Craft Knife Facebook page!

A Finished Waldorf Doll

A purchased pattern.

Lots of wool.

SO much hand-sewing (don't look too closely!).

The consultation of a very many Waldorf doll web tutorials and walk-throughs.

Another purchase:

Hair that already needs to be mended (sigh...).

Hallelujah, a massive wardrobe taken entirely from a collection of doll clothes previously owned (and sewn?) by the children's great-grandmother.

And the day before her birthday, her Waldorf doll was finished:

Sydney really, really loves her, in that kind of love that makes you carefully pack away the extras of the fabric and yarn that you used, because you know there are going to be some serious repair jobs coming your way one day soon.

Willow Has Discovered--

--softball!!!

And that's going to be our summer, I do believe.

Reading and "Writing"

Have I mentioned that my girl is learning to read? She's very phonetically inclined, so much so that she can spell MUCH better than her sister ("I think you left out the 'n' in 'January', Willow," she says), even if she can only read the phonograms that I've explicitly taught her:


However, although her code-breaking skills are still very limited, my girl is already a writer like her Momma (with a better imagination and better sense of pacing, too). Here's the epic work that she spent the better part of a week creating, staying up late and then sneaking it into bed with her after Dadda's patience finally collapsed of an evening, being excused from schoolwork to work on it by decree of the Momma, taking it with her in the car to get a few more pages done while running errands:


I'm sorry that her voice isn't as clear as it could be, but to be fair, that was probably the tenth time that she'd read that particular nine-minute book out loud that day. I'm also sorry that it's recited so down-tempo, with Willow falling asleep next to her, but it was also, for various reasons unrelated to our current story, vastly past the children's bedtime.

And, of course, the story isn't written down--the child can't write all those words, nor spell them, nor read them once written, quite yet. Instead, her work is relayed through the oral tradition, just as some of my favorite Anglo-Saxon and North tales were, so many millions of years ago when I studied them in grad school. As well, when I listen to her read her creation, my nerd-mind goes, quietly inside my head, "Oooh, a hero myth! Oooh, the archetype of the wanderer! OOOOH, a QUEST!!!"

Oooh, a monster with eleven eyes and two claws and it lives in a cave and wants to eat unicorns!

Waldorf Doll WIP: Second Round

Nope, I'm not counting how many hours it's taking to create my first Waldorf doll. But...let's just say I've been making a lot of progress on my Hulu queue.

Yep, Syd is watching me work. Her opinions change by the hour about the prospective length of her doll's hair (no matter what she eventually "decides", the doll's hair is going to be down to its feet, to commemorate Sydney's greatest wish to have the longest hair in the world).

Nope, I'm not pleased with how it's turning out; my hand-sewing is SO amateur-ish! But it does help that every time Sydney pops by to check in on my progress and spies her doll, her eye light up, she smiles a huge smile, and she exclaims in happiness and excitement. SHE doesn't think my hand-sewing is ugly.

beginning to embroider the eyes and mouth

finished face, with features both embroidered and drawn with beeswax crayons

machine-stitching to form the arms

arms sewn across the back of the shoulders

tracing the pattern for the body and legs

the torso pinned into place, ready to hand-sew

I'm hoping that it looks less like it wants to eat my face off after I add a full head of humanoid hair and put it into a homemade dress.

Waldorf Doll WIP

For the girls' birthdays this year, they are each going to receive (hopefully) one Momma-made Waldorf doll.

I could have made the same claim three years ago, because that's how long this project has been in my head, but I mean it this year. If I procrastinate much longer, I'll have lost the chance entirely to give Willow the doll during the period of her childhood when it can be a real playmate to her, and for Sydney, I think this is going to be a magical present.

If I get them made, of course.

The project, which I would have told you up until I actually began it was prohibitively difficult, is actually not so bad. It's complicated, yes, and my results are clearly far from perfect so far, but it's do-able, and the doll is turning out, if not perfect, quite acceptable.

I'm using the Magic Cabin doll pattern, but Cotton Waldorf Doll Skin Fabric from Weir Crafts--

--although if I want to make more Waldorf dolls beyond the three that I currently have the materials for, I'm hoping that I can source the fabric locally. This first time, it was just too hard to figure out exactly what to buy, so I bought the stuff specifically labeled for Waldorf dollmaking.

Using the pattern and a huge variety of online Waldorf dollmaking tutorials, my first doll has been coming together!

gathering the top of the head 

tucking it in

laying out a piece of wool to wrap the wool head stuffing in

forming a wool ball to stuff the head

head and shoulders ready to tie off

skin fabric stitched over the head, and pins to mark the features

skin fabric stitched over the top and back of the head (it will be covered by the hair)

Now all I have to do is sew the body, piece it together, stitch the details, embroider the facial features, construct the hair and sew it on, sew a dress, and ideally dye Sydney a pink play silk (one of the few colors she doesn't already have!) to wrap it in.

Oh, and her birthday is on Sunday.

P.S. I do have a Waldorf dollmaking pinboard, where I've been trying to collect all the good tips and tricks and tutorials and ideas that I come across, if you'd like to check it out.

Before the Ballet Recital

Here's my baby ballerina, just practically almost six years old, all costumed and ready to perform her role as a flower petal in our university's pre-college program ballet recital:

This is the same child who, on the way home from her sister's gymnastics class this evening, got so mad at me for taking away the ipad before she'd finished her drawing that she began to kick the back of my seat really hard over and over again, so I pulled into the parking lot of the nearest grocery store and told her that she had to get out of the car if she couldn't ride safely, so she jumped out of the car, barefoot, ran across the (empty, whew!) parking lot, in the rain, and hid behind a dumpster.

Fortunately, this type of behavior does not faze me, because I am from the South, y'all, so I, too, jumped out of the car, chased her down, hauled her back in, lectured her mightily, and drove her back home before she could, I don't know, attempt to throw herself out of the moving minivan or something.

I swear, that kid's TEMPER! I just don't know where she gets it from!

(ahem.)

The Friday Zone Girl

In case you've been left wondering if my older daughter has been spending her time locked in a closet all these weeks while little Sydney walks the runway in a fashion show and performs on the giant stage at our university's Musical Arts Center in her ballet recital, you'll be pleased to know that while Sydney commands the stage, Willow is a TV star.

The local PBS affiliate in our university town produces an educational children's show called "The Friday Zone." It has winning young hosts, field trips to local tourist destinations, interviews with local celebrities or other people of note, and craft projects and science experiments demonstrated by the Craft Kids, little groups of children pulled from the community determined by their ability to attend a two-hour taping mid-morning on a weekday in the middle of the school year.

It makes for a fabulous homeschool field trip, actually, since there's a studio tour involved, and you get to run around with kids that you've only just met, and there are craft projects!

Earlier this spring, Matt took Willow to the studio on campus so that she could be one of the show's Craft Kids. She's a little hard to pick out on set, but she's the kid in the back row, on the right, in the green dinosaur shirt:

Ah, there she is!

She had a fabulous time, participated in two different tapings, and, this weekend, finally had the pleasure of watching herself on the big screen:

In case you don't care to watch the entire show, you can find Willow's segment beginning at the 17:20 mark, just after the segment on the junior roller derby (which you should also watch, as they're pretty awesome!).

I tell you what, I have been just amazed at these kids of mine recently. It hasn't been that long since Willow would routinely refuse to speak to a grandparent, much less a TV host, and would routinely refuse to join into conversation or games with her best friends, much less pal around with children she's only just met. She's often so very into her own head, so very impatient with anyone else's agenda, no matter how compelling it's made for her, that I'm thrilled, and very proud, to watch her enjoy being part of a group, to willingly take instruction and participate in a fun project not of her own invention. Don't get me wrong, I've long been thrilled, and incredibly proud, that I have such an independent child who will go her own way regardless of peer pressure, who knows her mind, who will not be persuaded. When I watch other parents interact with their amiable, tractable small children, I often remind myself that later in Willow's childhood and young adulthood I will WANT such an independent soul out in the world along with her silly, flighty peers. Nevertheless, I've always felt that she was missing out on the fun games of her friends, simply because she didn't want to leave a Nancy Drew novel that could be finished later, and I've often resented parenting her through her latest gigantic fit thrown because I wanted her to put on pants so that I could take the girls to some glorious children's museum or hands-on science center and spend all day following them around there.

So it's nice to see my kid chatting with other kids, doing a craft project, sitting where she's supposed to sit and not looking at the camera just as she's been asked not to. And if this new leap in maturity will also help her not throw a half-hour tantrum at the beginning of every whoppingly two-hour schoolday, or help her consent to clean her room or empty the dishwasher at the specific time when I ask her to, at least every now and then, then goodness, so much the better!

The 2012 Trashion/Refashion Show

She designed the perfect outfit.

She chose all the fancy dresses in their rainbow colors, coming with me to two different thrift stores on their various sale days to make the selections.

I sewed it up, photographed it, and sent it in to be juried.

It was accepted into the fashion show.

She practiced and practiced and practiced her runway walk:


She even drew the sidewalk chalk runway herself this time!

Of COURSE there was some last-minute sewing to do:

And some last-minute...welding? Searing?

You will be pleased to know that, in the nick of time, I finally thought of the perfect way to attach giant, bulky, cumbersome wings to a child. I'll share later.

The official word this year was that, although the Hair Arts Academy was again donating their hair and make-up services, we needed to provide our own make-up supplies. This was doubly awkward for me because not only do I not wear make-up, but I also don't know anything about make-up, and thus didn't have the first idea of what I should buy (nor did I want to *buy* anything that I was only going to need once). This is why it's good to have friends, since my buddy Kimberly was kind enough to talk me through what I would want for the look that she thought I'd want. And honestly, I did my best at CVS, agonizing over neutral but shimmery eyeshadow, and blush and lipstick, and a stick of stuff to put around your eyelids, and mascara, and body glitter, and then actually spending 60 FREAKING dollars of my homeschool/crafts budget to buy it all, but when we got to Hair Arts Academy and met our stylist, Jordan, he listened to me so kindly and patiently as I described the neutral and shimmery look I was going for, but when I handed him a CVS bag clearly full of totally random make-up, told him (as if he didn't already know!) that I didn't know anything about that stuff, and mentioned that whatever he didn't use I'd return to the store, he very kindly and patiently, without even looking in the bag, handed it back to me and said, "Why don't we just use my make-up, and you can return all that?"

Thanks, Jordan!

Fortunately, Sydney knew EXACTLY what she wanted to do with her hair--two small braids with rainbow beads on each side of her head (inspired by a little playmate who often has all her hair done up in gorgeous beaded braids) and a ballet bun. My friend who does her daughter's hair in those enviable beaded braids told me how to do them, and I had them finished before we got to Hair Arts Academy, since they're so time-consuming that I didn't want her stylist to have to stand there and do them all while a million other models waited their turns. It was actually pretty great, since Sydney's beaded braids got loads of compliments from all the stylists--it's like in The Hunger Games novel, when everyone falls in love with the complicated braid that Katniss' mother puts in her hair the morning of the Reaping, and you know that, for all her flaws, her catatonic depression and how she would have just let her kids starve to death, at least she can do her daughter's hair real cute.

Jordan's ballet bun also seriously blew mine out of the water:

Yep, glittery eyelids:

Hair and make-up, a dress rehearsal, and a photo shoot (or twenty)--

--made for a LONG day, and by the time the main event FINALLY arrived, the kid had her game face on, ready to go: 

The Jefferson Street Marching Band was the opening act:

And then, my baby's big moment:

Then a TV interview:

And THEN she got to just sit back and relax!

It would be so easy to mess this kid up, this child who can never have enough attention, who loves clothes, who craves the approval of others. It would be so easy to dress her effeminately, to praise her for being so pretty. She would be easy to encourage into the most constricted stereotype of the girly-girl. She'd do toddler beauty pageants if I asked her to, dolled up in heavy make-up and fake hairpieces and inappropriate clothing, shaking her butt and winking on stage. She'd go with me to commercial auditions, and consent to be a child actor on a sit-com, or mouth pop tunes on a tour of all the shopping malls in America.

The hard thing about this kid is to parent her while respecting her passions, but without degrading them into the usual sort of stereotypical girly-girl pop culture fluff--to channel her love of acquiring fancy clothes into fashion design, and to allow her to take ownership of her passions, even if it means I get dragged into a major fashion show every year. To show her that make-up is a legitimate craft. To praise originality over conformity. To interest myself in what SHE loves. To tell her that yes, she is a lovely child, but that loveliness is a circumstance, not an accomplishment. To buy her those shoes that can only be described as stripper heels, since they're on sale and I can afford them, but to require her to wear her purple Keen's sandals on the runway instead since the stripper heels are slippery and the Keen's won't cause her to fall off the stage. To also buy her real make-up to play with, and to allow her to walk out in public with me even when she puts what seems like all of it on her face, but to also buy her real clown make-up, and to allow her to walk out in public with me when she paints her entire face like a baby jaguar, and then again the next day when she's a zebra.

Yep, she can be a HARD kid to parent (aren't they all?). But oh, this journey with her is worth it.

Labeling the Giant Map of Africa

Remember our big map of Africa, up on the living room wall? It's still with us!

We left off working with it for a bit when I started homeschool boot camp, but even though Willow is still really struggling with focusing on her schoolwork, she does love geography, and she does love complicated projects, so it's come back into rotation.

My first thought was to use map labeling as copywork practice, but then I decided that I'd rather have the children doing copywork at the sentence level so that they could practice grammar, and using primarily common nouns or really important proper nouns so that they could practice their spelling, and THEN I purchased the Africa pin flag maps from Montessori Print Shop, and discovered that the set comes with two sets of country labels, WAY too big to use with the pin flag maps, still too big to use with the Montessori map puzzle that the instructions say that the labels are for (if I print them 1/4-size, perhaps...), but just right to use with our big map of Africa.

Labeling the big map of Africa involves several steps, all of which Will did independently:

First, she cut all the labels out, a task that I spread out over a couple of days, since Willow doesn't enjoy cutting. At some point while she was doing that, I drew in the two countries, Eritrea and Djibouti, that our Megamaps map of Africa doesn't include. This was very easy, since both countries are inside the former border of Ethiopia.

Willow spread all the labels out, chose them one at a time, compared each one to the map master until she found its location--

--then used a glue stick to glue it to the proper country:

I had expected to spread this activity out over several days, but Willow enjoyed it, really focused on it, and finished it in two:

If you wanted to make this activity repeatable, you could laminate the labels, and use tiny bits of Velcro on the backs of the labels and on the countries. I finally decided to splurge on pin flags, however, so we'll (and yes, I do mean WE, since I don't know these countries, either!) be memorizing the countries with those, and I plan for our Africa map to become so vastly cluttered with other information that leaving space to re-label the countries numerous times simply isn't practical.

For these labels, which we can now print as many times as we'd like, I have other extension activities in mind:

• using them to practice alphabetical ordering
• using them as headers for individual country pages in a handmade Africa book
• if I print them quite small, I'm toying with the idea of gluing them to the backs of the pieces in our Montessori Africa puzzle
• if they're legible when printed VERY small, we can use them to practice labeling the pin flag map at times when getting out the pin flags would be impractical
• and, yes, probably we will eventually get to using them for copywork and to memorize the spellings of the countries