2015- 100th Day of School

It's exciting when we reach 100 days of school being accomplished.  Some years, I decide we should celebrate, and other years, we just do a small celebration to acknowledge their hard work.  This year we quickly made some plans with our friends and did a small little school day of fun learning.  They are slightly ahead of us in their year, but we all enjoyed the time together and the fun educational activities rather than the book work.  Here's a peek at what we did to celebrate the day!

First activity we named the Marsh Pick Building Game.  It was the Brothers against the Bovees.  Each family was given a bag with 100 mini marshmallows and 100 tooth picks.  They had 15 minutes to build the tallest building.  They were in separate rooms, so they couldn't see how the others were doing and they set out to building and being creative.  It was fun to see how they tried to figure out better stacking techniques and problem solve ways to make it sturdier.  They all did great!

I didn't take pictures of everything, but next they hit the gym for some P.E. class.  They had different activities with reps that equal 100 that burn 100 calories.  It was fun to watch them being active together.  We had to laugh at the thought of how we looked in public school as elementary children, trying to figure out jumping jacks and push ups.  What a sight that must have been as our small group of children sure made us chuckle.  

After the Burn 100 Calories, we gave them a sheet of things they had to do in 100 seconds.  We ended up just timing them for a minute.  The page was I Can ________  in 100 Seconds.  They did things like jumping jacks, sit ups, hop on one foot, write their name, and write 0-__.  

One of the best activites was having them write a paragraph or more on what they would like to accomplish by the time they are 100 years old.  We took pictures of our children, then Casie used an app to transform their faces into being 30 years older.  Some of them turned out pretty funny looking.  We had them do the writing part ahead of time, so during the party they all did oral presentations on what they wrote.  I sure enjoyed listening to all their hopes and goals for life.  

They also had some math pages to accomplish.  Rolling the dice til they reach 100 and coloring in numbered squares 0-100.  And also another color/number page that they had to work math problems to figure out which squares to color in.  I made this page up, so I wasn't surprised when it didn't turn out right.  Oh well, they got the math practice in.  :)  We also had a chalk board where they were to write 100 things they were grateful for.  And I had another art page for them to do, but we ran out of time.  During supper I hid 100 hershey kisses in the school room.  Each kiss had a number on the bottom, 1-100.  When supper was finished, they all got to go on a kiss hunt.  Once they thought they found them all, we sat down and as I called out a number, they said whether they had it.  It was a good exercise for the younger ones in identifying numbers and keeping up with the counting.

Then we planned to watch 101 Dalmatians, but we couldn't find the movie, so they just picked one and had some down time.  All in all, it was a good time/

Today, Monday, actually marks our 100th, so I decided we'd do something fun today as well.  They did all their regular school work, but then we added some extra counting fun.  The counting book that Reese's Pieces has is a lot of fun.  Benaiah especially had a blast with it since it was full of diggers and loaders of all kinds.

That's a wrap.  We have 80 more days.  Less til we go on our big vacation to Florida.  Now we sort through summer clothes to make sure everyone has stuff to pack.  Studying Oceanography this year for their theme study, so have lots of fun stuff planned while on vacation.  The count down for that now begins.  :)

Conleys and Swissies

We've been busily working at remodeling the bathroom upstairs, and with many errors and challenges, it was time to take a break.  Our friends, the Brothers, met a family, the Conleys, and we've visited with them a couple times before being invited to come visit their house.  We arrived on thursday evening and left Saturday morning.  Here are some pics of the fun we had.

 My children were excited that we were taking Friday off of school, but when we got there all the children went upstairs to their school room and started playing school.  Funny how it's more fun when it's their idea.

 I don't think they respected their teacher very much.  :)

 The whole bunch! 6 adults & 17 children (with 1 on the way)

Time for games!  There was a major competition of foosball, basketball, ping pong, and some racing game on the wii.  There were people playing as hard as they could all over the basement.  We had some good games going on between adults, children, and adults and children.  Everyone had fun!

 Clay is showing the brackets and explaining the rules.

He should have also said to have more fun than wanting to beat someone.  These two guys below always need that reminder, though they typically do have fun even when they are determined to beat the other.  :)

After the children went to bed, the adults stayed up later and played adult games or just talked.  Doesn't feel like we get that time often of just adults, so it was refreshing and enjoyable.  The laughter in itself was a good thing as there isn't much of that going on with the remodel project.  :)

Saturday morning we got up early, had breakfast then headed out to a special thing we planned for the children.  We are interested in Greater Swiss Mountain Dogs, and I found a weight pulling event for this breed just an hour away from the Conleys.  This was our first time to actually meet this kind of dog, and they proved to be the best breed for us.  Continueing our search for a puppy when we have saved enough money.  The children collectively have saved $250, so we are well on our way.

 We loved talking with other owners and meeting so many dogs!

 Saphira wasn't bothered one bit by their size. 

The pulling event was really fun to watch and though we didn't stay for the whole thing, we did read online which dogs pulled the most and how much.  It was fun for the children to read how their favorite dogs did.  

Sometimes you just need some time to get away for a short bit and enjoy fellowship and fun.  The best was when we left the dog pull and the children just beamed with thankfulness for bringing them there.  We love to give good things to them, and even love more when they are appreciative of it!  A successful surprise I'd say!