Our First Official Group Field Trip...

Last year we weren't exactly what you would call involved, but this year my goal was to get involved with other homeschoolers. I think we are doing a good job and having fun at it. This was our first official field trip. We went with our group to Traveler's Rest to their trade days to see how people used to make things. I'll be honest and say that we really kind of went around on our own so so much for the involvement! We had the absolute best time though, including me!

This is the beautiful old house we got to tour. Jackson is really interested in Andrew Jackson because they share a name. It was fun to see where he stayed when he came to visit.

They had several hands on crafts. I have always wanted to know how to make a corn husk doll. They actually fairly easy.
Jackson was even able to adapt his to be a boy!

We learned a lot about bees and were able to find the queen bee. Do you know how long they live?

There was a huge group of kids watching the musket demonstration. However, after the noisy discharge only boys were left :)

I was absolutely fascinated by the soapmaking.Ashton, not so much...

We got to write with feather quills. I was awful. The kids were pretty good.

They really enjoyed getting to help do the pottery wheel. I was just sad there were so many kids so I was unable to try :(

It was freezing, but it was awesome to do something with just my 2 big kids. It is so exciting for me who as a child begged to go to every historical house in 3 counties see my kids enjoy history as well. We honestly could've stayed hours more if we could feel our extremities! In fact, they were wishing their daddy could take off and take them back the next day because they knew he would've loved the gunsmith and arrow heads. This event is something we will definitely do again. We love field trips!

Twin Tot School #14...

Wesley and Will are 26 months old

I wasn't able to post last week, and I'm late this week. Let's just say we've had a lot going on!

Last week started off great with farm week. Monday I had a great setup. For the first time I was using my new trays and my new bookshelves together. All 9 were filled with farm themed activities with another couple of things on top. I was so proud!

The boys really enjoyed having so many options, and it really has helped with them not fighting over the same things. Although they still keep a close eye on what the other is into as Wesley is doing here:

One shelf had tons of farm books on it. If you haven't put books out as a tot tray you need to. I was so amazed at how much they read the books from their tray even though they were the same books they barely read when they were sitting on their bookshelf in the same room!

They were so cute on this day because they were loving chilling out in their little chairs:

Both boys are puzzle crazy now. They work puzzles all day long if I leave them out. They are so much better at puzzles than they were even a few weeks ago.

I got these great new puzzles that are matching numbers with items. The twins by no means know their numbers, so I set this up with only 3 pieces directly across from each other for them to match up.

It's wonderful to have a big sis to read to you:

This is how I planned this activity to go: we would say the colors of the balls and he would hit them:

This is how the activity actually went: he ditched the tower, he used the tray to roll the balls back in forth until one rolled off.

This is how I saved the learning: when the ball rolled off I would say, "Where is the red ball?" Then he had to tell me the color before I'd give him the ball :)

He thought it was hilarious:

Wesley's favorite part was wearing a cat mask Nana gave him and roaring at everyone until the got him:

That was the great Tot School morning they had. Then Will woke up with a fever. He had a really bad case of croup that landed us in the ER. While there he decided he didn't want the monitor on his toe. So, he removed his sock then tried to put it back on. Daddy pointed out it was a good Tot School activity so we snapped a picture on his phone:

Then the little stinker tried to put the monitor back on:

So, Tot School shut down last week as we recouped.

Last week was fall break and Daddy was on vacation. We took a trip to Huntsville to the Space and Rocket Center to culminate our space study. If you will remember that Wesley in particular is obsessed with space, you know he had the time of his life. If only I had a nickel for every time he said, "Look rocket!" "Look space!"

I love this picture because this is how he spent the day pointing his chubby little arm at all the rockets!

The boys (Daddy included) were sporting their new Superman shirts and were all adorable, even when pointing to more rockets!

They both got to ride their very own rocket! They had so much fun that we decided we should probably start a savings account since space camp is probably in their future! The best part was the entire way home Wesley spent pointing and telling us about every "rocket" he saw which were all actually cell phone towers and church steeples!

We had no official Tot School since Mommy was enjoying fall break as well, but we had lots of fun!
We rocked out:

They "helped" with laundry:

They found sister's dress up bin:

They had a little life school cleaning lessons:

They worked as a team- 1 with spray and 1 with towel:
And for Mommy's favorite:
So, there is our 2 week wrap up! Go over to Carissa's blog to see what others are doing!

Tot Tool...

Ever since I saw this on Carissa's blog I have wanted to make this tot tool. I decided to make it first for my nephew since he actually likes for me to give him homework!

The picture and circles were done on my word processing program. Then I used coke tops and covered them with circles I cut out with my scrapbooking supplies. I think it looks great except for my handwriting which I have never liked :)

I love this tool and can't wait to make it for the boys!

For My MOPS Friends...

I had the honor of talking to our local MOPS group about some activities they can do with their preschoolers today. It was a lot of fun, and they were a great group. I gave them a list of the blogs that I enjoy stalking, I mean checking, for new ideas. I thought I'd add links here to my favorite blogs for them and other people that have asked me.

I've talked often about how inspired I am by Carissa's blog especially with Tot School and linking up every week. She also started the Totally Tots website which has lots of great features.

I find most of my blogs from people who link up to Tot School each week. Some of my random ones I have on my favorites list are Spinner's End, Walking by the Way, No Time for Flashcards, Homeschool Creations, Letters Numbers and Books, The Activity Mom, and My Family My Forever. These are just some of the very creative mommies who really inspire me.

I also shared some Tot Books I made. There are also these other great sites with free printables: Childcare Land, File Folder Fun, and Christian Preschool Printables.

Here are the trays I had and here's some of my favorite toys.

Thanks again to the MOPS for letting me have show-and-tell today! I'd love for you to leave a comment and let me know you stopped by!

Twin Tot School #13...

Will and Wesley are 26 months old

We had an exciting week here at our house. We have been raising butterflies or "bugs" as the boys call them, and it was finally time to release them. You can see how excited they both were:
They carried their oranges around offering them to the butterflies but them would get scared if they got too close!

We also went on a field trip to our local nature center. While the big kids were in their class the boys and I had lots of fun. We did some bird and squirrel watching:
We played in the log house that was just their size:
When you have a playground all to yourself you have to run:I think Will's hair is so funny!There was also this really tempting mud hole which believe it or not they stayed out of it. That is until Will was knocked into it right as we were leaving!This was also our first time to have a theme in Tot School. This week was Farm Week.

I got this great idea from another blog (I can't remember which-so sorry!). I was going to turn a jug into a pig, but Jackson decided he wanted to. He did a really good job- see the pipe cleaner piggie tail! Then they fed the pig some yummy beans!
We also worked lots of farm puzzles including this difficult block one, but Will just wanted to play blocks!
This week also included the debut of many new Tot Tools. This came from an activity swap we did. The can lids have stickers on them. They have to clip the clothespins with the matching stickers on them.

This was really their first time to use clothespins, so Wesley was pretty proud of himself!

We also used the hammer to bang in the pieces of our foam puzzle. This was a BIG hit (pardon the pun)!

Another new activity was using the tongs to transfer pompoms into these great pumpkin ice cube trays.

These boys loved this activity!

We finally finished our Parmesan so we could use the container. This time we put beans in the holes since we had them out from feeding our piggies.

Then my favorite tool was color matching pipe cleaners to holes I punched in the top of Pringles cans and surrounded by hole reinforcers colored different colors.

Big Brother helped Wesley a little, but he was still one proud little fellow!

And my favorite photo of the week- a new use for tongs:

We really had a great week, and it was wonderful to watch how proud of themselves the boys were when they accomplished something!

To check out what others did this week head over to Carissa's blog!