Homeschool Zoo

 My baby can sit and my big girl can read!

My Heidi is content with her scissors and all is well with the universe.  What a happy homeschool moment.

To suppliment homeschool and socialize Alex a bit more, we decided to sign Alex up for a homeschool class at the Zoo!  She has had 2 of 4 classes thus far and seems to enjoy it.  She gets to run off with 20 other kids her age and do all sorts of stuff while Heidi enjoys my complete attention and gets full decision making authority.

  The first week Heidi decided she wanted to see the camel.  So off we went to explore for 2.5 hours until it was time to pick Alex up.  

Well, the sea lions are on the way to the camel and we got a bit distracted by the baby.  Heidi spent the next 30 minutes racing baby back and forth over and over and over.  She laughed and laughed and ran and the sealion just kept chasing and racing her.

   Next was the camel who was interested in eating leaves.  Heidi thought that was fantastic and wanted to feed it the leaves.  Then we got yelled at.

  We were allowed to pet the Goats, and Heidi made sure we touched each and every one.

  Meercats, bat room and baobob tree for the next hour and then the statue and slide for a bit longer.  Then it was time to get Alex and grocery shop.

Today was class number 2.  I was in charge of our wanderings today and so we went the big animal route.  

We started off with the baby tiger.

Now that we are zoo experts (we've been 9 times in the last 12 weeks. totally getting our money's worth of that pass.) I've  started people watching.  Everyone gets really excited when the animals are active or close.  They crowd together, everyone taking mediocre pictures on their smart phones, and then running off to the next thing.  This pattern repeats with each animal.  But Heidi stays.  She sits and watches and waits.  I love walking the zoo with her because she is so content to stay and observe, and that is really fun.

She spends a lot of time locking gazes with wild animals.

My brave child, she will probably be a lion tamer someday.

I'm fairly sure Quinn is teething.  That or she suddenly REALLY hates me and has decided to scream ALL the time until I find her a new mother.

Heidi has recently become a wanderer.  She has no desire to keep me in her sights, nor do I think she cares if I can see her.  She is always saying "I don't care" and when I threaten her with stories of children getting stolen and us never seeing her again, she responds with some comment about the stranger being nice and letting her watch movies.  It makes outings rather stressful.  The stage before this one was "YOU ARE ALWAYS LEAVING ME", when I would get 5 feet ahead of her.  I think she has accepted things how they are and decided to spite me.  If you won't wait for me, then I will just run away.

We went to Target the other day.  Or as Heidi calls it "The circle store."  We saw this outfit and the girls BEGGED me to get it.

I have to say for a mom who refused to put my first baby girl in pink, I've come a long way.

Quinn can sit on her own and is great at those baby sit ups.  She can get anywhere by rolling and spinning so I think she may follow her sister's example's and just go straight to walking.  She loves to eat paper, any color or kind and no one can make her laugh quite like Alex and Heidi can.

Home school is fun.  We are learning I have been forced to be a better person.  It's hard work and I no longer have the luxury of wasting time or even really doing crafts anymore.  My "free time" is spent interacting with the baby, planning the next day's lessons, or if I really love Tyler- cooking and doing laundry.  Last week in history we learned about Japan.  I made candy sushi and we ate fish and rice over couch cushions on the floor.  It reminded me of my Mom doing the same thing for passover one year when I was a kid.  I thought it was the coolest thing ever.
     I'm hoping that the girls remember all the good times we are having.  As stressful and crazy as life seems to be right now, I love being with my girls and I'm so happy that I'm homeschooling.  We have adventures every week and are learning and growing all together.  It is so fun being a part of their learning process, and watching them teach each other.