End of the Year Room

By the end of the Wild Wild West our school room walls had filled in.

American Indian Costumes

Photo taken Thanksgiving Day 2009

We love costumes! Alexander helped me choose the fabric, cut out, and sew both the boys' costume. They recently wore them to the museum for the Natiive American art exhibit, and they received quite a few compliments on them. (Unfortunately my camera was out of batteries and wouldn't even take one picture. Sigh.)

I posted these on my craft blog awhile ago, but I realized I had never posted it here. You can go there for more details and the pattern information.

Indian Family

We had a lot of fun making these. They make great toys, too.


Alexander poses with all the little people


Here's our painting "studio" set up


Don't you wish you were a member of this tribe?


Alexander painted: Lincoln, Peter, Owen, and Grandpa Rick, the chief.


I painted the Indian versions of our family (with the names we made up before): Fun Horse (Father/Daniel), Good Tree (Mother/me), Playing Teepee (Son 1/Alexander), Grunting Buffalo (Son 2/Lincoln). They don't look anything like us, but the kids' costumes are similar to the ones we're making for the real kids. Lincoln's costume actually has a shirt in real life, but I didn't want Fun Horse to be the only half naked one.

Teepee

10/6/09

Native American Names (and an update)

Yes, we're still back in the Wild, Wild West while everyone has moved on to a different theme. I just wanted to do things slow and thoroughly. I hate to miss out on any of this wonderful theme that Amanda, Sadie and I wrote together. Our time in the old west has been amazing. Besides, Alexander is still loving it. So is Lincoln! His favorite things right now are buffalo and horses.

So now we're delving into the American Indian component. We have several library books we've been reading, and we recently bought some costume "suede" and started sewing our Native American garb. Alexander helps me with the sewing. He's really good at taking the pins out of the fabric when I need him to. You'll see pictures of those costumes when we finish them.

Yesterday morning we made up some Indian names for each of us. I should say Alexander made them up, with a little guidance from me. I mostly just told him when his suggestions didn't seem to fit. He came up with the ideas on his own. Needless to say, we've been calling each other by these names ever since (at Alexander's--I mean Playing Teepee's--request).

Each of these names represent something about the person. Alexander loves to play. Then he needed an Indian word to make it sound Native American-ish. We built a mini teepee a few days ago with sticks from our backyard and muslin fabric. Alexander has been playing with it, putting a little Schleich Sioux chief in it like Omri does with Little Bear in The Indian in the Cupboard, which we've been reading. So that's why he chose "Teepee" for the second part of his name.

Lincoln's name makes me laugh. I don't know if the "Grunting" has additional meaning, or if Alexander chose that just because that's the sound bison make. The "Buffalo" part of the name is a no-brainer for Lincoln. Did I mention that he loves the beasts?

I'm glad I got the adjective "Good" in my name, though it doesn't compare to Dadda's "Fun." The "Tree" and "Horse" parts were just nature, outdoorsy things that Alexander picked (I didn't let him pick "Monkey" since there probably weren't many of those around in the old west). I'll post more pictures soon!

Golden Spike

What a fun excursion this was! The boys were enthusiastic and posed for pictures throughout. They each did an age-appropriate Junior Ranger program for this historical site, though Peter was the only one who got the badge.


The kids in front of the "One-One-Nine" train. The Jupiter was being cleaned or something that day. Isn't the scenery picturesque? We felt like we were in the middle of nowhere, but it sure was beautiful!


There isn't much track left, so you can see that Alexander really isn't in danger. The have the raised railroad plane (Amanda, is that what they called it?) throughout the area, still, even though there is hardly any track. You can drive, hike and bicycle on it. Wouldn't that be fun?The pamphlet said to bring spare tires, though, because occasionally some of the old nails surface. Cool, huh?


We dressed the boys up as train engineers as best we could. They got a few compliments on their outfits. I love the way Alexander hams up the photos. Yes, Lincoln was there, too. And Peter, the good big cousin is taking care of him.


Here's the 119 locomotive running! See the steam? That was way cool. This is what I remember from when we came here when I was ten. The other thing I remember is the postcard I got of the Golden Spike. It just so happened that Alexander picked the same postcard! We also bought some posters for our schoolroom wall. Waaaaaay cool.


This one was so cute, I couldn't resist. The boys are showing us the map of the two railroads and where they met.


And here's the Golden Spike! Actually, I don't remember if this is a replica or not. The boys are pretending to hammer it into the railroad.

The kids thought the museum was pretty small (I think the gift shop was bigger!), but honestly I don't know how much they would have gotten out of a bigger museum. It's not like they stay still enough for me to read anything, anyway. But they were pretty good for the historical video. Alexander even recognized a picture from the video that we saw in a book we read a week later.

So... Thanks, Amanda, for organizing this! It turned out to be really fun. (But the Junior Ranger packet was a little too long) The weather was beautiful and I think the kids learned a lot.

Rodeo!

We took the whole fam to the rodeo last Friday! I wanted to put up a video of Alexander learning to throw a lariat at the kids' corral before the official rodeo started, but the video was too large to upload. So... you can see more pictures (and some shorter videos) on our family blog.

Horses Horses Horses...

5/16/09
Daniel's cousins walked Alexander around on the pony at their house/ranch last week. They give horseback riding lessons and compete in vaulting, which I understand is gymnastics on a moving horse. We'd been talking about going over there all year, and we finally made it. I should have at least let Lincoln sit in the saddle for a picture, but I didn't think of it. Well, I guess we'll have to go back! Amanda, maybe we could take your kids, too, since you know the girls now.


Lincoln looks really interested in Alexander's helmet. He actually loved the horses, as you'll see in a few pictures.


Check out my boy riding a real horse! Well, a Shetland Pony.


Love the smile.


Lincoln's hand, right before it went into the horse's nostril.

Pledge of Allegiance Poster (Old West Style)

I want to put the Pledge of Allegiance in our schoolroom so we can recite it every day. But of course it has to be thematic, right? Of course, the cowboys and pioneers (and obviously the Native Americans) didn't recite the Pledge, as the first version wasn't even written until the 1890s (according to Wikipedia). So today I made an old western-looking poster with the modern wording and punctuation of the Pledge of Allegiance. For the design I sort of copied a picture of a real broadside poster advertising passage to California from a pioneer book we have. The flags in this poster have 13 stars, I think. That's not accurate for the mid-to late-1800s, but the clipart looked cool on the poster anyway. Let me know if you find any typos in it. I hope you guys like it! 

-Brittany

P.S. If you want to make it classic Karen Kindrick style then print it up on parchment. Did I even need to tell you that?

Independence Rock

Yesterday we read a children's story/picture book from the library about the Oregon Trail. At one point in the story the pioneer kids painted their names onto Independence Rock. So we decided on a whim to write our names on the (sad looking) Independence Rock on our wall. We interrupted our reading to do it (you gotta take the opportunity when it knocks!) then went back to the rest of the story afterwards. We put our names, the date, and our ages (although the pioneers probably didn't put their ages). It was a fun experience.


"I'm writing, but Alexander writing. And Alexander wants to write on the piece of paper but it's not a white piece of paper, it's a brown piece of paper. It's supposed to be Independence Rock. And pioneers wrote their names on that like Alexander and Mamma and Lincoln did on that. So you can see a picture of me doing that too. And pioneers liked to write their names on that too, because that's a special time to do it." -Alexander


Alexander was so obliging for the pictures!


Maybe we should have used a Sharpie so it would show up better.

We just got a whole bunch of great pioneer library books. I was thinking of doing a post about them. Amanda, I'll pass them on to you when we're done. Or you can come read them at our house!

Here are some Independence Rock photos I found in a Google Image search:

historytogo.utah.gov/.../photo_exhibit/13.html

http://myancestry.org/pictures/IndependenceRock.jpg

www.caspercomsci.com/pages/wyoming.htm

Antelope Island with the Heywoods

4/23/09
We just had to show Sadie Antelope Island when she was in town last month. We were sorry that the Amakasus couldn't come, too. Alexander is going to help me caption the photos again.


"Alexander is smiling and Levi is doing a different pose. He's just doing what he want to do, and Olivia is not smiling. And so... Alexander is by the gate... and... they're all by the gate. So... Alexander... will like to do lots of stuff. But if Alexander would like to play he would he would also play if he want to. So at Antelope Island we like to play on lots of play toys." -Alexander

"Alexander is not with Levi and Olivia. They are going to be in a different picture. And Alexander is just smiling there. And Alexander is doing so much fun at Antelope Island. Alexander smiling next to a wheel." -Alexander

"Mamma and Lincoln want to play on this horse. And he want to do lots of stuff on the horse. But Alexander is the coolest in the whole world. And if Alexander want to play he can. At this place. It's so fun. But Lincoln, he is having so much fun, but he's teeny tiny. He can't talk. He's just looking all over the place. That was he's doing. " -Alexander

Olivia making dandelion wishes

"Ewwwwww!" -Alexander

Buffalo chips

Sadie and Brittany

We Are the Bison

4/23/09
 
When were at Antelope Island last month we had some really good carside views of the bison. We kept our distance and stayed in the car, then passed out paper and pencils and sat for about 45 minutes while we all drew the huge, impressive animals. When we left Alexander complained that he still wanted to draw the buffalo. Sadie and I made up these words to the "We Are the Dinosaurs" song by Laurie Berkner. At first it was "bison" (to be correct), but Alexander makes us sing "buffalo" when we sing it at home. I guess the syllables fit better that way.

We are the buffalo (bison)
Grazing, grazing.
We are the buffalo,
We eat the green grass.

We are the buffalo
Stampeding, stampeding.
We are the buffalo,
We run in a mass.
We run in a mass.

Calico Ghost Town!

May 4, 2009
I extended our trip to California one day so Sadie, Ashley and I could take our kids to Calico. Sadie and Amanda had already been here a couple months ago. Even though we skipped over the Ghost Town section of our theme to come back to later, we still couldn't resist visiting this real old west town while the weather was still mild. Alexander is going to help me caption some these photos.




"Alexander is doing a cool pose and Levi is doing a bad pose. And Alexander is doing this because that means he is starting to fight the bad guy, Levi. Levi is pretending he is bad and that what happens in here." -Alexander


"Levi is driving the chuck wagon and Olivia and me is riding. But there's none horse! And Alexander is drinking a drink. And Levi is making a funny cowboy face." -Alexander


Olivia, Levi and Alexander getting ready to go into the silver mine.

"We like to be in here. The mine. And it's so cool to be in there. But there might be very end but we can't go out the very end but we go all the way down to the top of the part and it will be cool, cool, cool. This is where they dig for the silver. I thought that means to put the shovel and they put the dirt on it. Mom, how you look for gold?" -Alexander

We told the kids we would pan for gold, but by the time we were done in the mine the panning had closed. Still, the next day Alexander said his favorite part was when we looked for gold. Hmmm. 

Olivia the outlaw gets her feet put in handcuffs by Sherrif Levi

Lincoln and Alexander

Sadie and Levi are sad to be in jail

Sadie, me and Ashley. Levi took this picture for us during our snack break before we drove home.