Her little friend Mike

Leeli's been busy again. A friend had a birthday, and those smart fingers got to work.

Concord Museum (in the 3rd grade)

I went on a really great field trip.
All of my kids have taken this trip in third grade and come home raving about everything that is Concord-fantastic.
Recently my sixth and final child brought home the field trip permission slip for the Concord Museum.  I decided this might very well be my last opportunity to experience Concord in the third grade.
Let me report: The Concord Museum is a desirable destination. The staff there caters perfectly to third graders. And chaperone-moms. The trip was everything they said it would be, and MORE.

 If you don't live near Concord, Massachusetts, put it on your short list of places to explore. Besides the Old North Bridge (the shot heard 'round the world?), Louisa May Alcott's house (Little Women fans?) and a quaint New England town FULL of history that makes you want to wander in and out of little shops and have tea and crumpets, the Concord Museum is the crown jewel of this historic area.  I can't believe until now, I managed to miss this experience.

 I loved the hands-on parts of the day.  Each student was allowed to touch and explore colonial period artifacts, 

 try their hands at the art of apprenticing with a tinsmith, 

put together a model of a colonial town, 

sew a simple project 

and they helped cook an entire meal over an open fire in a working colonial kitchen. 

They even ate the food and washed the dishes.

 The experience left me so enthused about colonial life I was ready to move in and set up shop.

...AND...

I learned something NEW on my trip to Concord.

The very famous statue of the Minuteman 

(picture is of the museum replica)

was an early sculpture by Daniel Chester French.

The very same man who, later in life, 

sculpted the Lincoln Memorial.

sisters

I met my cute sister at the Boston Temple yesterday.

She brought two more cute sisters along.

One of them comes from a town where one of my very best BFF's lives.

  It's a pretty great day when the temple figures into the plan. 

It's even better when you make new friends and find out you have top notch people in common. 

raising cain in Virginia

We spent a day with cousin Logan in Charlottesville.

He's a lot of fun.

(He even tolerated some shopping)

We asked him where we should stop for lunch.

We like to try new things.

 He took us to his favorite spot.

 It's a good thing we almost had the place to ourselves.

 (I try to emphasize manners at meal time)

 We can't help it... we raise cain wherever we go.

road trip

do you wanna build a snowman?

Junior Basketball

 It's been another season for the record books. There will be many more years of basketball in our future.