The Oriental Institute

When we were in Chicago, we went to the University of Chicago to tour the Oriental Institute.  It was a wonderful experience.  It was like a visual tour of all we studied in our history curriculum this year!  Our focus this year had been Ancient history with an in depth look at the Old Testament. We studied how the Israelites and the prophets fit into the greater global picture with the Egyptians, Assyrians and Sumerians.

We accidentally went on graduation day, which made it a little crowded, but scored us free parking.  It was fun to see all the graduates in their caps and gowns.  And you know I am always looking for opportunities to glamorize and promote college life!

Some things at the museum were actual relics and some were replicas.  This is a replica of the Steele Code of Hamurabi. The actual one is in the Lourve.

Another supplementary thing we used a lot this year was the art videos available from Kahn Academy.  Here is the lesson on the Stele Code of Hammurabi.



How awsome is it to homeschool in 2012?

Here is Sargon.  Those guys really liked to put their head on the body of an animal!

Of course, mummies:

Our family with giant King Tutenkahmen.

This is my favorite picture!  LOVE it! It is an Assyrian Relief of a procession in the throne room, but look at those cute kids!

We later learned another significant thing about this museum.  About 40 years ago, when he was in seminary, Grandad used to drive buses downtown Chicago.  When he was on a break he would come to this museum to do research for a big paper he wrote!

Chicago Visit

What a fun visit we had with the Chicago cousins!  We absolutely packed this visit with activities. These are some lucky kids! It started off with swimming in Lake Michigan.

And a picnic lunch.

This is just a cute picture of the girls on campus at University of Chicago.  I will explain later why we were there!  It is never too early to start college visits...especially when your fourth graders are doing Algebra! (just kidding, no Doogie Housers here)

Whenever we visit we have to walk down to the pizza place for some of this delicious gelatto.

The last night we went to Navy Pier after dinner.  The kids ran in this fountain.

And rode the Ferris Wheel.

And stayed laaaaate for the fireworks.

They weren't too tired the next morning though.  They entertained us with their last "Cousins Concert."  Violin, Piano, Guitar and Drums. It was beautiful.  Stay tuned, we may be taking the act on the road.

And finally....gratuitous cuteness:

Lions and Tigers and Bears

Last October, when I was in Chicago with my sister, Ohio made national news.  Here is the story.




PD was back home pulling all-nighters dealing with this fiasco.  Little did we know that the legislation that resulted from this would be a huge project he would work on for the next nine months.  Finally last week everyone was able to come to agreement and a new bill was signed limiting and regulating the ownership of dangerous wild animals in Ohio.

I decided to take the girls downtown to see the bill become law.  At the last minute PD texted me that Jack Hanna would be there. We were so excited because PK1 is such an animal expert.

He told PK1 that she could come work for him in three years!  We thought that would be the best part of the day, but later, the governor called the girls up to help him sign the bill.

Proud dad watching.

Isn't that amazing?  They were on the news and in the paper as well.  I SO hope they are old enough to remember this.

One day, a few months ago the girls and I took PD's car to run some errands because he had parked me in.  PK1 started reading from a giant stack of papers she found in the back seat, "Lemurs, snow leaords, cape buffalos, komodo dragons, cheetahs, African wild dogs, cougars (also known as pumas)...."  We quickly realized it was daddy's working list of possible dangerous wild animals to be banned.  We lead weird lives.

Friday Funnies

A Blast from the Past

I think I mentioned that PD and I were cleaning out the basement.  We are going through EVERYTHING.  I had probably 10 boxes of stuff I had kept from when I was a kid.  Everything from a doll I loved to the most important papers I wrote in college.  I made myself get rid of 90% of it, but I took a few pictures of some pretty funny stuff.  Here are the tickets and pictures from the Amy Grant concert I went to in 5th grade.  I still remember that night and the pinstripe jeans I wore. It would have been about 1985.  It was "like totally awesome!"

My mom and sisters and I have a joke about these jean pocket cards my Nana would always send us.  For years, we all got the jean pocket card.  I always thought it was the exact same one, but now that I pull them out, I realize there are slight variations.

I lettered in high school in .....wait for it.....theater.  Just in case  you thought I was only a dork as an adult.  I was also on the Prom court, but only because a bunch of theater people nominated me.  I don't watch Glee, but I think it was kind of like that.

These will come in super handy some day.  

As will the birth certificate for my Cabbage Patch doll.  I also kept the doll.

This is kind of cool.  Rich Mullins was from my home town.  I went to a few youth conferences where he performed before he became famous.  I remember one time just a few of us were around a piano eating a sack lunch and he was just playing songs that he was working on.

When I was a kid we were visiting my grandparents in Florida.  We went to this really dumb show called Waltzing Waters.  For years after we would say, "Remember Waltzing Waters?"

9 and 7

I took advantage of some nice natural light when we were out to dinner one night and snapped a few pictures of my darling girls.  They could both use a hair cut, but I love all the different expressions that are so unique to each of them.

Memorial Day

We had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend with absolutely no obligations.  Three whole days with PD home to just have fun and chill out.  It turned out to be blazing hot, but we went ahead with a lot of our favorite activities.  We went to Creekside twice!

We waded and did the paddle boats.

We took the girls on a butterfly hike at the Metro Parks.  Here we got one on one attention from the naturalist because we were almost the only ones there...probably because of the heat.  She was really impressed with PK1's knowledge about birds.  She said we should sign her up for Junior Audubons, but we looked into it and you have to be 12.

We also slept in, ate at our favorite restaurants and hit the pool!  Great way to kick off the summer!