Quote from Forum Archives on December 31, 2003, 2:24 pm

Posted by: homenews <homenews@...>

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THE HOPE CHEST

with Virginia Knowles

Tidbit #22 on December 31, 2003

People, Places and Things

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The Hope Chest is a free e-mail newsletter with encouragement and practical teaching tips. The writer is Virginia Knowles, wife of Thad, mother of nine children, and author of Common Sense Excellence: Faith-Filled Home Education for Preschool to 5th Grade, and The Real Life Home School Mom.

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Dear Hope Chest friends,

I enjoyed our trip to Maryland over the holidays and I’d like to share some of it with you. I’ve included a whole bunch of educational ideas, mini resource reviews, web links and spiritual encouragement. At the very least, you may be entertained at what it takes to get a family of 11 to Grandma’s house nearly 900 miles away!

Tuesday, December 16

My plan for the day was to finish packing and then load the van -- a gargantuan effort when you have a family our size! Two major interruptions…

First, when Thad removed our van’s rear bench seat to make room for luggage, he discovered wet mold and an ants’ nest underneath the vinyl flooring! Ick! The mold would have given us major breathing problems on our trip, so he had to rip out a big section and install a carpet remnant.

Second, while all that was going on, Andrew (6) tripped in the kitchen and gashed his forehead open (again). Our EMT-to-be, Julia (14), who had been at a first aid class all day, was quite disappointed to have missed all the action of the sirens, fire truck, emergency workers, etc. Fortunately, the ER doctor deftly patched him up with six stitches, and said we could still go on our trip as planned.

Wednesday, December 17

My best packing idea, besides using a bazillion zip lock bags, was to wedge a plastic three drawer cabinet within reach of my front passenger seat. Baby Ben didn’t need leg room, so this was a great way to use the “dead space” behind the driver’s seat and give me easy access to small travel amusements, first aid & medicine, and Ben’s food.

I’m glad our first day on the road turned out to be rather uneventful, other than complaints such as, “She‘s putting her stinky feet on my seat!” We arrived at the Winngate Inn in Florence, South Carolina, around 9:30 at night. At last, a pair of hotel rooms with ample bed space! (Each room had 2 queen beds and a sleeper sofa.)

Thursday, December 18

After a sumptuous “continental” breakfast at the Winngate (make-your-own Belgian waffles, sausage croissants, and lots of other yummy stuff to put my weight back on), we were on the road again. The first major excitement of the day was finding a patch of snow in a Bob Evans parking lot when we stopped for a diaper change. You can laugh all you want, but most of my children had never even seen snow! Everyone jumped out of the van for a quick frolic and photo fest.

The Washington D.C. beltway presented our first taste of horrible traffic gridlock. Inching past the city, we caught our first glimpse of the Washington Monument and the Capitol building on the distant skyline. Micah (4) asked, “Where’s the Eiffel Tower?” We were all glad to arrive at my parents’ house in time for a lasagna dinner.

Friday, December 19

My sister Barb gave us the grand tour of her “new” house in Ellicott City. I got to meet Ginny the Guinea, who was named after me. (I was called Ginny Lynn until I got to kindergarten and found out what my “real” name was during roll call!) The other guinea pig, Betsy, was named after their Aunt Beth.

Thad and my mom took our older three girls and my niece and nephew to see the new Lord of the Rings movie. At her request, I had given Rachel (12) the book Finding God in the Lord of the Rings by Kurt Bruner and Jim Ware (Tyndale House, available from www.christianbook.com) for an early Christmas present, but she says she won’t read it until she has read the whole trilogy. We’ve had quite a few interesting family discussions about the themes, but I’m limited in that I’ve only seen the last part of the first movie, and haven’t read the books at all.

Meanwhile, Barb and I took the seven younger children to the historic district of Ellicott City to see the B & O train museum. Unfortunately, it took me a whole nerve-wracking hour to find an accessible parking space for our 15 passenger van in the tiny public parking lots! Just as I gave up hope and tried to exit the last lot, located several blocks from the museum, we finally found a space -- and it still took me several minutes to maneuver into it! We did enjoy the museum with its model train exhibits, and also a quaint toy shop on the way back up the hill to the van. Then we went back to Barb’s house to make Christmas cookies.

Saturday, December 20

In quiet moments, we watched colorful birds congregate at the many feeders outside the dining room window -- cardinals, morning doves, titmouses, sparrows, blue jays and woodpeckers. My mom keeps several bird watching books on the shelf; she helps home school my nieces and nephew, so her house is full of educational goodies! Later in the week we saw three deer crossing the front yard.

My older brother John arrived in the early afternoon with Dana. At dinner, John announced that Barb’s family will need a new guinea pig to name after a new aunt, as he and Dana will be married sometime in 2004. This is an extra blessing since John was widowed over ten years ago, and Dana is a very friendly and intelligent young lady. I spent the rest of the weekend teasing her about passing various domestic arts tests, such as making a pumpkin pie. Of course, I didn’t make up any of these tests until she had already aced them -- so she enjoyed a huge dose of approval! We also played our extended family’s favorite card game, Scotch Bridge.

Sunday, December 21

Some of us went to church at New Hope Lutheran in the morning, and then my Grandmother Driggs flew in from Denver. While my Dad tried to find a parking space at the airport, I went in to wait for an attendant to bring my 94 year old Grandma out in a wheelchair. As I watched two mothers wait for their daughters to return from college, my heart thumped at the reminder that my own girls will be leaving home in the next several years. Sigh…

Anyway, grandma’s second husband, Dr. Howard R. Driggs (36 years her senior) was an eminent frontier-born historian, NYU professor and author of countless books. My sister recently found a book called Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth and the Lasting Legend of the Pony Express, which listed one of Dr. Driggs’ books in the bibliography, so she bought it for Grandma for Christmas. (She took Mary with her on Tuesday morning to get the book autographed by author Christopher Corbett, a professor at nearby UMBC.)

We scheduled our big “Christmas dinner” for this day since we would all be together. John and Barbara gave our children great presents such as bead sets, Viewmasters, books, etc. Andrew received a set of K’Nex; it was so sweet to see him share these with Micah and Naomi as they built a butterfly, a helicopter and an ostrich together.

Monday, December 22

Thad and I took our oldest six children to Washington D.C. While he parked the van, the rest of us tromped rather quickly through the Smithsonian American History museum (http://americanhistory.si.edu/). Unfortunately, the hands-on exhibit rooms were closed for the holidays.

It’s a good thing Thad and I both have cell phones, because we had quite a time finding each other walking between the museum and the Capitol, where he parked. We finally met up in front of the National Archives, so we decided to visit the Big 3 “Charters of Freedom” -- The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. (http://www.archives.gov/)

After that came the main attraction, the National Gallery of Art.(http://www.nga.gov/) Lydia (9) loves anything French, so we majored on that. Rachel commandeered the digital camera to take pictures of everything either of us found particularly interesting -- I think we took over 200 on our whole trip! We saw the only da Vinci painting in the USA (“Ginevra de’ Benci”) as well masterpieces by Degas, Cezanne, Renoir, and so much more. Seeing Mary Cassatt’s painting “Little Girl in a Blue Armchair” (http://www.nga.gov/cgi-bin/pinfo?Object=61102+0+none) immediately reminded me of the picture book Suzette and the Puppy: A Story about Mary Cassatt, by Joan Sweeney, which describes the story behind the painting. In the gift shop, I bought a lotto/memory game (http://www.nga.gov/shop/children0030.htm) which has paintings from the National Gallery. The boys enjoy matching the cards to the game boards.

Our final event was walking around the Capitol building (http://www.senate.gov/vtour/), which was closed by the time we got to it.

Be sure to visit all of the web links in this section -- there are great virtual tours and loads of educational information! For example, the National Gallery of Art has a great kids page with activities at http://www.nga.gov/kids/kids.htm.

When we got back to the house, Barb and her ten year daughter were playing cello and viola Christmas duets. What a treat!

Tuesday, December 23

By far the big deal of the day: my mom took the five older girls and my nephew to Wisp for snow tubing (www.skiwisp.com/season/winter/snowtubing.html). It was a three and a half hour drive each way to western Maryland, but well worth it for the hours of fun they had zipping down the hills! This is definitely something we can NOT do in Florida!

Thad and I stayed at the house with Grandma Driggs and the younger children. I decided to give them another early Christmas present, the Veggie Tales video Larrry Boy and the Angry Eyebrows (available from www.christianbook.com). This is simple cartoon style, rather than the full Veggie Tales animation, but it’s still an excellent story! The moral: “If you hold onto your anger, your anger will hold on to you!” How true! There are so many opportunities to get tense, but in order to live a peaceful and pleasant life, I have to learn to F.A.C.E. my anger (Forgive fully & freely, Affirm with acceptance & affection, Communicate with courage & compassion, and Encourage & evaluate toward excellence.)

Wednesday, December 24

My mom has a grandparent pass to the National Aquarium in Baltimore (http://www.aqua.org/) and so we took the younger children, most of whom hadn’t gotten to go to many exciting places. My favorite tank was the one with the weedy sea dragons in the sea horse exhibit which closes on January 4. They are weird looking! I also enjoyed seeing some of the creatures featured in Finding Nemo.

In the evening, my mom’s friend Karen, who is a OR nurse, came to take out Andrew’s stitches. House calls live on! A few minutes later, some of the older girls went back to New Hope Lutheran for the Christmas Eve service, and got to see Karen playing the clarinet. She is multi-talented!

Thursday, December 25

The children opened their remaining presents -- some from Grandma, and books from me. One of the videos that the younger children received was Red Tide in the Kingdom Under the Sea series by Bridgestone Multi-Media (available from www.christianbook.com) Featuring the same style of animated fish and coral reef as Finding Nemo, it offers a great Christian message of redemption and forgiveness.

While I’m on the topic of videos, let me also recommend the Hide ‘Em in Your Heart videos by Steve Green (available from www.christianbook.com). I’ve really liked the corresponding audio cassettes for years, but I‘m super impressed with the videos, since they bring the Scripture memory songs to life with stories acted out by real life kids. I borrowed volume 1 from my sister, but now I know I’ll have to get my own.

I gave Joanna the book What Difference Does it Make? Faith Answers for Kids written by Debi Little Brazzale. It is based on Paul Little’s classics Know What You Believe and Know Why You Believe and published by Cook Communications (www.faithkids.com). Joanna’s interest in outreach was confirmed by the fact that she gave away a dozen of my Gospels of John during vacation and ordered a batch of her own free from the Pocket Testament League at www.readcarryshare.org.

Thad and I took a two mile walk through the woods overlooking a branch of the Little Patuxent River. It was beautiful scenery, great exercise, and a wonderful chance to talk. We should have done this every day we were there!

In the evening, most of us drove through the 1.4 mile Symphony of Lights display at Merriweather Post Pavilion in Columbia, which will be open through January 6.

Friday, December 26

Time to head home! Grandma sent us off after lunch with an ice chest of sandwiches and fruit for dinner, which saved trvavel time on congested I-95. I had an extra copy of the Jesus movie (produced by Campus Crusade for Christ, http://www.jesusfilm.org/) that I had planned to give away sometime during vacation, and as we pulled into a BP gas station for an unexpected potty stop, it seemed that the Holy Spirit said “Here!” I handed it to the gas station owner, who thanked me profusely as he explained that he’d tried to watch a movie about Jesus on TV the previous evening, but hadn’t been able to finish it. I’m praying that God will use it to minister to his heart.

As evening progressed, a gorgeous sliver of golden moon sank lower on the horizon, sparking an astronomy discussion between Mary and Thad and I. I think we came up with more questions than answers. Thad asked where we would get information about this if we were at home, and Mary and I were unanimous in our reply: “THE WEB!” The Internet sure has opened up a world of educational resources. More importantly, I had, by divine coincidence, just read aloud Psalm 8:3-4 “When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?” (English Standard Version).

Saturday, December 27

After another Winngate Inn breakfast, we embarked on our most tiring day on the road with congested holiday traffic, a teething baby, and children starting to get sick. I pulled out the last few items from my travel amusements arsenal. The hot item, much in demand by the younger children, was a Matching & Sequencing flip book by Learning Playground, which I got for $5 at Staples office supply. It is better for travel than flash cards since it’s bound, but it till has tactile/kinesthetic appeal.  Baby Ben finally stopped his fussing when I showed him the bright pictures in his new board book, My Busy, Busy Day by Kelly Kim.

After we finally arrived home around 7 at night, I dashed out -- all by myself! -- to the grocery store to replenish our fresh food supply.  By the time I sank into bed that night, I was pooped!

After Vacation

I’ve spent the last few days trying to get life back to “normal” -- whatever that is!  First I tackled laundry.  Yesterday I took Lydia to the doctor in the early morning (strep throat), Andrew to the doctor in mid-morning (sore throat, but probably not strep yet), and me for a thyroid ultrasound in the afternoon.

I totally agree with Thad that we need to revamp our schedule and lifestyle to be more efficient and effective. Always a new challenge in our home schooling adventure! But as a look back over the years, I’m still as excited as ever to be learning and growing with my own children at home.

In His Sovereign Grace,

Virginia Knowles

www.thehopechest.net