Activities

I have always said that I want Scout to not have too scheduled a life. Lots of free time to play and enjoy being a kid, thats what is important. She does go to more activities than we thought she would. But she LOVES them all. So now we think it is important to expose her to as much as we can and let her decide what she wants to participate in...whether it is many or few or none. We know she loves them. We always ask if she wants to go, if she says no we would stay home. It never happens. If there is a week off she has a sense that too much time has gone by and starts asking to go back. She still has lots of time everyday to be free as a lamb and always will...the beauty of unschooling.

Tonight was swimming. She has been going every week since she was 6 months old (we took the summer off but went swimming at the beach every week).

We just want her to have fun, to enjoy being in the water. She will learn all she needs in her own time.

And she has, she swims with a bubble, jumps off the side, goes underwater, blows bubbles and can climb out on her own.

It is great family time, we always try to be there together.

Tonight she floated. Look at that right foot, such effort and concentration.

She did it on her own. Floated. No one asked her to try it.

Life is Good... and happy!

A trip to the beach, a lesson in death

We had a great day at the beach and an opportunity to talk about death.

Scout said the day before she wanted to see the water. Already she is a Cape girl.

We loaded everyone in the truck and headed out. We are so lucky that one of our (yes, one. WE have 3 ocean and 3 pond beaches!) town beaches is Sandy Neck . It is 7 miles long, we can camp there, build fires, drive the jeep on and ride the horses. As you can see the dogs can enjoy it too.

We LOVE collecting treasures.

The landscape looks different every time. Today, lots of smooth stones and tumbled shells.

Finding crab shells

Walking Seamus

We believe death is part of life. It is something that should be talked about as easily as anything else in your life. There are photos of a dead dolphin coming up. If you don't want to see them stop looking now.

We came upon this dolphin on the beach. It was a great opportunity to talk about death. What you talk about is personal to you and your family and not important here. We talked about it. At the same time we talked about it's body parts and how it swam. It all seemed normal to Scout.

Living in the woods and on a farm we will continue to have these opportunities. We will continue to talk about it.

This one was about 75 yards away from the first. It was much smaller, maybe a baby.  We talked about bones and felt our own bones.

We learn something everyday, each night we marvel in all the learning opportunities that we encountered throughout the day. The life of an unschooler...Life is Good!

Battleship Cove

We had a GREAT family day yesterday at Battleship Cove in Fall River, MA. It is one of those places you never go because you live nearby. Zach has been wanting to go and Scout enjoyed the opportunity to climb, climb, climb.

View from the USS Massachusetts

Me and my awesome kids!

Dreaming

exploring

This was a great time of year to go because there was no one else there.

Lots of climbing up...

...and down.

Loving her big brother.

Everyone had fun!

I cherish these family days.

Check it out

All is well

We had a busy weekend. Before leaving for a day of skiing we made sure the animals were ready for the cold snap.

A big bowl of porridge for the chickens.

Extra hay for the horses.

Everyone pitches in.

Two new rescued roosters arrive.

Arriving at the ski lodge.

Hot dogging with Daddy.

We love spending time together outside.

Back at home all the animals did great with Zach and Sam taking care of them.

The new roosters were accepted into the flock.

Life is Good!