Easter

Happy Easter!  We were so happy to have Jason's mom here with us for Easter.                                  The girls love their Monty!

Everyone woke up to see what the Easter Bunny had brought.  They don't wake up as early as they used to though, so it's usually me waiting on someone to wake up! But they did finally wake up and found the loot waiting for them.  There were candy-filled eggs hidden all over the house too.  What a nice Easter Bunny!

 
 
















Then everyone got dolled up for church.  I can't believe I found three cute affordable dresses in the right three sizes that all three girls liked!  It was an Easter miracle!

We actually didn't color hide eggs or any of the usual Easter stuff the rest of the day.  We went to the river to catch critters.  The girls caught crawfish, baby trout, water bugs, etc.  We even found some really interesting eggs of some sort. 

And the chickens are getting bigger.  And they love apples.  They are so ugly-cute!

A little after Easter we also went with out neighbors to a food packing event.  I love it when the girls get to do some hands-on helping for others.  There are lots of opportunities for adults to get hands-on or face-to-face, but not as many for kids.  So I love that we could pack meals for people in other countries and pray for the people who will received the food.  We also got to hear an awesome concert by the bank Willet from Westminter too.  They partner with Stop Hunger Now to do these events to raise awareness of areas of the world with chronic hunger and to support Willet's mission for evangelism and orphan care. 

USA Science and Engineering Festival

The weekend after we went to the USA Science and Engineering Festival in DC.  This is a totally free huge multi-day event that fills the entire convention center.  I will say that we only skimmed two of the five halls while we were there.  It was that huge!
Our first adventure was with the Lockheed Martin Mars landing exhibit.  The girls got to try to construct a "helmet shield" that would allow light in but keep heat out.  Then they got to see what the designs and models were for a future Mars lander and base.  And I noticed that the booths were "manned" by women.  Double cool.

We also happened to walk by when Karen Nyberg was giving a talk.  She was an astronaut on the International Space Station team.  It was so cool to hear her in person sharing some of her experiences and also advice for students wanting to pursue careers in space technology. 

There was a helicopter simulator that took the pilot on a flight over and around DC.  The girls each got to try out being the navigator and the pilot.

The winners of the various robotics competitions were there with their robots.  These girls had made and programmed Lego robots to complete tasks.  There were also larger robots made by high-schoolers that had to be able to shoot basketballs.  I think this got my girls really excited about a possible engineering project for the Fall!

We found the Animal Jam booth finally.  It was closed down already because we didn't find it until the fair was about to close down, but Animal Jam is pretty popular in our house so we had to get a picture.  We also found the Magic School Bus.  I think Lyla was protesting something at the moment, so no picture of her, but Gwyn and Celee obliged.  I think I need one of these in my yard.  ;)

These grad students from South Dakota were manning a booth about 3D printing and the girls got to make a charm with their initials on it our of "silver."  I thought it was a creative way to show the process to kids.

There was a Marvel exhibit about the science behind the super heroes. 

I'm not sure Celee and Lyla really understood what they were doing in this game - It was supposed to replicate electrons hitting a target and how to determine the position of the target based on the number of hits.  Yeah, it was more like skeet ball to them.  Well, it gives me ideas for the future!
We spent a good bit of time at an insect exhibit.  Celee is holding a hissing coackroach in her hands. That circle on the paper has two termites going Nascar around it.  Apparently the ink in Bic pens mimicks the pheromones that termites use to leave trails.  So they will go round and round for hours on that circle.  They also had tent catepillars and the girls got to test how tough the silk it that they spin.  They could not tear it!

My little zombies!

And my little boogers!

We had an awesome time!  I definitely want to go next year, and for more than one day.  It was worth it!

Girl Scouts

A few weeks ago, Gwyn and Celee got to go to Survivor Camp at Camp Whipporwhil in Annapolis.  We thought it was going to be about surviving, but it was actually supposed to be themed around the tv show Survivor.  I think I may have seen one episode of the first season way back when, and my girls have never seen it, so we were a little clueless as to some of the particulars.  The girls were sorted into "tribes" and sent off to make their base camps.  They were given certain tasks that they had to interpret and work together as a tribe to complete.  Then they got beads based on how well they did.

It was interesting (and frustrating at times) seeing how all these pre-teen girls did or did not read instructions or work together for some of the tasks.  The adults weren't allowed to help them, so I just got to walk around and watch for most of the weekend.

Campouts are almost always fun, even when things go awry.  I'm glad Gwyn and Celee had such a good time!

Later Gwyn and Celee both got to participate in a Rock climbing day.  This was cool because they got to climb as much as they wanted for two hours.  They are both very good at climbing walls!  Celee even got a little bored and ended up trying to climb with her eyes closed toward the end.

We all got to go to the Big Outdoor Event at Camp Ilchester in Ellicot City.  Because we registered early for the events each girl got a free geode.  They picked one out at a big table and then they got to crank a machine to crack the geode open.  I just think it's super cool to think that you're getting to see something that has been sealed up for 20 million years that's never been seen before.
The girls also got to do archery and cook smores.  Lyla and her friend didn't want to wait in line for archery because, "We can do that at home."  They did get excited about the owls.  There was a large barred owl and two little screech owls there.  The screech owls were so cute they didn't look real!

So it's been Girl Scouts, Girl Scouts, Girl Scouts.  I'm glad we get to do so many cool things and that they girls have some really great girls in their troops, but man things get busy in the Spring!  

Sproutwood Fairie Festival

Fairie Festival?  Yes!   The girls were super excited to go to the Sproutwood Fairie Festival.  We read about it in the local paper and they were dying to go!  It ended up that I was beginning to get what turned out to be a "flu-like virus" and started feeling bad the day of the festival, but at the last minute I decided that we couldn't miss it.  Put on your wings!  We all dressed up in our very fairy-est costumes and went for the adternoon.

Sproutwood is a really neat CSA farm just over the Pennsylvania border from us.  They have all kinds of educational programs and just fun programs and two big festivals each year.  There were three different stages with very interesting music.  There's lots of audience participation too!  Two ogres (I think) chased the girls for one song.  There was a green goblin-lady walking around with her pet insect.  The girls got to make fairie wands.  They had a fairie tea party with purple tea of some sort and lavender cookies.  

We also went on a magical journey into the fairie realm where people, and fairies I suppose, had built fairie houses to attract the fairies back each year.  I honestly don't know how much that the lady in charge was telling us was playing along or real to her.  And the girls came away convinced that fairies live near ourhouse because  we have lots of skunk cabbage and thorns, which apparently are signs of fairies.  The girls even built a fairie house and were told that the fairies would then recognize their scent on a fairie house if they built one on our property and will

trust it to be safe.

There were tons of things to do at the festival.  The girls wrote letters to the fairies at the fairie post.  And we got to view sunspots through the observatory telescope.  This place has a little of everything!

Including snakes.  And lizards.  And tortoises.  Which the girls got to pet and wear.  There was surprisingly little adult supervision with the reptiles.  

And who doesn't love a rope swing? Again with little to no supervision.  But like the reptiles, it seemed to be ok here.  Which was very surprising and nice.  

We stayed until the festival closed that evening and still the girls didn't want to leave.  It was an awesome location and an awesome festival.  I don't know how crowded it would be if we'd gone on Saturday instead of Friday, but the crowd was perfect!  Just enough people to see all the cool costumes and feel like the place was filled, but not so many that you had to wait in line for things or feel crowded.  

The girls already made me promise to take them next year and they're already planning their costumes.  I can't wait myself!