[email protected]

I've had visiting kids since the tenth. My nephews and nieces, a boy,
Hunter 16, girl, Mylisa 15, girl, Lillie and boy, Evan 12, and a girl,
Emily 11.
So up went the tent, the pool, the trampoline and there seems to be
steady night and day activities.
One morning, and almost every day since, there were two extra kids here.
I'd never seen either one of them before, but they were calling me Tia
like my nieces and nephews do, and they seemed to know where everything
was. One was making a sandwich in my kitchen and when I said - do I know
you ?- he just laughed and headed out the back door. Who knows how many
people I'm really feeding?
I was watching one unknown boy jump on the trampoline, he was beautiful,
maybe 15 and so happy. As I was calculating whether my homeowners
insurance would pay for his broken head he said "watch this back flip..."
and to my horror I heard my own voice saying ok, as if that was just
fine. ( and it was )
Those trampolines have warnings about severe head injury, spinal injury,
death, but no kid ever reads that. Only the parents do and we should be
sensible like the kids and ignore it. I can't say enough about
trampolines. There should be one warning about peeing before you get on
though, never mind spinal injury.

We planned a three day camping trip starting with an eight mile hike to
Trask lakes. If any of you have been in this area the trail head starts
at the end of Rock Creek Lake. It's a beautiful hike and the kids, even
the little ones were great. At Trask lakes though, there was three feet
of drifted snow and no place to camp. You just don't know how
disappointing that is after an eight mile hike, but we started down again
hoping to find a good campsite somewhere along the trail. We ended up
coming home, and the older kids were in bed half the next day but the
little ones were out on the trampoline.
Deer Lodge has an event called Territorial Days every year, a kind of
historical celebration with a parade and a muscle car show, street
vendors and a street dance. They always hold the Prison Break Run, ( the
MT State prison is here ) and all the kids decided to enter the five K.
Everyone of them got a medal for their age group, first place or second
or third and I'm so amazed at how easy such things are for kids, just one
more thing to do on a Saturday morning, and by the way, we have these
medals...
We went bowling. No one bowls, but we still had fun. We went four
wheeling, or "quad running" as my nephew says. We went camping, for real
this time, at Kading campground, near the headwaters of The Little
Blackfoot river, where Lillie, the 12 year old perfected her fly fishing
skills and Emily learned how to tie wooly buggers. Dylan and I hiked the
trail to Blackfoot meadows, five miles and a little steep in some places.
He scampers across streams and up the rough places like a mountain goat.
That was a six hour hike but there was hot food waiting for us and a
campfire and all those fun kids.
Their parents arrived Thursday, and they've all gone off to do different
things and my house is so quiet these last two days. Cleaner, but quiet.
Dylan slept twelve hours Thursday night, I think just trying to catch
up. We'll have the older kids again tonight and tomorrow because my
husband's promised to take them out and let them drive his old truck.
This is a big deal, learning a shift and their destination is the
fireworks shop at Race Track where they sell the big, noisy, terrorist
type, explosives.
Everyone leaves on the fifth, and I don't know what we'll do around here
without them. Now I know why my homeschooling friend in Colorado has
seven children. There's a strange, soothing madness about a house and
yard full of kids.

Deb L

[email protected]

In a message dated 6/29/02 7:55:37 AM, ddzimlew@... writes:

<< Everyone leaves on the fifth, and I don't know what we'll do around here
without them. >>

WOW!
Sounds better than ANY summer camp!

And although it probably cost you a lot in groceries, fireworks and gasoline,
it sounds like you had a great time too.

Your kids will probably just be exhausted for a week after the others leave!

Sandra

Pam Hartley

----------
From: ddzimlew@...
To: [email protected]
Subject: [AlwaysLearning] Summer stuff
Date: Sat, Jun 29, 2002, 6:51 AM
One morning, and almost every day since, there were two extra kids here.
I'd never seen either one of them before, but they were calling me Tia
like my nieces and nephews do, and they seemed to know where everything
was. One was making a sandwich in my kitchen and when I said - do I know
you ?- he just laughed and headed out the back door.
----------


LOL! Now we get a glimpse, maybe, of how our children feel when their house
is invaded by strange guest adults. <g>

----------
Everyone leaves on the fifth, and I don't know what we'll do around here
without them. Now I know why my homeschooling friend in Colorado has
seven children. There's a strange, soothing madness about a house and
yard full of kids.
----------

Fantastic post, thanks for sharing it!

Pam

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

[email protected]

> And although it probably cost you a lot in groceries, fireworks and
> gasoline,
> it sounds like you had a great time too.
>
> Your kids will probably just be exhausted for a week after the
> others leave!

My husband said -
Do you think we can stick to the budget?
What budget?
The grocery budget we agreed on...
There was a budget??
I guess not.

It HAS been exhausting, but wildly fun and worth it, and we still have
4th of July festivities to look forward to.

Deb L

[email protected]

> LOL! Now we get a glimpse, maybe, of how our children feel when
> their house
> is invaded by strange guest adults. <g>

I did find out who those kids are. They are from the Tamarillo family
up the street and there are five of them. I figured that mother had
someone else's kids and didn't even know some of hers were missing. When
everything settles down I'll take her some fudge, because I'll bet she
could use it, and I won't say a word about the back flip, and I might
even be able to find my husbands missing shoes there.

Deb L

Sue

----- Original Message -----
From: ddzimlew@...
To: [email protected]
Sent: Saturday, June 29, 2002 11:51 PM
Subject: [AlwaysLearning] Summer stuff

Now this sounds like your family had the time of your lives - that is what I like about unschooling - the freedom to live.


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Sharon Rudd

Today is July 1 it is about 6:00pm and I just now
recieved the post below. I have no idea what it refers
to. My email has gone wonky!! It is the same with
other lists and personal posts, too. ????????
Sharon of the Swamp

--- SandraDodd@... wrote:
>
> In a message dated 6/29/02 7:55:37 AM,
> ddzimlew@... writes:
>
> << Everyone leaves on the fifth, and I don't know
> what we'll do around here
> without them. >>
>
> WOW!
> Sounds better than ANY summer camp!
>
> And although it probably cost you a lot in
> groceries, fireworks and gasoline,
> it sounds like you had a great time too.
>
> Your kids will probably just be exhausted for a week
> after the others leave!
>
> Sandra
>


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[email protected]

Sharon, I posted about kid visitors. That post was on Saturday, the
29th, I think.
My mail's ok, but someone on the MTunschoolers list is having trouble
with mail from all her yahoo lists. A yahoo snafu maybe.

Deb L

On Mon, 1 Jul 2002 15:20:43 -0700 (PDT) Sharon Rudd
<bearspawprint@...> writes:
> Today is July 1 it is about 6:00pm and I just now
> recieved the post below. I have no idea what it refers
> to. My email has gone wonky!! It is the same with
> other lists and personal posts, too. ????????
> Sharon of the Swamp