Sunburn! 7-2-11

I took the kids to the river yesterday after VBS and let them wade/swim for nearly three hours. Everyone got a little pink but for some reason Eldest Kidlet and I got rather more sun than the others. I suppose the fact that we're the two most likely to stay in doors may have something to do with it as the others were all a light toast color to start with while this is the first time I've had my swimsuit on in almost two years and the younger kids like to tease Eldest Kidlet that she must be a vampire since she avoids the sun so much.

I'm also going to count the trip as an hour of science since we did much observation and discussion among the playing. We observed and identified a female black swallowtail, the iridescent blue bands on the lower wings being the indication of gender. Watched tadpoles in a boggy area as well as competition for a burrow between two crawdads, the challenger being the winner and claiming the burrow from the defender. We also discussed how the bed of a river impacts the rate at which the water flows, as was demonstrated by various fast shallow or slow deep stretches we came across, and how a tsunami is formed at sea by the same general dynamic.

The change in the children is dramatic. Before if they had a question and I said, "Well let's go look it up" their reply was almost invariably,"No, that's okay." Now, they make absolutely certain I don't forget to look up the things we saw as soon as we get home. They're also pulling out the various informative books that they've gotten at book fairs and such but never gotten around to reading and going through them of their own free will. I'm so thrilled to see an excitement and hunger for learning that I have long enjoyed but feared my children would never know