100!!!

I set up a reward (or bribe, whichever floats your boat) for G a couple of months ago; when he showed me that he could count to 100 without help, we would go out for ice cream. He was excited about the idea at first, but as time went on, he seemed not to care about our little deal. I was even thinking about taking that deal off the table and trying to come up with something a little more enticing. Lo and behold, last night I caught him practicing his counting in bed when he should have been going to sleep. I knew he'd be able to count to 100 soon, and today he did it! He's so excited that all his practicing has paid off, and I'm so proud of him. :-) It's Baskin Robbins for dessert tonight, baby!

Speaking of The Magic School Bus...

I found a site where you can watch Magic School Bus episodes online. I think we'll be getting some use out of this!

Sunday Morning Creativity

Yesterday morning G (being the Magic School Bus fan that he is) watched an episode of the show about spiders. Next thing you know, he's asking for yarn and a pair of scissors so he can make his own web. He covered the couch in "web", then made a bug out of a pipe cleaner and acted out the way a spider catches its food complete with tiny, high-pitched screams for "help, help" from the bug who was caught in the web, and the sounds of the spider sucking its blood. It was hilarious...and a fun way to learn about spiders! And the best part is that he came up with this idea on his own. :-)

The Museum of Flight

Today we visited the Museum of Flight and it was amazing! I'm so glad we did a little background reading beforehand. It was exciting to see G's face light up when our tour guide mentioned that the Wright brothers came up with the idea of "wing warping", since he had seen that on a video we had watched during the week.

It was so amazing to see how quickly airplanes evolved. They went from gliders to actual jet airplanes within 45 years! I got lots of pictures of the different airplanes they had on display:

This is Leonardo da Vinci's glider design:

Here's the Wright Glider:

And here's the Wright Flyer. They made the engine themselves at their bicycle shop since nobody would do it for them because it wasn't worth the time to make just one engine. Engine makers didn't anticipate the flyer being a success. The engine is off-center on the flyer so they made one end of the wings 2 feet longer than the other end to compensate for the extra weight of the engine.

This is the first Boeing passenger plane. It had seating for 18 and was the first to have the co-pilot feature. It also came complete with flight attendants.

They also had a section on space where we saw a command module,

a replica of the lunar rover,

and a replica of the inside of the space station. Oh, and we also saw a real moon rock!

Next, we got to board the Concorde and a retired Air Force One!

Last, and this was Daddy's favorite, the Harrier Jet:

We had such an awesome day! We'll definitely have to visit the Museum of Flight again someday!

Seeing Double

Ok, how often does THIS happen...seriously! Today must be my lucky day!

Health Website for Kids

I just found this site that has doctor-approved articles, animations, games, and resources to help kids learn more about their bodies and staying healthy. It looks really cool! http://kidshealth.org/kid/ I can't wait to play with it more when we do our All About Me unit in a couple of weeks.

The Glorious Flight

This week we are reading The Glorious Flight for our FIAR book. We are also reading about the Wright Brothers, Charles Lindbergh, and Amelia Earhart. All this learning about famous people in the world of flight is leading up to our trip to the museum of flight this weekend. I think G is going to LOVE it!