Hey, we're back...

We had such a time at the unschooling conference. Ups and downs I am so glad to have been there. Here are some highlights-

-I got to hear the song Funky Town while watching many many people do DDR (dance dance revolution- something I admit to knowing absolutely nothing about prior to the conference, including what DDR stood for or that there was even such a thing in the world). This is fun because it is a song that is in my head on and off anyway and yet I so rarely hear it otherwise.

-The kids enjoyed making puzzles out of popsicle sticks and now we can make hundreds more because we have soooo many popsicle sticks and I always think, hmmm surely there is something to do with these. I use them as markers in the garden to show where I planted seeds and we have made sculptures and robots and...so now we have puzzles. Here's how- you tape several together and turn them over and paint or draw a picture of your choice. Remove tape (or keep it on for a popsicle picture instead as Eva chose to do) and shuffle. Et voila! A puzzle! And here is more. Or what about this.

-We learned to play Stratego. Samuel loooooved this game and made up his own version, inspired by both chess and Stratego, that night with cards. He taught Eva and I how to play. He said we did really well, for our first time. Grin.

-Samuel got to play chess. Eva got to dress up as a fairy princess.

-I have no pictures of the conference except of a wild bunny that lived near the hotel who we saw eating grass one night and we tried getting a picture from our hotel room and then wandered outside to get one close up. He (or she?) let us get very close and we tried various flash settings and yet our memories are still the best representation of that bunny night.

-We got to swim.

-There was a thunderstorm and it is a testament to how infrequently there are storms here that many people stopped everything to go watch the storm. It reminded me of how much I love thunderstorms and how much I miss that kind of weather. The rain here is very very mild compared to a thunderstorm. I think there have been less than a handful of these kinds of storms since we moved here 5 years ago. The air is still amazing!

-I got to see Scott Noelle talk again, which is a lot of fun and very inspiring.

-Got to talk with a lot of people and watch a lot of kids enjoy life and unschooling. It was very inspiring and exciting to see so many people in one place doing these things.

-The talent show was a lot of fun with everyone's spirits shining through what they chose to do. There were tumblers and dancers and singers and comedians and one woman did the hula and another sang a song about bald men. And of course someone sang....da da da da da da da.