Museum of Science and Industry

Today was a long, but super-fun day at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago.  With the weather not wanting to cooperate this Labor Day Weekend, we decided to do a little something special indoors.

On the way up this morning, we ran into a major rainstorm!  It was raining so hard, we were lucky to drive 40 mph!  So thankful that we moved through it, because it was a little scary!

When we got there, the kids were so excited!  There was so much to see and do!  This was the first place they wanted to go.  It was all about weather.

But, first, we had tickets to go to the Coal Mine.  Since they are all so crazy about Minecraft, that was the place they chose to go.  We bought them a general admission ticket and gave them the choice to pick one extra.  They could've chosen a movie on the Omnimax or a submarine, but they really wanted to go to the Coal Mine.  We got to ride on a mine car/train thing.  They thought that was cool.

We got to see lots of the equipment they use and then we ended up in a control room and got to see real coal.  They thought it was awesome!

Once we finished there, we went back to the weather section.  This was probably the coolest place in the whole museum!  Especially for my weather nerds. :-)  I mean, who wouldn't love to see a 40 foot vortex?

Madie tried out the balloons.  You fill them up with heated air and they rise.

Here they played with ripples in water.  There were pools above us and the light went through them and reflected on the floor.  They could make the ripples go fast or slow.

This was a really neat thing.  I don't even know how to describe it.  It was a touch screen and you could move the pictures around.  It would show the picture using different kinds of light - ultraviolet, regular, x-ray, etc...  The kids REALLY liked this one!

They all tried it out and moved all the pictures around, so they could see the differences in them in the different lighted boxes.

This was also in the weather area.  Not exactly sure why, but it was all about colored light.  Using different lights would change the color of your clothes.

They had these pods where you could move the panels to make a vortex of your own.  Livie never figured out how to do it, but Noah did. :-)

This was about friction.  Each circle was covered with a different surface on the bottom of it, so you would push a button that would push them with equal force and some would go far and some wouldn't, depending on the bottom of it.

Each of the kids got a chance to go INSIDE the vortex, which they were thrilled about!

Livie had to hold the string on a balloon to see how it would rise.

We checked out the farm area a couple times.  This part was right outside the food court and I knew I had to take a picture of that!

There was a whole section about DNA.  The thing I loved about this museum is that it had so many interactive things.  Lots of computers screens with different things to check out, lots of movies, games, etc...  Noah was checking out one on Down Syndrome here.

In the DNA section they had a chick hatchery.  It was so cool to see the chicks starting to hatch.

There were 3 baby chicks that had just hatched and 2-3 eggs that were moving around with small holes in them, where the chicks were trying to peck their way out.  The newly hatched chicks looked almost dead!  But, they were just really weak and trying to learn to get up and move around.  They would stand up and wobble around, then lay back down again and close their eyes.  It was almost like they were too tired to continue on at times. It was really neat and so sweet to watch.  The kids LOVED this!

There were several chicks whose feathers were all cleaned and puffed up and running around.  A couple of them kept coming over to Noah and Livie and checking them out.  :-)

Once we left the DNA section, we went to the Transportation wing.  We got to check out lots of trains and even climbed into a real 727!

They had a HUGE display, with the Chicago Skyline, that had trains running around it.  I told Pete his Uncle Bob would LOVE this part!

Isn't this train awesome?!

There was a toy-making section that had a rock-climbing wall.  Another favorite!  They love climbing rock walls!

There was another floor to the weather area, so we went up there and checked it out.  This dealt with air flow.  They could make the air come out of the tubes faster or slower, and put balls in the air to see how the air flow manipulated the balls.

And, who doesn't love a giant plasma ball?!

Or fire?!  We went to so many different parts of this museum and I definitely think the weather center was their absolute favorite of the day!

We checked out the old-time downtown area.  It was set up to have store fronts and a road like you would've found in 1910.  They even had a silent picture going, to which Noah said he wanted his 10 cents back, because it was B.O.R.I.N.G!  I told all the kids that their great-grandpa Drexler used to play piano at the silent movie theaters before he became a pastor and they thought that was cool, but not cool enough to stick around and actually watch the movie. ;-)  Noah did like these things though.  They had rings to hook the horses up to and he thought that was neat.

We went into a place about computers.  They each got to buy a necklace that they scanned and were able to make into an avatar of themselves.  They used the necklace to do all sorts of things in this area.  It was pretty cool!

This section was about the future.  Not sure why they had this mist stuff at the entrance to the place, but they thought it was fun, so that's all that matters, right?

They got to see tractors and farm stuff.  Livie decided to take a break inside the tire here. ;-)

And, we had to get a picture on one of the cows, right?

We ended at this special kids section where they got to play with all kinds of things, including water guns and lasers.   Even with these 35 pictures I've posted, you can't even get a real idea of all the great stuff we got to see!  We were there for over 6 hours and felt like we were running through it at times.  We didn't even see everything!  We were all really tired at the end, but had a really great time!  They're already trying to schedule a repeat visit soon. :-)  It was a fun way to start our 3-day weekend!

Open House

This has been a crazy busy week with home visits and Open Houses and more.  I scheduled our 2s Open House to be on Thursday from 5:30-6:30.  Little did I know that the MES Open House was the same day from 6:30-7:30 and my co-teacher, Katie?  Her girls' Open House was the same night too!  I was able to leave our 2s OH and rush over to catch the tail end of ours and meet all of their teachers, though I've met most of them already.

Livie has Mrs. Newberry, which was both Madie and Noah's kindergarten teacher.  Kinda fun that she'll now have all 3 of my kids!  Livie was so excited to show me her room.  You'll notice in the pictures how sweaty and ragged my kids are.  Our school has no air-conditioning and with the temps soaring into the 90s, it makes the school easily reach 100-110 degrees inside.  I feel so bad for them.  The neighboring school district actually cancelled all the schools in their town due to the heat problem.  These kids come out exhausted and soaking wet.  At least they're calling for cooler temps next week!

This is one of the pictures Livie's drew and had hanging up in her classroom.  It's a picture of her family. :-)

Another paper of hers that was hanging up.  You'll notice she's got this wide, open-mouthed smile in nearly every picture I took yesterday.  She just got her new retainer and she wanted to show it off. ;-)

We went up to Noah's classroom (I now have 3 kids on 3 different floors).  Here, he is showing me the Minecraft picture he made.  He told me to guess which of the pictures was his and I knew it HAD to be Minecraft!

Mrs. Heredia and I met before school started to talk about his diabetes, so she was another teacher I had already met.  But, it was nice seeing her again and she had her little 8 month old with her, so that was really fun too. :-)

Madie wanted to show me her new locker and while she was rummaging through it, I was able to talk to her homeroom teacher, who was really nice and knew one of the teachers that I work with.  Small world!

This is her homeroom, which is actually not a bad size.  Livie's room is pretty small, but this one was nice and open.  Noah's room is also really nice and open.

We finished the evening with this quick picture and talking to several friends.  Even ran into one of my former 3s that is now in one of the kindergarten pods.  It's always so much fun to run into former students.  Love seeing how much they've grown.  So, Madie, Noah, and Livie are back in school and well on their way!  I start up next Tuesday and am so excited to get started.  Glad that I got all the home visits and Open Houses out of the way, so we can just move on to getting the school year fully underway.  Today are cheerleading try-outs, so hopefully that's another thing we can look forward too.  Crossing our fingers she makes the team!  Lots of fun stuff happening around here. :-)

Catching Up...

All I'm doing lately with these posts is catching up!  Once again I am a couple days late in posting about the girls and I going to the Adagio Recital.  I have a feeling it's going to be like this for the next few months as my busyness increases and my down time is spent relaxing and watching "Duck Dynasty" with the family, instead of sitting and posting on the blog.  But, at least I'm still posting, right?

Saturday night we got tickets from a friend, so we could go to the Adagio recital.  Adagio is another local dance company.  They focus more on modern dance/hip hop/etc.., while our dance company focuses more on the classical dance.  It's fun to see our differences and watch them perform.  I think I've mentioned this before, but we actually know more people at that dance studio than we do our own.  Mostly because I have several former/current students involved there, since the studio's owner and instructor sends her kids to our school.  In fact, I'll have her and her son in our 2s class this year.  Fun!  It was a wonderful show and we didn't have to deal with any crazy people sitting in front of us like we did at ours.  Nothing better than a drama-free experience, so you can just sit back and enjoy the show. :-)

We were able to go backstage and see our friends and congratulate them on a job well done.  Miss Tess was fantastic and sassy, as always.  We always LOVE watching her perform!!  Tessa is actually Noah's age, but you can see how much taller she is than Madie (and me for that matter!).

Madie's friend, Sam, was also in it, so Madie took the time to tell her what a great job she did too!  They are in the same grade and were cheerleaders together last year.  She's also a Type 1, so we have something in common. :-)

As we were leaving, we ran into our friend Jenna and were able to congratulate her as well.  All the girls and boys did a wonderful job and we had the best time watching them!  Pete and Noah stayed home, obviously, since Noah's not a huge fan of watching dance routines.  They went on a long bike ride together and had a lot of fun daddy/son time.

In other news, Livie got her expander out today.  Hooray!  She has been anxiously awaiting this day.  She said she even dreamt last night that she ripped the expander out of her mouth and threw it across the room.  Guess she was REALLY ready to get rid of it!  Two of the things she missed most were apples and Doritos.  She wanted to go to Subway for lunch (since she was missing lunch at school), so she could get both of those things.  I mentioned on FB that I did a little something different with her hair today.  I put it up in 3 messy buns and she HATED it.  In fact, she cried all morning about it.  Thought it looked stupid and wanted to hide in her room for the rest of her life.  Pete told her if she got one compliment today, she wasn't allowed to complain about it ever again.  When I picked her up from school, I asked if she got one compliment and she said she did.  Her friend Julianna told her she looked like an alien and now, she loves it!  She wants me to do her hair like that every day.  I need to remember she's not like most girls.  Telling her she is beautiful and adorable is not the key to her heart.  Telling her she looks like a 3-eyeballed alien or a ferocious yeti or a blood-sucking vampire is much more complimentary to her and makes her enormously happy. :-)

First Day of School .... Three Days Later

I finally feel somewhat alive after battling a nasty cold these past few days, so I'm a little late posting pictures from the first day of school, but here they are!

My Livie is a 2nd grader now - the same grade that Noah was in when he was diagnosed with Diabetes.  Isn't that weird to think about?  She's definitely not my baby anymore.  She's growing up fast and was soooo excited to be back to school with her friends.

Perhaps, even more mind-blowing is that I now have a 7th grader on my hands.  How are my kids growing up so fast?  I'm still 27, right?  She wasn't crazy-excited to be back at school, but was glad to be back with her friends and get involved in different activities again.  She's now just one year away from 8th grade graduation!  WOWZA!

Noah is now a 5th grader and I'm starting to notice some growing up happening around here.  I think he's anxious to start puberty, which is always a big topic in our house with a 7th grader and now a 5th grader.  He's been eating everything in sight lately and is hoping to pass up his mom in height soon.  He's only an inch away!  He's never terribly excited about school.  He doesn't like sitting in a classroom, when he can be playing video games or riding his bike, but he does like being back with his friends, so he wasn't too upset about his summer coming to an end.

I've got three amazing kids that are growing up right before my eyes and excited and ready to tackle a new year at school.  Their school is a little different this year with the flood construction still ongoing.  They now walk outside to go to the cafeteria, while the cafeteria hallway is being worked on.  That proved to be interesting on Thursday when it was pouring down rain all day.  They got soaked, but thought it was hilarious, so this year is going to be an adventure in more ways than one, but they are always up for a good adventure. :-)

I'm watching the neighbor boys again, as well as another set of boys from down the street.  They only come 2-3 times a week though, while our neighbor boys come every day.  The kids were THRILLED to have them over again!  Even though we live right next to each other, it's just not the same as having them at our house every morning and afternoon.  They really are best buddies. :-)  So, I now, at times, have 7 kids running around this house of mine, so it's gotten a whole lot busier, but that's not even the busiest part!

Can you see what my calendar looks like JUST for next week?  There is hardly a space left to fill!  I found out on Thursday, that the job as the Asst. Teacher for the 3s was mine!  SOOO excited to be back with the 3s again!  I met the new lead teacher, who is a really sweet girl, right out of college.  Dad liked to remind me that I could basically be her mom.  Thanks, dad.  But, I'm really excited to work with her.  I think it's going to be a really fun year!  So, now I will be teaching/asst teaching on Tues and Thurs mornings, Thurs nights, and Fri mornings.  Next week we'll do all of our home visits with the students for our 3s class and have our Open House for the 2s as well.  I need to finish up getting my classroom set up and help get Carissa's room set-up, so we're ready for all the stuff coming up.   If you add in the babysitting, cheer practice/try-outs/ortho appts, and more, well it looks like my year is going to be filled quickly!  And, I wouldn't have it any other way.  Here's to the 2013-2014 school year!  Hoping and praying it's going to be a great one!