Mother's Day Mountain Biking Excursion

Mother's Day means that I get to pick what we do and where we eat. So even though Jack was voting for Wendy's for lunch, I opted to try The Daily Ration. The promise of pancakes was a good persuader and Jack was on board with forgoing Wendy's.

We were pleasantly surprised to get right in at the restaurant, and even though it took a little while to get our food, it was worth the wait. Though a photo at the restaurant with my boys was not going to happen (someone was hungry and needed a nap!).

After our fill of delicious food, we headed home to grab our bikes and hit the trails for a little family adventure. On the drive home, Isaac had a little cat nap and Daniel had time to take Jack to get me flowers and make me a sweet gift.

Once our bikes were loaded on the car, we made our way to Stringer's Ridge for some mountain bike action. We have been wanting to take Jack to try out the Pump Track there and if we felt like he was able, we thought we would try one of the shorter trails at this park.

I can't tell you how excited I am that Jack is ready to start getting on easier trails with us. Daniel introduced me to mountain biking about 10 years ago when we lived in Charlotte and I love it. It gets me out in nature, and there is a thrill element to flying through the woods while navigating sometimes difficult terrain. It is a ton of fun.

Being able to take our kids out with us is fantastic, and it was a great way to spend Mother's Day.

When we arrived at the Pump Track, Jack hopped on his bike and went straight to the biggest mound to ride over. He didn't make it up and ended up in the tall grass. Initially I thought he was going to be over the experience, but he got back on his bike and worked on the smaller mounds.

Before I knew it, he attacked the big mound again (following Daniel this time), and he made it! And then he rode down it like it was nothing! Proud mama moment for sure.

After we all did several laps, we made our way to the second track and tried it as well. The first track we did was kind of a figure eight, the second track was 3 loops (kind of like a snowman?). You can do variations of the loops and work on your banking skills, as well as riding over small repeating bumps and hills. It is really good skill development for being on an actual trail.

Unfortunately Isaac was not enjoying the Pump Track. We noticed that his head was bouncing around more than we prefer and we were in the sun, so it was hot. We told Jack to take a few more laps and then we loaded the bikes and drove around to the other parking area and trail access at Stringers. The trail access to Stringers from the Pump Track area is really steep and not great for little kids.

So we loaded up and made our way up the main trail to the Choo Choo trail. The Choo Choo trail is a short dirt path that loops Old Baldy. It was PERFECT for Jack. He had some small climbs, but it was manageable even though Jack's bike doesn't have gears.

As soon as we were on the trail, Jack shouted something like, "This is AWESOME! It is just like the pump track!" It was better for Isaac too because we could ride quickly and it was in the woods so it wasn't as hot.

We did four loops on the Choo Choo trail before we had to leave.

Jack had a lovely meltdown because he wanted to go back to the pump track and we were out of time. Other than the meltdown, it was a fun day with our family.

After our ride, Daniel dropped me off at Warehouse Row where I met a couple of girlfriends for dinner. We ended up eating at Tupelo Honey (after I got changed and cleaned up a bit). Three hours spent with other moms, visiting with no distractions, responsibilities, or bedtime duties, was a perfect way to end a lovely Mother's Day.

I am looking forward to more adventures with my little family. It feels so good to know that the kids are getting bigger, and more skilled and that bigger adventures are just around the corner for us!

Previous Mother's Days:
Paddling Lookout Creek (2016)
Biking South Chick Greenway (2015)
Time Spent with Family (2014)
First Mother's Day – we were supposed to hike, but got rained out (2012)

Visting my Little Brother

Mark, my little brother turned 30 last year. Which means I am old! He also bought his first house. Somehow, while I was busy with my own life and figuring out how to be a grown up, my brother was as well.

This has been a bit of a crazy year for us – Daniel's work schedule has been a bit nuts (improved since he left nuclear, but still busy), and Mark has been busy himself – renovating his new house, working full time and traveling the world with recent trips to both Europe and Australia.

Before he left for Australia, he asked if I had time to pop over to Nashville to hang out and see the improvements he had made to his house. Daniel was actually in Colorado for work, so I thought a road trip with the boys would be fun.

When we arrived in Nashville, Mark took us to get groceries and also to get the boys to pick out belated birthday presents for themselves. The kids loved this. Jack picked out a new kind of nerf gun (it shoots balls instead of darts) and Isaac got a truck with figures. They were in kid heaven.

We also went out for ice cream at Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream. It was amazing. More kid heaven :)

For dinner, my aunt and uncle and one of my cousins came over to visit. We had such a lovely time catching up. Mark is becoming quite the cook and it's nice to see him in his own element.

Jack loved sleeping in a little couch fort Mark created for him and the next morning Isaac helped Mark make breakfast. I hope my kids grow up remembering all of these sweet moments.

We said goodbye to Mark before lunch and headed to the airport to pick up Daniel. It worked out for one of Daniel's sisters, Emily, to meet up with us for lunch, so we were able to squeeze in a little extra family time before heading home.

Speaking of feeling old, Emily has grown up too... she was barely a teenager when we got married!

Books Read #11-16 ⎮ Arpil 2017

The month of April was another good month for reading, not only for myself but also our kids. We have been adding library visits as part of our monthly activities. Jack loves picking out new books for himself, some chapter books and a lot of picture books. We read every night at bed, but also during the day. Isaac is getting in on the reading action as well. He brings me picture books all day long to read. He insists on two at a time – one for him to hold while I read the other aloud, and then we switch.

The best book I read this month was Creative Schools: The Grassroots Revolution That's Transforming Education by Ken Robinson. I wrote more extensively about it in my recent blog post about our plans to homeschool. If you are interested in the directions of schools in our country (regardless of how your child is being educated), this book is worth reading.

I gave it a 5/5 on Goodreads.

One of my favorite blogs is We Are THAT Family by Kristen Welch. I enjoy her style of writing, her view of the world, how she's raises her children and shares her faith. Last month I finally had a chance to finish her book Rhinestone Jesus: Saying Yes to God When Sparkly, Safe Faith Is No Longer Enough. This book shares her personal story of how God can work through ordinary people to do amazing things. In her case, this meant opening Mercy House, a home for single mother's in Kenya. I think her story is an encouraging one, though I have to admit I like her writing style more on her blog than the book. But it is still a worthwhile read to see how God works through people today.

I gave it a 3/5 on Goodreads.

Our small group has been making it's way through the book Graced Filled Marriage: The Missing Piece, The Place to Start by Tim Kimmel over the course of the last several months. While this book has some good nuggets in it, it's not the best marriage book I have read. However, it did work as a good catalyst for discussion in our small group. But that probably has more to do with our group than the book.

I gave it a 3/5 on Goodreads.
 

Since we are on the brink of starting homeschool, I have been doing a lot of research on what I will be teaching this fall. Give Your Child the World: Raising Globally Minded Kids One Book at a Time by Jamie C. Martin is a book that kept showing up on my radar. Then Amazon had it on sale, so I went ahead and ordered it. It is written by the author/founder of SimpleHomeschool, a blog/resource for homeschoolers, and her book is a resource for bringing the world to your child. She writes about her multi-national family and how that has affected her life and the second half of the book is a source list, broken down by country, continent and age appropriateness. I look forward to diving into the books she listed and bringing the whole world into our home.

I didn't rate this on Goodreads since I have not actually been able to use it as a resource yet.

Another school-related book I picked up last month was Reading Magic: Why Reading Aloud to Our Children Will Change Their Lives Forever by Mem Fox. Mem is an Australian author and literacy expert who travels the world sharing her incite on how to teach children to not only read, but to love reading. This was an encouraging book to read. I naturally do a lot of the principles that she teaches and this book instills confidence that I am on the right path with my own children. The last chapter of Mem's book shares a list of books to read aloud to your children. This list is now top on my list of reading resources for our kindergarten homeschool experience this fall.

Passages that really spoke to me from Reading Magic:
Children who are read to early and regularly quickly acquire the skill of listening and the desire to hear stories. They understand the immense pleasure waiting for them in books and develop the ability to concentrate and relax.

The more expressively we read, the more fantastic the experience will be. The more fantastic the experience, the more our kids will love books...

Children who have been read aloud to regularly do expect to make sense from print. They know about rhyme and rhythm and repetition. They know how real stories work, which makes it easier for them to read real stories. They can predict that certain words, patterns and plots will occur, and they're proven right. *I have seen this first-hand with Jack. He naturally expects words to rhyme and can often guess what comes next. Rhyme, rhythm and repetition are huge for me and my own love of reading stories to him.


The more we know about life, the universe, and everything, the easier it is to read.

...we need to help beginning readers make rapid progress through a story so they're able to remember what they're reading. Then they'll relax and make more sense of the print...

The whole point of books is to allow us to experience troubled realities that are different from our own, to feel the appropriate emotions, to empathize, to make judgements, and to have our interest held. If we sanitize everything children read, how much more shocking and confusing will the real world be when they finally have to face it?

A phonics-only approach can never teach children to long to read.

If you are teaching a child to read, or just want to help your child along, this book is worth taking the time to read. At the very least, the biggest take-away is READ ALOUD, READ ALOUD, READ ALOUD.

I gave it a 5/5 on Goodreads.

I read the second book in The Guardians series, E. Aster Bunnymund and the Warrior Eggs at the Earth's Core by William Joyce aloud to Jack (and Isaac). Like Nicholas St. North, it is slightly above his age level, but he sits and listens to me read. He has enjoyed the pictures throughout and especially likes to hear about the fight scenes. We are moving on to the third book in the series now. I am enjoying it and I think we will re-read the entire series in a few years when he shows a bit more interest. 

I gave it a 5/5 on Goodreads.

Honorable Mention:
Jack continues to love the Flat Stanley series by Jeff Brown. This month we read Flat Stanley in Space. By reading a chapter or two each night, we were able to read this book twice before he it had to go back to the library.

My favorite picture book in the month of April was The Pirate Jamboree by Mark Teague. I read a ton of picture books to both my boys. I am ONLY including chapter books in these blog posts because these otherwise these posts would be incredibly long.