Willodeen Book Party

We celebrated the completion of our book, "Willodeen" with a Book Party out at the cabin.  We started by decorating our nature journals.  The kids really got into this and used stickers, washi tape, and personalized name labels to make their journal their own.

Jessica made beautiful signs for the Willows, the Food Court, and the a Welcome sign for the Faire.  We used the tree in the stair way to make a home for our hummingbears.

We had a yummy lunch of breaded peacock snails (chicken nuggets), Dibby Duck eggs (hard boiled eggs), Aspen sticks, dilly bugs, and slugs (Chex Mix), Duzuu's Blue Willow snacks (blue corn chips), red leaf beetles, sunberries, and sunferns (strawberries, blueberries, and mandarin oranges), Baby Screecher milk (Capri Sun), and Nedwit Poole's Hummingbear Pastries (jelly donuts).  

The highlight of the day was the walk through the woods, recording special things in our nature journals.  The kids did leaf rubbings and sketches to document the beautiful and interesting things they saw.

We loved the book, "Willodeen."  It had some wonderful lessons and was an engaging, sweet story that our whole family connected to.  It was so fun to celebrate the beautiful story with our friends at one of our favorite places!

 

Milwaukee Trip - Milwaukee Art Museum

After a couple of less than stellar breakfasts at our hotel, Eric decided we were going to get something delicious from The Golden Nest Pancake House right across the street.  I'm so glad we did.  Olivia got out-of-this-world red velvet pancakes, Nolan got amazing French toast, and Simon devoured his chocolate chip pancakes.  Eric and I each got delicious egg scrambles, which were a treat after cold processed egg patties at the hotel breakfast buffet.  After our yummy meal, we headed to our final destination: the Milwaukee Art Museum.  I really wanted to get the kids there as October will be Art month in school and one of the main projects is attending an art museum.

Per the suggestion of our curriculum, I purchased post cards of different pieces of art from the museum.  We then used those for a matching game, hunting down the different pieces and jotting down a few notes on the back of the card once we found the piece.  It really made it fun to try to find the matches.  Simon even enjoyed it and found several!  

The museum also had sketch books and art supplies to check out, as well as a kids' creation center, and lots of recommendations on how to make art accessible to kids.  I was so impressed!  Though our visit was short since we needed to get on the road, I am so glad we made time to stop by this amazing place.  Our October book, "Julieta and the Diamond Enigma" takes place in two famous art museums.  I am glad that now my kids will have some perspective on what an art museum can look like and feel like for when we start our book.  

A cast of Rodin's bronze sculpture, "The Walking Man"

Nolan sketching, "St. Francis of Assisi in his Tomb" by Francisco de Zurbaran, created around 1630.  

A match! "Flowers in Terra Cotta" by Jan va Os, 1780

A BIG match!  "Sunny #4" by Alex Katz, 1971.

"Fragment 1 for Composition VII" by Wassily Kandinsky.

"Lake George in Autumn" by Georgia O'Keeffe, 1927

"Poppies" by Georgia O'Keeffe, 1950.

Another match!  "The Cock of the Liberation" by Pablo Picasso, 1944.

Nolan's favorite sculpture, "Dandelion," by Harry Bertoia, 1970.  

 

Milwaukee Trip - Domes and Wedding

On our third day, we needed a quicker activity for the morning, so we had enough time to get to the wedding that afternoon.  We decided to go to the Domes, another iconic Milwaukee place that neither of us had ever been to!  They had just released their new flower show and it was geared toward rainbows and reading.  It was bright and colorful and there were Little Free Libraries everywhere, along with adorable places to read.  I absolutely loved it in there.

The next stop was the Desert Dome.  There were so many unique plants, as well as a Bearded Dragon named Steve.  Nolan and Eric especially liked reading about each of the species.  I could have spent a lot more time in there too, but Simon demanded a quicker pace.

The Tropical Dome was really amazing and there were so many familiar spices, foods, and plants with super cool names.  It was fun to see all the different varieties.  The highlight was the koi pond with many super large, brightly colored fish to observe from the bridge.  We also learned the koi can live to be over 200 years old!  

The Domes also offered interactive children activities that were really fun for little kids.  We were so impressed with our visit and would definitely go back!

The afternoon was spent at Alyssa and Chad's wedding, which took place at Bret and Stacy's house.  We met up with Grandma and Grandpa and had fun celebrating.  Livi and Simon both really enjoyed the dance later in the evening - no one could keep up with Livi's awesome dance moves!!