Liquid Kaleidoscope

You will need: a tin or shallow dish, whole milk (could use half and half maybe), food coloring, toothpicks and a quarter size amount of dish soap (ie Dawn).

Step 1: pour milk in the dish and let it sit to get to room temp. (I let this sit out for about 3 hours) I guess you could microwave it too.
Step 2: When ready for the experiment, put several drops of food coloring in various places on the milk.
Step 3: take a toothpick and touch the end to the dish soap, then touch the milk with the soap, and voila...you should start to see the kaleidoscope movement, repeat the soap to milk part to see it move more! So very cool, it will actually move on its own after a while!

Why does this happen...because the oil in the soap moves the fat in the water based milk!  Enjoy!!

Sea, sun, starfish and sandollars...

...and kite flying and watermelon eating and sand castle building!  We made it to the beach this weekend when visiting my family!  So much fun!! I am thinking Olls and SC could be beach bums if we let them!  The kiddos are staying the rest of the week with the grandparents, thanks Mom and Dad for the many upcoming adventures you will have this week.  I have a workshop for school this week for a few days but Matt and I are excited to have a "staycation" here at home! It's so...very...quite...here!

VBS!!!

This past week, the kids and I went to VBS at church.  We all had a blast! The theme was Operation Overboard and Ollie and Sarah Claire both were in classes, so fun that they had pre-school classes even for 2 year olds.  I was the Exploration Discovery teacher, which meant that I did really cool science experiments with the elementary age kids and I led a few games and activities with the preschool kids.  Ollie loved all the songs and by the end of the week even SC was doing the motions.  Such a fun week of our summer! I am going to put up a few of the science experiments we did this week on the blog b/c they were so much fun!

Catching up...

 We've been loving being at home and enjoying summer around here!  Ollie and I worked on a science project one day last week involving baking soda and vinegar...Love the safety goggles!

 Sarah Claire is back into taking care of all her many baby dolls, she also has really enjoyed playing upstairs in her room and the playroom this summer sometimes even by herself...love that!

 My little cows dressed up for cow appreciation day...so cute! We went for breakfast to beat the crowd!

 MOOOOO!

 We had our neighbor friend Molly over the other day to play and did yet another Pinterest science project...made SLIME! Using the ingredients above, it was a big slimy hit!

 SC was a princess fairy this week...took the picture b/c she is sporting her brother's old shorts.  They are too cute and with her cute white girly shirt I figured, hey why not?  I've decided with much thought to try and consign the majority of their clothes this fall, a huge project to take on as we have a lot of clothes in the attic.  So I found these gems when sorting out the other day!

We headed to City Lake Park yesterday with a few friends from church.  We enjoyed the carousel, played mini golf and rode the train lots of times...but man was it HOT!  We've also been enjoying pool hopping with friends this week, since we decided against joining a pool this summer!  I love summertime!!!!

Day 29...reflections...

"Awe man...do we have to go home?!" -S.C.

Well, we did it.  We successfully traveled for 3 plus weeks in our Dodge Ram pick up, pulling a 19 foot camper, with a small amount of worldly belongings.  We made it back home a few days ago.  The whole getting home part was pretty tough, going 500-600 miles a day, a few 10 hour days in the car.  We pretty much drove, stopping only briefly, we did crash at hotels every night on the return journey which was nice.

Am I glad we did it...yes, of course.  We saw things we've (both Matt and I and the kids) never seen before.  We had fun like we've never had before.  We simply just enjoyed being together, something I know we take for granted when we are at home doing home things.  It was so nice to simplify for a while, live in a tiny space (I miss it) I love that it forced us to have to get along and hang out.  I hope we take with us from the trip the value of a camp fire, meeting new friends, the yumminess of grilled chicken, the beauty of a snow capped mountain and the peacefulness of just getting away and leaving the world as we know it behind.

Being back home I am looking forward to lunch dates, play dates, pool parties, pinterest projects, home organization and the like...but for a moment I reflect and am very grateful...and hopeful for the many adventures yet to come for our sweet little family.

Day 21...black and white

Last official day of the "vacation" part of the trip.  We will begin the 34 hours, 2,260 miles of driving to get back to Greensboro, tomorrow.  Today was a fun day, we dropped Matt off beside a river for a few hours this morning for one last go with the fly rod.  The kids and I saw the sights of Jackson, bought a cap gun (with allowance $), stood by one of the antler arches, just had a good time being together.  This afternoon Matt and I were able to slip away to see a movie and have dinner...alone! When you're in a city as swanky as Jackson Hole, they have a local babysitting service.  It was amazing...such a nice way to end a trip! 

Matt and I have been asking ourselves the past few days...what will we take away from this trip? We hope many good things.  We've learned that we surely can live with a lot less than we usually do and in much smaller quarters.  Our kids have learned to love each other in a new ways, we hope this love will continue to grow when we get back home.  Tonight I feel very thankful, thankful to have the opportunity to go on such a fabulous adventure with my family!  We (the Hannam crew) highly recommend a road tripping adventure!

We set out tomorrow bright and early...I've re-stocked all our dollar store items and I am prepared to once again sit in the back seat and our captain is ready to man the ship...bon voyage!

Day 20...Playing in the Creek

One of my favorite songs in college was a song called "Playing in the Creek"  today we hiked a little in the Tetons and the kids played in a creek, well more like a river that went right into a huge lake.  We saw a beaver and the last picture is of a moose, we were in the car, sorry not a good picture.  We had a picnic lunch by yet another creek, I did laundry and then had yummy tacos for dinner.

We've decided (after much discussion) that tomorrow will be our last day in Jackson Hole and we are going to round the corner and start our way back toward the East. 

Our trip in numbers...

While all the 3 other Hannam's are (mostly) asleep for naptime. I thought I would share some of our numbers with you.  You might not know this about me, but I am a numbers kind of girl, not so much a huge fan of math but I have always loved to count things.  So here goes...

# of days so far: 20
# of miles traveled: 3,812
# of gallons of milk we've drank: 7 (we drink a lot of milk)
# of diapers we've gone through: ?? 2 huge packs from Sams...had to buy more at the Kmart yesterday.  On the agenda when we get back...potty training...she's very close already but we didn't want to have to stop to potty as we drove.
# of baby wipe packs we've used: 4...baby wipes are so handy, we use them for everything around here, esp cleaning things up (had to buy more of those as well, underestimated their handiness.)
# of times we've done laundry: 3
# of boo-boos, cuts, bruises and splinters we've all accumulated: well over 20
# of books I've read: 2 (Mockingjay and read a great book on my Kindle "Broken Laces." It was a free download with the Amazon Prime. I've also gotten caught up on several magazines.
# of books we've read as a family: tons of picture books in the car and at bedtime, but 4 chapter books, read 3 Junie B Jones books and am currently reading out loud "Little House in the Big Woods" ( a spin off of Little House on the Prairie) Ollie loves it!
# of Targets we've been too: 0, have been to one Walmart and a Kmart, yesterday.
# of Chikfila's we've seen: 0 since we left West Virginia, sounds yummy right about now.
# of pools we've swam in: 6
# of oil changes we've had: 1 (Matt just went to take the truck right now)
# of snuggles and good times (don't worry there have been some frustrating parts as well): countless!!!!

Day 19...Grand Tetons!!

 Hello Grand Tetons! We made it to Jackson (not sure if it's called Jackson Hole by the locals or just tourist) today and it is beautiful! 

 We are staying at our 8th KOA campground, crazy!  This one is right on the Snake River.  Of course we had to go check it out when we arrived this afternoon.  Love this Carolina girl...she is a long way away from her Carolina roots!

 The kids quickly got in the freezing water and threw a plenty of rocks, having a blast! It's much hotter hear than in Yellowstone!

 We've seen these boats everywhere...so interesting, Matt wanted me to document them.

 Tonight we headed out to the Bar J chuckwagon supper and dinner show.  It was so much fun!! We went on a carriage ride, toured the gift shop and saw the sights before dinner.

 Ollie and Sarah Claire found a surprise in the outhouse...a fake cowboy.  Well Ollie wasn't sure if it was real or fake, so funny.

 I had to take a picture with the old cowboy.

These are the Bar J wranglers...we had a delicious BBQ dinner with applesauce, baked potatoes, baked beans, cornbread and spice cake.  You sat at long tables with other people and we sat across from the executive superintendent for all of Wyoming...pretty cool!  The music show was amazing, very, very fun and funny evening, will definitely be one of my favorite parts of the trip!  Tomorrow we'll set out to see the sights in the Grand Tetons.