Camp Meme Day 7, Final day

The last day of Camp Meme starts with waffles. Instead of cold cereal, we needed a good carb fill, so waffles it is.
These boys know how to eat and love waffles.

One of the things we went over and over for Camp Meme is the fact that people in colonial times couldn't get everything they wanted in the store, they had to make it. So I thought it would be good for the boys to learn about knitting. We made an appointment with Clare of Knit Unto Others to teach us how to knit. The boys took to it and loved the feel of the yarn. It was wool and was very soft. Clare showed us all kinds of yarn. They actually loved the feeling of yarn.

Wy caught on pretty quickly. If he had had more time he could have really done a lot. Mi thought the needles were great swords or missiles or karate kid num-chucks. He actually said after Clare asked him if he could do it on his own. "I think you can do it for me."

Clare showed us around the shop and showed us the ball maker. The yarn is around a kind of stretcher and you attach a string of yarn to this gadget and turn the handle and it makes a ball of yarn. It was so cool, and so low tech and yet worked in a matter of minutes. How ingenious.

Mi has to have a turn too.
During the day we called their mama and talked to her and after they hung up talking to her they were kind of blue, but then they bounced back like a pair of Mexican Jumping Beans. I am not kidding. They could have been flubber for all the hi-jinks they pulled after that. I guess they are excited about seeing their parents.

Obi took them to play at a park and let me rest. Thanks Obi, you are the best!

After supper Juju helps make a dirt cake for tomorrow's fun day.

When you have to make a dirt cake you get to throw in a lot of gummy things. Yummy

After reading the last chapter in Wilderness Journey the boys head for bed. Flan gets home, Mr Green gets well and because of Flan's good job of getting the powder to the 'French lick,' the Indians are staved off and he gets to see his 'mam' and the trader tells the family how Flan saved them all. After we finished reading and we were asking how they enjoyed the book, Wy said he liked it "...and I'm still jealous of Flan." That is a great testament for the love of books.

Camp Meme will be closing tomorrow at 10 am.

All campers will be dismissed at that time.

Camp Meme Day 3

When I was working as a substitute teacher in the High School I always loved the library that Paul Sivals runs. He always has had a great respect for books, (which are just being pushed out of librarys to make room for "media" items.) Most of the students I had that had to do some kind of report never looked in a book, but only used the Internet to get their information. I love that my grandsons love books. They love to read them and look at them and learn from them. Must be great parenting.

I noticed that Mr. Sivals had a great collection of large books of the battles of the Civil War. Even though we are studying the colonial time period I know Wy loves the info about that war. He knew so many of the battles and what happened. I was really impressed and impressed that he took the time to look at the books. Also, I wanted to take them to the High School to show them around where I had worked. They are so good and polite especially in the morning, that I knew they would enjoy seeing other places where there are great books. Of course having the library all to ourselves was just fantastic as we soon had a maze we had to run round in.

These boys are just amazing and so ready to help out.
Well almost ready to help out. At Wally World I saw a friend and we began to talk and this is what I saw when I looked back at them. Very patient, but still "please Meme, enough talking already! We have Mac & Cheese to make and we are hungry boys!"

As the water was boiling for the mac & cheese, the boys put the pictures from Day 2 into their notebooks. I had covered some writing tablets with wallpaper and each boy has a pack of colored pencils. They can use the notebooks to draw in or write in, but I like that they can use them as a scrapbook about Camp Meme. What I mean is they can glue (this we ran out of the first day because glue needs to be spread all over the back of your picture don't you know, so we opted to use tape instead) all the day before pictures into their books. I try to give each boy some of the same pics and some different pics so they have a variety of pictures in their notebooks.

Really this kind of scrapbooking is my kind of scrapbooking. Very down to earth, no frills or bells. Just pics and drawings.

At last the mac & cheese is done. Ain't it great!

Another game of baseball minus one.

For our craft, I suggested we make whistles out of clay.Because in the colonial days (are you tired of hearing me say this phrase yet?) they had to make everything for themselves. First we have to make the clay. This involves mixing, which involves machinery. See, this is what really attracts men to be chefs. They get to use power tools in the kitchen. Varoom, Varoom.

" The glob will take over the world!"

Rolling, rolling, rolling keep those pins a rolling.

" My whistle will be the greatest." It is now an official race to see who can get their whistle done fastest. (It is just genetics. the sooner you learn to deal with it the happier you will be.)

The whistles have to dry so tomorrow we will see if we have been successful in our musical instrument making.

Press play to see how boys turn jars of cream into butter. Like the song says, "Why didn't I think of that?" When you are a Meme you work smarter not harder.

We finally get our butter made and all this time I thought I would have to teach them how to make it, but lo and behold boys will be boys and churn their own way.

The mad scientist must find out why, why does water go down!

Obi's old cell still has some games on it. Kool! Boys are in free time as Meme toils over a hot stove of fried chicken, homemade biscuits, fresh gravy, & roasted corn on the cob. Oh and fresh sweet tea, yes sweet tea is a hit at Camp Meme

Swimming at OBU. The warm up pool was shallow enough to use as a small person private pool.

The noodles provide a lot of fun.

Meme is enjoying being in water and swimming and having fun with the grandsons, but we must go home to get ready for bed. The camp counselors are feeling like they have been camp counselors forever!

Back at the ole home stead, we must read two more chapters of Wilderness Journey to see what does Flan do in his perilous situation.

Vacation day 10

I am working on our Camp Meme for the boys. I love getting ready and making a plan which is always good when you have grand kids. We are emphasising the pioneer/colonial period of our country. I have a lot of places to go to already, but we have to have crafts and food that is reflective of that time. It has been hard to get ideas for the boys crafts. Not that they don't do crafts, they love them, but so many of the craft projects are in a girl vein. But, I have been able to translate some projects into modern day use. I don't think the pioneers had to think up crafts. Their whole life was a craft. Need a plow, make one. Need soap, make it. See what I mean? Still I needed more help. That is why I went to the library today. I love our Clark County Library. It is great. It is just what a local library should be. Up to date and down to earth. Isn't this building just the best? Linda, my favorite librarian, always has a great attitude and friendly way with the patrons. All I had to do was ask if the library had books on the colonial era for children and she got me 3 of the best books I have seen. I have been looking and looking for recipes from the colonial era and she found one that is wonderful. I can't wait for the boys and I to mix up the recipes in this book. It translates what the colonials made into friendly 21st century cooking.

Don't these floors look just wonderful? I love the way the Library is kept up. It has all the modern conveniences and yet retains its charm that makes it one of our family's favorite places. When our kids were young J4 would take them to the library. and now when the boys come to visit the first place the boys and J4 go is to the library. I think they have checked out every Wishbone video they have. I must give credit to Judy Golden the director of the Library for keeping it going and keeping it relevant and user friendly. WTG

As I was driving away from the Library I saw a logging truck come by. They always have to make big turns and it sometimes awkward for those trucks to turn the corner on such narrow streets. I was so glad to see them as our local paper mill has slowed down and people are concerned about losing jobs. One day I was with Jerusalem in Little Rock, and I commended that I hadn't seen any logging trucks go by and she just laughed and said there aren't any logging trucks in LR mom. Whoops! I forgot how provincial I had become.

After visiting the OBU library where I found some great books thanks to Alyse and Shirley at the front desk I headed over to the cafe to see if J4 was working and there he was. So I visited with him and had some time to read some of the books I just had checked out.

Since we will have the boys I am always looking for inexpensive ways to entertain them. We go to the local water park at least once while they are here but that can get spendy. Last year Judea worked at a local motel and we swam at their pool. I really loved that better because Miles could wear his swimmies while we all played together. It was small and had a shallow end with stairs that we could sit on or swim around. Wylie was jumping off the side and swimming like a fish. So tonight I went to the school's pool to check it out and see if it would be useful for us to swim in. I liked the pool. Very nice. We will see.