The Western Museum of Flight and Possibly a Few Other Mentions

I was tempted to write a post today about I began my day with the best of intentions. I woke up early to exercise a bit, showered, and began working methodically through the to-do list and the housework. It would seem that a mother high on productivity doesn't mesh well with a child who refuses to eat yogurt, because it doesn't look, taste, feel, or smell like Cheerios. Nor does the euphoria of "See house. Clean house. Conquer life" fit with a child who doesn't understand place value and proceeds to guess her five-year old mind through Math. Ugh... the furry!
But I will not mention all that in fear of making myself look a bit psychotic.
Instead I will write about a highlight from last week. For the first time ever, thanks to a friend who plans monthly field trips, we visited a very small museum about fifteen minutes from our house. It is the Western Museum of Flight. For a tiny little dot of museum it was a very pleasant field trip. I think the large benefit being the interaction of the older men passionate about airplanes who led our small groups through the small hangar.

Here Nathan tells the leader he has a Lego set just like that airplane.
Speaking of Legos... I was absolutely flummoxed this morning when I went into the previously cleaned-by-children-playroom and found it destroyed all over again! To play with the Legos and plastic animals the two rascally... I mean middle children took out the two bikes and the large basket of balls and the sand toys, so they could play on the floor of the closet. I mean, why not? Why not destroy the playroom floor so you can play the same game in the same way on the closet floor? Well, this is probably were I would have censored the post, because a mother screaming about messes is a very unattractive and pathetic phenomenon. Of course, it wasn't the playroom necessarily, but the playroom along with the school that was trying to get done along with the laundry along with the mess of the living room. But I wouldn't write about such an ugly happening on a public blog where people can judge. 

This was a fascinating plane to inspect as it showed the compartment where the airplane wheels folded into during flight and a compartment up top where the ammunition would have been loaded.
After texting, "Please pray for me. Not a good day." to the husband I packed up all our school books, all my pie-in-the-sky books about writing and Bible studies and blank paper full of possibilities, and our lunch and we escaped the house. As it turns out my bad attitude hopped aboard as we loaded in the van for a small gated playground nearby. I gave up on place-values and was instead horribly discouraged as I taught another one how to read. Oh yeah... but I was going to give the facade that I don't occasionally wonder why it is we homeschool. 

This little plane was a make-your-own plane that would take most people about ten years to build. We all found it fascinating and terrifying to think of people building their own planes.
At the park a friend from church showed up with their family. We chatted for a bit. The children, after giving their mother  quite a scare that they would never read or understand place-value or capitalize a person, place, or thing, got out all their energy on the play structures. After lunch I read one little bitty chapter from one of my books. But before leaving I watched a bright green tree bristle in the warm breeze. The brilliant green grass of the field next to us shone hopeful.

As you can see, Simon liked climbing in and out of planes.
We came home and I was ready to power through the house for a few minutes, do an hour of school, and reserve time to write. Well, that was before I remembered I had to put dinner in the crock-pot. What a mess the house was. And then, what sealed the deal for me... I had to bring a snack to our Bible study tomorrow morning. And that's along with the picnic lunches that need to be made.

All of the children in our group could have sat in this plane for hours. There were so many dials to read and buttons to push and levers to pull.
So it was at that time that I decided to celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day after all. This afternoon, while I folded laundry, David Attenborough taught my children Science as he narrated their favorite "Life" episodes.

Would you believe this man here was a pilot sixty-four years ago! I was shocked! He looked so young. He spent a good part of an hour standing on a ladder explaining the plane to all the visiting children.
Now that I have nourished my soul by writing I can clock back in and conquer the kitchen. Picnic lunches and cut fruit for tomorrow's snack will all have to wait. It's already five o'clock and my day is nearly gone.
I had hoped for productivity and instead I cursed myself with doing more harm than good. So what if the laundry is all clean? What a very irritated mother I was today. I know I was. I'm just glad you'll never know it.

The day ended with a picnic lunch (Ugh. Picnic lunches.) which we ate with our group near the runway. We went home in time for nap and a good afternoon of school. The museum will go in our arsenal of "ways to spend a morning".
Tomorrow will not begin with exercise. Tomorrow will begin with me and a cup of decaf coffee and an open Bible study. It's not my talisman, of course, but a Kingdom-perspective that I will be looking for. Knowing human nature I will probably still get super frustrated at "hiccups" in school. Oh, that's right. I'm not doing school tomorrow! I have a study and then a field trip! I'm resting in God's sufficient grace while remembering the hero of Dr. King Jr. and looking forward to another adventure tomorrow. But now on to the kitchen and those darn picnic lunches.