Roadschool Trip to Canada

Until recently, the kids had never been out of the country.  While in upper Michigan, we decided to remedy the situation...discovering some historic sites along the way!  Join us to explore bushplanes, the War of 1812, and Canadian history!

ETA - Yes, we now realize that this isn't actually WEST Ontario.  Southern US public schools don't exactly emphasize Canadian geography....and I resemble that comment!  Who knew Ontario was so huge?!

With a day to kill and passports in hand, we headed up over the Mackinaw Bridge, an hour north of our hotel, and into Ontario, Canada.  It was the boys' first trip north of the border, but given how much we enjoyed our short time probably won't be the last......as long as we visit in summer.

You know him; you love him; you've learned more than you ever wanted to know about airplanes because of him!  Oh wait...maybe that's me.  😏  Our airplane kiddo was desperate to visit the Bush Pilot Museum....as this is his new career goal - bush pilot in Alaska...and so that was our first stop.  We spent several hours chatting with the folks who worked there, many of whom were past bush pilots themselves.  Where the museum is used to be an emergency outpost...

The inside is much larger than it looks!  There are hands-on exhibits, airplanes you can crawl up inside of to play, airplanes you can get inside of to 'fly' over the area, and a lot about fire safety.  (We learned that one of the things these bush pilots do is airplane firefighting.)  There are also exhibits about life in the bush camps, where they live when it's too far to get back to base in the same day.  

These airplanes are much larger inside than  you'd imagine!  We toured emergency planes, hospital planes, research planes, and good old passenger planes.  There are models of airports past and many hands-on STEM exhibits where you can fiddle with the mechanical drawings of several different planes.  One of his favorite planes was the old DC-3 passenger jet.  He loves the golden age of flight!

He also liked the large cargo jet, where he was able to get into the cockpit and actually 'fly.'  If you have children, or just airplane folks, this is an affordable and fun museum to visit in the northwest Ontario region!   

If you have a kid that's interested in flight, you might check out AV-STEM.  It's an online class that we've been doing for about a year, and is taught by an Alaskan bush pilot.  It comes with all of the equipment needed and will prepare you to get your pilot's license...and the customer service is fantastic.

As much as one loves airplanes, the other loves historic costumes.  Every museum we visit (that has uniforms) involves us stopping to take dozens of pictures of the minute details for future re-creation....  These War of 1812 uniforms were discovered inside the Ermatinger-Clergue Museum just across the street from the airplane museum.

Not only were there uniforms on display, but there were costumes to play dress up!!  I am totally the mom who will dress up and re-enact with her kids.  😊  We played here for a bit, watched a historic video (where the characters actually say 'Eh!'), and then headed to the second part of the museum.

One of the things we discovered in the house was this old map.  Not being from Canada, we'd never seen one like it before, and the boys love historic maps!  We'll be studying it further as we study Canadian history next year in our curriculum.  We also found snowshoes, furs, and other cold-weather gear that aren't often seen in the historic homes in our neck of the woods...  (pic above)

This house was built by Charles Ermatinger, of the NorthWest Company, and is the oldest surviving house in northwest Ontario.  It was constructed when the area was a fur trading post on the Upper Lakes, and became the center of the region's social and business life.  It also served as military headquarters briefly.  We enjoyed looking around at the inside, which is set up to represent family life in the 19th century, and wondered at the architecture of the home beside it, which was not open to the public.

With daylight rapidly fading, it was time to cross back into the US, meet up with dad in Sault Ste. Marie, pick up some fudge, and prepare to hit the road again!

War of 1812 & Canada Resources 

• The Star-Spangled Banner (Reading Rainbow)
• Jeremy's War
• Primary Source - Broadside
• The War of 1812 (Primary Source Readers)
• War of 1812 Map
• PBS Educator's Guide
• PBS Classroom
• National Parks (broken down by grade; elementary through high school)
• The Town that Fooled the British
• The Kids Book of Canada
• Canada for Kids : People, Places, Culture
• Kids Book of Canadian History

Love + Friendship

Today, I just want to take a moment to remember a good friend.  It's funny how life changes in the blink of an eye.  One moment, you have everything figured out.  The next, you're getting an earth-shattering, life-changing phone call...

In the midst of a difficult time, which led me to build walls and shut out the rest of the world, one person broke through. I should say, rather, that he charged through like a bull in a china shop, because honestly, he did nothing without fervor...

For years, we were inseparable. Even as we went to colleges on opposite coasts, the birth of this new thing called the internet (well, the coming-of-age of its widespread use, especially at college campuses) kept us in constant contact. For the first semester, we also stayed glued through telephone lines...but that was quickly shut down when the bills came in!

Both of us being very passionate, outspoken people, there was never a dull moment, that's for sure! I remember the first time he rang my doorbell, during a break from boarding school. Dressed in VERY torn up jeans, bike shorts, a t-shirt held up only by the neck, and sandals that were duck-taped to his feet...I was fairly certain that my mother was about to have a heart attack. Bless her heart...

His family traveled extensively, and I received airmail every summer from all over the world. Some of the most beautiful imagery I've ever seen written came in a letter from Japan, just after he had hiked a mountain near Kamikochi.

On September 20, 1998, I lost my best friend.  It was shattering.  My scholarship program made me attend mandatory grief counseling, at which point I was informed that I had experienced 22 losses in 5 years - including both the flooding & burning down of my dorm (separate incidences---hence our class song "Fire and Rain"), several deaths of friends, car accidents, and my parents' divorce....not necessarily in that order.  This last one was really the lynchpin.

But you know, I wouldn't trade the pain of losing best friend for the three years we had together.  If I tried to share only the best memories, I'd bore you to tears with an extremely long post.  So, I want to leave you with this :  cherish today.  Play with your kids.  Tell your loved ones that you love them...repeatedly.  And if you've lost someone, take a moment to relive a happy memory.  People are only gone if they're forgotten.

Roadschool Trip to Eau Claire

Ever been looking for one thing, but found another?  In Wisconsin, we stumbled upon this cool Paul Bunyan Museum!  Further down the street was the Children's Museum of Eau Claire.  All in all, a great (and inexpensive!) day in this city!

While the legend of Paul Bunyan is well-known, maybe you don't know that he was actually just around 6' 5" tall!  The other men were all my size, and that made him look like a giant...hence the folklore.   This museum has a nice balance of folklore, history, geography, and science.  It's a tiny little place, and you'd almost have to know it was there to be find it... 

The logging industry was the economic foundation of the North Woods for several decades.  Inside the museum, we learned how to distinguish different types of trees by their leaves and bark.  We had a chance to follow the logging steps, from felling trees all the way to running them through the saw-house.  Also, there were several games to play and you could even go "ice skating!" 

Inside the historical mock-up, we had a chance to see how the loggers lived.  It must have been cramped, dirty, and miserable during the long winters.  There were nine beds for thirty-six men, and the cook had to live in the corner of the kitchen!   Each of the outbuildings had an audio recording, autobiographic-style, talking about how that building was used.  The boys were particularly taken by the stables and blacksmith shop. 

What we discovered was that the museum we were looking for actually sat back-to-back with the Paul Bunyan Museum.  Go figure!  We had a picnic lunch and walked over to the Chippewa Valley Museum.  Most of the museum was closed for indoor construction, which was a bummer.  It would have been nice if they had told us that when we bought the tickets....however, it was still a nice, albeit short, glimpse into Wisconsin history. 

There was a lot of Little House in the Big Woods items, since the Ingalls family lived in this area during that book's time.  Back at the hotel later that evening, the boys decided to pretend they were in a logging camp.  We hiked the trails and made 'ruts' in the path.  We identified trees and decided which ones would be best for building, and which ones should end up in the wood chipper!

Paul Bunyan & Chippewa Valley Resources:

• Marven of the Great North Woods & FREE unit study
• Little House in the Big Woods & FREE unit study & FREE 3-D model project
• Tall Tales activities (free)
• Paul Bunyan (Step into Reading)
• Paul Bunyan (Classic Illustrated Junior)
• Paul Bunyan (Reading rainbow book)
• American Family of the 1980s Paper Dolls
• American Legends : 4 Disney movies  
• Life in a Logging Camp (free site with good photos)
• Wisconsin Logging History (free old-timey video)

For the afternoon, we visited the Children's Museum....another one of the ASTC Passport museums that grants you free membership.  Upstairs, they have several exhibits about Wisconsin history - featuring logging and fishing.

 

We found a camping exhibit where the boys had to follow the Cub Scout methods of building a fire and setting up tents.  Then it was downstairs, to the museum's basement, where there is a HUGE water exhibit.  It's so extensive that the children have to wear aprons in an attempt to keep them dry.  We spent most of our time at the water guns and ...some sort of engineering exhibit.  By turning various valves, you could direct water to the other exhibits and soak down unsuspecting visitors.  ..............you can imagine how much fun this one was!

The mid-floor is set up like a small town, where children can practice working in different jobs.  Here, my oldest is working as an electrician.  He had to rewire this 'house' to make the fan and lights work.  Thanks to his dad and grandpa, he did this rather quickly!

Off to the side is a fabulously gross exhibit on the digestive system.  It's so gross!!!  You go in through the mouth, pass through the digestive organs (complete with sound effects), and come out...the other end.  Naturally, we spent a lot of time here, as did many of the other elementary-aged children at the museum.

Not surprisingly, they now have a wonderful understanding of how the human digestive organs work together to create poop.....and that's all there is to say about that!