Week ONE consisted of rapid movement, dealing with hiccups, communicating, planning, driving, sightseeing, new relationships, and overall good learning experiences!
Our family motto for this one year adventure is EXPLORE ~ LEARN ~ SERVE. So far the easiest part is the EXPLORING. Who doesn’t enjoy seeing new sights and meeting new people? You’d think (and hope) the learning would just naturally come when one explores, and sometimes it does. However I’m finding it’s usually after we’ve been somewhere we ask ourselves what did we LEARN? You’d think it would be all little facts of history but usually it’s the relationships with the kind and friendly people we meet that we learn just how great people can be! Don’t worry the homeschool mom in me determines we do learn some history and fun facts and write them down. 🙂
SERVING has been a good one to keep in the back of our minds since it’s a tougher one to actively seek out – especially on “vacation”. (Yes it still just feels like we’re on vacation – one week – that’s a typical vacation, right?) We hope to soon be involved in a service project, but for now we just try to stay aware of the small things – picking up loose trash, sharing extra water with hikers out of water, and retrieving a run away basketball for a group of boys.
Our teen girls have been rock stars. They could easily be friend/homesick and constantly remind us they didn’t “sign up for this”. Instead they are positive and happy (most of the time), looking for the learning experience in even the most exasperating moments. Every moving day (which averages every other day) they are squeezing their personal belongings into their teeny tiny spaces, helping without reminder to put up the stabalizers, check proper hitch hook up, gather the chocks, and get situated for yet another 2-5 hour drive to the next destination.
