Our Year of Adventures on the Road!!!

I am SO sorry to all of you who have asked me to post sooner!! I know it has been MANY MONTHS since my last post, but I am just now finding the time to write a summary of our adventures being a full-time family on the road for a year! The past couple of months we have been busy settling into our new community and ministry. We have visited with lots of family & friends, celebrated birthdays (Alan turned the big 4-0!) and the boys are getting involved with our church, a local homeschool group, soccer, and library programs! One weird thing that happened - in February,  I ended up getting Bell's Palsy (temporary paralysis on the left side of my face). The symptoms lasted for about a month.  I am just relieved it was temporary and did not last longer than that!

Overall,  everything is going really well! The boys are making new friends as well as enjoying quality time with old ones.  Alan is loving his new ministry! We are so blessed to be serving at such an amazing church here in Texas. It is exciting to see God working through His people!

So- finally...here is the review I promised!!! Just to start, here are some fun facts and adventures by the numbers:

* We visited/traveled through 28 states and Ontario, Canada!

* We were on the road full-time in our RV for 13 months.

* We traveled a total of 12,270 miles in our RV and 22, 769 miles in our mini-van exploring the states we camped in. That's a total of 35,039 traveling miles!!!!

* We stayed in 57 different RV campgrounds/state parks.

* We visited an estimated 35-36 different churches.

* The boys participated in 13 different Junior Ranger Programs with the National Park Service.

* We ate ice cream in EVERY state and another country (Canada)!

* We visited with family, reconnected with old friends, and made lots of new ones!

* We enjoyed serving with the National Center for Biblical Parenting doing seminars all along the east coast.

* We saved all kinds of money during our travels when we joined 9+ grocery/convenience store clubs (that we can remember..ha!) and 5 camping memberships!

* The boys took turns buying a postcard from every museum/state capitol/national park we visited:

Our year on the road was full of amazing adventures, museums, parks, campfires, s'mores, miles, history, firsts, laughs, family time, nature, new friends, and memories of a lifetime.  We are forever grateful for this wonderful opportunity God gave us!  When I first started to narrow down the thousands of pictures from our adventures to post a slideshow on the blog, I still ended up with almost 500 photos!!!! I decided that was WAY too long! (I figure even our family would not want to sit around to watch a 35 minute slide show!)  I tried to get it down to around 300 or so, which was really hard for me to do. So...here is the 20 minute slide show :) ...for anyone who wants to see, click the link below to view our year of adventures:

****UPDATE**** We fixed the video so that everyone can see it now (It was password protected before, but now you can view it! Just click the link below:

Haigood Family RV Adventures!

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)

"Road School" Days - Fall 2013

In mid-September, we started homeschooling again after a short summer break.  This past year of "roadschooling" ...traveling from Florida to Maine and being able to experience so much U.S. History with our boys...it truly has been an amazing opportunity and blessing!

This year we have one FIFTH grader...wow...time flies!

one fourth grader...

one kindergartner...

(Caleb had fun learning to spell with Cheez-its!)

...and our youngest is in preschool!

For several years we have enjoyed using My Father's World curriculum.  It really has worked well with our four boys.  This year, we are studying Rome to the Reformation. On the first day of school I came out wearing a toga, and well...you can see in the photo below the boys had mixed reactions! Ha!

One rainy afternoon, the older boys made an arch with pudding and cereal boxes!

Some of you might be wondering...what is it like to homeschool four young boys in an RV?  (You can read my previous posts on "roadschooling" by visiting the right side of the blog under the "Labels" section and just click on the "Homeschooling/Field Trips" posts. ) There are some days that homeschooling in an RV can feel cramped and there is not enough room for everyone to use the table or spread out (OK-that is honestly EVERY day!).  So- on the days when we just need to spread out (or when I am about to pull all of my hair out!!)  we take a field trip and visit the local public library.  The only down side of traveling full-time is that we cannot check out books at the library because we are not local residents.  So- when we do visit a public library, we usually spend a few hours there while the boys read books during our visit. 

Most school days, the boys are divided into two groups. The older boys do school at the table while the younger two play in the back room in the RV or do some activity on the couch. Then, part of the time when I am teaching the younger two boys, the older boys go back to their beds to read.

Making clay tablets

Learning shapes and colors

Caleb's Creation Book

We often do some subjects, like science projects, together as a family. This fall, we have been studying the human body and one day we put together a human "cell" made with jello...

The fun part was putting the gummy worm, peas, beans and a grape in the gooey jello to make the different parts of a cell...

The past week we have been studying all about bones.  When I realized this lesson involved going to a butcher to get some raw animal bones, and then cutting them open...well...I decided this would be a GREAT science project for Alan to take over and teach the boys! (I get queasy at the thought of it! Just...eewwww!!!)

Sometimes we all do a craft together, which can be challenging with four different ages!

We have also made raisins from grapes...

This was a learning experience! The book made it sound like it would take just a few days in the sun for grapes to turn into raisins.  Our grapes must have been really big, because it took about 2 weeks for them to shrivel up!!!

Then, there are days when I surprise the boys with something crazy fun...like writing our spelling words in shaving cream!!!

Yes- many of our days homeschooling in an RV can be really challenging, cramped and CRAZY!! But- when I really stop and think about my life, I am truly grateful for this past year on the road as a family. Life has not been perfect, and there have been lots of opportunities for each of us (especially me) to learn & grow in the areas of patience, grace, and gratefulness!  During this season of Thanksgiving, I am thankful for my many blessings...family, friends, good health, a warm bed, electricity, running water, and the list goes on and on...

May you and yours have a very blessed Thanksgiving!

Jill and the boys:)

Creation Museum in Kentucky!

At the end of August, we stayed four days at the Thousand Trails Indian Lakes RV Campground in Indiana.  The campground was fairly close to the Creation Museum in Kentucky.  This was another place on our "list" of things to do in the U.S.  We have really enjoyed visiting all kinds of natural history museums, but most do not even consider the possibility of God creating the world and everything in it.  Many people think science and God are two separate issues. We believe that true science actually proves that God exists...He is a loving creator and He displays His majesty in the world and in the living things He has made...from the very beginning.  In fact, God is the creator of science!

On our way to the museum, we actually crossed the border from Indiana back into Ohio...

And then crossed the border again into Indiana...

crossing the Ohio River...

into Kentucky!!!  All of this in just 30 minutes of driving! Ha!

Admission into the Creation Museum is good for 2 consecutive days, so we took advantage of that and visited twice.  There is SO much to see and do here!  We LOVED our experience at the museum and we highly recommend coming for a visit if you are in the area.

First, we viewed a really neat film in the special effects theater, and then we toured the "Walk Through History" exhibits.  This area of the Creation Museum displays scientific and biblical answers for the world we live in today. 

We were really impressed with the interactive exhibits, complete with talking historical figures from the Bible.  

The boys enjoyed the huge ark display full of fun facts, history, and educational computer games...

We also attended one of the workshops available that featured evidence on how birds could not have evolved from dinosaurs.  We all enjoyed this "hands on" presentation...

If you visit the Creation Museum, be very careful!!! You might run into one of these...

Some of the boys were a little frightened...

NOT!!!   They are quite the actors, aren't they?!?!?

During our second day at the Creation Museum, we spent some time walking through the beautiful Botanical Gardens outside...

A little way down the path we found the petting zoo...complete with all kinds of fun animals...

Joshua was just a little pumped;)

The animals were very tame. We all enjoyed petting and feeding many of them!

Ever heard of a Zebroid??  We had never heard or seen one before our visit to the Creation Museum.  They are beautiful animals! The common names for Zebroids are "Zorse" and "Zedonk".  They are"inter specific hybrids" with a zebra for the father and either a horse or donkey for the mother.  The first zebroids were bred by the British in the early 1800s in Africa.  These animals were used primarily for farm work until machinery became more popular.

The sign on the fence by the Zebroids stated:

"Genesis chapter 7 states that Noah took only two representatives, a male and female, of each unclean 'kind' on the Ark.  All of our modern equids, and many now-extinct species in this family, are descendants of this single pair.  These Ark 'horses' would be a bit different in appearance from zebras, horses, and donkeys since they were the ancestors of all modern varieties.  God designed each animal kind with the ability to speciate (form new species) so that they could survive in various environments.  Modern-day equids display the results of genetic drift, pre-programmed genetic responses to the environment, natural selection, and artificial selection (domestic breeding) within their own created kind."

There was a cute little wallaby there too...

Micah tried to help lift Daddy up to feed the giraffe...

No- It wasn't real! Silly guys! Ha!

I decided to try to feed a few of the camels.  They were actually very tame and gentle.  Although, I was a little afraid that they might decide to spit on me! 

They were nice...and none of them spit on me:) From my expression in the photo below, it kind of looks like we were having a deep conversation...

"Oh...really?!"

Caleb tried to explain to the camels that all of our food was gone....

"See?!?! No more food! Sorry!"

For the last part of our visit at the Creation Museum, we attended a dinosaur workshop with Buddy Davis! We learned a lot and had fun creating our own dinosaurs with clay...

Buddy Davis is a speaker, author, singer/songwriter and dinosaur sculptor! He created many of the dinosaurs at the Creation Museum.  He also has several fun educational videos out including "Swamp Man" and "I Dig Dinosaurs".

Our last stop before we left...photos of the boys riding a dinosaur!

"Whoa...slow down!"

Hang on Micah!!!

On our way home, we stopped by Sonic for dinner. But- it wasn't just any ol' Sonic! It was a "dine in" Sonic!! We had never seen or been to a Sonic with a dining area! Free refills?! We are so there!!!

Can you find Alan in the picture?:)

Blessings to you and yours,

Jill and the boys:)