Snow & Ice

Pinewood Derby

Dudeboy raced Moby Dick yesterday at his pack's pinewood derby car competition. He did fairly well . . . he won one heat and finished 2nd in his other races. However, his overall average times kept him from advancing to the finals. Dudeboy said he had "a whale of a time!"

Columbus

For a short video Dudeboy helped put together about Columbus, go here. We weren't able to make a longer video, because that would cost moolah. Animoto.com is a pretty cool site, where one can make very professional videos of your own pictures. This was just a trial run.

Geo-Bee and Newspaper Picture

The local home school association participates in a geo-bee to send a representative to the state geo-bee (the winner of which goes on to the national geo-bee). This is for children from 4th through 8th grades. Alas, Dudeboy is too young for that. However, the home school group does have an unofficial geobee for the younger kids from K to 3rd grade. AND Dudeboy won the geobee! He was not sure he wanted to participate, but now he is glad he did. Also, Dudeboy was in the BG Daily News. There is an article about a Spanish program he participates in at the library. He is in one of the photos under the main one of the teacher.

We Are Devo . . .

Follow this link to see Dudeboy "Devolve" into Australopithecus afarensis, Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and Homo heidelbergensis.

A Visit to Stones River

Saturday we went to Murfreesboro, Tennessee for the 146th anniversary of the Battle of Stones River. It took place December 31, 1862- January 2, 1863. First we went to the visitor’s center where there were two reenactors in character talking about their points of view. One of them was a union officer and the other was a southern civilian.
Next we went to the “Slaughter Pen” where the union was positioned in “nature’s fort,” (natural formations of limestone) but it was hard for them to get out. There was a confederate soldier talking there and a union soldier. They had different points of view about what happened at the Slaughter Pen. Also the union reenactors were firing from their positions in the Slaughter Pen.
After the Slaughter Pen, we went to the Cotton Field where the confederates came out of the woods and faced union artillery in the distance. At this stop on the tour one confederate and one union reenactor were talking about that part of the battle. The confederates were driven back here by lots of artillery fire.
Then we went back to where we began, but it was changed. They signaled two union soldiers to come out of the woods. They did some demonstrations of the cannons and guns. After that we went to a monument erected soon after the battle--one of the first Civil War monuments--and I liked that the best. I liked the old, old stones and the weathered writing.
Dude Boy

Happy Sir Isaac Newton Day