Assumption Eco Park in Antipolo...

Today is a day when I'm struggling to feel like we have enough of a framework, and my patience with living carless and household goods-less is wearing thin. That means it's a perfect day to blog about our day trip to Assumption Eco Park in Antipolo! :) I am so thankful to bloggers who have shared their local finds with me, and this is a great one.

Dear "Aunt Sheryl" loaded us up and drove us an hour out of our neighborhood up into the hills on the edge of metro Manila. The Eco Park is on the grounds of a Catholic school. For 65 pesos per child and 85 per adult, we got a guided tour, including a look at the butterfly museum, the shell museum, animals, an organic garden, a butterfly house, and a tree house.

I oohed and ahhed over the shell and butterfly collections, and my inner homeschooling mom went a little overboard with enthusiasm. There are so many tropical shells and butterflies that none of us have ever seen in person. I really couldn't help myself. "Look at this one, boys! It's naturally that color! That one looks like green onions. Isn't that super cool?" Yes, totally obnoxious.

The animals were definitely close, and the cages were clean, but not large. This hawklike owl really gave us the staredown. He looked a wee bit more aggressive than North American owls. I'm glad I'm not a mouse.

Our tour guide, Minda, gave the boys a cup of cracked corn so the boys could feed the pigeons and doves in the bird cage. The cooing that filled the air all around us as they settled by the boys' feet was soothing.

Minda told us what many of the different plants were, and I was really surprised when she pointed out a cacao tree. Yes, that kind of cacao. She cut one open for us. It wasn't fully ripe, but we all chewed on the sweet, fruit covered seeds. It didn't taste at all like chocolate. She said that you roast the seeds to make chocolate.

One of the best parts of the Eco Park was this tree house! There was a wonderful breeze among the branches. I wanted to stay there all day.

The butterfly house had a caterpillar area as we were leaving. The boys got to hold this spiky looking caterpillar, and Minda told us that it would turn into a large black butterfly with huge royal blue spots on its wings that we'd seen flying around inside. Though it looks sharp, the spikes are actually soft.

There was more than one cage of local monkeys. We got a lot closer to them here than we'd ever be able to get to monkeys in the U.S. The boys sat and talked and sang to them as they ran and paced. If we looked them in the eyes, they'd open their mouths wide and snarl. The boys named one of them "Gaper." :) When it was their lunch time, we enjoyed watching them eat corn off the cob. :)

Time for lunch with my own monkeys! We were able to go get our packed picnic from the car and find our way back to the tree house.

We had this place practically to ourselves on a weekday morning, and after our tour, we could just wander around and spend more time by the exhibits.

I'm so thankful that our first nature exploration in Southeast Asia was a success.

CM co-op in the Philippines...

The internet is a beautiful thing. I found out about a Charlotte Mason style homeschooling co-op here in the Philippines through a CM Facebook page. :)

We ventured 40 minutes away to a local university campus using Uber and all the nerve I could muster. :) I packed a lunch and plenty of water and supplies to do paper cutting and nature drawing, etc.

There was no class for Ben's age, so I sat with him in a little cafe in the building, and I read him books and chatted a bit with a couple of homeschooling moms.

The co-op was mostly in English, but there were a few short portions in Tagalog. Seth and Evan were a little overwhelmed with the class attempts at narrating a folk tale in native language.

I had wanted to try and stay until the nature study time, but I think we were all overwhelmed and experiencing some culture shock, so it didn't happen. We ate our packed lunch, and Seth played Old Maid with some classmates. After that, I tried to hail an Uber.

Unfortunately we were far off the main road, and the cell signal was weak. Another homeschooling mom saw me walking around with my melting kids trying to find a signal, and she asked her husband to drive me to a local mall where I could get a better signal and pick up an Uber. Of course, the Uber request completed while we were on the way there. Gah!

I was really thankful for our good Samaritan who spoke Tagalog. He called the driver and worked it out, and he didn't leave us until he was sure the driver knew how to get us back to our barangay.

The driver called him my "kuya." Kuya means "brother" in Tagalog, and he wasn't wrong. I thanked my Christian brother before he left us, extremely grateful for the body of Christ all over the world.

We may try this class again when our car arrives, but I don't know that I've got the guts to do it again without one. The nature study time especially could be worth a longish drive, especially when it's not the hottest time of the year like it is now. :)

But how amazing is it that homeschoolers are using CM methods all over the world, y'all? Seth and Evan narrated and sang "Crown Him With Many Crowns" with Filipino kids, and the mom who rescued us made sure to compliment Seth on his narration skills before we hopped into her car. :)

My homeschooling life here is pretty surreal at times. :)

Ordinary days...

We have our routine around here, and it helps keep us all grounded and sane. We have school in the morning, then rest time/play time in the afternoon, snack, a little Netflix time, and then we're usually playing at the pool until Daddy gets home.

Seth has embraced his Kindle Fire (used for reading only), and I'm really grateful for the ability to download books for him from our library back at home in the U.S. (Thankful for wonderful librarians who helped me figure all that out before we left.) He found instructions for making origami Star Wars characters today in one of his books, and he made a whole cast list of finger puppets.

I sneaked out with Ben yesterday for a little mommy/son date. We delivered get well soon cards to a friend who was down with a cold, and we borrowed her dog to walk. Ain't he cute? Well, ain't both of them cute? :)