We’re having Field Trip Week at Pacific Christian School.

See, Alan is out on Fall break, so the timing is perfect for maximum family fun.

First, let me tell you about Abalonetti! This place has an exciting local’s menu, food that every single one of my children like (as in yes, they have pizza), and delicious sea food.

I’m the kind of person that picks a favorite restaurant and then stops going to all other places. I have now picked my place. Every time I get to eat out in Monterey, this is where I will be.

But you didn’t come here to read about where to find the best calamari, so let me show you what else we’ve found.

We had the sweetest family evening. After eating at Abalonetti, we walked around the wharf gawking at seals and sea lions. John David was so delighted with it all. I didn’t think we’d get him home without a struggle. However, we managed to just stand around and soak it in long enough to satisfy even J.D.

It is a pet peeve of mine for people to call seals “sea lions,” and vice versa, so let’s review:

The plain brown ones with long flippers and ear flaps are sea lions.

The multi-colored (mostly gray) ones with short flippers and no ear flaps are harbor seals.

Now that we have that settled, I have so much more to show you!

JD was so cute about it. One seal popped up, and he pointed and said, “Mama”, then he pointed at the next one and said, “Daddy”, and then the next one, “Baby.”

Now onto our day at sea! This was a different day, and we left the two small boys with Nonna.

Monterey Bay is eaten up with humpback whales right now. I’ve never seen so many in one place. Everywhere we would turn around, there was another couple of whales either nearby or in the distance. We probably saw 20 different humpbacks.

We boarded in Monterey, but then we had to ride the boat 45 minutes (ish) to the water off Moss Landing, where all the whales are.

There was a mega-pod of long-beaked common dolphins out in force, and watching them made my day. I have never seen so many dolphins at one time, literally over 100.

Good-bye dear Pacific!! In the spring, Daniel will turn five, and we will be back out there for another ride.

The post A Day at Sea with the Dolphins and the Whales appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

A little while back, I got an email from Viktoria Altman, President of Brainy Kit. She asked if I’d be interested in receiving a complimentary kit of Montessori materials and lesson plans.

YES! Would I ever!!  I’ve only had two blogger offers that I was this excited about: Brainy Kit and Jamberry Nails. (Look for a Jamberry post soon.)

Now I know you’re wondering what in the world I’m talking about. Well, Montessori is a hands on method of preschool that I have always been intrigued by.

What the Brainy Kit does is bring those Montessori materials into the home. It makes this method more attainable for the average family, for those who may not be able to afford to send their child to a Montessori School.

I received Brainy Kit #1: the Polar Kit. We are LOVING it.

Each item in the kit has provided DAYS of fun, not just one lesson of fun.

Here’s what came in the kit:

1. A book of seven detailed lesson plans: Each lesson plan has tons of activity suggestions.

2. A Bag of miniature animal replicas, Eskimos, and an igloo

3. pretend snow

4. Amazing Arctic Animals book

5. a huge sheet of stickers

6. a glue stick

7. a pre-cut-out walrus craft

8. laminated animal cards

9. laminated Polar Animal learning chart

10. colorful Penguin puzzle

11. jigsaw puzzle

Daniel, JD, and Caleb have all enjoyed this penguin puzzle. I left it out on the coffee table after preschool time, and it saw lots of play time for days, and then JD hid all the pieces…..and well, I still haven’t found them all.

I would have never thought to stop and teach Daniel about the Poles. Poor third kid….but it was in the lesson plan, so I got out the globe and did some explaining. 🙂

Another idea behind the Brainy Kit is that it will help children transition from the home environment to the school environment.

Everything in the kit is so useful! This is a book we will keep in our library and reference for years. It’s a great read-aloud.

This was by far the most popular item in the kit: tiny animals and fake snow. JD joined Daniel for this one. He just couldn’t resist. The great thing about this activity is that it needs very little help from Mom. They played with this for an hour the first day, an hour the second day, and believe it or not, it took them 3 or 4 days before they finally destroyed all of the snow.

I was able to teach the big boys their grammar lessons while the littles played with this. As you can imagine, I was thrilled!!

It had a walrus, a killer whale,  a beluga whale, Eskimos, an igloo, a wolf, and a polar bear. JD carried that walrus around ALLLLLLL day.

Later on, I whipped out the old Polar Bear documentary, and all four boys watched it, while JD clutched his toy walrus.

The lesson suggested adding a little water or ice to the scene. The boys LOVED dragging ice cubes around in their snow. It made the fake snow a little fluffier too, just like the way real snow changes when it’s wet.

After a while, Daniel asked me, “Me have some juice, Mommy?”

I don’t remember what I said, but Daniel added, “Me thirsty from eating that snow.”

haaaaahahahaha  Well, of course, he ate it, really!

That was all just from last week. I haven’t even gotten to the walrus craft, the stickers, or the jigsaw puzzle yet!

I am giving this brainy kit a billion thumbs up. Huge hit here!

Anyone with a 2-6 year old child should definitely sign up for these kits!

The post Montessori at Home: Brainy Kit Review appeared first on Stories of Our Boys.

While my parents were here, we wanted to be sure that we all got the full California experience…..soooooo we went hunting for movie stars….

Ha!

No, that’s not us at all. We don’t even know who any of the current stars are, really.

Nah, we figured a more authentic California experience would be if we…….all got Marijuana prescription cards….NOOOOOO just KIDDING!!!  We took our guests WHALE watching, of course!!!

You didn’t really believe me, did you? I got that prescription idea from a conversation we overheard yesterday. We were at the library, and as we parked our car, I told Alan, “I don’t know about this space. There are an awful lot of youths (high school kids) hanging out back here..”

We laughed, locked our doors, and as we got out, we overheard one girl tell her friends, “So my mom is always going to the doctor because she hurt her f****ing neck, right? So I told her, ‘Mom, why don’t you let me have your marijuana card? I mean that’s money just f****ing sitting there.'”

Ah yes, young lady, aspiring to a life of selling drugs, noble idea….

The things you hear from back alleys.

THANKFULLY,  we really and truly did manage to go whale watching!!!

We called up the whale tour people. We thought we’d take my parents, and reserve a whole group of 8. We were a little disappointed to learn that actually, children must be at least 5 years of age to ride the boat. We had to split into two groups. Alan, Joshua, Caleb and I rode out on the morning tour. My parents boarded the afternoon tour. A wonderful time was had by all. Both go-rounds were hugely successful in finding humpback whales and tons of sea lions. Mom and Dad’s boat even found orcas!!!

Sorry, we only have humpback photos to share.

I highly recommend this activity. It was especially fun to watch Joshua and Caleb seeing it all for the first time. Alan and I had done this one time before, in Boston. We saw at least two humpbacks there. This tour was even more exciting, as we saw herds of sea lions swimming along with FOUR humpback whales.

Four!!!

We saw an additional one, way off in the distant literally jumping out of the water. It was a spy hop move, where they push their whole upper body straight out of the water, vertically! No, I didn’t get a photo of that either…..I was not on a roll with my camera. In fact, I finally gave up altogether and handed Alan the camera, so Alan took most of these pictures. I am not overly steady at sea.

These are in backwards order of our trip day, but rearranging this many photos is way too much work, so here we go. 🙂

I love Joshua’s outfit: Alabama sweatshirt, Boston hat, touring in California. That’s a military kid for ya.

“Where are you from?” they ask us.

“Um, uh, uh…” Such hard questions!!!

Yep, that’s our humpbacks.

Notice the blow hole spray.

All those little things you see in the water are the tops of a sea lion herd, out hunting for fish with the whales.

Caleb said, “Those whales sure do like to eat those sea lions.”

“No, no,” I reassured him, “Those whales only eat little fish.”  Blue whales only eat krill, but humpbacks are less picky. I think they are in town for the anchovy buffet.

I love how these sea lions LEAP out of the water. I’ve seen a this few times from the shore too.

There’s something extra fun about managing to get a tail picture!

Here’s a better sea lion herd photo. I just love these guys.

My FAVORITE of all these sea mammals is actually the sea otters. At one point and time, these guys were believed to be completely extinct, but thanks to the protection of countries around the world, they are staging a come back. We saw about twelve of these on our kayak trip today. They make their homes in the kelp. More on that in my next post!

Did I mention that sea otters are my favorite?

Things were so exciting this week with the grands here. I wish they could always be here!!!

Pssst! Don’t forget to “like” my Facebook Page: Stories of Our Boys.

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We visited Carmel by the Sea this week, and I am completely in awe at the state park we found there.

This stunning state park is called Point Lobos, and if you have been, then you know. If you have not been, allow me to introduce you to my favorite state or national park in the entire U.S of A.

Carmel by the Sea may be the ritziest area that I have ever visited. I’m used to walking through streets with shops named Gap, Starbucks, and Banana Republic. This beautiful little town was designer all the way. After passing stores such as Chanel and Oscar de la Renta, I wasn’t sure I should bother to step inside the souvenir t-shirt shop.

But somehow I managed to score myself a $15 Carmel fleece jacket:

Oh, and interesting Carmel fact:  Clint Eastwood served one term as their mayor!

My favorite thing about Carmel was not the designer shopping. Let’s face it. I love pretty clothes, but I buy most of my wardrobe at Target and the NX, BX, or PX….

(NX= Navy Exchange, BX= Base Exchange, PX = Post Exchange.  For you civilian types, those are just department stores on military posts. I find their clothes to be reasonably priced, for the most part.)

The BEST part of Carmel was Point Lobos State Park.

With its breathtaking views, seal nurseries, sea lions, sunning sea mammals of many kinds, sea otters, and Bird Island, it is by far the most incredible park of any kind that I have ever been to. This place is surreal.

This was one of the best days of my summer. We saw seals galore as well as a large colony of Brandt’s cormorants. This particular species of bird lives only on the Pacific coast.

Look on the left of the hills. See those large black squares? Those are the cormorant nests. They are all perfectly spaced.

a modern day castle, by Point Lobos State Park

Seals!!!

more seals!

As we were hiking up the hills, I told Alan, “This is just so exciting for me. This is the best thing we’ve done on this whole trip.” Alan asked, “Are you serious?” Yes!!! This place is total bliss.

If you visit us in California, I will escort each of you to this park. In fact, I think Point Lobos needs to be on our regular home-school schedule.

“When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,

what is man that you are mindful of him, the son of man that you care for him?

You made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor.

You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet:

all flocks and herds, and the beasts of the field,

the birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas. O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”

Psalm 8:3-9

For more photos of seals, sea lions, and sea otters, check out some of my other posts about wildlife encounters in Monterey:

Seals or Sea Lions: What is the difference?

Whale Watching in Monterey Bay

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