Thirteen Colonies

Well, we missed the President's Farewell Address tonight.  Darn.  This was because we were working on a bit of homework at the last minute though.  Yeah, we had to do a quick introductory assignment about the Thirteen Colonies, so Madison watched a video, and she wrote a small bit about what she learned.  Here it is below:

     Before the fifty states of the United States of America, there were just thirteen colonies:  New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

     Starting in the late 1500’s, people from all over Europe came to the New World, from countries like Spain, France, Sweden, England and the Netherlands. 

     They came for many reasons.  Some of the voyagers were escaping Europe because of religious persecution, and others came in search of wealth.  But all of them wanted a chance to have a better life.

     The voyagers claimed land and made colonies all over North America.  They mainly claimed land along the East Coast, because it was closest to Europe, and they came by boat, like the Pilgrims in 1620.

      The Northern Colonies had farmers that grew crops that could not grow in England.  They also had big ports like Boston and Philadelphia where things were sent back to England by boat.  The Middle Colonies were known as the breadbasket, where a lot of wheat was grown.  The Southern Colonies had many plantations, and 40% of the population were African slaves.

       In 1775, the Thirteen Colonies fought against England because of high taxes, and little return.  After the Revolutionary War, the Thirteen Colonies became the thirteen United States of America.  

Not bad, really.  To add to this early governmental education, we also started the latest Rush Revere book about the Presidency.  Daddy was wanting to get to this around the time of the latest Presidential Inauguration - we'll be reading this for another few weeks, so these two are going on at the same time.  So yeah, we'll have another President in a little over a week.  It's sort of a historic moment, isn't it?  Our great system of government continues with another peaceful transition of power, one determined by we the people.  Just like four years ago, and four years before that.

We had ballet today, and a much longer session of that with practice towards the upcoming "Into Grimm's Woods" production.  That went late into the night - Madison got home much later, hence the late homework writing.  Daddy and Mommy were there to help out as much as possible.

Madison also had piano earlier today, so there was that as well - we're playing "The Hall of the Mountain King," which happens to be one of the songs from the movie "Trolls," so it's suddenly kind of cool in a way.  Madison is just starting that one, playing up to eight measures there.  We met in class today, and once again it was decorated for Winter Wonderland.

That's the yearly time where kids get these snowmen that are cut out, and the students decorate them, hang them on the wall, and put stickers on them to chart their progress.  In about seven weeks or so, we're going to a secret place for a fun day or night, and until then all the kids have to try and guess what it is.  Last year was the only year that Daddy correctly guessed, so we'll see if we can figure it out early enough this year again!

It was Taco Tuesday once more, although Mommy and Daddy are fasting meat and sweets.  Not even a Chaco Taco for us!  Madison was all about the tacos though, eating the ones loaded up on her taco trucks.

There is still snow on the ground, but not for long.  It appears as if the weather is about to get warmer the next week, unusually warmer.  It'll feel great outside, although somewhat odd because it is still January when it is supposed to feel frigid.  We have no illusions about it staying warm outside.  In fact, I'm pretty certain it will snow again.  Just you wait and see, right?  This might be just wishful thinking, as we didn't get to do a proper snowman yet.  The snow this time around just wasn't good enough for that.  So we're placing an order:  more snow please!

Madison went to bed after reading from the new book, and reading from the Bible.  We just had time for one chapter, the next chapter, and it was all about ancestry after Noah.  That's it.  A whole chapter where we read names.  There's a bit of something interesting about Nimrod, and then something about Peleg.  But other than that, there's not much to talk about with a ten-year-old.  Still, we vowed to read it from covereth to covereth, so that's what we'll do!

It was a good day today.  Daddy got another Summer Xtreme message done, and an activity for tomorrow night as well.  Things are getting busy - we're doing a service at a local Christian Academy on Thursday, and then there's a class that Daddy is teaching Thursday mornings, starting in two days.  This on top of all the other usual activities... there's lots to do lately!