The Alaska State Fair

My family and I went to the Alaska State Fair.  I went on the Raider.  The Raider is my favorite ride.  It has a climbing net, a bouncy bridge, and two slides.  I also went through the Pirates' Cove maze.  I used my own money to pay for the rides.

At the Fair, I like to go into the barn to see my favorite animals.  I like the brown and white cows the best.  I like big pigs because they lay around.  Daddy paid $5 for me to enter the goat obstacle course because it looked interesting to me, and it was!  I led a goat over bales of hay, over a teeter-totter, across a bridge, over some spools and a tarp, and through some branches. They timed everyone to see who could do it the fastest.  I did well, but I wasn't the fastest.

The fair has special thing that I like to do. I ate a big turkey leg.  I also went through the flower maze.  I also went to the Lumberjack Show.  It was fun to watch.  I also went to see my 4H display about goats.  It was fun doing special things at the Fair.     

                 

Summer Camp

This summer, I went to Solid Rock Bible Camp with my friend Lane.  I was gone for three days and three nights. I slept in a covered wagon with Lane, six other boys, two counselors.   I went horseback riding on big, brown horses.  I also went swimming in the cold lake.  After dinner, we had Bible study.  I would like to go to camp again because it was fun!

(Note from Andrew's mom:  All of these pictures were taken by Andrew with the disposable camera he took to camp.  The parental version of his camping experience is here).

Counselor Cobin

The whole group of boys.

The wagon trains circled around the campfire ring.

Counselor John

Me and My Friends

The best part of this summer was playing with Josh and Caleb.  I liked to do bike races with them.  We also started building a really big fort together.  We went hiking a lot, too.  It was fun playing with my friends.

Our Train Ride

Last Thursday, we went on a train ride. Mommy, Jacob, and I joined the M.P. school kids on the school bus at 5:45 a.m. We rode the bus to Girdwood, then we rode the train to M.P.
The train ride was fun!

"The Shield of Kindness"

We read the story "The Shield of Kindness." An old man wanted to give his three sons a test to see which son was the kindest. The kindest son would receive the special shield.

The first son went to Lake Tana at the start of the Nile River. He saved a baby from being eaten by a crocodile. His father said that anyone would save a baby.


The second son took care of a man's money while he was at the market. He didn't take any of the money. The father said he was honest and good.


The third son went far away to a mountain. There he saw his enemy sleeping on a cliff. He could have yelled to scare him and make him fall. Instead, he gently grabbed his enemy's arm and took him to a field for safety. His father said, "You showed true kindness because he was mean to us and you were nice to him."


I really like this Ethiopian fable!

(Illustrations taken from When the World Began-Stories Collected in Ethiopia by Elizabeth Laird...a delightful book that came from the Anchorage library with other books for our unit on Ethiopia. Regrettably, it's no longer in print-otherwise I would track one down for our personal library).

If I Were an Astronaut...

If I were an astronaut, it would be fun. I would jump in craters on the moon. I would tie a rope to a comet so it could pull my spaceship . I would make a video of volcanoes on Venus. It would be fun to be an astronaut!






















(Oil pastel with watercolor wash).

Drumming Lessons

Two weeks ago, I went to Cooper Landing School for drumming. In drumming, I learned how to make different sounds on the drum. If you hit the drum in the middle it makes a bass note. To make an open note, you have to hit it on the edge of the drum. Mr. D taught me how to play the "Soda Pop Song," "As I Was Sitting In My Chair," and "Are You Sleeping?" My favorite part was playing "Are You Sleeping?" because I like how it sounds with the two parts. It was fun drumming!

(Ed.note: Pardon the red stage lighting and the crinkling of Jacob's bag of popcorn in the background)!