Buying Gifts for Everyone is a Pain in the rear end updated

By Jeremiah the 4th grader

Buying gifts for everyone is a pain that is finally over! YAY! I'm very sure that Dad will like his present, Mom will like her present, Josh will like his present and Nathaniel will like his present. To other branches of our family tree we are sending boxes with hot cocoa supplies      
and other gifts. To our neighbors we are going to do Oreo and Nutter Butter truffles with handcraft handcrafted star ornaments!

The Last Week Til' Christmas for Me!

By Joshua, the 6th grader

Let's see, I got my mom *beep*, my dad *beep*, Jeremiah *beep*, and Nathaniel *beep*! Sorry! My "Present checker" (basically me) didn't want me to write down what they'll get from me! But hey, I still have gotten everyone presents a week ahead of time! So now I can relax and enjoy the excitement for Christmas! I think I'll write down who got what for Christmas the first day I get back in school (Jan. 5!) However, the Amazon pop-up has popped up 202 times! (It tells me how many!) Pottermore has taken advantage of this time by adding on new stuff! They also gave 300 galleons to every single user on Pottermore! I hope you all have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Getting Christmas Gifts for Everyone is A Pain in the Rear End!!!

By Jeremiah ,the 4th Grader

I'M NOT KIDDING!!! It is a pain in the rear end and I only have 2 people done! I'm so doomed! I think I have the hard part done which is very good.

Our Chickens Laying in Winter

by Jeremiah, the 4th grader

I can't believe that our chickens are laying in winter! It's very uncommon for chickens to lay in winter so i'm very excited! So far we have 2 edible eggs but sadly the first egg froze. I can't guess how big our chickens are. They are so big!

The Story of JimmyCricket217 (unofficial Minecraft book) Chapter 6: The Arena

By Josh, the 6th grader

JimmyCricket217 realized that he went a little over the top in anger. "Creeperhiss killed by SUPERPIGEON!" "Super pigeon?" thought JimmyCricket217 "That guy must love pigeons!" "Attention all survivors!" said Haybale "Your numbers have already gone down by 50! So, I'm making you all TP" (it means teleport, not toilet paper) "to the same Jungle biome!" Instantly he teleported to an amazing Jungle, with lava, villages, even Jungle temples! "Do not try to escape, I blew up the rest of the world!" Suddenly, there was a distant boom, then BOOM, BOOM, BOOM! JimmyCricket217 was 1 block away from being destroyed! "AstroManiac, ESCAPEE15234, Calabunga!, and Super Stupendous Steve all died in the explosion!" He then said "Watch out, there are 1 block holes to the void everywhere!" "Game On!" said A123456789. Then he saw a gold armored guy with an iron golem coming after him, then falling in a hole "Butter King fell in hole!" "This won't be as easy as I thought!" said JimmyCricket217 as he began making a beam. Suddenly, a flaming arrow whizzed past him, then 5 more simultaneously came at him! "There must be 5 people attacking me!" thought JimmyCricket217, then he remembered that he did have a map and 4 buckets of lava. So he crouched and put a bucket of lava on each end of the pole and watched it go down onto the 5 players (on his map) and 3 extra players that were sneaking up on the 5. "Are, Air, Thing1, Thing2, Thing3, Mr. Sneaky, YouWon'tLikeMe, and Withered Herbs killed by JimmyCricket217!" "acartridgeinapeartree fell into hole!" "New most kills! 1. Killing Machine(dead), 35 2. JimmyCricket217, 33 3. arachniddestroyer, 26 4. ThatGuyOverThere(dead), 15 5. Spare Death, 12."

The Story of JimmyCricket217 (unofficial Minecraft book) Chapter 5: The Realization

by Joshua, the 6th grader

Once he had finished off VillageLover there was a message that popped up and said Haybale: (he's the founder of this competition) "There are only 100 people left out of the 1,065 people to begin with! The winner will get $100!" Then JimmyCricket217 realized, that VillageLover and Killing Machine weren't trying to kill him for his stuff, they were trying to win! Then Haybale said, "I'll report who died and who killed him/her - Roddy killed by Not Steve! Here are the top killers and the most kills will win $50! 1. Killing Machine(dead), 35 2. Arachniddestroyer, 26 3. JimmyCricket217, 24 4. Spare Death, 12 5. Jouster Steve(dead), 9." JimmyCricket217 felt good that he was 3rd place, but surprised that Killing Machine was in 1st. Just then, "AboveInfinity killed by ThatGuyOverThere!" "JayJayJayJayJayJay killed by ThatGuyOverThere!" "FreckleDude123 killed by ThatGuyOverThere!" "MINE! killed by ThatGuyOverThere!" Then he saw ThatGuyOverThere battling Arch-nemesis, then "Arch-nemesis killed by ThatGuyOverThere!" So JimmyCricket217 found a splash potion of weakness and knew what to do. He went over to ThatGuyOverThere and splashed it on him which made his attacks 1/2 of what they're supposed to be. Then JimmyCricket217 hit him over and over again, but then me^infinite came out and finished ThatGuyOverThere off and "ThatGuyOverThere killed by me^infinite!" So then JimmyCricket217 killed me^infinite in 3 swift blows, then "me^infinite killed by JimmyCricket217!"

The Story of JimmyCricket217 (unofficial Minecraft Book) Chapter 4: The Village

By Joshua, the 6th grader

"I don't believe I lost my house!" said JimmyCricket217. He decided to go to the desert after a long time of looking for his lost house. On the way he found a group of leather armor users. They tried to kill him with their Stone swords but ultimately failed to do so before he killed them with his Diamond sword. As nighttime approached he finally found a village that he could live in. As he went he found out he wasn't the only one who wanted to live in a village as he found a user with complete Iron armor with the username of VillageLover and wanted the village all to himself. To do that would mean that JimmyCricket217 would have to die. So JimmyCricket217 quickly dug a hole 3 blocks down that VillageLover fell into and filled it up with sand which sunk onto VillageLover which killed the user.

The Story of JimmyCricket217 (unofficial Minecraft Book) Chapter 3: The Group of Monsters

By Joshua, the 6th grader

JimmyCricket217 was feeling much safer wearing diamond armor. Suddenly he found the old group of monsters, "Hey look it's them again," said JimmyCricket217, "Oh great, now they have 12 spiders, 20 zombies, 15 skeletons, 7 creepers, and a spider jockey. A SPIDER JOCKEY!" Then they noticed him.
He started running like crazy again. As he was running his food bar went low. He slowed down, he picked up a music disc from a creeper and ate but then they started attacking each other! He got in the frenzy and then they remembered what they where doing and started chasing him again, but they were low in numbers and were all killed. All that was left was the creepers and they chased him into the Taiga biome and then were killed. He then couldn't find his way home.

The Story of JimmyCricket217 (unofficial Minecraft Book) Chapter 2: The Big Sprint

By Joshua, the 6th grader

Killing Machine was going 2 blocks when JimmyCricket217 went 1. He only had iron armor! He then remembered that he had made a house full of TNT in case of something like this! He quickly faked a left and went right, totally fooling Killing Machine and opening the gap 30 more blocks, just enough to get to the TNT house. He dodged a skeleton arrow, but then it hit Killing Machine, opening the gap 5 more block and wearing down his armor. Now the skeleton was much more interested in getting Killing Machine, so JimmyCricket217 quickly ate a steak and the chase was on again! Killing Machine couldn't eat now, so every heart down was permanent until he ate, so that balanced the scales. When he got to the house he lit the TNT and ran out the back entrance. Killing Machine went in and when the house exploded it said "Killing Machine died". He went over and he saw Killing Machine's armor and sword, nothing else survived. He got the armor and put it on. When he got the sword he found out it was named "Kindness." Very funny, Killing Machine. After that he headed home but this is only the beginning of the story.

The Story of JimmyCricket217 (unofficial Minecraft Book) Chapter 1: Meet JimmyCricket217

By Joshua, the 6th grader

Larry liked Pinocchio. "So, why do I need to know that when this is a book about Minecraft?" you might ask. Well it explains why his username is "JimmyCricket217". He used a popular unorganized PvP world and had a nice, cobblestone house with a resource hole that, if anyone fell in, would get a free trip to a bedrock tunnel, full of flowing water with lava on the ceiling and then the "Game Over" screen. The hoppers would bring the resources to the chest, waiting to be collected. So you can see that he is a skilled miner. "Today is average," he said. "Rotten flesh," (he always finds it, and already has a whole large chest full of it) "dirt, gravel, flint, gold ingots. GOLD INGOTS! Score!" He has been working on making a room coated in Blocks of Gold. "Let's see, there's also arrows, a bow, 3 stone swords, iron ingots, and 3 stacks of cobblestone." He then went out at night and he found 3 spiders, 8 zombies, 4 skeletons, and 2 creepers in one area, then ran like crazy, Looked behind him, and saw a user 20 blocks behind him. His username was "Killing Machine", had diamond armor, diamond sword, and a splash potion of slowness.

A Minecraft Action Novel! Chapter 1: Meet Steve8681 and his Team

By Jeremiah the 4th Grader

This is Steve8681.

(image found here) 

 Steve is part of a team, and that team is a treasure hunting team. The boss of the team is Bill707, and there's also Luke8784, Alex563, Joseph91, Caleb3147, Dave7283, Mary7539, Ronald9040, Sarah5150, and Mike1493. This is what they're good at. Bill is good at planning. Luke is good with redstone. Alex is good at crafting. Joseph is good at mining. Caleb is good at farming. Dave is good at building. Mary follows orders well. Ronald is good at spying. Sarah is good at hunting. Mike is very lucky. Steve is good at going through structures without getting killed. This is where we begin our story.

Our 1st Egg!

By Joshua, the 6th grader

Finally! Our 1st egg! We've been waiting a 1/2 a year for our 1st egg, and now here it is! Unfortunately, the cold caused the egg to freeze up and form a crack, making it inedible. I don't have any idea whose it was, but I think it was the Rhodebar. I just can't wait for the next egg! I can imagine now going to the coop daily, and finding their eggs there.

What Our Chickens Look Like

The chickens are at the age that they might start laying. It's cold, though, so they might not. This is what our chickens look like now. 

She's pretty big even for a hen! This is our Rhodebar.

 This chicken is especially weird because it's a chicken that looks like a roadrunner. Surprisingly she's actually kind of rare. She's a Cream Legbar.

This chicken is the youngest one. We did have 4 for a while (we also had a barred rock) but it died in an accident. She's the only Orpington that we have because our other one was a rooster.

How to Earn the Pikmin Versus Stamps Easily in Nintendo Land

by Joshua, the 6th grader

Beware! These stamps are really hard to get, so it's good to know how to get them easily. One convenience is that they pretty much ranked easiest at the top, hardest at the bottom. So here you go!

Candy from a Pikmin
This stamp is for getting 10 candies from the Pikmin in 15 attacks. The knuckle seed is a huge help when trying to get this, but make sure that the Pikmin are closer then the... anything else. Another help is the hammer seed, because it causes them to lose multiple candies at once.
Clobber Olimar
This stamp is for landing 10 blows on Olimar in 1 round as Mii Pikmin. One thing to keep in mind, is that they didn't specify what time limit, so it'll be easier for you to get this one. You'll probably be able to hit him/her once before he/she starts attacking you, so grab a buddy, and start hitting him/her back and forth, over and over again! You can also use charged attacks to help also.
Rock Your Foes X5
The name is pretty self-explanatory, hit your enemies with rocks 5 times in 1 round (no, I don't mean Bulborbs and Beebs, instead I mean Mii Pikmin and Olimar!) This one can be done by getting close enough that they won't have much reaction time and throwing it, and doing it 5 times.
Incredible Comeback
This stamp is for winning, even though at one point your team was losing by 30 candies! It's hard to imagine there's one harder then this one. The easiest thing to do is to team up with somebody else, tell them what you're planning (without the player as Olimar hearing) and putting it into action! The plan would to wait until Olimar has 30 candies, then start attacking!
Pacifist Victory
This stamp is on the bottom because it's for not attacking anyone and still winning! Firstly, it's pretty much impossible to do this and win at the same time using Olimar, so don't attempt it. Also, try to get it solo as a Pikmin, and you'll be clobbered by Olimar (unless he/she is aiming for Pacifist Victory also.) So just about the only way to get this is to team up with another person, or a bunch of people, as Pikmin, and just stay behind, grabbing all the spare candy, and just hope you guys win!

Cold in WA

by Joshua, the 6th grader
I don't know how cold it is at where you live, but it's FREEZING here! Every morning we wake up to less than 20 degrees outside! Even though it's cold, we don't have any snow yet. It's so cold here, I've already gotten used to the frost covering nearly everything, all the water turned to ice (which by the way, I was able to make a stop-motion video on Nathaniel's water table.)

Nerf Gun Deals at a Thrift Store

By Jeremiah the 4th Grader

Usually when we go to the thrift store I like to go to the toy section in the back of the store to see what new Nerf guns they have. These Nerf guns we got good deals on. Like the bottom right gun, on the Amazon website it costs 20 something bucks and I only paid $3 for it! The price difference for the other guns is pretty much the same. It would really really be worth your time going to your local thrift stores to look instead of paying full price on a website. 

"Minecraft Combat Handbook" Book Review

By Both Boys

(Image found here.)

Josh's View
I think this is a good book! But unfortunately about 1/2 the book talks about PVP (player versus player) on PC! But it does a good job talking about hostile mobs and good tricks to kill them, traps, and good ways to kill without losing a single heart! I also like how it talks about durability of weapons! I suggest this book to anyone who's really into Minecraft.

Jeremiah's View
I also think this is a good book! I like the sword durability table and one thing I learned from this book is that you can actually name tools and it actually shows you the different recipes for different things. I also like the defense points table for armor. I agree with my brother that I like the help in combat things. It's very useful because it teaches you how to make lots of different potions like potion of swiftness, and it also shows you tips about combat. Like Josh, I suggest this to anyone who's really into Minecraft.

Christmas Coming Up

By Joshua, the 6th grader

Well, Christmas time is coming up (after Thanksgiving, which we have 0 plans for!) At this rate I'll have about $180 to spend (if I don't use it on anything before then!) But I have no idea what to get everyone for Christmas! I have a lot of people to get presents for! Luckily, I still have a month to decide. So hopefully I've decided by then. Maybe I'll get Jeremiah (this part removed in case Jeremiah decides he wants to read this!) I'll probably be easier for them because I have less stuff on my Amazon Wish List than them (If you want to know why then it's because there will be less stuff to narrow down from.) Another reason why I'm excited is because it's supposed to be really cold this year and you (probably) know what that means! SNOW! I love snow. My mom, however, doesn't enjoy snow much. Hopefully you won't have (much) trouble finding presents for your friends and family!

"Minecrafter 1/2.0" Book Review and My View of the "Minecraft Construction Handbook"

by Joshua, age 10

(image found here)

The first book is sort of like a beginners guide to Minecraft. It gives some tips everybody knows (like don't dig straight down) and others that few people know (like bows work well with ghasts!) It is a good book if you're just starting out.

(image found here)

This second book shows you the harder stuff in Minecraft like "Murder Holes", What to do if a creeper gets inside your house, and you get to fight down staircases! It also talks about Redstone and what to do with it. It also talks about how to make games in creative to turn into survival like Spleef!, Sheep Tagger, and Connect 4! This also has a step-by-step guide to get to the end! This is a good book to anyone who wants to learn the advanced stuff.

 My View of the "Minecraft Construction Handbook"

Do you remember Jeremiah's view of the "Minecraft Construction Handbook"? Well, in my view, this book is not that good! When Jeremiah wrote his, he listed off nearly everything it shows you how to make! Most of the book is filled with things that other people have built! This is just about the worst book in the whole series! So really think twice about it before you use $7.60 on it!

No More Braces

Well, about 1 month ago I got my braces off! I am so glad that I did. I couldn't have popcorn, nachos, and the list goes on, and on! I have met a lot of people who would get braces really soon.

LEGO G-G-G-Ghost

I really like building Legos and I was thinking about maybe making some Lego Halloween decorations. I built some Lego candy canes to put on our Christmas tree for Christmas and I was thinking maybe I could do something like that but for Halloween. We have a lot of whites so I decided to make a ghost. At first I was thinking of maybe a pumpkin or a witch but I didn't have enough orange or black.

"Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" Book Review

Image found here

by Joshua, the 6th grader

Remember how I talked about Pottermore? Well, this is the 1st book it talks about! This book is about a young wizard named Harry Potter who was put in a muggle house until he found out he was a wizard. He also finds out that he's famous for surviving an attack by Voldemort. Then he goes to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and this book goes through his journey for his 1st year. There are other books in the series, and here's the list: (in order)

• Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
• Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
• Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
• Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
• Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows

I suggest this to anyone, that's right, ANYONE!
Warning: Books get darker as the series keeps going!

Minecraft Redstone and Construction Handbook Reviews

by Jeremiah, age 8

Redstone is kind of like electricity but it's Minecraft electricity. This handbook is very useful for redstone. You can learn lots about it like lots of different circuits that use redstone and other things that only work with redstone.
Redstone is actually an ore. It can be found very far down underground. You can mine a staircase very far down then once you hit bedrock jump 5 blocks from bedrock then go to the wall and mine a branch off to the side of the staircase. You should find redstone and very rarely even diamonds this way.
In the handbook they show you recipes of things like pistons and sticky pistons. They even tell you how to kill slimes which give you slimeballs.
This is my favorite Minecraft book that tells you about redstone. I would suggest anyone that is a beginner to Minecraft and even masters to read this because it is very useful for learning the properties of redstone.

This book is a lot different than the "Redstone Handbook." The first thing it shows you how to build is a huge, awesome house made out of wood and glass. It also shows you how to build a lot more awesome things like fort field walls, a royal hall and suspension bridge and gives a difficulty rating for each project: easy, normal or hard. It also shows the construction materials you need. It really inspires people to build lots and lots of new things like giant floating islands. There's even a steampunk city in here!
It can be very useful to beginners and also to masters. This book is amazing! It has lots of things to look at. There's even a maze you can make! I really enjoyed looking through this book. It's my favorite Minecraft construction book that I've read.

"Escape From Lemoncello's Library" Book Report

by Joshua, age 10

Kyle Keeley was not a book person, only video game guides. But he loved Mr. Lemoncello's games. But when a local library opened nearby and asked for the seventh graders to write a book report to get into the lock-in and $500 Kyle wanted to be in the 12 lucky ones. But when he noticed that Mr. Lemoncello was going to be there, he wished he had written a better report. But he got picked! But it was all fun and games until Mr. Lemoncello started up a brand new game called "Escape From Lemoncello's Library" and the prize was to be starred in all of his commercials! There are some hilarious parts of the book! I suggest this to people about my age.

Imagine Children's Museum

by Jeremiah,age 8

This museum is my favorite! We found an area that there's only one room that you can play in that is not saved for classes. In that room it is the construction room where there are these really cool blocks.

The connectors are corner pieces and you can build whatever you want, though I'm pretty sure it'd be hard to build a 20 story building with them. My other favorite besides this is the H2O area, which is the water area. It's really fun because you get to play with water and they're working on making it better! Once you come after October 4th you may get to play with the new stuff.  There are also stairs to take you onto the rooftop where there is a huge play area with fun diggers you operate with your hands. This is the best museum ever!

Looking Forward to New Eggs

by Joshua, age 10

I've been waiting and waiting and waiting ever since we've had the chickens. I remember those eggs that we got from the person who bought our 3rd rooster. (Man, they were good...) Well, we're probably going to get at least an egg from Sept. 28 - Nov. 9! I think that the Legbar will lay the first egg because it will normally lay when it's 20 - 26 weeks old, as for the Rhodebar, it should lay when it's 20 - 28 weeks old, but who knows? They like to come up to our back porch and just sit there, probably because we normally give them food.

Legos

by Jeremiah, age 8

Legos are very special because they have these little bumps called studs. They can come in many shapes and sizes. This is my latest creation with these amazing building blocks. This is one of my favorite things that I've ever built, it's a super super sled.

Pottermore

By Joshua, the 6th grader
I know, I'm sorry that I'm doing another blog post about a website. But this one is a very good one to anyone who likes/loves Harry Potter! This website is called Pottermore!

(Image found here)
First it takes you through Diagon Alley to do the necessities before taking you to Hogwarts to get sorted into one of the houses by asking you questions like "Left or Right?" Then, you get a welcome message to your house and you get to start earning house points! Normally you will go to the moments which are basically moments in the book to move stuff or to take stuff that are out of place and put it in your trunk to earn a house point. It only has the first 4 books but getting more! You could also go to the dueling club and duel other students to try and get the higher number by being more accurate. If you win then you earn 5 house points! You may notice that dueling is the fastest way to get house points and you would be right! Then the last thing is potions which is a slow to earn house points. What you need to is get the ingredients to brew the potion then work on it by following the instructions correctly in a time limit, if you finished it correctly and under the time limit then you need to wait for it to be ready (which is 30+ minutes later) and then work on finishing the potion (I've never finished a potion because my fastest cauldron exploded, that's right, EXPLODED!) You try to get house points so later, when it's time for the house cup your house will win! This is the link to my profile:
http://www.pottermore.com/en-us/profile/runesun13004
This is the one to Jeremiah's:
http://www.pottermore.com/en-us/profile/willowsword2460

3rd Poll Results

By: Joshua, the 6th grader
O.K, I guess that this says what you guys want to hear more of!

What Type of Blog Post Do You Want to Read More of?

Legos

  3 (50%)

 

Chickens

  3 (50%)

 

Book Reviews

  2 (33%)

 

Math

  1 (16%)

 

Websites

  0 (0%)

Fiction

  1 (16%)

 

What We're Learning About

  3 (50%)

 

So you want to hear more blog posts about what we're learning about, chickens, and Legos! So I will make sure to keep that in mind! 

My thoughts when poll ended: O.K, that's what they want? Got it. (Wow! No votes for websites!)

Jeremiah's thoughts when poll ended: Wow, I'm surprised that there are no votes for websites!

Plans for Jeremiah's Minecraft B-day Party

By Josh (with Jeremiah's help)

Well, Jeremiah's b-day party is coming in 2 days and he's already excited as you can see:

 There will be 22 people there and 4/11 of them will be kids including us! We have some plans for some stuff at the party

Here's our fondant to put on the cupcakes!

Skeleton scare!*

I've already gotten my present for him but I haven't wrapped it yet!
We also have some food that look like foods from Minecraft like Swedish Fish for fish.
*As you can see, Jeremiah is going to be the skeleton

"The Strange Case of Origami Yoda" Book Review

By: Joshua, the 6th grader

(Image found here)

This book is about the strangest kid in Macquarrie Middle School named Dwight, though when he folded a Yoda out of origami he made it say great advice! A kid named Tommy builds this "case file" as he asks the question, "Is Origami Yoda real?" This case file/book is to answer that question as other kids in the school write about their experiences to help. This book is very funny!
I suggest this book to people about my age.
If you liked this book (Which I did) then there are more books in the series so I'll make a list:

• Darth Paper Strikes Back
• Secret of the Fortune Wookie
• Art2-D2's Guide to Folding and Doodling (not in series, though made by same characters/author)
•  The Suprise Attack of Jabba The Puppett
• Princess Labelmaker to the Rescue (I haven't read it yet)
• Emperor Pickletine Rides the Bus (I haven't read this one either)

I've read this book multiple times (and it never gets old!)

2nd Poll Results

By, Both boys
Here are the results of the 2nd poll!
What is your favorite secondary color?

Purple	12 (57%)
Green	9 (42%)
Orange	0 (0%)

Josh's thoughts as poll ended: C'mon people I would at least like somebody to vote on orange!

Jeremiah thoughts as poll ended: Why oh why isn't anybody voting on orange? Why oh why oh why oh why! 

The New Chickens

by Joshua, age 10

Ugh, more waking up at 6:00 in the morning! Yes, that's right, another rooster. It's because the Light Orpington is actually GUILTY! So we went to a guy who also sells chickens (not the same guy who we bought the 1st ones from) and we bought two 8 week old chickens and hopefully they're hens! Here are the types of the new chickens:

• A Barred Rock
• A Buff Orpington

The new chickens! 

The chances of having 3 roosters is 1/1000!

A Minecraft Guide for First-Timers, Part I

By Jeremiah, age 7

These are the top priorities for your first day playing Minecraft:

1. Mine wood
2. Craft wood planks
3. Make a crafting table
4. Craft sticks
5. Craft wooden tools
6. Mine cobblestone with pickaxe
7. Craft furnace
8. Craft stone tools 
9. Look for coal underground or put wood in furnace (wood planks don't work)
10. Craft torches
11. Make house
12. (Optional #12-13) Kill 3+ sheep
13. Craft a bed
14. Sleep or work on house

A detour to skip steps 1-3, 7, and 10-11 is to find a village.

The Roosters

By: Joshua, the 6th grader

Well that's the end of waking up at 6:00 in the morning! Why do I say that? It's because we just got rid of our roosters (yes, I meant the plural of rooster). We had 2 roosters so here they are:
Easter Egger (Cream Color): GUILTY (And I was looking foward to multi-colored eggs!)
Light Orpington: Safe
Dark Orpington (Guy who we bought it from said it was actually a Swedish Cross but I'm not so sure about that!):GUILTY
Rhodebar (Red+Stripe): Safe
Cream Legbar (Red+Stripe): Safe

The hens!

Note: Nathaniel likes holding chickens now!

Poll results

Sorry about it being so long but here are the results!
What is your favorite primary color?
WW\

Red	4 (18%)
Yellow	3 (13%)
Blue	15 (68%)

I have just set up a new poll so please vote in it!

Geocaching

by Joshua, Grade 6

Yes, I know. I'm talking about another website but this one is nothing like any of the websites I've talked about yet (except a little bit like Project Noah) and It's called Geocaching! It's free to sign up (though not free if you buy a premium membership which I will talk about later) and then you can start your geocaching! Here is a step-by-step guide of how to do geocaching.

I really enjoy doing it and I bet you will like it too no matter who you are!
Here's our profile!

     

Welcome Back to School!

by Mom

We're back into another school year here in the Pickle household. We now have a 4th grader, a 6th grader, and a pre-preschooler. We're giving the bigger boys more independence this year in controlling their own studies. We've provided the curriculum and given them an indication of the pace they should be taking their studies at to finish them by the end of the school year. The rest is up to them! Each year we handle school in a slightly different manor, figuring out what seems to work best for our boys that particular year. They're excited to experience a little more freedom while still having help whenever they need it.

As far as this blog goes, the big boys will be using it for their writing practice. Please comment if you are interested in what they've been doing or if you have suggestions to offer. They love getting feedback on their blog. Thanks!

Here's to an exciting new school year, lots of new things to learn and a new way of doing things!

About Our Chicks Week 2

Now we have had the chicks for 2 weeks and they've been growing a lot, here's their growth chart (we were able to get weights!):
Day 3:

•  Cream color is 1.8 oz and 3.75 in.
• Light Orp is 1.3 oz and 4.5 in.
• Dark Orp is 1.1 oz and 3.5 in.
• Red+Stripe is 1.3 oz and 4 in.
• Dark+Stripe is 1.1 oz and 3 in.

Day 5:

• Cream color is 2.1 oz and 4.25 in.
• Light Orp is 1.6 oz and 5 in.
• Dark Orp is 1.3 oz and 4.25 in.
• Red+Stripe is 1.3 oz and 5.5 in.
• Dark+Stripe is 1.3 oz and 4 in.

Day 7:

• Cream color is 2.3 oz and 4.5 in
• Light Orp is 2 oz and 5 in.
• Dark Orp is 1.5 oz and 4.75 in.
• Red+Stripe is 1.6 oz and 5.5 in.
• Dark+Stripe is 1.3 oz and 4.5 in.

We also have data from day 9 but I will save that for week 3.
A highlight for this week is that we can start taking them outside for short periods of time. By taking them outside we have found out more about them! We have some pictures to show you:

Our Chicks grouped together!

Our chicks up close!

Dark Orpington

Notes:

All: Gaining wing feathers!

Dark Orpington: Quite brave! It keeps leaving looking for bugs while the others are huddled up in a group.

Red+Stripe: Really noisy. I wondered if it was either one chick being loud or them taking turns chirping, until I saw this one's mouth opening up a lot while I heard the noise.

Others: No notes.

About Our Chicks Week 1

By Joshua

A few years ago, Mom wanted to start chicken farming though we lived in Virginia Beach, VA and it's not allowed inside city limits so we couldn't start... yet. But now we can since in the city of Marysville, WA the only rules are:

1. You can't have a rooster (so it doesn't fertilize the egg(s) that will make chicks.)
2. You can't have more then 6 chicks/chickens.

So a day before I wrote this we got 5 chicks and they were these types:

• An Easter Egger
• A Blue Orpington
• A Black Orpington
• A Cream Legbar
• A Rhodebar

Our chicks!

We don't have names for the chicks yet and we forgot which is which (except for the Orpingtons) but we do have their heights!

• Cream Color is 4 in
• Dark+Stripe is 3.5 in
• Red+Stripe is 3.75 in
• Dark Orpington 4.5 in
• Light Orpington 3.5 in

Notes about the different chicks:
All: Extremely Cute and Cuddly! They're 5 days - 1 week old
Cream Color: Especially cooperative and normally stays out of the area that the others are in.
Both Striped: Loves jumping into the food until we changed it from a bottom of a red solo cup to a co-op bought feeder.
Orpingtons: Extremely fidgety (when we measured them they kept running away!)