The Apple Pie Experience

One of the many things I love about our co op is that Connor and Brody are exposed to so many things that I would most likely not do on our own! A prime example of this was Apple Pie Day that took place last week. For our community service project one of the moms had the idea for the kids to work together to make apple pies to take to "Apple Pie Day" at the capital. The purpose of this day is for homeschoolers to gather at the capital to show our desire for freedom in home education and to take each member of legislature an apple pie. I had never been before and wasn't sure what to expect, but it turned out to be a great day. The event is sponsored by OCEAN Network which we are a member of, and who works hard to protect homeschooling freedom here in Oregon. It started on our regular co op day which was Wednesday. My friend Kim gave a great class and presentation on the basics of the process a bill takes through the House of Representatives, the Senate and on to the Governor. Then we broke the kids up into groups. There were three groups of pie makers...

Connor went with the kids that worked on the dough...

Brody got to be an apple slicer!

When they weren't in the kitchen working, they were busy writing letters to their Representatives and Senators. I am pretty impressed that Connor can tell you the names of the people holding those titles in our district. I couldn't do that before last Wednesday! They told them a little bit about themselves, something they like about homeschooling, and asked them to support our freedom that we currently enjoy. It was such a great thing and I am grateful to my friends Tera and Kim for organizing it all! Then the next day we were off to the capital! We went with our friends Kim, Sam, and Grace. We didn't have much to do until our tour time, but we had fun. The tour included a walk up over 100 stairs to the top of the capital which Brody decided not to do. I stayed with him, and luckily Kim took Connor with them, because he was thrilled! Older homeschooled kids had an opportunity to be volunteer pages for the day and a lot of people had appointments with their representatives and senators, which we just might do next time. Then there was a rally at 12:00 which included children performing and a special speaker that is with HSLDA (Home School Legal Defense Association) and it was very informative and encouraging!

I tried so hard to get the golden man in the shot...oh well, the kids are much cuter anyway!

I don't know how many people were there, but it was a lot! Here is just a piece of the crowd that we were in...what a great thing! The rain even held off for us!

Oh....and there were baskets and baskets of the yummiest, juiciest apples;) Here is Connor's journal entry about the whole thing....

For Apple Pie Day, we went to the capital! There, we went (or I went) to the top of the building! That was really cool. We learned how a law is made and about the legislature. OCEAN Network supports homeschooling. If someone wants a law, a bill is taken to the House of Representatives. If it passes it goes to the Senate. From there, it goes to the Governor. The Governor can like, or dislike, and it will pass either way. If the Governor hates it, he or she can veto it and it goes through a process I don't know about. Our trip to the capital was really fun!

Turns out all this interested Connor a great deal and now he even wants to participate in an event coming up in May called Teen Pact. They offer a one day "class" for 8-12 year olds where they can learn more about the legislative process, which I am looking into!