After a very long absence from this blog, I have been encouraged by several people to start writing again (thank you - you know who you are!).
There is much to catch up on but I won't do that in this post. I am just going to start back a week and hopefully catch up later.
We are homeschooling again this year and we took a field trip to Mystic Seaport last week. There is a living history whaling village there that we visited.
Here we are at the entrance to the Seaport! 
First stop: Listening to a man explain the life of a harpooner. They got up close to huge (as in: way bigger than their boat) whales and harpooned them all up close and personal. 
We went on board this ship first. It was pretty cool to be able to see what it was like on a whaling ship. The kids thought the sailor's bunks were just the right size for them. Not sure how the sailor's fit in them!
Another ship we boarded. I was surprised that there was more than one to view. I wish I could remember more details about this one but we were kind of on a whirlwind due to only having one afternoon to tour.
Another view of it. So picturesque. I kind of want to go back and see if those trees behind it are in full color now!
Captain Kate at the helm. She was pretty amazed by the size of the wheel.
I became completely distracted by all the gorgeous scenery in Mystic. 
The kids climbed into the small whale boat and were able to see how small they actually were. I cannot imagine harpooning a humongous whale in one of these. Ack!
One of the streets in the village, So quaint and beautiful.
This is a replica of a lighthouse that currently sits on Nantucket Island. There were two short movies inside that gave short histories about whaling.
Just more pictures of charming New England-y kind of scenes.
It wasn't long before the kids spotted a horse. It was too expensive for all of us to ride the carriage but the caretaker was kind enough to let the kids pet the horse. They were pretty much the only kids in the place since we went on a weekday. That meant that the staff patiently answered all the kids' questions and spent a lot of time with them in the village 'stores' and 'businesses.'
Getting a lesson on how all the signs were carved, as well as the figureheads on the bow of ships.
On the porch of the General Store. SaraGrace thought this Indian was pretty wonderful.
There was a hands-on kids cottage with fun activities. They were technically too old for it but since there were no other children, the kind lady running it invited them to come in and play. There was a boat to climb and play in, fake fish to catch, sailor clothes to try on (being modeled above by my three munchkins) and a galley kitchen where the girls would have spent all day if I had let them. Zoey was quite disgusted with Jake for wearing the black rain hat instead of a jaunty white sailor hat. She told him he looked ridiculous. Obviously, he cared not.
Heh.
There was a cute little play area with several wooden boats to play on. Jordan liked steering the best.
SaraGrace poses on the tugboat.
Blond is just not his color. Neither is the dress.
SaraGrace's shoes were getting too small and by the end of the afternoon, she was hurting. Zoey offered to give her a piggy back ride for awhile. So cute!
We closed the place down and then my matey's were hungry. We wanted to go to the famous Mystic Pizza, so off we went!
The pizza was yummy! I never saw the movie - however it was playing on various screens all over the restaurant. Some of the scenes were uh...not so appropriate for kids. I had to keep distracting them so they wouldn't look.
And then we drove home.
The end.
