"Survivor Wyoming"

I have a feeling I won't hear much complaining about school anymore.
Not after today.
We had "Survivor Wyoming" in our frontyard - and it was a blast.
This is how it came about:
Last week, the kids had just gotten off the school bus, there was a lot of complaining about school. Oh, and how much they didn't like going, and on and on...
Well, they got my little speech about how thankful they should be for the opportunities they have, and about how many kids in this world would LOVE to go to school, but will never have the chance to do so.
Then came the inspriational word from my sweet daughter: "I wish I could trade with one of those kids"
Bling, Bling, Bling....
A lightbulb went off in my head, and an idea was born.
"Well," I replied, "we could do just THAT! Let's have a third world day next week when you're out of school for conferences!"
You should have seen the fear factor look on their little faces.
Priceless.
For about a week now they have been DREADING this day, and tried their hardest to talk me out of it. They were pretty clever about it too, and argued that it was my birthday, and that would not be a good day for ME :-))
Well, no such luck for the crew.
Today, there was no TV, computers, running water (I made an exception with the bathroom), candy or any other amenity. Look for yourself....
******************

Breakfast is cooking! We had plain rice (no seasonings!) that we cooked on the camping stove outside. Elia is stirring with a wooden stick.

While the rice is simmering, Anya has to sweep.The boys, Nina and I go fetch water
Nico is filling the pots and buckets with water (we walked down the block to Grandma and Grandpa's new house)
And here we are, eating rice and apples... (Anja, Nico, Elia)
After breakfast, the girls did the dishes.
Meanwhile, the boys had to go dig a hole to dispose of the garbage from breakfast
Playtime. Sticks are the best!


Alex and Nina played with the wagon
But there was more work ahead. Time to grind flour so we could bake bread!
This was harder than we thought
But the results were pretty good!
The two bakers
After we had the bread dough ready, we rode our bikes to Grandma and Grandpa's shop. Since it is outside of the city limits, we were able to have a fire there and bake our bread for lunch.

Deosn't this look yummy?
It was very good, too! I admit, we begged Grandma for some honey to sweeten things up a bit


After an extended lunch hour, Grandpa took us rabbit hunting. Anya really wanted to learn how to gut a rabbit. We were contemplating fixing rabbit stew for dinner.
Nico with his new pellet gun (oh, how I cringe at this sight)
No rabbits in sight - yet
still nothing, but the scenery was nice...

Well, no rabbit was to be found, so we accepted the invitation for Pizza ;-))).

Needless to say, the kids had a blast. I think they realized that things can be fun even if not everything "modern" is at their fingertips.

Will they like school better now? That remains to be seen, but as far as I know this has been a very memorable birthday!