Gone to Carolina

Tomorrow morning, very early, we are leaving for N.C to go to the Live and Learn unschooling conference. I just finished packing! I need the adrenaline of last minute intensity to do things well. Well, to do things. This is a conference filled with "fun shops" in a variety of unusual topics (not to mention the talks, the talent show, the all-age last night dance, the tie-dying, the music and s'mores round the camp fire). The "fun shops" we are most interested in are: clothing tattoo, recycled art, tea time, one about all things Japanese, birding (Gillen is leading this one), soccer (all three guys here are hosting this one), letterboxing, geocaching, belly dancing, taking apart sweaters to get yarn, and many more. So there's a lot to bring for all of this - from our favorite tea bags, to binoculars, yugioh cards and embroidery tools.

And there's a raffle - for which I made a "passion basket" about our passion for Laura Ingalls Wilder (in particular, Farmer Boy), which contains seeds we saved from heritage plants at the farm, quartz crystals that came up out of the dirt at our farm, four of the Little House books, locally spun virgin wool yarn, a cob and husk to create Laura's first doll and a wonderfully smelly bar of soap. I wished I'd asked for more ideas here, many moons ago...
Above are our piles of raffle stuff, funshop stuff and camera stuff, and of course, colored duct tape, with which the boys declare they will be making stuff.

I love N.C. As a young girl, I went to summer camp near where we'll be this week. "Nothing Could be Finer than to be in Carolina in the Mo oo orning" has been stuck in my head. It's especially fine to be meeting up with familiar and yet to be met unschoolers. Not to mention, I don't have to cook or do dishes for five days. sigh. COULD anything be finer? Hope you all have a good week.