It’s hard to believe when we started this school year in August, we were on Bainbridge Island. We had just concluded our “Summer West” through Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho. We were just hitting the West Coast and would soon follow that West Coast all the way down to L.A. before heading inland to the Desert Southwest. And, little did we know that we would end the school year on a front porch in Washington, D.C., our buckets of school supplies under a coffee table that would be somewhat sedentary, visiting museums that shared and explained relics of our history that felt more real as we studied them in the places they happened. We tackled 4th, 2nd, and kindergarten through birding, reading, speaking Spanish, conducting science experiments, playing on rocky, sandy, or pebbley beaches, doing math in the sand, going to local museums, stopping at visitor centers, looking for patterns, painting and pastels, maps, nature journals, national parks. We made bracelets for our left hands and Sam still has his on today. (We might know east/west better than we know left/right.)

And also, how the kids saw themselves: first versus last days.