More Cool Treats

Eagle eye

We’re still in a heatwave here and in need, more than ever, of cool, delicious drinks. If that describes you, here are some good ones. Again, we’re eyeballing all amounts. It gives you more reason to taste as you make them!

Lemon mint refresher–mix up some lemon juice, sugar, and water (think basic lemonade at this point). When sugar is dissolved, add a few drops of mint extract and lots of ginger ale. Serve over ice. This is a family favorite of many years.

Berry fizzle–I do this with fresh or frozen blackberries, but you can also do blueberries or raspberries. Boil the fruit with some sugar and water, and maybe some cinnamon and cloves. Let it cool, then strain it and discard pulp. Mix the resulting juice with lemon-lime soda for a unique flavor.

Homemade rootbeer–we make this every 4th of July. It is such a fun tradition. Mix around two pounds of sugar with around two gallons of water and around two ounces of rootbeer concentrate. Taste and adjust till you get the flavor just right, then dump in a couple pounds or more of dry ice. Now you can add carbonation with club soda, but that’s not as fun. If you have a local store that carries dry ice, it’s worth it to make this, the best all-American drink ever!

Happy 4th of July!

Answers to Great Documents Quiz

Brass bookends

I hope you had a great Fourth of July. Here are the answers to the great documents quiz I posted earlier this week. The answers appear in parentheses after each quote. How did you do?

1. “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!” (Patrick Henry speech)

2. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” (Bill of Rights)

3. “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.” (Gettysburg Address)

4. “When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them…” (The Declaration of Independence)

5. “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more Perfect Union…” (Preamble of the Constitution)

6. “…with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.” (The Declaration of Independence)

7. “…that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom–and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.” (Gettysburg Address)

8. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” (The Declaration of Independence)

How Familiar Are You With America’s Great Documents?

Brass bookends

The following lines, penned generations ago, are familiar to most of us, but can you remember which documents they are found in? Take this quiz to see how you do. Match up the numbered quotes with the letters corresponding to the documents they come from. Some documents are used more than once. The answers will appear here on Friday.

1. “Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!”

2. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

3. “Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

4. “When in the course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them…”

5. “We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more Perfect Union…”

6. “…with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.”

7. “…that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom–and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

8. “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”

A. The Declaration of Independence (1776)

B. Preamble to the Constitution (1787)

C. Bill of Rights (1787)

D. Gettysburg Address (1863)

E. Patrick Henry’s speech (1775)

 

 

 

A Historic Meeting of Great Minds

Eagle eye

Welcome to July 4th week on the Eagle’s Quill. This is my other favorite holiday (the other being jingle bells and all that), and it is a time for me to reflect on the amazing history of our country. In our homeschool, we talk a lot about the “world stage”, using our historical timelines to see when certain important figures entered the stage (were born) and exited the stage (died) in the grand live performance of world history. For us, this points out God’s hand in history in bringing certain discoveries, explorations, inventions, and accomplishments to the earth with carefully calculated precision.

Nowhere is this more evident to me than in the miraculous placement of the American Founding Fathers during the beginnings of our country. Benjamin Franklin was one of the first to enter the stage, being born in 1706, followed by George Wythe in 1726. Wythe was not only a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a member of the Constitutional Convention, but served as a teacher and mentor for many other leaders, including Thomas Jefferson. George Washington, John Adams, and Patrick Henry were born in 1732, 1735, and 1736 respectively. In 1743 Thomas Jefferson took his place on the stage, with James Madison following in 1751 and Alexander Hamilton in 1755. These are just a few of the many who worked hard to form a new nation.

It’s no mistake that these infants were born at the time and in the place they were, or that they were brought together at the appropriate time to fulfill their destiny. Having accomplished their noble task, they began exiting the stage in the late 1700s. And here’s a bit of remarkable trivia for you. John Adams and Thomas Jefferson both passed away on the same day–July 4, 1826, the 50th birthday of the United States of America. Shakespeare could not have written a better play.

Said John Adams in a letter to his wife Abigail, May 12, 1780, “I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.”

They certainly knew and played well their parts on the world stage.

 

 

 

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