Happy Earth Day!

This post is a little late. I have had it in my drafts since last week, but I wanted to post it before April was over. We had a fun earth day filled with activities. Here are some of the things we did.

Amelia got the World map out and wanted to see where we lived. So, I showed her the Atlas so she could see where we were on the map. She followed the lines and asked where Boo and Arn live and where

Chris and Adrienne live. We traced the roads with our fingers. This is our HUGE laminated US Atlas from when we were truck drivers

We painted the earth on coffee filters using blue and green paint. Aren't they pretty?

Next, we spread peanut butter onto rice cakes and pressed them in birdseed to make feeders.

We went outside and placed them in the trees.

We planted Marigolds in individual pots.

Then we planted an Annabelle Hygrangea just like the other one we have in the back already. They get large white snowball type blooms. Unfortunately,a week later, it is not doing too well. It looks find of weary and limp. I think we may need to move it to another spot...I'm just not sure where.

Bushes!

We had a car full of bushes last weekend. Stan's cousin had some bushes he wanted to get rid of. So we went to their house, dug them up, and packed them onto the car.

The first bush on the left is one of the four that we brought over.

Here are two more that we placed in some of the bare spots by the pond.

Four full-sized bushes for free. You can't beat that!

Learning about Birds

We have been learning about birds over the past couple of weeks. The kids have really been enjoying this topic. Here are a few of the activities we have done...

Our Storybook Nature Walk with the book "Feathers for Lunch" by Lois Ehlert

Geraniums

Lilac Bush

Finding nests HIGH up in the trees

A few of our craft projects (the middle one is a nest)

"Light as a Feather" Science Experiment

We dropped heavy and light objects to see which would land first. Then we put them on the balance to see which were heavy and which were light.

Here are the results...

Cookie Update

Two months ago I posted about starting to freeze my cookie dough and my decision to stop buying pre-packaged cookies. Well, I have done well. I have not bought any store bought cookies since making that decision. I HAVE had to make the girls put cookies BACK on the shelf in the grocery store. LOL! My latest batch was half M&M and half chocolate chip.

The cookies the kids miss the most are Fudge Stripe and M&M. So I made some M&M to try to fill the void.

Greater Than, Less Than

Amelia got out the number scale activity box the other day. I explained that to do the activity she needed to choose two cards that have a number with corresponding pictures. Lay them out in front of the scale and then choose the plastic numerals to match and hook them on the scale. The greater (or larger) number is heavier. She went through all the cards, comparing the numbers.

I showed her how to write the greater than/less than and equal signs and she decided to write some herself as well. So much learning going on with this little activity.One thing I love about homeschooling is that you see all of this progress in learning without having to TEACH a lot of the skills. Children are natural learners. For example, I never drilled her to learn her numbers, however, she just picked them up through daily experiences. Although I have taught her basic phonics, a few weeks ago she naturally chose an alphabet book and magnetic letters and matched up the lowercase and uppercase letters. This was not a skill I specifically taught, but she just decided to do on her own. I love it!

Old Faithful...and other yard stuff

This is our faithful rider mower. It first belonged to my parents, then was given/sold (I don't know which) to my uncle Arn and Aunt Boo (that's her nickname), and finally was given to us as a house warming gift by my aunt and uncle. It must be between 15 and 20 years old. It runs great and faithfully mows our acre plot of land every week from April until October every year. This will be our third summer using him.

This is Mama relaxing on the hammock chair after a long day of yard work. This is the view from the hammock chair...

I love flowering trees. Don't you?

Signs of Spring

Last year a late snow knocked out all the beautiful spring flowers from the bushes and trees before I got any shots of them. So I wanted to get some photos this year. Take a look...

Isn't God amazing! Look at all the beauty that we have right in our own backyard!

There is so much to be thankful for.

Happy Easter!

We had a beautiful Easter this year! The weather was warm and the sun was shining. My house was a MESS because of some bedroom rearranging we have been doing (more about that in another post) so we had Easter at Grandma Nitas house.

Our Easter Spread

Preparing for the Hunt

What a pretty spot for hiding an egg...

The Girls are ready!

Happy Easter Everyone!