Birds, Caps, Adam and Eve

Time just passes so fast! I never finished posting about our Bird Themed week. Here are a few more projects we did that week.

We made some bird treats. First we took some slices of bread and cut them into star shapes using cookie cutters. I poked a hole into one tip so we could thread the string through to tie it up. We let them sit and dry out over night. The next day we spread peanut butter onto one side and then dipped that side into a plate of bird seed. Once one side was covered we turned them over and covered the other side.

We found that we had to add extra bird seed to the places that didn't cover well and press it into the peanut butter.

We found a place to hang them up outside. We don't really have good places to hang bird treats and so they ended up near the gate. Then we waited for the birds to come and enjoy their treats...and waited and waited. Unfortunately, the birds in our neighborhood didn't appreciate our efforts. One eventually fell off and was then consumed by the birds on the ground. A couple days later I broke the other one off the string and left it on the ground too. Okay, it wasn't the best place to hang the treats.

Our next project was to make treats for ourselves. We decided to make bird nests. These are made with crushed cereal. We used Chex style cereal because that is what we had. Chloe enjoyed doing the crushing with her own rolling pin.

I found the recipe here. We pressed the mixture into muffin tins lined with cupcake papers. You can't really tell by this picture but there are slight depressions in the center to make them look like nests.

We added the "eggs" (m&m candy because that is what we had on hand) and put them in the refrigerator for a few hours.

Our m&m's had a mixture of colors but that gave Chloe a chance to sort.

They were so delicious!

We also made these cute birds inspired by this duck craft.

One other project I worked on that week was to try my hand at homemade water colors.

Don't they look pretty? We were kind of disappointed with these. When we paint with them, they leave deposits of baking soda on the paper that flake off when it dries. The paint itself dries out quite a bit between uses. I find that I have to add a bit of water to each cup to get a bright enough color to paint with. We will probably look for a different recipe to try. I also learned that I need to check my container for holes before adding liquid! Most of the cups in this egg carton had tiny holes poked through them. I checked the other few egg cartons that I have on hand and they all have these holes. I guess they come that way. Now when we use them, I make sure I put paper towel under the carton.

 The next week we used Before Five In A Row by Jane Claire Lambert. The book we read was Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina. I didn't take many pictures of this weeks lessons but I used two resources. The first was here on homeschoolshare.com. The other is from one of my favorite sites for printables, Homeschool Creations and the link to her preschool pack for Caps for Sale is here.

This is a project we did to go along with this lesson.

This week we are doing a lapbook about Adam and Eve which I found here at Lapbook Lessons. Along with the lapbook we are working on basic concepts using worksheets from two books Everything for Early Learning and More of Everything for Early Learning. 

In the coming weeks we will be using an Apple Theme, Farm Theme, Owl Theme using the book Owl Babies by Martin Waddell, and a lapbook about Creation.

Ponds, Birds, What Next?

Chloe is really enjoying playing school. The pond theme was a big hit last week. We made our pond sensory box. At first we left it out on the porch but because the temperatures were reaching 100 degrees and higher, the box didn't get played with for a few days. I decided we needed to bring it inside. Some of the plastic frogs and turtles and the craft foam lily pads were moved to the water tub/table on the first day. We inherited a washtub on legs when we bought this house. It's a great water station for Chloe to play with.

This week we've started our bird theme. We got off to a late start this morning on lessons because the bird sensory box we put together last night was a great distraction. The base filler in the bird box is bird seed which we will be feeding to the birds outside our fence so our dog, Molly, won't chase them away. I had to fashion a stick tree out of several  sticks, three actually, to get a good "tree" with a nice branch layout for the birds nests we made today.

I used two different kinds of yarn and about 2/3 of a small bottle of white glue. The glue is almost dry and next we will pop the balloons. I wanted the nests to be small enough to put in my stick tree so I used water balloons.

I also made a couple little birds out of pom poms, craft feathers, chenille sticks and googly eyes. The bird seed is surprisingly dirty and now our soft little birdies are dirty too. Then I decided we needed a bird house. I emptied the last of the half & half into a small pitcher so I could use the carton for a bird house. I cut it down to a shorter size and taped it back together. Then I cut out a hole and wrapped the carton  in construction paper. The spout on top became the chimney. Chloe was supposed to put the flowers on the paper but at first she didn't want to get glue on her hands. Then once she did, she was distracted by peeling it off again. I ended up finishing the flowers.

 I had an old flower pot base already painted purple so we painted the inside bottom light blue to be the bird bath. The birds legs turned out a little funny looking and when you sit them on the side of the bird bath, it looks more like a wading pool. For awhile, Chloe pretended it was a bird feeder and filled it up with birdseed. I love how these sensory boxes bring out her imagination! She actually sits and plays in them for long stretches of time, freeing me up to plan what to put in the box next.

I'm looking forward to adding the nests tomorrow. I think we will need some eggs too. We have some river rock just sitting out by the garage so I think we will be painting some of those tomorrow.

Some other projects I have planned for this week is to make a bird treat out of a piece of bread, peanut butter and bird seed. We'll have to look for a good spot for these treats so we can watch birds eat from them. We are also going to make ourselves some edible birds nests filled with candy "eggs".  We are also using the Bird Preschool Pack from Homeschool Creations. There is more to go with this pack  Birds Preschool Pack found at 1+1+1=1.

As I've been researching ideas and projects to do with each theme, I've come across so many good things that don't necessarily go along with any particular theme. I've decided to toss in a few free weeks to pick up on those types of things. Last year I purchased the book Before Five In A Row (BFIAR). I found it was very difficult to get copies of all the books featured. I did find about half of them in two local libraries that are the closest to me. While picking out Preschool Packs from Homeschool Creations, I noticed that Jolanthe is creating packs to go along with some of these books. I will be interspersing some of these as well. I had planned to do an Astronaut/Outer Space theme next week, but I think I will be using the book Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina.  We actually own this book and will be using the Preschool Pack from Homeschool Creations.

I'm learning about blogging as I go along. In this blog, you can see that I learned how to insert photos and link to other websites! We never stop learning.

It's been a long time!

I haven't updated this blog for a really long time. I haven't been "in the mood" to write anything. And it's not that nothing has been happening. We've stayed pretty busy.

This summer we tried to take advantage of activities provided by local businesses and libraries. We use the Pharr library because it is larger than the San Juan library and they have more to offer for kids Chloe's age. We also discovered Quinta Mazatlan which is one of the World Birding Centers here in the RGV. They had a Story & Stroll time on Tuesday morning and Family Night on Thursday evening.

Last week, I officially started teaching Preschool/Kindergarten to Chloe. In her words, "Let's play school." Ha! I hope she keeps that attitude. I've decided to use a different theme each week. There is so much available on the internet. Some amazingly creative people have blogs with which they provide us with free printables. One of my favorites is Homeschool Creations with Jolanthe. I love her Preschool Packs and use those as the foundation lesson and then add other printables, crafts, activities and books. Another favorite blog of this kind is 1+1+1=1 with Carisa. Again, I get a lot of ideas and printables from her blog.

The first official week, our theme was Gardens. I wish we could have planted a garden but we can use this theme again later and do some actual planting. This week the theme is Bugs. One of the preschool packs is called Pretty Bugs. The drawings are cute feminine bugs in pink, purple and green. Chloe has an aversion to real bugs so I'm hoping this exposure to bugs will help her get over that. She was really excited about studying bugs this morning. We went to the dollar stores and got some really cheap plastic bugs, a bug catching kit and butterfly net. I also bought a shallow storage container that we will use as a sensory box. This week we will put some potting soil in the bottom. Add the plastic bugs and some sticks, leaves and rocks. Chloe can play with that sort of activity for long periods of time thanks to her very active imagination.

Next week our theme will be Ponds. Do you see a nature theme happening here? Next week we will transform our sensory box into a "pond". We will use either aquarium rocks or colored rice for the bottom. Then we'll add pond creatures like turtles, frogs, lizards, ducks, dragonflies and such. We'll put in some old plastic aquarium plants we have laying around. We'll add some logs for the turtles to sun themselves on. We also dragged an old washtub on legs out of the garage. It was something that was here when we bought the house. It has a drain on the bottom and we always thought we would fix it up and use it for drinks at BBQ's. Well, it's been stored in the garage since we moved in 8 years ago! So Randy got it out, added a hose valve thing to the drain and filled it up with water. He put a stool in front of it for Chloe and she had fun playing with it for a little while last night. I plan to make some lily pads out of green craft foam and take some of her plastic pond creatures outside to play "pond".

I think the following week might be "Birds" mainly because we have a real birds nest on a branch from a tree we cut down last spring. We attempted to study birds a few months ago but it wasn't really official and I hadn't really prepared. I think we'll use the Preschool Pack again. I'm thinking of making a birds nest with yarn on an inflated balloon with watered down glue. I'll be doing most of that planning next week. For now I'll just plan one week in advance.

Besides all this, we've been using a computer based reading program called Funnix. Chloe is starting to be able to sound out certain words! That is so exciting for me because I love to read and I really want to pass that on to her. We are only doing about 2 reading lessons a week. I don't want to push her too hard. She's not even 4 yet. In September, I plan to begin the Funnix math program as well and take it lesson by lesson to see how she accepts it. She loves counting things, so I really don't anticipate her disliking the math program.

Some other areas I want to focus on this school year are clocks and money. I want to introduce the clock face to her and have her learn where the numbers go and what the hands are called. Maybe begin with the o'clocks. I also want to teach her to identify the coins and begin to understand the values of pennies and nickels. If she catches on to that, we'll move on to more valuable coins.

I'm hoping to update this blog more often. I know that was my intention when I first started so I guess we'll see how things turn out! :-)

Where was I?

Now that Thanksgiving is over (several days ago), I think I can get back to a normal sort of schedule. December is always a pretty crazy month though! Added to the usual busyness of this month is that we are moving into the new sanctuary at church and having our first Sunday service there on the 5th! We attend a church that has a congregation of over 3000 people attending every Sunday. The logistics of that kind of move is pretty crazy, but I know that we have some really great organized people in charge of it. I had the opportunity to go over Tuesday evening to help move some of the stuff around for the new classrooms and the two new nurseries in the new building. I helped assemble a couple cribs. Most of all the older stuff had to stay where it was for one last Wednesday night service.

Randy works with the production team doing stuff with the sound equipment. Sorry, I can't give detail about that because I really have no clue how to do any of that stuff. Last night at the Wednesday service, in the old sanctuary, we didn't have all the equipment because some of it had been moved to the new building. Randy was there until almost midnight with the worship team, helping set and hook everything up. Tonight they have a training with the professionals to make sure they all know how to run it.

We are also going from having 5 children's classrooms to having 10! Sunday morning is going to be interesting getting all the kids in the right places. We are also going from having 3 services to having 2! Every other Sunday I volunteer in the toddler class but since we are changing all the classes around, I'll be switching to the one year old class. The room I was in before will be used by the 2-3 year olds now and Chloe will be moving back into that class. I really want her to have some independence from me and church is pretty much the only time that happens. It just happens that all this change is taking place on my Sunday off so I will only be part of the 9:30 am service. Maybe things will be more settled by the second Sunday when I volunteer again! :-)

On another note, Dad and Janet are here for the week. They are staying down at the Island (South Padre Island) and we will be going down to see them Friday night. Chloe and I got to see them at the Flea Market yesterday when we went to visit Mom at her fried pie booth. But it will be nice to just sit down and visit tomorrow night.

Ok, well since I typed that last sentence, Chloe woke up, we made waffles and ate them, I unloaded the dishwasher and reloaded it, and Chloe is watching an episode of The Little Einsteins. I guess we need to get on with our day. I'll probably play at least one round of Flylady Bingo (The Flylady on Facebook) and do some homeschooling with Chloe. Later today I'll make a grapefruit pie to take with us when we go see Dad and Janet tomorrow...

Not as productive.

Well, I didn't get much done today as far as housecleaning goes. I'm still motivated to get the house less cluttered though because I still want to decorate for Christmas starting Friday. What I did get done, though, was an almost complete lapbook for The Runaway Bunny which is the book we've been reading for the last few days.

For those of you who don't know, I'm planning on homeschooling Chloe. Okay, allow me a moment to brag about my kid. (All of us parents like to do that every now and then!) Chloe just turned 3 a little over a month ago and she loves the alphabet. Pretty much anything to do with words, she loves. Ever since she was a newborn, one of the songs I would sing to her (I'm sure off-key) was the ABC song. She could sing it all the way through including pronouncing clearly "LMNOP" by the time she was 2 1/2. Actually, I've noticed her singing it when she needs to comfort herself, lol. Just before she turned 3 we noticed that she could identify about 3/4 of the upper-case and a few lower-case letters. I hadn't planned on really starting any serious schooling until she turned 4, but I quickly realized she was going to leave me behind if I didn't get started!

I started researching online and asking other homeschool parents for advice. (I'm planning on joining a homeschool co-op after the first of the year.) During my online searching, I discovered File Folder Games. There are a lot of free resources online! These games are on several different sites and you can print out the graphics. The idea is to store them inside file folders. For example, one of the ones I made had some pictures of scarecrows, each in a different color. There are two of each color and one also has the name of the color printed on it. I pasted them to parts of a cereal box for more stability and then covered them with clear contact paper. I pasted the ones without words inside the folder then put one side of a velcro button on their bellies. The ones with the words, I put the opposite side of the velcro button on their backs. Chloe has to match up the the two scarecrows. Well, wouldn't you know, it's too easy for her, so she gets this sly smile on her face and pretends to guess all the wrong ones!

So I moved on to something more challenging. I found a File Folder Game that has her matching the lower case letters to the upper case ones. That is still a bit of a challenge for her, but I was surprised that she can match about half of them without my help. In the meantime, I also ordered a book called Before Five In A Row which is a preschool version of the Five in a Row curriculum. This is a literature based curriculum that takes a children's story book and you use it for five days in a row to discuss different things. For example, the type of art used in the illustrations. The Runaway Bunny uses both pen and ink sketching and water paints. This story is about a baby bunny who tells his mommy bunny he wants to run away. She has an answer for all the places he says he's going to run to and she will always be there for him. That brings up a mother's love for her child, etc. The book uses the word "Crocus" which is a flower Chloe had never heard of before. There are so many things to talk about when you read a book slowly and look closely at the pictures.

That brings us back to the lapbooks. As I was searching for more File Folder Games, I kept coming across references to lapbooks so I did a search for those. Wow! So many great, quality, free resources out there. The lapbooks round out the discussions that we have verbally. I will give examples. First you use file folders as well, but you can fold them differently and add more parts to them so they have extra flaps and such. They all fold back down to the original size so you can just file them away. The things included in our The Runaway Bunny lapbook are - the letter R and r and the word "rabbit", some story cards in a little pocket that tell "if/then" of all the situations in the story (the baby bunny says he'll turn into a bird and fly away, the mommy says she'll become a tree so he has a place to fly home to; so the pictures are of a bird and a tree and Chloe has to match them), a mini-book with a poem about a rabbit, examples of the two types of art used (I also added some of Chloe's art work), etc. We found different shapes on some of the pages so we talked about those, especially round (sphere, disc and circle). We went to Lowe's today and pick up some paint chips in different shades of green because the final colored picture in the book has several shades of green in it. I'm planning on helping Chloe make a collage to put in our lapbook. Can you tell I'm excited? As she gets older, she can help more with the cutting and pasting parts of the project. Eventually, the plan is for her to put her own lapbooks together.

I will eventually figure out how to add photos to this blog. Then I can just show you what I'm talking about!

Cleaning the house! Who, me?

Have you ever heard of The Flylady? If not, you can check her out at Flylady.com. She also has a Facebook page. One of the biggest parts of following her advice on organizing and cleaning is to do things in 15 minutes chunks of time. You can do anything for 15 minutes. I used to try to follow her advice about making a Control Journal for keeping routines but I found I focused more on creating the journal than using it to help me clean the house!

So years have gone by since I tried any of her suggestions. Recently, I've been having the urge to purge junk out of the house and get it more organized. Sort of like "Spring Cleaning" except in the Fall. The timing is perfect because we like to decorate for Christmas on the week-end after Thanksgiving. Well when I went to The Flylady on Facebook, I saw people playing a Flylady Bingo game. The idea is to make a list of 6 things you want to do in your house, laundry, dishes, etc. Then one person on the site volunteers to call a number. What ever number they call, you do the corresponding chore on your list for 15 minutes. When the timer goes off, you go check the site and see what number gets called next. Three numbers are called for the first 45 minutes. Then next next 15 minutes is a break. Then the last three numbers are called. I joined in a few days ago and it's really motivating and a lot of fun. I've been really seeing a difference in my house.

Sometimes I put a chore on my list more than one time. I learned after the first time I played that I finished the game with a lot of unfinished jobs. The next game I played I listed laundry three times because I had a lot of clean clothes to put away. I'm planning on playing another round this afternoon. Then nice thing is, you can jump into the game anytime you want. You don't have to wait for a new game to start. I figure 15 minutes worth of cleaning, organizing and purging junk is better than none!

If you struggle with being motivated to clean, this is a great way to make it fun! Even Chloe gets into it and wants to help me!

New to blogging

I decided to give blogging a try and see if I like it. So far, I'm having trouble changing the template on my page. My brain will probably be more clear in the morning so I guess I try to make changes tomorrow. I'm planning on blogging about anything I'm interested in at the time. Some things that are holding my attention right now are Preschool Homeschooling my 3 year old daughter Chloe, baking (especially cupcakes), looking for great coupons, and crafts (which include knitting, loom knitting and crocheting). We are also remodeling our home so there may be blogs about that too. I'll probably write about stuff like things we did or places we visited too. I guess we'll just have to see.