Greening Sam and Avery

cling wrap is not a substitute for contact paper (kids craft with flowers)

Well, I found this awesome craft project and knew we had to try it out. Our neighbors rose bush has been dropping beautiful pink petals that we have been using in our mud kitchen but we have been wanting to craft with them as well. 

However, our grocery store did not have contact paper and I don't keep that on hand. I thought I would try out cling wrap (saran wrap) to see if that would work. It does but there is a lot more steps and issues that make the project way more challenging!

Anyway, we used pressed leaves, fresh petals, pressed flowers, glue, rubber cemet, paper plates and cling wrap. 

I cut a big hole out of the paper plate and then glued one layer of cling wrap to the back. Then Sam and Avery placed leaves and flowers in the middle. They weren't sticking very well (or at all!) so we started adding a small dab of rubber cemet to each leaf or flower. Then we placed another layer of cling wrap on top, gluing it to the plate. 

I cut off all the extra cling wrap, punch a hole in the plate and then hung them up!

Avery lost interest right away. The cling wrap got caught on her fingers and the leaves and petals were tough for her to pick up. Sam finished one and then lost interest. But I left the supplies out and right before lunch she came back and wanted to make a few more. The cling wrap just added too many other steps to the process, steps that Sam really couldn't help with. At age 4 she likes to do as much of the craft as she can and this one was tricky for her.

If you head over to For the Children their process is much easier and more child friendly than the way we did this project!  

 

 

flower planting day

Our veggie garden has been a bit of a bust so far this year. I tried to use some of last year's seeds for onions and carrots which so far has not produced any sprouts. But we have also planted beans, more onions and lettuce and are hoping that those will sprout in the next day or two. 

To make us feel better today we filled all of our pots with beautiful flowers! The girls got to pick out (some) of the flowers without any guidance or coaching from us so we got some that I wasn't expecting but it has lead to very interesting and fun pots around the house. 

The girls got to help with all the planting and filling of pots. We were very excited this year to fill our pots with soil from our own compost bin! No store bought potting soil for us this year. We did occassionally get a few egg shells in our pots which the girls thought was hilarious. 

After all the plants were potted then came their favorite part...the watering!

Happy flower planting! 

MY mother's day

How I wanted to spend today might be a bit different from what other moms did today. But it was an AWESOME day and I did exactly what I wanted to. 

There was water play in our new pool, 

and it was a bit cold but the girls still has a blast!

I tackled a patch of stinging nettles that will hopefully be our pumpkin patch! 

The grass got cut! And I didn't have to do it!

I weeded the strawberry bed and admired the beautiful blooms that have suddenly appeared. 

And we planted a tree! Well, transplanted it really. This small maple tree was in a different part of our yard, being choked out by a larger bush so we decided to try and move it to save it. I don't know if it will make it because we couldn't get a lot of roots, but we will see. 

If this one doesn't make it we have decided we will buy a small tree to put in this spot. We need a bit more shade in our yard and are hoping that we can save this small tree tree and not have to buy one, but we will see. 

We ended the day with a great dinner, reading time and cuddles. 

It was a great outdoor day full of productivity, fun and laughter. What could be better than that?

Hope you all had a great Mother's Day!

outdoor play link - guide to keeping kids happy at a garage sale

I am no expert since over the last two days we have had plenty of tears, falls and at times crabby kids. BUT myself and several other moms have certainly learned some valuable lessons about how to keep littles ones happy while at the same time trying to make money by selling your stuff at a garage sale. 

So I am passing along our wisdom!

1. Keep them outside because it wears them out and leads to excellent naps! While a movie or tv shows might keep them happy for a while indoors it will also not use up much energy. And you won't have eyes on them while you are outside at the garage sale. Outdoor play is your best option!
2. Bubbles. Don't stress over the spills. Give each child their own bottle. Have back up bottles in case someone drops or spills immediately. Challenge them to see who can blow the biggest bubble, get their bubble to float the longest, blow a bubble while running, blow a bubble while spinning, etc. 
3. Sidewalk chalk. Tell the kids you need their help to attract customers. Have them draw bright colorful pictures along the sidewalk and driveway. Games like hopscotch, drawing the whole alphabet or tic-tac-toe can also be great ideas. 
4. Yard games. If your garage sale is mostly in the garage and driveway then hopefully you have some grassy area for the kids to play games like ladderball, washers, horseshoes, etc. Plastic kid versions of these games are commonly available at many stores for smaller kids too. 
5. Lemonade Stand/Bake Sale. Let your kids take part in the selling of stuff and have them make a little money of their own. They can decorate a cash box, decorate the sign, learn how to run the stand and then be the seller at the stand taking care of customers. 
6. Let them play with the toys that you are selling. Some people might disagree with this but old toys that your kids don't play with anymore may have new appeal when they are brought outside and suddenly up for grabs by other people. But be sure to tell them that even though they are playing with them right now they will still go home to somebody else's house today! 

We wanted to put up a sprinkler as well and I think water play could be a great way to keep them entertained but it was not warm enough for us to do that today. And it could be a pain if you don't have enough distance between the water and the merchandise. 

For some other great outdoor play ideas and some very cute poetry about outdoor play be sure to check out "A Stick is an Excellent Thing; Poems Celebrating Outdoor Play" by Marilyn Singer!

 

Now on to the party!

A few guidelines for the party...

- Any kind of children's outdoor play-related posts are welcome!

- If you'd like us to further share your post (e.g., on Facebook/ Twitter/ Pinterest), please just include a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play!

- Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back.

- Each time we will feature an activity from the previous party. 

- By contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished. 

Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week! The linky goes live every second Friday at 12:01 GMT+1

 

 

postponing a post

I am engrossed in garage sale madness today/tonight so my apologies but a post will not be going up for the outdoor play party for a few days! It is actually kind of nice to be SO unplugged. 

BUT if you want to join the party you should stop by

The Golden Gleam

Mama Pea Pod

Learning For Life

Enjoy!

gardening report (gardening with kids)

We are in the middle of yard sale/garage sale madness at this house! Five families have dropped off stuff at my house to be sold Thursday through Saturday. The kids (mine plus three other friends) will have a lemonade and cookie stand too! 

But in the midst of pricing, organizing, and setting up to sell all of our junk, I mean slightly used wonderful stuff, we had to do some planting.

First off I just wanted to ask if any gardeners have ever seen Rhubarb that looks this THIS!

Should I harvest it? Is it suppose to flower like that? What do I do with those really long stalks? Any advice you have on harvesting rhubarb would be AWESOME! Please leave a comment. 

Today we planted yellow onions, romaine lettuce, yellow beans and bush beans. The girls had a great time taking turns to plant with their dad. 

 Our method for having the girls help is to hand them a few seeds and then we point to where the seed should go and they put it in. Once all the seeds are planted we work together to push the soil back over the seeds. I imagine this is a pretty common way of having little kids plant row crops.

Sam, at age 4, is already pretty good at handling the smaller seeds (carrots, onions, etc.) but Avery is just on her first planting year to be involved so she just helped with the bigger bean seeds.

Beans are, in my opinion, some of the best plants to grow with young kids. The seeds are big and easy to handle. The seeds sprout fairly quickly so that they don't have to be patient for too long. The beans are easy to pick off and a great immediate snack in the yard. My girls both loved helping to pick the beans last year and I know this year they will get just as into the process.

To see a list of other great plants to grow with your little ones head over here. And be sure to check out the book "Roots, Shoots, Buckets and Boots"  by Sharon Lovejoy. It is an awesome resource for gardening with kids. 

How is your gardening going so far this year?  And WHAT do I do with my rhubarb?!

watercolors to capture the flowers

Nana's backyard is filled with flowers. 

As described by a four year old there are yellow spikey ones, 

purple ones with five parts,

orange ones that just look like lots of circles, 

and pink hanging down ones. 

So to try and capture all the beautiful flowers in the backyard we got out our watercolors today. And painted out on the deck. 

These are super simple sets, they actually came with coloring books (like Dora and Tinkerbell) but then we save the paints long after the book as all been used up. 

Even though we walked around looking at the flowers, talking about their shapes and colors, Sam did not really translate that onto the page. She wanted to use blue paint, so suddenly there were blue flowers in Nana's backyard! 

Oh well, we had great conversations about the flowers anyway. And painting is always fun. 

Even I got into it!

I have no artistic skills but Sam just loves to see me paint with her. And I always find it very soothing. 

A great way to spend some quality time while Avery was still napping. 

 

bring on the boots

Between taking Sam to school, doing laundry, packing the car and mulitple other tasks Avery and I stole a few minutes to go find some puddles in our boots! 

Our yard did not have the big puddles that it normally does after a storm (woohoo for rain barrels and new landscaping! shhh don't tell the girls that I am preventing their puddles!) BUT that did not stop Avery from hunting for them. 

And possibly the best part of having rain barrels is being able to indulge your daughter when she says "mommy can you make me a river?".  

With not much watering happening in the garden yet I knew we wouldn't run out of water in the rain barrels before the next rain storm. So why not make a river?!  

I mean really, what could be more fun then having your own little river to walk in? 

Our rain barrel makes play in the mud kitchen, water table, creating rivers, puddles and allowing the girls to water whatever they want whenever they want totally possible and for this going green momma comletely guilt free! I love that. 

Have you stomped in a puddle with your little one lately? Why not make your own puddle just for stomping? Get a rain barrel and you can make one whenever you want. 

Just wanted to check in to see if others were keeping up with the 2012 goal of playing outside everyday. We haven't missed a day yet and I am working really hard to make sure our backyard is ready for LOTS of continuous outdoor play this summer. I can't wait to get all my projects done and be able to share with you lots of ideas for backyard outdoor play to fill your summer days! Let me know how your everyday outdoor play is going. 

preschool butterfly books

I was all about my butterfly program last week. Which of course in this house meant a trip to the library! 

So, this week the girls are really enjoying reading and having me read to them all about butterflies. 

From Caterpillar to Butterfly, Deborah Heiligman

This is a great little story about a class of kids that get the chance to raise butterflies. It presents great information about butterflies but also shares the story of the kids in the classroom and what the process was like for them. The pictures are cute and there are some simple  butterfly images in the back that can help with identification. 

Animal Lives: Butterflies, Sally Morgan

This is not a story book so it may not hold the attention of many preschoolers but it is a great resource to have on hand for those random questions that preschoolers love to ask that you may not know the answer to. There is tons of information about the natural history of many different kinds of butterflies and beautiful pictures!

A Monarch Butterfly's Life, John Himmelman

This is a perfect first butterfly book for little ones. It keeps the story very simple and the images are greatly enlarged so that young ones can really see the the body parts of details of the caterpillars and butterflies. The one sentence per page is just enough information to be informative but also hold a young child's interest!

Are You a Buttefly?, Judy Allen and Tudor Humphries

This butterfly book is kind of a silly approach to an informational kid's book. The author treats the reader as if you are trying to figure out if you are a butterfly! The text is informational, but also light-hearted and a good read. 

And lastly, I wanted to share a "big kid" book. Sam and I found this one in the Early Reader section of our library, which is where she has been finding a lot of great books lately. 

Butterfly Fever, Lori Haskins

This is a early reader paperback book. It focuses on how monarchs migrate. The story is about a little girl and her class at school that track the monarch butterflies as they move across the country. Then the town that they are living in has a big festival when the butterflies arrive. The story is informational but also really fun and a great read! 

 

Lots of great butterfly books to check out! Enjoy. 

outdoor play link up - nature discoveries

If you want your little ones to have an appreciation for the outdoors simply make some nature discoveries. In your own backyard just start looking around for the little things that are amazing. Creating a child that has a love of nature, the backyard kind of nature to the big beautiful mountains kind of nature, starts with showing them the nature that they walk past everyday. 

So head out and try a few of these...

look inside a nest, 

 lift up a rock, 

find a treasure, 

watch a bird catch a worm, (the birds were much closer to us, and we got to see one pull up a worm, but then they quickly flew away as we grew close)

create a natural restuarant, 

catch something in a creek, 

float something on a quick current, 

or simply dig a hole to bury something!

 

Feature of the Week!

I just couldn't pick. There were two mommas that rocked my world this week with their awesome play and inspiring ideas. Growing Play: One Step Further had an awesome competition going on at her house...who can stay outside the longest! Genius!!

  

And Frog, Goose and Bear had the most amazing camping trip! I would love to be a kid in this family. Who wouldn't love to have a sculpter in the family that can just whip up some great works of art on a camping trip? 

Go and check out these great posts if you haven't seen them already! Thanks ladies for linking up. You are going to have some outdoor loving kids that will turn into outdoor loving grown-ups! 

 

Now on to the party!

A few guidelines for the party...

- Any kind of children's outdoor play-related posts are welcome!

- If you'd like us to further share your post (e.g., on Facebook/ Twitter/ Pinterest), please just include a link back to this post (either in your post or sidebar) to help us spread the word about the importance (and fun!) of outdoor play!

- Please feel free to grab the Outdoor Play Party button from the sidebar and/or include a text link back.

- Each time we will feature an activity from the previous party. 

- By contributing you are giving permission for an image and link to your post to be republished. 

Share your ideas for outdoor play activities with us every other week! The linky goes live every second Friday at 12:01 GMT+1