Field Trip

     Some times in the quest for fun and interesting things to do, it is easy to over look what is most convenient.  There is a wonderful little living history museum just a few miles from our house, but in the four + years we've been here I'd never been!  It took a co-op field trip for me to finally take the kids to a really cool educational place.

The house and outbuildings are furnished to evoke the period from 1795- 1840, which makes it especially neat if you have read books such as the Little House books or Understood Betsy.  It's fun to look around and say, I know what that is! So-in-so had one in this book. 

I didn't get to look around as much as I would have liked, since Samuel was obsessed with getting into the 200 year old cradle that was in the house.  He also can't pass by a chair without sitting in it, so a house full of chairs that he couldn't sit in was pure torture.  So as you can see from the pictures, most of my time was spent dragging Abriel around while trying to keep up with Samuel, who took particular interest in climbing the fence and running into the spring house.

At the end of the tour, the children dipped their own beeswax candle.  The smell of melted beeswax is heavenly.   Anna's candles came out a little crookidy, but I think it added to their artistic charm.  I found just the right candle holder for them, and they look delightful on out nature table.

Testing Time

     In compliance with our state law, Anna had her first annual National Standardized Achievement test yesterday.  Anna has never been tested for anything, ever, so I was curious (and I admit a little nervous) as to how she would do.  I didn't even do anything to prep her for it. We just kept on doing what we do, which is a very gentle, steady, no rush approach to learning.  It's definitely not "standard" , and so with taking a "Standardized" test I wondered if what she knew would show up on the test. 
     All said and done though, she did very well, which adds confidence for me to continue on with what we are doing.  Even if she had done, let's say "less than average" I probably would keep doing what we are doing, since I love it, but it's nice to have a little test score pat on the back.  I thought it was funny that one area where she didn't do as well, was story recall.  Considering the agony that is narration around here, I wasn't too surprised.  Eventually she will learn the art of narration, but for now, it's a bit like pulling teeth. 
     Anna is very different than me in many aspects, and it was never more apparent in seeing her calm confidence at getting ready to be tested.  It didn't seem to faze her one bit.  I was very proud.

Spring Is Here! Getting Back into Nature Walks

     With the return of warm weather has come the return of nature walks as well.  Saturday we went on a nature walk at a local bird sanctuary without even bringing the stroller!  The twins are really growing up. 

     There is a huge tree there that is more fun than any jungle gym.  The kids had a blast climbing around on it; I even climbed some. 
We did not see a single bird, (well, maybe a robin) but it was great getting out, getting muddy, and seeing things that we don't have in our back yard.

Our Island Story- The Founding of the Round Table

Spring Has Arrived at the Nature Table

     After a slow and awkward transition, our nature table has now been thoroughly transformed into spring.   The tree is still bare, as are the trees out side, but there is forsythia and daffodils blooming, moss growing, and a bean seed waiting to sprout.

     The bean in the jar is part of a nature study I did on germination with my co-op class.  Doing Charlotte Mason style nature studies with a class has been fun and challenging.  There are twelve little children ranging from kindergarten to second grade, so keeping everyone engaged and interested requires a lot of patients and an interesting subject matter.  The bean jars were a hit.

     A new little friend has just joined the nature table.  Even though he is a daddy bird, he has the job of keeping the eggs warm, since making a female cardinal was a little beyond me.  I actually started him to be in our winter table, but have just now managed to finish him.  Maybe if I start a robin now, I will get it finished in time for summer.  I made the nest as well, and the wooden eggs were given to me by my sister.  I have several real nests that I could use, (I went nest collecting this winter to show my nature class) but I could just envision several little hands strewing nest debris all over the house.  So for now the fake nest is better for us. 

     I have to admit that I think I am enjoying the nature table better than any one.  It has been so much fun thinking about what things to put on it to best reflect the season.

Glasses for Abriel

     It has been a really long while since I've written anything, but I'm ready to start writing again.  There's no specific reason for the break; I haven't been particularly busier than normal, maybe just more tired. 
     The big news today is that Abriel got her glasses today!  I am very glad that she can finally see, and she looks so durn cute in them too.   So, how did I figure out that my just turned two year old is having trouble seeing?  About a month after Anna's eye surgery, I started noticing Abriel's eye turning in.  At first I thought I was just paranoid; after all Anna just had surgery to correct her exotropia, so I was sort of on  the look out for wandering eyes.  However, it soon became apparent that this was definitely not my imagination.  Here's a picture of her with her eye going in.

     This is not even as extreme as it can get; some times going in so much you can hardly see her iris.  It's not just one eye either, the other one goes in too, and sometimes they cross together.  An appointment to the Ophthalmologist showed that she is very far-sighted and is crossing in an attempt to focus.  But really, other than the eye crossing, she seemed to see fine. 

     That was until she tried on her glasses.  At first she tried to take them off a couple of times, but then  I showed her a book.  She was so excited, she kept saying "Ooo, Eee, look!"  After that she kept them on.   Here she is in all her cuteness.

And the side view.

    
       She took them off a few times this evening, (I found them on her bear once) and has already bent them out of shape a little, (good thing I got that warranty!) but all in all I think she is so thrilled with being able to see that she wants them on.  She even cried when I took them off for her to go to bed.  She told me, "I want gwashes!"

     I haven't posted in a while because I have been BUSY finally getting the kids rooms switched around.  I kept waiting for a time when I could be in the house for a few hours by my self, but it started becoming apparent that even a couple of hours without kids was never going to happen.  So, I went ahead and dove in and packed up, and even through out, with the kids eagerly helping the whole time.  Anna was surprisingly amicable to having some of her things thrown out or put into storage, and I could not be happier with the new arrangement. 
     Here are the "before" photos.  This was pretty normal for both of their rooms.  Even with mandatory clean up every night, Anna's room would look like this before noon the next day.

     The twins have less stuff, therefore less mess, but definitely room for improvement.

     And now.... Tada!  The "after" photos.

     Now the sleeping room contains only beds and clothes.  It is a cinch to keep clean, and after the first night when Samuel kept saying, "Uh-oh Anna, uh-oh Anna."  they all sleep well together.  They also love the playroom, and since there isn't anything out that they all can't play with, fights have gone way down. Here's how it looks.

     Anna can keep the toys she doesn't want the little ones to get out of reach on the top shelf of the book shelf or on the shelf on the wall.  Her legos are in the closet, and papers and notebooks are in the little desk.  I have most of the books in a storage library.  They can get out new books when they want, but there can only be so many books out at once.  Almost every thing that can be put in a bin or a basket, is in one.  Yes, the room does get wrecked, but it can be cleaned very quickly too.   It feels great to have these two room free of clutter and easy to clean; it motivates me to conquer new areas in my house.  Maybe I'll tackle my craft supplies this weekend.  Yikes!

Five Things To Do With an Old Sweater

    I have several wool sweaters that had been accidentally felted, that I have hung on to for years, thinking that "someday" I would do something with them.  Well, I finally got a sewing machine a couple of months ago, and now I can't stop thinking of ideas for what to do with my old sweaters.   The first thing I made was backpacks for the twins for Christmas.

                                Here they are wearing them.  They love their "packpacks".
     Of course I had to make Anna something out of felt too, so I made her a brush roll to hold her paint brushes.

     The great thing about both of these projects is that they cost hardly anything.  I had to buy webbing and bias tape for the backpacks, but that's it.  The material on the brush roll is from an old sheet, and the pretty mother of pearl buttons are off of an old shirt. 

      I also made play food...

Mittens... (these have obviously been played in; just ignore the dirt)

And Anna made little mice.  Now if I could just find the time to make all the other felted sweater ideas I have.



Our Winter Nature Table

     I made our first nature table today; the purpose of it being a pretty place to display nature finds, and a fun way to reflect the seasons.  I wanted it to look like winter, so Anna and I closed our eyes and thought about what meant winter for us.  The most obvious thing was snow, (we have lots of that right now) so I put a white piece of cotton material down, and we cut paper snowflakes and stuck them to the window.  The next obvious thing was bare trees, and for that I put a couple of branches in a jar with some rocks to keep them in place.  The branches were a perfect place to hang glass icicles.  I've had these for years, but they never showed up much in the Christmas tree.  I didn't even bother to put them on this year, but they look beautiful in our little "tree".  Next we thought about animals that are out during the winter,  so a couple of wool mice Anna had made, a bunny, and an owl made it to the table.  Someday I will make a squirrel and a few birds, since that is undoubtedly what we have the most of.  The next step was to put our outdoor finds on the table, which were  pitifully few at this time of the year.  We did manage to find some pretty Lunaria and a few pine cones.  I also had acorns on hand that I put into a small bowl.  Voila!  Our finished nature table! 

     Here's the little bunny and mice getting ready to eat some acorns.  Someday I will also make a little cottontail, as we don't have any dutch rabbits hopping about here. 

    Our owl, being a finger puppet, was easy to set on a branch, although Anna says he looks uncomfortable. 
     I am sure we will be finding new things to put on our table all the time.

Nature Study/ Snowflakes

     We finally got the perfect snow for observing snow crystals.  Two things are necessary for that to happen. It must be super cold, and there can't be much wind.  This morning I looked outside and knew that this was "the" snow.  Ideally we should have gotten out there when the snow was still falling and we could have caught some flakes on black construction paper, but "ideally" rarely happens around here.  The sun was out by the time we got outside and it looked like the ground was covered in diamonds.  Every little snowflake was reflecting the sunlight.

     Although my camera by no means has the capabilities to capture a single snowflake, this picture gives an idea of how the snow looked.  Glittering isn't it? 
     And you could actually see little six pointed shapes!  I was eighteen before I saw my first perfect little snowflake.  I mean, you see pictures in books, and it's amazing and beautiful, but it doesn't compare to actually seeing a intricate, tiny snowflake yourself. 

     Our yard has been sprouting snowmen lately.  Anna is behind one of them, examining snowflakes that haven't begun to melt yet.

    That's one big icicle!  Actually, Anna finding this inspired me to go ahead and do something that I have been meaning to for quite some time.  We need a place to showcase our nature finds, and that also reflects the changing seasons, so today I made a Waldorf style nature table.  Unfortunately, the icicle could not be displayed, but I'm sure there will be plenty of more heat tolerant nature finds in the future.