Early Ed ~ I Spy Bottle for Logan

My friend over at Her Cup Overfloweth made this last week and I couldn't wait to try it. Everything about it I already had. I used a large tall quart mason jar... I know it's glass, but they really are sturdy and I don't keep plastic around much (even Logan has glass drinking glasses).

First I wandered around and picked up tiny things. I have an obsession with tiny things so it took all of about 4 minutes to gather the things up for this jar. In there I have tiny things like carrots, milk jugs, and wooden books from their doll house stuff (anyone who wants to see my craftiest crafts... check out the doll house pictures), tiny shells and stones from the nature table stuff, small rocks and heart shaped glass pebbles, a tiny clothes pin, a couple of glass marbles that had peace signs and quotes on them (for the older kiddos), and a sweet little glow in the dark frog. Then I filled the jar 3/4 of the way with short grain rice. At first I over filled it, thinking that it would be better, but it really doesn't uncover the stuff quite as well when there isn't a bunch of headroom, so if you try this, bare that in mind.

After that, it just takes mixing it up for a few minutes, giving it to a toddler and watching the delight!

Logan had a blast with it. He spent about a half an hour just turning it and looking for the frog. He would find the rock and I swear he called it three different things. One was "a bug!". lol! It certainly was a perfect Eco-friendly craft.

Muffin Tin Monday ~ Unit study on Apples and Peanuts

Top Row: Cyan's strawberry Applesauce, toast with Alex's peanut butter, string cheese (trying to balance the meal).

Bottom Row: Apple cider (homemade), watermelon (first from the west coast), celery with Alex's peanut butter.

Muffin Tin Monday at Her Cup Overfloweth this week was Make Your Own Theme Week! As with all things for us, we made it into a big fat homeschool lesson! This morning the kids woke up to notes for school that said that we were going to make peanut butter and applesauce! The kids were really excited and finished their morning chores quickly, wanting to move on to the 'fun school stuff'. :)

I had gotten books on both George Washington Carver (the 'inventor' of peanut butter) and Johnny Appleseed, and then a speical treat... the PBS special on Johnny Appleseed with Shelly Duval, Martin Short, and Molly Ringwald. Cyan and Alex made everything themselves with me standing their giving direction (I like to take over, so this was a challenge for me too).

We finished up a very busy baseball week on Saturday. The Jr. High season is now done and Tabor has another JV game on Tuesday. So that will give everyone a week off before summer ball starts. Only 13days of school left and summer will be in full swing. The 1st football camp at the U of Mn starts June 20Th at 7:30 am.

Cyan's newest fairy house

Tucked away in the corner of my yard, every now and then, pops up a magical fairyland.

This time she asked me to help her make the fairies a swing:

Kevin & Kinsey's 2nd grade play

This was Kinsey's part in the 2nd grade play. She's a red robin (in case you were wondering)

This was Kevin's part. Isn't he a great little singer?!?! The play was very well done. All the kids did a super job.

Plants, visitors and fun with books

All our experiments. The hydroponics plants and coffee plants are my personal plant experiments (like for the last two years), but then comes Cyan's apple seedling, a cutting from my grandma's old plant that grows REALLY slow, and our egg shell herb garden. All the egg shell garden got planted in big pots yesterday. It was starting to really outgrow it's shells. ;)

This is my teacher friend Carley... she came to visit with her family and goodness it was nice to visit with her! The kids loved dragging her around the house showing her all their favorite stuff, and of course, the kittens. Her son Sam was quite enamored with the babies.

More and more lately, this is where I find Logan. I think it is just so sweet!

Photo Friday