Pipe Cleaner Earthworms

Last week I ran my annual preschool nature camp. Every summer for one week I run a small, morning only camp for 3 to 5 years at a local historical site. The beautiful grounds, gardens, and natural water sources give us lots of opportunities to explore nature. Unfortunately, the weather last week stumped me a little as there were several rainy mornings. However, one rainy morning lead us to the fun of exploring Earthworms!

Despite the rain, we got outside and looked through the gardens and mulch to find several different worms. And when we got back inside? We created these adorable pipecleaner earthworms. We also paired the experience and craft with several books about earthworms, which meant kids also learned several interesting facts about worms.

Dandelion Painting

It's that time of year again when now that the grass is green the dandelions are popping up too. I have to admit, even though I know they are a weed, there is something so summery about seeing those bright yellow bursts all over the yard.

Of course, the boys love to pick them. And in addition to picking them, we've discovered how great they are for painting with. They make awesome designs!

Easy Cardboard Bird Feeder

As we're solidly in the middle of winter, it is a great time to be thinking about the wild creatures who are surviving the winter outside. We decided to create some easy cardboard bird feeder treats to hang outside for the wild critters in our neighborhood.

If you've been reading our blog for a while now, you know we love projects that use materials you can easily find already at home or at a local store, and this project is definitely one of them. 

Fall Scavenger Hunt

On this chilly and rainy weekend, it's hard to remember back a week to the gorgeous fall days we've been having up until now. But, really, we've been pretty lucky this fall season. We've had so many incredible weather days.

It was on one of these beautiful days that the boys and I took a quick walk up a local trail after school. As we hiked we used this printable scavenger hunt to collect some fun fall items! 

Painting with Tennessee Dancing Gourds

It's that time of year when there's all sorts of fun fall materials around that are perfect for a variety of different projects. We love finding new ways to use different materials. So we were excited to be given a handful of these "Tennessee Dancing Gourds" grown in my school gardens.

The boys love how the gourds can spin like a top, they really get some great motion when they get going. Watching them spin gave me a great idea for painting. 

Red Leaf Suncatcher

September flew by - the return to school, the beginning of soccer season and gymnastics classes, and weekends full of birthday parties and family gatherings meant that we barely had time to be home. You may have noticed that we were pretty quiet on the blog during the month of September. Although we did have a little time to play, create, and learn our focus mostly pulled us in other directions.

So this week, when things finally calmed down, we were excited to wind up with an extra home day. Some beautiful weather and the arrival of the foliage season pulled us outside. 

While we were outside we found ourselves collecting tiny, red maple leaves off the ground. They were the perfect size for a paper plate suncatcher project. 

Forest Week (A Simple Summer Theme)

Among all of our Simple Summer Theme Weeks, this has to be one of the favorite ones so far. We're pretty lucky to live with a giant woods area right behind our house so we didn't have to travel far - yet each time we went into the woods I felt our energy change as a group.

In fact, the boys have continued to ask to go into the woods many other times this summer so that they can repeat some of the activities.

Stick Painting

We've done this project a few times this summer and I just love how they turn out every time, even though they are always a little different. Originally I had imagined they would look like trees as the kids painted them, but instead they always turn out a little more abstract.

But I also love how they are art created using found objects in nature which adds to their simplistic appeal. The materials are simple enough for many different age levels to explore!

Forest Scavenger Hunt (with free printable)

A few weeks ago we really enjoyed "Forest Week" in our Simple Summer Theme weeks. For the most part the boys truly just loved getting outside into the forest - which meant we could really keep things simple. (Which was in fact one of our July Monthly Goals.)

To kick off "Forest Week" on our first adventure into the woods the boys worked on this Forest Scavenger Hunt as we walked through the woods.

No only was this a great way to begin exploring the forest, it also gave us good opportunities to discuss textures and colors. 

Wildflower Color Science

This week we kicked off our Simple Summer Themes with Science Week. We've had a blast with a variety of science experiments and explorations, all using materials we have on hand.  For this experiment we were inspired to use something from nature: wildflowers.

I love that this time of year both in the yard and along the roads, flowers are blooming. The boys and I went for a walk the other day and collected several different varieties of white wildflowers with the classic flower dyeing experiment in mind. We were curious to see how it worked with wildflowers. 

10 Classic Ways to Enjoy Spring (April 2016 Monthly Goals)

Whether it's the unusual winter we just had, the sporadic temps we're still experiencing, or just a touch of late cabin fever - I am so ready for spring, a real spring, to arrive!

Something about this spring also has me thinking about those classic activities that families and kids get to experience during the warming spring months and I find myself just wanting to slow down and enjoy those experiences as much as we can. I'm sure some of this comes from the fact Big Brother turns 6 this month and officially is in the world of BIG KID. A time is going to come when we're more focused on sports, school, and friends and have even less time for these family focused moments.

So for my April Monthly Goals I've come up with 10 classic ways we can enjoy spring as a family. (Although of course I'm still chipping away at my January goals of organizing household clutter, my February Goals of using the crockpot more, and my March Goals of fitting in more exercise for myself.)

Fall Textures Basket

There's something about November that is so drab and brown, but yet also can be really pretty. Recently Little Brother and I had the chance to get out for a walk just the two of us. Because the weather was beautiful and sunny the dried plants, leaves, and trees really captured our eyes. We love finding ways to explore nature connections, especially when we take a walk. 

This time we brought the materials home with us to create a Fall Textures Basket, an easy way to create some toddler sensory play. 

Nature Objects: Sink or Float Exploration

The last few weeks have been so hot weather wise that it's been a little hard to get into the mood for autumn and we've been finding ourselves thinking back to summer fun. One activity we've enjoyed on hot days in the past is doing a Sink or Float exploration. 

For this exploration we took it outside and collected items from nature to experiment with. 

Painting with Acorns

You may have noticed it's been a quiet few weeks here. Adjusting to our new schedules and a minor illness have definitely left us a little thrown off the last few weeks. But despite our quiet front here online, we are still finding a few moments to craft and create.

One great aspect of our new schedules is that Little Brother and I have a few hours a week that's just the two of us. This is a first for us and we're both enjoying it! It's been fun to think of some projects that are geared just for him.

As we slip into fall this acorn painting was an easy and fun toddler project.

We were inspired by our post a few weeks ago on 35+ Fall Painting Ideas to try painting in a new way, using something simple we could already find in our yard this month. 

4 Ways to Explore Symmetry at Home

We're really excited to be participating in the Cool Maths series hosted by Peakle Pie, which is continuing for the entire month of July. Each day this month bloggers in this series will be sharing great and practical ideas for how to explore math at home, and make it fun!

We're often doing math at home, sometimes as a project or game but more often it is just part of our daily experiences and conversations.

This week we started exploring symmetry. To introduce the topic, we explored it in four different ways.

Symmetry is a geometry term. The symmetry we explored focused on the idea that a shape or object can have a line of symmetry. When an object is folded in half, or you visualize a line going down the center of an object, you can see that the other half exactly matches or mirrors the first half. 

Clothespin Dragonflies

Big Brother has asked me to organize "theme weeks" this summer, which makes me laugh as I'm starting to think he might be a future teacher in the making. Or, at least a camp counselor. I'm trying to approach our weeks with enough projects and activities to make it seem like a theme to him, but also enough freedom to make it still seem like summer for me.

Our first theme was "Bugs." We did several simple bug explorations and activities, but one of my favorites were these adorable clothespin dragonflies.

Dandelion Sun Catcher

A few weeks ago we shared our Dandelion Soup play invitation, which was a great way to use some of the dandelions in our yard. Of course, after the dandelions turned to seed, we couldn't use them in quite the same way. Instead, we created a couple of these Dandelion Sun Catchers.

Several times now we've made paper plate sun catchers from nature as inspired by these nature collage paper plate sun catchers from Hands On: As We Grow. 

Pretend Play: Dandelion Soup

We've been having a lot of fun sharing images over on Instagram lately, so you may have already caught a preview of this activity earlier this week.

It's dandelion season, and despite my husband's best efforts, they are popping up all over our yard. I'd been waiting for a hot day to set up this pretend play invitation with a nature connection. It was also great water play for a hot afternoon on the deck.

I love finding simple ways to play with things we have on hand. Before we started playing I set up a bunch of kitchen materials that the boys could use to pretend to make soup with. I also had the boys pick a large container of dandelions, including stems and some leaves. 

Invitation to Build: Create a Dam

As Big Brother is getting older it's really interesting to see both his interests and skills develop into more specific skill sets. Lately he's been really interested in the building of things (mostly stemming from a love of Legos, Magnatiles, and our wooden railroad track.) As he leans that way I'm finding myself looking for other creative ways to develop those interests and skills.

A few weeks ago he had the chance to observe a beaver dam up close with my husband on one of their nature walks. This lead to some great questions. A few days later I followed up with a drive to a local man made dam which he was able to inspect from a distance.

When we came home I set up this building investigation in the yard. It was inspired by a great tinfoil river activity we did last year from the amazing book 101 Kids Activities That Are the Bestest, Funnest Ever by the team over at Kids Activities Blog. 

Frog Pond Playdough

Truly one of my favorite sounds in the world is the sound of the spring frogs in the woods around our home, especially that first night I hear them as it means spring is here. I was pretty excited to notice it for the first time last week. So now that the frogs are here, it means it's time for the boys and I to start exploring the world of frogs.

We started that exploration by reading a few books and playing with some frog pond playdough this week.