Thursday, June 25, 2009
Adding to the Summer School fun...and a baby shower gift
Adding to the Summer School fun...and general funYou know me, I have a hard time sticking to just one plan. I like to do a few things spur of the moment. I like to infuse a little 'homeschooling on the fly' into my life. It can be a curse, sometimes, but mostly, it's just fun.Ok, got a great email from The Long Thread....OH. MY. GOODNESS. If you haven't checked out her site, or signed up for updates on her blog, get over there now...just stop reading my drivvel and get over there. She shares such cool ideas it's just amazing. The sharing I received today was on 50 Summer Crafts For Kids...lots of links to a collection of great ideas for summer projects to have fun with. Sort of a carnival of summer ideas. After finding tons of cool projects we can do during these hot and humid days, I checked out her archives of Crafts for Kids and found these (among about a hundred other great ideas!) Those paper stars would be such fun to do and have a start exchange with our postcard buddies. And just hanging them all over to brighten up things. Gifts for Grandma. oh, the places you could use those pretty little things!! We are definitely going to make a bunch of them.  Along the same bent, we found these too -- what a cute gift idea. And a Fabric Butterfly Mobile...and some pretty Paper Butterflies...Ok...well...there's plenty more to keep you busy making all sorts of neat crafts this summer. We've signed up for the Nim's Island CurrClick Live class that starts July 8th and runs for 8 weeks. They offer so many Live Classes at CurrClick...and so many good resources. It's worth checking out the fun there, too. We found the book at Amazon for next to nothing and ordered it as well, and while we wait on it to arrive, we'll just check it out at the library. Hope it turns out to be a great read-aloud! And we have 2 nightgowns finished now, and I'm moving along to the baby shower gifts...that diaper cake for sure, made from cloth diapers and plenty of fun burpies, and maybe some of those fabric butterflies for fun, and a couple of receiving blankets and changing pads. And I'm definitely decorating the cake with some ideas from the sites shared below...like the baby sock roses. Here are some tutorials on make the Diaper Cake: About.com Diaper Cake How to make a Diaper Cake this one is to buy a video, but the photo's will give you lots of decorating ideas A YouTube Video for a Diaper Cake How to Make a Diaper Cake |
Wednesday, June 24, 2009
Summer School Adventures Starting
Summer School Adventures starting...What do you do when the heat index passes 100? You take a field trip to a park and do some nature exploring, of course :o) Yes, I've been known to be a bit insane at times. Man, it was hot. It was beyond hot. Way off yonder on the other side of hot and muggy. Way. Off. Beyond.I know -- I've been here in Mississippi for 4 years now, and we've made a few drives down the Natchez Trace, mostly as a by-pass kind of trip, but nothing really in-depth -- nothing you'd even call skimming the history even. But, that's about to change for this homeschooling brood. We spent about an hour in the park, checking out the swings and playground fun, then walked around the 'lake' there and found all sorts of things...the sun-drenched playground, some hungry geese who thoroughly enjoyed our bread, a hidden Muscovey nest under the wooden band shell, lots of interesting tree shapes to add to our notebooks, even several trees with lines/rows of markings (wood peckers maybe? I'm not a nature person so maybe someone else knows what they are...lines and lines up the trunks as far as we could see, little tiny holes that don't realy go very deep), and the biggest bullfrog I've ever seen in my life. Maybe I just don't get out much, but that baby was huge, let me tell you. I had to sort of lean way over, hanging on a tree limb and squatting down and stretching out my cell phone to get his picture way up under the brush and tree swamp stuff.       And on the way home, we took The Trace (to by-pass Tupelo traffic really) and decided as we were already dripping with Mississippi summer heat, we might as well stop at a couple roadsides and check them out. We walked the trails around the Chickasaw Village site, and the Olde Town Lookout site. Then we pulled into the Visitor Center there at the Tupelo exit. Can't believe I've wasted 4 years not stopping in there! I could spend alot of time and several chunks of the school book budget in there. All manners of books covering the history of the area, the history of the Trace itself, tthe Indian tribes from the area, Civil War sites around, etc. Tons of stuff. I'm going to see what I can find online to get us started with the summer long unit study.   We may even join their Junior Rangers Program, and starting this weekend, we'll make the rounds with their Pioneer Day and their Dulcimer Day they offer each month. We are even taking our dulcimer along for some lessons. I'd like to take a trip and follow the entire 444 miles of The Trace, stopping at all the side areas along the route itself. For now, we will contend with looking through WebRangers and then see what we can gather this coming weekend at the Pioneer Day gathering. I think we can even tie in our Trail Guide to U.S. Geography studies as well -- doing a virtual tour of the various National Parks online, and meeting up with online folks from those areas. Of course, you know me...I like my curriculum...I found this the other day, and I would like to given it a try, too. Looks interesting. But...the last thing I need to is to be tossing another iron in my fire, heh? We'll have more than enough read-aloud material after visiting The Trace Visitor Center again this weekend! shhh...don't tell Dewey I'm adding even more curriculum...let's surprise him :o) |
