Spring Hunt

Desperate for better weather to come and noticing the nights lighter and the days sometimes sunny three intrepid adventures when on a hunt for Spring! Armed with cameras (and a scooter!) they set off to collect the evidence that Spring is starting.

 The journey took them to the woods at the top of the hill where they listened for the sounds of Spring, some birds were heard singing a song or two but as yet there are no nests to be found and the trees remain 'naked' as Bug Boy (6yrs) described them. 

Wait a minuet, what have these two adventurers Book Worm (8yrs) and Little Boy Blue discovered? The trees have grown and new bark appears also buds upon the branches are a promised sign that the trees and bushes will soon be clothed in fresh green leaves.

Our first true piece of evidence that Winter is nearing its end are these beautiful Snowdrops that pop up all around.

Struggling to break through even in stony ground are the odd Crocus or two, they start to paint a colourful picture that we can't wait to see.

Even one lone Daffodil was captured by camera shining in the sun and many more bulbs seemed to shy or cold and wait to explode like bright yellow suns!

Normally our adventurers know to leave the wild flowers alone but in all the excitement Little Boy Blue who is still not yet a 'fully qualified' adventurer pulled one out to have a closer look! 

  

So it seems that the intrepid adventurers weren't chasing shadow after all but they did find some anyway! lol

Note: Most of the photos and words used in this post belong to and are the work of Book Worm & Bug Boy who also wish you to know that this adventure continues and more evidence will be gathered in due course. Thank you.

Blogolicious

Do you blog hop?

I do a bit of blog hopping! In this day and age who doesn't? Whatever the reason - looking for ideas, finding like minded people, making connections, to encourage fellow bloggers or to see whats happening outside my own 4 walls there is always something out there on the world wide web! 

Being a newbie at blogging I sometimes feel a little intimidated by other blogs but am never the less grateful and appreciative for the hard work that has gone into them. I have decided to do a regular feature reviewing blogs I follow and calling it Blogolicious! 

First up is a blog that I have followed for a long time:

 1+1+1=1 http://www.1plus1plus1equals1.net/

Who?

This blog is by Carisa a mum to three kiddies (2 boys & 1 girl), a wife, a home schooler, a former school teacher in the US and part of a full time inner city missionary family. 

What?

Carisa shares aspects of her family life and home school journey capturing it with some beautiful photography. She has used her teaching past to develop some wonderful resources a lot of which can be downloaded FREE (music to a home schooling mums ears)! All the printable resources are easy to download and explained well with posts of when and how Carisa and her family use them.

The blog is set out in an appealing easy to use format, the main categories are at the top of the home page which also drop down to give subcategories. As I said before there is a wealth of knowledge here and lots of content, there is a search option if you are looking for something specific or a search by category down the side.

Where?

http://www.1plus1plus1equals1.net/

Why?

The blog has adapted and grown over the years I have followed it, the aspects that draw me are: 

It follows a home schooling family.

Is filled with a wealth of knowledge and resources for educating your children.

Has organisational tips.

A hands on approach to learning. 

This blog has wide appeal and could be visited by home schooling mums, mums with toddlers/pre schoolers, childminders and teachers in school settings to mention a few.

Tips

1. Carisa openly shares her faith on her blog which if you don't share you may not look any further but please be open minded and look on. 

2. Make sure the first time you visit the site you have some free time to explore all that it has to offer as it is filled with lots of gems. 

3. WARNING - be prepared you will love, love, love her printable resources and want to download and print them all! Make sure you have plenty of paper and ink, lol.

I hope you enjoy Carisa's blog 1+1+1=1( http://www.1plus1plus1equals1.net/ ) as much as I do.

Make Your Own - Colour Pattern Activity

No Toddle Table Tuesday this week because we were away but I did make the following colour pattern activity for Little Boy Blue and his busy bag collection and wanted to share it with you to prove that anyone can 'make' activities for their children, this one was so easy.

Supplies:

Card. (from my own supply)

Bottle tops. (£1 for Willko)

 Self adhesive Coloured Dots. (98p for Supersave)

Instructions:

1. Measure and cut out strips of card, make as many as you want and adjust length depending on how complex a patten combination you desire.

2. Stick the self adhesive colour dots in different combinations onto the cards.

3. Stick the self adhesive colour dots on to the inside of the bottle tops.

4. Once the cards and bottle tops are made put in a ziplock bag and add to your busy bag collection.

The object of this activity is to help little ones with colour recognition and introduce the idea of patterns, the child covers each dot on the card with the same coloured bottle top. 

One thing I would suggest is if your little one is like Little Boy Blue make enough colour tops to cover every activity card, I had originally made enough tops for a few activity cards thinking they could be taken off and reused for the next card but as you may see in the photo he wanted to cover all the dots on all the cards!

The bottle tops could be used for lots of different activities like dividing into colour groups, as a manipulative for counting/graphing or as play pieces for board games. Let your imagination run wild and let me know what you come up with.

Testing Comfort Zones!

One of our activities last week even tested Little Boy Blues 'comfort zone'! 

Sensory Art Activity

This week I introduced a product that was not only new to Little Boy Blue but to myself too, PlayFoam! PlayFoam is made from tiny polystyrene balls that are coloured and stick together a bit like Rice Krispies mixed with melted marshmallows! It is also quite a 'clean' product to use so appealed to me due to the lack of mess. It can also be reused and apparently never dries out. Our 'kit' came with feathers, pom poms, goggly eyes, sticks, gems and pipe cleaners.

This did give me an idea for a Krispies & Marshmallows eatable sensory activity, so come back and see what I come up with.

Bugs & Beasties

A friend notified me of a ZooLab (http://www.zoolabuk.com/) visiting our area and we booked into a session, it was for ages 5 to 12 years so unfortunately Little Boy Blue was too young to attend. Book Worm and Bug Boy had a great time especially Bug Boy, they held a Giant Millipedes & Hissing Cockroaches, touch a Gecko, Boa Constrictor & Monitor Lizard and got to see a Tarantula & Scorpion. Mummy however was a little less impressed but Bug Boy now wants a pet Giant Millipede, I suppose it beats the Giant (bat eating, poisonous) Scolopendra that he did want!

The Beach Isn't Just For Summer

We Scots are known for stripping down to our summer clothes at the first sign of sun but even we weren't that silly on a dry, sunny but winters day however we did head to the beach!

Daddy used this as an opportunity to give the boys a practical example on how irrigation works which is a subject they have been learning about while studying Ancient Mesopotamia in History. 

We also went for a paddle in the water (in wellingtons) and did some beach art.

Painting

Painting is one of the things I dread but I thought why not bite the bullet and go for it! So I set out some paints in tubs on the plastic table in the kitchen, we then painted some stones we gathered and on some paper. Then came the dilemma where to dry it but I think I came up with a great solution, what do you think?

While we were painting I discovered that even some things are beyond Little Boy Blues 'comfort zone'. I went to paint his hand to do hand prints, well you would have thought I'd slit his wrists instead of painting his hand the screams that came out of such a little fella!!! Mummy also didn't enjoy following the little painted fingers around the house as Little Boy Blue tried to do a runner. 

So it looks like Little Boy Blue may be more like his mother than I thought! 

Have you wondered what other activities can you do if your child doesn't like getting their hands dirty or mummy doesn't like them getting dirty? If you have followed my posts then you will know I generally look to do low mess activities and will continue to post about what we do but Mummyology a blog I follow also have a few suggestions: http://www.mummyology.co.uk/2013/02/5-hands-on-ideas-for-kid-who-hates.html 

Enjoy x 

Happy Valentines

We don't go in for the whole Valentines thing in our house, I believe we should show love as often as we can. As things become more and more commercialised and twisted for the sake of the almighty pound/dollar/euro whatever currency you have, the more I find myself pulling away from it. However here are some of the ways we express our love as a family. 

Seeing signs of love all around us

Random acts:

A rose from the garden picked for mummy.

A gift sent from a friend.

My husband getting tickets to a special football match for my Dad.

Me abseiling for a cancer charity following the death of my Aunt from cancer.

Sharing Together:

Make, read, play and laugh.

My husband and I worked on painting a tea pot together, he painted one side while I painted the other. It looks as if it has a split personality but who said that doing something together means doing the same?

Capturing acts of love & kindness:

Lots of Hugs & Kisses:

These are only a few snippets from our lives there are just way too many to post, another way I am trying to show my love to my children is by doing things they love but I dislike. Wait till you see this weeks post on what got me 'out of my comfort zone' which I hope to post on Friday!