YIPPEE!!! I got a new laptop!!! After weeks of fighting with the old one and then over a week without one at all, I am so relieved! No more fighting The Hubby and Cailey and Colin over the desktop! LOL
I was taking to Cailey and Colin yesterday about what they wanted to do next in science. Colin says, “I want to be a mad scientist! I want to mix stuff together!” Ok, chemistry it is! 😉
This post is all about the hands on of chemistry. The more technical stuff (with printables and all that) will come later. Right now I just want to introduce them to the fun side of it and learn that way. 😉
We will be using this book.
There are TONS and TONS of science experiments books out there. Search your library system, you are sure to find more than enough. 😉
SHEW!! We have been busy little elves around here! The kids have been making things left and right! I have to keep thinking up new things to keep them busy!
We made cardboard stockings and painted them.
We made coffee filter snowflakes and decorated them with glitter glue.
We also made aluminum foil Christmas trees and painted them. That was a definite favorite!!
Then we made something very special for a friend but you won’t be seeing that until next week. 😉
We also played around with cornstarch and baking soda clay but they wouldn’t leave them alone long enough to dry. We ended up with crumbled messes all over the place. 😦
We have been VERY busy lately with Christmassy stuff. Our tree went up the Saturday after Thanksgiving. It was a day late! LOL
I took Cailey and Colin to the Lowe’s Build and Grow last Saturday. They made the cutest scratch and sniff Christmas trains!!
We missed the 2 kids workshops at Home Depot this month. 😦 One because of a bad tire (and NO place open to replace it) and one because of the ice storm (see yesterday’s post).
We’ve painted ornaments for the tree. Colin decided to go with an all black snowflake. LOL That child definitely has his own opinions about everything! 😉
The Hubby and I sneaked away for a few hours to go to his company’s Christmas party. It was sooo sooo sooo pretty! I was afraid that I was going to get thrown our for harassing the peacocks!
And we have been doing tons more Christmas crafts!!
You can find the template for the Christmas Tree puppet at Scholastic.
We made Rudolph with hand print antlers. Colin’s is on the left and Cailey’s on the right. She said she wanted hers to look like it was facing her.
We listened to The Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies from The Nutcracker and I asked Cailey and Colin to paint what it made them think of while they listened to it.
Then I let them watch it with me and paint what they thought of it after watching it.
Here we did white crayons with water color paints over it. If you look very closely you might be able to see their snowflakes. I think next time we will try construction paper instead of butcher paper.
SHEW!! And that is what we have been up to lately. I’ll surely have more crafts and activities in the days to come! 😀
Last Friday we took Cailey and Colin to a local pumpkin patch. We had SUCH a blast! There was so much to see and do! Even though it was freezing that day we still had a really great time.
The first thing we did was hit the corn maze. We let Colin lead us through it. He loved it. It was a HUGE maze cut into the shapes of different animals. He lead us all through the frog shape and then decided we were done. Too much other stuff to see and do!
They absolutely loved the petting zoo. Even though we have had bunnies and goats in the past, they still loving interacting with them. I think this was their first experience with a sheep!
We took a lot of silly pictures. This is one of my favorites. LOL
We got to take a hayride. Since we were some of the few there that were not with a school group, we got the hayride and big pumpkin patch all to ourselves! FUN FUN FUN!!! Colin jumped off and grabbed the first pumpkin he saw! I didn’t even get to snap a picture! Thankfully Cailey took a bit more time and I got the exact moment when she found hers.
This was one of their favorite parts of the whole day!!! I caught Cailey in mid-flip! LOL
Their pumpkin choices! 😀
We did ALL kinds of stuff! Corn maze, hayride, pumpkin patch, corn tub, bouncy pillow, petting zoo, fudge, hot fudge cake, ginormous slides, and a bunch of stuff I know I’m forgetting. We are definitely making this a yearly tradition, but maybe we should go a little earlier in the season next year. We froze our tushies off!! LOL
So you’ve probably been wondering where I’ve been….
At the beginning of last week my dad was admitted to the hospital with pneumonia. He was still bound and determined to go to the family reunion on the weekend. Prayers were sent and he was released on Wednesday. They drove from Nashville to here that evening and we left on Thursday to go to my aunt’s in Columbia. On Friday we visited my grandparent’s grave and placed flowers. Afterwards we headed to Hilton Head!
We had SO MUCH FUN! I can’t even describe how wonderful it was to see and spend time with everyone. My dad has 7 siblings and all but one attended the reunion. Then add in all my cousins and 2nd cousins and a couple of 3rd cousins! LOL It was a BLAST!!!!
On Saturday we had a cousins day at the beach! It was just so cool to see all lined up down the beach and hanging out with each other and watching our kids play in the sand and water together.
We had pool time, family meals, park day and family worship on Sunday. I can’t wait for next year!!!!
Here are some of my favorite pics from the weekend. (At the time of writing I didn’t have permission to show everyone’s face.)
My dad and Colin at Golden Corral.
At the beach! Almost all of my cousins that attended the reunion were at the beach on Saturday, one of my 2nd cousins and her 2 little ones missed this trip. The kids all totaled 12.
At the pool!
At the park. All in all, I believe we had 9 kids at the park! SO MUCH FUN!!!!
At Sunset Bay Restaurant.
At Hilton Garden Inn.
I think this picture says it all!! LOL We ran around alllll day long everyday and then hit the pillows HARD when we finally made it back to our room! LOL
I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to spend time with my wonderful, loving family!
If your kids are like mine then they LOVE to create!! I used to have a hard time coming up with new and different things for them to try. Then along came Pinterest!! SHEW!!! Here are a few ideas that I found.
I get a lot of our craft supplies from the Dollar Tree. They don’t have everything but they do have A LOT! 😉 I miss having Michael’s and Ben Franklin’s close, though. WAH!!!!!
This list is from The Domestic Goddesque. This list is extremely good if you are looking for alphabet activities!
I LOVE 3 Dinosaurs!! I use so many of the printables and arts and crafts idea!!!
It says for tots but I know older kids would have a BLAST with these ideas as well!!! Click over to Inner Child Fun and check them out!
This list from TLC just goes on FOREVER!!! You can even look up crafts based on what material you want to use.
This comes from Putti’s World. My kids are going to have a BLAST with this!!!! It’s creative and something they can show off and wear!
I ❤ No Time for Flash Cards!!! It’s my go-to site for kid crafts. Sit back and grab some refreshments before you start exploring this site! LOL
This is very nice list from Red Ted Art’s Blog. Make sure to bookmark or Pin so you can keep going back to it over and over again as the list keeps getting updated! 🙂
This great list is from Little Family Fun. Hopefully it will keep Colin occupied for a while…. LOL 😉
DLTK’s Crafts for Kids is another of my favorite sites. I use it ALLLLL the time and not just for crafts. It’s a great resource for homeschooling younger kids.
This site is FULL of ideas!! I just found it but I think it will become another favorite! LOL
So sorry for my lack of sewing posts lately. I did manage to cut the pieces for Cailey’s Tinkerbell costume! Step one – complete! LOL I should have a tutorial up by the end of the week.
Then Deanna comes in yesterday and tells me that she would like me to make her a long black skirt to wear to the Halloween party on Sunday. Nothing like waiting until the last minute! LOL AND she wants makeup like this –
Yep… Nothing like the last minute! 😉
Anyway, since I have a lot of sewing to DO but nothing to SHOW, I thought I would do a post about hands on science for homeschooling! FUN! 😉
OH! Legos!!! A great hands on unit for boys especially!! This is from The Homeschool Post.
This is an AWESOME idea for this time of year!!! Basically you just fill your pumpkin with soil, water it every so often and watch the seeds grow! 🙂 This idea comes from Growing in PreK. Although it says Pre K, I think this would be excellent for any elementary age child!
I ❤ the Crafty Classroom!!! This fossil craft would be an AWESOME addition to a fossil or dinosaur study! The page has more hands on idea for fossils. And you should check out all the other themes on the right side bar. AH-MAZ-ING!!!!!!
This is BRILLIANT!! What a great way to show the molecules in the different layers of the atmosphere! A really good visual from Science Matters.
E Is for Explore has a lot of great ideas to show static electricity! And we are quickly approaching the time of year when static electricity will be zapping us on a daily basis….. LOL
I thought this was just brilliant. I would never have thought to use a soggy graham cracker to represent the tectonic plates! Thank you to the Homeschool Den!!!! This page has a lot of other ways to explore plate movements. 😉
Another perfect for fall science experiment!!! This one was put together by Science Sparks with a guest post by Rainy Day Mum.
The Science Behind Who Gets Magical Powers would be great for high school biology. It’s not exactly hands on but it is definitely an attention grabber for those HP fans!!!
If this shows up (FINGERS CROSSED!!!) it will be a video from BBC One that shows how your ear works.
Launch a rocket from a spinning planet with this guide from NASA Space Place.
Water Cycle Wonders from Practical Pages. And while you’re there, check out allllll the other amazing things on this blog!
Another brilliant idea!!! This can be found at Momma Owls Lab.
Here is another one that isn’t actually hands on but definitely an attention grabber. It shows the skeletons of different cartoons!! How cool is that???
Speaking of skeletons, we had an interesting science time yesterday. LOL Cailey was petting Bonnie and asked if a cat has bones in its tail. Instead of just saying yes and moving on, I looked up cat skeletons on Google to show her. Then we dragged out our DK Eyewitness Skeleton book and looked at all the different types. That led to dragging out the starfish as an example of exoskeletons! LOL
Whenever your kids ask a question, don’t just answer it. Help them explore it. See where it leads! You never can tell….. LOL Science is a natural topic for kids. They are always wanting to know the how and the why of everything around them.
We haven’t been doing any “actual” homeschooling since we decided to move. There have just been a thousand things going on around here…. BUT they have still been getting their daily dose of science just by being interested in the things around them. Such as, “why are the leaves turning colors and falling off the trees?” “Why do squirrels collect nuts?” “Why are the buzzards circling over there?”
Sometimes you even get really lucky and can add some history in, too. 😉 “Why do we use pumpkins on Halloween”, can be both a science and a history question!
And don’t forget with Thanksgiving just around the corner that the opportunities to combine the two subjects will continue! Weather, crop growing, and the different animals of the New World just to name a few science items to go along with the history!
And I just had to pause this post to explain how the earth tilts for the different seasons and why there will most likely NOT be any snow in Georgia this winter…. LOL Geography AND science in one question! LOL
I need to get sewing on Cailey’s costume but all I reallllly want to do is take a nap! LOL I am trying to fight an oncoming cold….. WAH!! I do NOT need a cold right before we move!!! AND right before Halloween!! Not to mention that I am still having awful fibro flares. I think they are due to having to get up at 4 am this week to take The Hubby to work. WAH!!!!! BUT when we move he will have more decent hours! YAY!!!!
Stacy Sews and Schools 