Apples - Day 4

Today we basically did a science experiment. Above are our questions and hypothesis. It also has the results written on it.

We put an apple on the stove, in the oven, and in the microwave and discussed what happened and what was different from a fresh apple.

What happens when sugar is added to apples?

APPLESAUCE!!!

Apples - Day 3

Craft: Apple Prints -- we talked about the star when you cut it horizontally too.

Science: Learning Center -- I put out all kinds of things that come from apples. Fresh apples, apples seeds, dried apples, apple sauce, and apple juice. Collin loved examining everything w/ the magnifying glass.

Snack: Apple Coleslaw
In a bowl mix ¼c mayo, ¼c milk, and 1 tsp lemon juice. Grate 1 large apple and 1 small cabbage and add them to the mayo mixture. Eat and enjoy.

Apples - Day 2

craft: apple collages.... pretty self explanatory.

Language Arts: The Letter "A"

Math: sorting apples

Snack: Apple Finger Cubes (this was obviously before it set and was cut into cubes ;)
Pour 2 envelopes of unflavored gelatin (I used strawberry though.... it was all I had) into a bowl. Add 2 c boiling water. Stir until gelatin is dissolved. Add a 6oz can of unsweetened apple juice concentrate. Pour mixture into lightly greased 9"x13" cake pan and chill. Cut into cubes when firm.

Apples - Day 1

Craft: I cut out trees and the kids painted the apples on there w/ their thumbs.

Math: I forgot to take a pic while these were on the flannel board. I cut out a bunch of numbers... okay, actually, my hubby did the cutting. And then he cut out a bunch of "apples". The kids had to put the correct number of apples by the numbers.

Science: We had 4 different types of apples (red delicious, granny smith, roma, and golden delicious -- I think, I may be wrong -- something like that). First, we talked about the differences in the different apples; color, size... etc. After that we guessed how many seeds we'd find in each and if it would be the same in each apple. Then we cut them open and counted the seeds. Then we tasted each one and talked about the differences in their taste/texture/juiciness... etc.

After cutting all of those apples, I bet you can't guess what we had for snack time. :) W/ a bit of peanut butter they were super yummy!!

Math and Reading....

We started them today! The reading book wasn't too exciting. We learned about 'm' and 's' today but Collin already knows his letters and the sounds they make but we thought we'd go through it like it says to. He's only 3 so we don't need to rush it.
Math, however, was totally fun! I thought we would just do chapter 1. Collin didn't want to stop with chapter 1. We did 7 chapters today and the only reason we stopped was b/c I forced him to. haha!

Here is Collin working on one of the worksheets. He had to find the pictures that matched and then color them to match as well. I thought he did really well! I was sooooo proud of him. I just couldn't believe how much he loved doing it. haha!

Picture Schedule

This is our picture calendar that I made last night. Collin was always asking what we were going to do next so... I made him this. It has worked out really well. I remove the pictures as we complete them (they're velcro-ed to posterboard) so he was easily able to see what we were going to do next. It has been a lot of fun! I think today has been the best day yet! We are definitely continuing this! If anyone wants it e-mailed to them just let me know. ;)

Birds - Day 2

First, we painted pictures with feathers, then we went bird watching. After that we talked about nests and gathered items that can be used to make nests. We folded down the sides of the paper bags we placed the items in and left them out for the birds to use. I'll go and get them later tonight. ;)

Birds Day 1

I cut two circles out of their choice of paper and the kids glued them on blue paper for the head and body of a bird. Then they glued feathers and googly eyes on them. They both liked this one. Neither of their birds look too much like birds but good try.
Made felt birds and did the "5 little birds" poem w/ it.
We made birds' nests for snacks. Shredded carrots, chow mein noodles, dressing, and grapes. yum yum.

Paper Plates Day 2

Here are the self portraits. You may have to lick on the picture to see Collin's "face". He insisted on using his favorite color, orange, that you can't see very well in the pic. ;)

We made happy and sad faces on a plate and then I came up w/ things like, "It's your birthday, your toy was taken, more red juice... etc" and they had to flip to the happy or sad plate to express how they would feel.

Ronni did this one while Collin did the following activity. I put stickers on wax paper (easier to remove than the original sheet they were on) and she peeled them off and stuck them on her plate.

We thought this one may be too difficult for Ronni. I let Collin color a paper plate however he wanted and then cut it into 6 pieces. I then used a whole paper plate for him to put his "puzzle" back together on. It held the pieces in place better.

Paper Plates Day 1

We talked about healthy foods and not so healthy foods. Then we went through magazines and cut out different types of foods and put them on the "good" plate or the "bad" plate. We talked about how the things on the bad plate are great treats once in a while but you can't eat them too much.

This game was mainly for Ronni. I colored plates different colors (red, yellow & blue) and then cut them in half. We worked on matching the colors that looked the same. I gave one half of each to Ronni and I had the others. I asked her to hand the one that matched to Collin. Sometimes she'd get it and sometimes she didn't.

We cut the center out of plates to make visors (hats). I let the kids paint them.

Below is a pic of them wearing them. ;)

I think our life is finally returning to normal so we're back on for the "craftivities". We're just going to call this break the summer vacation. hehe!

I am still here....

I just thought I'd post and let you know that I am still here. I am actually babysitting two sets of twins right now. That means that I have 6 kids all 4 and under and I just haven't had time to do "craftivities". I know... total slacker here!! I'm watching them for two more weeks and then I'll be getting ready to go out of town so I'm hoping I'll start back up mid July. Hopefully then I'll be doing some for an 18 mo old too. I'll have double the posts going up.... can I do it? I hope so!! =D

Caterpillars

Day 1:
I don't know what happened to my Day 1 pictures. *shrug*. I'll just tell ya what we did.
For the craft we were going to make egg carton caterpillars but I realized the cardboard egg carton I had saved and was sitting on the counter was gone and all I had in the fridge were the Styrofoam ones so.... we scratched that idea. =( You just cut one side of the bottom part and paint it and use pipe cleaners for antennae. Very easy!

This day was spent learning about caterpillars. We learned about the life cycle and Collin colored a picture of the life cycle that I found online -- egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, and butterfly. We also talked about what they eat and sang some songs.

Day 2:
We were working on patterns. The one on the left is Collin's and the one on the one on the right belonged to a friend. I was babysitting today so they did them together. I had a bunch of red and green circles cut out and they made their own patters. Caleb changed his pattern several times throughout. ;)

We also played a game where we pretended to be a caterpillar and curled up in our chrysalis (blanket) and then came out as a butterfly. We recited a poem as we did it. There were also a couple of songs.

Bees

I played Flight of the Bumblebee and told Collin to pretend his crayon was a bee dancing to the music. It was kind of fun. I did it too. ;)

Here is a "B Hive". Only items that start w/ a B can go in the B-hive so I had a bunch of pictures and Collin had to decide which ones started w/ a buh buh B!

Here was a matching game... Okay... so they don't really look like bees... don't judge my art work, k? hehe I had 10 bees and each had 1-5 stripes on them. Collin had to match them up. We played "Memory" w/ them.... a couple of times. he really enjoyed this one.


Because of more responsibilities going on in my life I am only doing craftivities two days a week now. I will try to post at the end of each week. Although -- for our week of Bees we only did it one day. There were some cool ideas I had that I was going to do but it didn't happen. This was the week I got sick.

Easter week...

We did a week of Easter. Here are the links: Day 1
Day 2
Day 3-7

Egg-stravaganza Day 1

We didn't do much today. We decorated eggs so we can use them throughout the week for activities. Also, Sunday we had eggs for breakfast so I saved the shells, washed them and dyed them. Today we smeared elmer's on paper and sprinkled the shells for a picture. Collin thought it was tons of fun!! =D

Rocks -- highlights

My life has been busy lately. Sorry. here are some highlights from our week of ROCKS. Above is a rock sculpture Collin made. We glued them to form a picture. Collin was just gluing them randomly and then realized a face was forming so turned it into a face. It now sits on his bookshelf in his room. hehe!

Here is the collection of rocks. We sorted them by colors and then we use a rock sorter I made and sorted them by sizes. That pic is below.

Finally: our last day or rocks we told the story of stone soup and then made stone soup. Just make sure you clean and boil the rock ahead of time so it's safe to cook w/. It's amazing all the stuff that cooks out of a rock. =D Collin decided that Stone Soup (or magic soup as he referred to it after the story) is very yummy.

Milk - day 3

We made BUTTER!! We just put whipping cream in a jar and shook shook shook. Once a lump of butter formed we rinsed it, added some salt and ate some bread and butter. There's Ronni eating it below. hehe!

Then we made some dip from cottage cheese, milk, and onion soup mix. It was okay but I've definitely had better veggie dip.

Here's a pic of our FEAST!! LOL!!!

Collin LOVES veggies. hehe!