Outdoor Hour # 18 and # 19

We've been working on both pollen and seeds over the last week. Sometimes on purpose (like today) and sometimes accidentally (like the other day when I saw a bee as I was washing the dishes, captured it and called the kids to observe it so that we could release it as soon as possible).
This was the best example of pollen we could find in our garden. The beautiful flower reminds unknown but we like it in our garden :) It was easy to get some of that yellow pollen on our fingertips.

This is the bee I managed to capture in the kitchen the other day. The kids thought it was well exciting to watch it this close. It was just that the bee was probably so upset inside the jar that it was flying around so fast it was difficult to observe it with the magnifying lense (let alone take pictures of it!).

Yesterday we went to the countryside just a little outside the city and as I knew we'd be looking at seeds we collected some from there. On the top left are the seeds of that orange flower in the first picture, the ones on the top right are the seed pod and the seeds of urucu (although these didn't have any red colour on them anymore), the ones on the bottom left are of cacao and the top right ones of some unidentified tree. We'd never seen blue seeds and these are so incredibly blue it's almost untrue :)

Later on today Luana drew some seeds and we made a drawing together featuring butterflies, a bee and some flowers and their seeds.

Glittery fun

I was hugely inspired by the Glitter issue of Kids' Craft Weekly so we did glittery crafting this week. First we tried out the glitter and glue prints made with cookie cutters. The kids loved them and went on dipping their fingers in glue and painting their own figures and then covering them with glitter.

Yesterday we made our own glitter-glue-paint. So little was needed for so much fun. The kids absolutely loved this and I also painted some small things for decorating cards later on.

Obviously the inevitable happened - when my kids see paint and paintrbushes they ALWAYS end up painting their hands, legs, tummies etc. This time was no different and it was glitter paint all over :)

We had recently talked about the birth of Jesus and they both painted a scenery of the pastors in the field (stars in the night sky and cotton for lambs). After that they went on painting lots of different things. And they went on and on until all paint was finished :)

Luana painting Lucas' hand :)

Outdoor Hour # 17

We're still here! Last couple of weeks have been somehow hectic. We've been a bit
poorly (Luana even had to be admitted to the hospital due to a serious diarrhea) but thankfully we're recovering now. Homeschooling activities were suspended for a moment but I've got things organised again and we'll pick up from where we left a couple of weeks ago.

This time we studied leaves that we could find in our own garden. It's been really hot today so we didn't venture anywhere further than that :) This is what we found:

(top left) papaya, ixora, guava, some small unidentified leaf
(bottom left) tomato, "comigo-ninguem-pode" (dieffenbachia), manioc

We also sat in silence for a while and I asked Lucas to listen to three different things and Luana to identify five different things. First there was some laughter and I thought they wouldn't be able to sit still but eventually we managed. Lucas heard a motorbike and people talking. Luana heard a bird singing, people talking, a motorbike, some music and someone walking on the street.

Some other things we observed were the red and yellow ixoras that are blooming in the garden, our cherry tomatoes that are ripening, several East African land snails (a real pest that spread diseases over here) and even a small airplane flying over our house (something that very rarely happens as there's no airport in our little town).

Luana's entry for today. We did some leaf rubbings but she wasn't so keen on them. Instead she chose to draw a read ixora as well as a rose (which we didn't actually see today...).

All in all a very pleasant afternoon spent with the kids. They sure were happy to get back to the Outdoor challenges!

Today's jars

I made these jars today. Some came out just the way I had imagined, some didn't quite :) It was great fun making these though. And yes, I do realise that the rabbit still needs eyes...

Blogger turned this one for me but this is the lid of the candy jar (see last picture).

EVA magnets

I've got plenty of EVA at home as I use it for making flowers. The other day the kids wanted to craft "anything" so we made these small magnets. The butterfly and the turtle on the right are Luana's and she made them all by herself. I cut the car after Lucas' instructions (he picked the colours and the decoration). When we were done we glued a magnet on the other side and let the glue dry until the next day. Very easy and the kids would have made many more had we had time for that.