In our garden

My husband covered the garden with a fine plastic mesh in order to create some shadow. This also protects the plants from heavy rain (rainy season is just around the corner so this is important).

Our broccoli never really happened. The plants grew very large and produced big leaves but never the actual broccoli. I have no idea what happened as I've never really gardened anything before. My husband's got more experience with gardening but he's never dealt with broccoli so we're clueless with this one... It's a shame though because broccoli is really expensive over here and I was really looking forward to growing our own.

Basil is doing great and that makes me really happy. There's no fresh basil sold here at all and I've really missed that.

We planted some strawberries that my sister brought from Spain. We're hoping this is a variety that tolerates heat well. Fingers crossed!

We also got some strawberries from a friend and they're all doing well. I have no idea when we might get our first strawberries though...

We're going through changes in the garden right now. Rucola and kale produced well and we'll plant them again. On our list we also have parsley, radish, lettuce and agrião (one type of watercress). We'll be eating from our garden by the end of the year again although gardens don't really thrive during the rainy season.

First lapbooks ready

After our last Outdoor hour I thought we could study snails a little more. All of a sudden Luana asked if we could learn some more about snails as we had seen so many in the back yard so that was it :) I prepared lapbooking material and made some research about giant African land snails (Achatina fulica) and we set to work.

The lapbooks are green and they have a snail on the cover (surprisingly enough!) :)

Luana's lapbook on the top and Lucas' on the bottom of the picture. It's a little difficult to see some of the things as the background is brown. We however wrote down the maximum size and the age of the snails. On the two white squares on the top right there's the climate and the food the snails like. In the end we drew the kids' hands and wrote "wash your hands" on them. The the snails transmit diseases and that's why hygiene is really important. This highlighted the importance of not touching the snails with bare hands and always washing one's hands after playing outside.

We glued some snail "eggs" underneath a piece of brown paper as the eggs are usually under some kind of a cover.

I was so pleased with these and the kids really enjoyed doing them. I'm planning to do our next lapbook on Brazilian indigenous people...

Outdoor Hour # 20

We went over to our neighbours' side of the fence and checked out our guava tree that we started studying earlier on. I asked the kids whether they remembered how the tree was back then and they remembered the parrots and the abundance of fuits.

This time we found one ripe guava (that unfortunately had some insects so we couldn't eat it) and LOTS of snails. I knew snails can get to many places but that they climb trees... I had to tell the kids not to use the swing that hangs from the tree as these snails spread diseases and even touching the slime can be unhealthy.

We also discovered many more snails in our neighbours' backyard and gave them a hand in getting rid of the ones we saw. The doggy on the other side of the fence is our 6-month-old puppy Oona.

On a more positive note then we realised that the marigold seeds we planted already some time ago are actually becoming flowers! I had already given up on them but hadn't thrown them away. Two survived the lack of attention and pouring rain/hot sun and we finally planted them in our garden. I'm not a gardener type at all but it sure is gratifying to see the seeds grow into flowers :)

This is the other one that survived: a gourgette also seems to want to bloom. If I ever get a gourgette out of this one I bet it'll be the most delicious gourgette ever! :)

I thought we should take a better look at the snails and learn a bit more about them with the kids. And to my surprise Luana suggested that we'd study snails tomorrow! Not sure if we'll have time tomorrow but some time this week.

Around the corner

We went for a walk around the block just to see the river Mororó flooding yet again (se pictures in my other blog). On our way home we found this big bush in front of an abandoned house. We went to take a closer look...

... and realised it's passion fruit. The flower is so interesting and different.

We also spotted lots of fruits that are't ripe yet. I'll make sure we'll get back a little later hopefully to pick some fresh passion fruit for a yummy juice :)

Green Hour challenge 11

It's rainy season over here and we've decided to postpone task number 10 until further notice. It rains a lot and even if it doesn't rain the grass is damp so picnic wouldn't be that enjoyable. So we moved on to task 11. Again, had to modify a little as the only seasons we have over here are rainy and dry. The trees do change however even if we don't get the spectacular autumn leaves over here. We decided to study guava (psidium guajava) which is on our backyard (although at the moment on the other side of the fence as our other house is rented).

Guava trees can grow up to three metres tall so ours is about as big as they get. The kids' swing hangs from the guava tree and the ground underneath the tree is full of half-eaten guavas that the green parrots drop from the tree. The other day I counted atleast 30 parrots flying from the tree! You can't really see them while they're sitting on the branches as they're green but you can surely hear them!

There are at least two kinds of ants running up and down the tree. It was sooo difficult to get a picture of them! The bark is soft and greenish brown, a lovely mixture of colours.

There are lots of different kinds of guavas but ours are yellow when ripe and deep pink on the inside.

This is the flower where the fruit then comes from.

Some curly leaves that Luana wanted me to take a picture of.

When we got home it was time to taste some... They're really sweet and yummy and contain up to four times the amount of vitamin C found in an orange. There's more information on guava's properties in wikipedia.

Green Hour challenge 9

This is a vew of the rented side. On the left the lime tree, in the middle the guava tree (with the swing) and on the right papaya (the higher one) and manioc (the shorter one).

We just rented our old house (next the one we're currently living in) and just before the people moved in we went to "their" side (see picture above) and did the challenge number 9. This side of the back yard is more interesting than our side but still unfortunately there wasn't much going on...

The kids found:
three different kids of ants (huge, medium and small ones)
flies
grass
moss
small plants with leaves (unfortunately unknown)

After observing their squares we proceeded to the guava tree where their swing hangs from. Once underneath the tree we could smell the ripe guavas and as they were all high up the tree I had to climb. The kids watched with their mouths open as I climbed, got some ripe guavas for us and came down. They said they didn't know their mummy could climb a tree! :D

It's been raining a lot these days so we haven't been able to have our picnic. I'm just waiting for the next sunny day to do that!

Green Hour challenge 7

We did this challenge already more than a week ago but I've been lazy with posting lately... This challenge was called field guide but instead we did a field trip! Talking about slightly modifying the task... :)

We visited some relatives in the countryside (there are more pictures in my photo blog) and got to see some new plants as well as some old favourites.

My sister-in-law has two rows of pineapple (ananas comosus) growing and the first ones should be ripe very soon. So we didn't get to taste any but the kids liked the way pineapple grows - they had never seen the plant before.

I learned later on that the Portuguese name for pineapple, abacaxi, comes from an Indian language called Tupi. They call it ibacati which means "smelly fruit" (iba = fruit and cati = to have a strong smell).

I thought I hadn't seen this fruit before but when I tasted it I realised I had eaten it in Costa Rica many many years ago. It's called ingá-cipó in Portuguese and apparently in English it's called ice-crem-bean :) The Latin name for this is inga edulis. It wasn't quite ripe yet but we tasted some anyhow. You can eat the fruit around the large seeds.

And then there was our old favourite manioc (manihot esculenta) that we also have plenty of in our own back yard.

We saw lots of other plants too but these were the kids' favourites.

Mudcakes

Today was supposed to be another day for the Green Hour Challenge. However after their nap the kids went out and they're still playing there. I'm so happy and amazed that they've been going on for over two hours now without any major arguments or problems. I will have to spoil the fun at some point so that I get them washed and ready for dinner but I'll let them play for a while still, dinner can wait :)

Some more gardening

This time the kids planted manioc with daddy. We got loads of manioc just from one plant a few days ago and yesterday they decided to plant some more on the back yard. You can check out the manioc harvest here.

The kids were again really keen to help and honestly did a great job. Daddy is also very good in letting the kids help. I think he's got more patience in that sense than I do :)

I was so happy to see the kids engage in a longer creative play yesterday. It seems all they want to do nowadays is to watch TV and if that's not allowed they don't seem to be able to come up with anything to play with. I simply can't be there ALL the time telling them what to do and how to play. Yesterday they were busy carrying wood and building things. I allowed them to play with the wood but warned them that they'd have to take everything back to where it was once they were done. It worked out so well - no fights, no arguing, just nice imaginative playing for a good while. And a very happy mama :)

Gardening

I have to admit... as much as I love nature I'm not a gardener. Thankfully my husband is really into planting, mowing the lawn, cutting, trimming, getting new plants etc. I do give some ideas as to where I think a particular plant should be located but that's really it :)

Yesterday my husband came home with some new plants and asked us to join him in the front yard. At first I was going to decline but then I realised that I want my kids to appreciate gardening even if I'm not so keen on it. So I went along, took some pictures and ended up helping out quite a bit. It turned out to be a lovely afternoon all of us working together in the garden. I'm so glad I joined in!

Back to Green Hour

We played with these play dough animals on a rainy day last week. It's great to have been gone for several months because there are so many toys around the house that the kids don't remember anymore. These animals were one of those new-old toys.

Luana had been asking for several days to go for a green hour walk and we finally did that on Thursday. We went around the block behind our house as the kids wanted to see the river Mororó. It was also World Food Day so we tried to look for things to eat along the way. The only things we saw were chickens and mangos. The kids also drew what they had seen along the way and Luana came up with a really cute map of our walk :)

Later on we also talked about how usually one could drink water but the river is so polluted that the water's not good for drinking. Luana had some good ideas as to what pollutes the river and I think we can work on that later on as we continue talking about the river.

Water is really low at the moment as it's only the beginning of the rainy season. The river flooded a few times last year and I'm sure we'll see some of that later on as well.

There were so many mangoes hanging from the trees! We've already received some from my parents-in-law and we're all (especially Luana) really looking forward to the mango season to kick in.

Garden party

We went to a lovely garden party last Saturday. I had three days off and it was such a nice break. It seems I only ever go to work and come home tired when it's almost time for the kids to go to bed. I still enjoy my work a lot but being a full time working mama just isn't my thing :)

My father and my stepmum had both turned 70 earlier this year and now it was time to celebrate that in the garden.

Next to their summer cottage there's an old inn (by old I mean some 200 years old) and we were allowed to use their old stables and the garden, too. Birches decorate the entrance to the stable.

This is the stable door. You really have to watch your head!

One of the stable windows from the outside.

During this week we've finally seen some sun and felt the warmth. The kids have gone swimming after the pre school with my mum and I've worked... Yesterday Luana learned to ride her bike without the two small extra wheels (whatever you call them...). She was so proud of herself! She is also learning how to dive and swim and she's really excited about that too. Lucas recently learned to pronounce the letter r the way it's pronounced in Finnish (by rolling it) and he's now happy to repeat anything with an r after me... porkkana, parkki, riisi, Pirre...

P.S. You can see a few more pictures from the garden party in my other blog.

Drawing in the park

We're still here! Life gets somehow busy when you work full time and the kids are in the nursery. If I work in the morning shift I get to spend several hours with the kids in the evening after work but if I'm in the evening shift I only see them in the morning when I take them to the nursery. When I come home in the evening they're already asleep. So far this summer has been such a good experience for all of us but it has also shown me a different side of things. If I can choose I want to spend more time with the kids than what I do now. The way we've had it back in Brazil has worked really well in my opinion and I hope we can get back to that after we return. The kids go to preschool/nursery in the morning and come home for lunch. I have the morning to myself (read: household chores, grocery shopping etc.) and get to spend the entire afternoon and evening with them. We've got plenty of time for homeschool activities, for visiting grandparents etc. I do understand that I might have to work but I'm hoping I can get by with some private arts and crafts classes at home in the afternoons :) I've got lots of nice ideas in my head for next year and I'm hoping that Casa Criativa (Creative House) will be able to start working sometime in the end of February offering arts and crafts experiences to the kids in our little town.

In the meantime whenever we have some time together we usually head for one of the parks nearby. I'm not sure if I commented this in here already but when we first arrived here the kids we so impressed by all the great parks that they called them "amusement parks". That's how much they'd missed playing in a nice park and that's why we're planning some nice things in our backyard in Brazil.

This park is their favourite because of this toy. It spins around depending on how fast you walk on it. It's so simple but they laugh, jump on and off and have so much fun with it!

This time I also invited them to sit down and draw something. Luana came up with a picture of the park itself with the swings, the slide etc. Her Brazilian school activity book deals with the notion of space and awareness of one's whereabouts and I'm trying to work on those with her as well. I thought the drawing of the park was a good start. The next thing we'll do is draw a map of the area we live in featuring the places we usually go to.

Lucas didn't want to sit down and draw initially but after a while he too asked for a pen and a paper. He drew balloons and the round toy they like so much.

Last weekend

We spent the weekend at my dad's and it was good fun. I've been meaning to post about it for a while already but I haven't been able to download the photos. Well, they're here now and I'm hoping to have a few more in my Finnish blog soon.

We were supposed to spend a day in the Moominworld but it just so happens that I got the worst sore throat ever and wasn't up for a whole day out with the kids and a picnic lunch. So we opted for something easier and went to a museum called Aboa Vetus Ars Nova (Old Turku New Art). It's a museum of contemporary art combined with medieval ruins that were discovered underneath the building when they were renovating it. It's such a delight! They had a special tour for kids that we took. Lucas was a bit too young for that but I went with him and it was ok.

Wild strawberries at my dad's summerhouse. Almost ready to be eaten!

Lucas mowing the lawn with his grandpa. He was so excited that he was allowed to participate in something that involved pushing a very noisy machine! :D

The kids in the museum. They got to wear "medieval" capes and play with a medieval dollhouse.

After the museum we went to a big park that offers lots of things for free. The kids just loved it. They had to control themselves in the museum and now they could just let go and run, climb and play as much as they liked. This park brings back good memories as we used to play there with my sister when we were small and visited my dad. There are so many things to do outdoors and then there are arts and crafts available indoors as well. We didn't even go inside with the kids that day, there was plenty to do outdoors!

One of my favourite things about the park: there's plenty of water all over the place. There are places where the kids can swim and then other places where they can simply play with the water. That day was absolutely too cold for swimming although I did see some kids running around in their swimming suits eating ice cream...

My sore throat finally got so bad that I had to go to the doctor's as soon as we got back home. And sure enough I had a nasty infection and needed antibiotics, which I'm now taking. Lucas had the same bacteria and same treatment. So far it seems Luana got away with it :)