You're Welcome - Part 2

Lord help me with this entertaining little thing...



Here comes a costume change.




My favorite part of the first one??  Her tights on the outside of her outfit and hanging down to her knees.  And the second video?  Her undies hanging out the bottom.

She loves dancing so much that part 3 is coming up as soon as I learn how to splice videos together.  Think unicorns, bowling alleys and dancing.

Yep.  You're welcome.

Best Daddy Ever

Happy Birthday Daddy!!

I'm thinking I was maybe 3 here.

I hope, when my children are grown, they have the kind of memories of their childhood that I have of mine.  Memories of nothing but fun, laughter, and love.  And guitars.  Thank you for being the very best daddy a girl could hope to have.  I love you.

Kristin


p.s.  Hiding/sleeping in guitar cases.  Mud and the digger in our front yard.  Camping setups that would blow your mind.  Music.  Merlefest.  Tree house.  Even awesomer tree house.  Building a house.  (I'm pretty sure there is a picture of me painting my own room when I was about Fisher's age.  I still remember thinking it was fun.)  Gymnastics in the yard.  That old truck.  Being sung/guitar played to sleep.  Here's a story 'bout Jelly Man Kelly, he loves jelly the most.  (I've GOT to find that album for my kids)  Fixing the well (again) cause somebody (or everybody we ever knew) backed into it with their car.  Love.  Love.  And more love...I could seriously do this for days.  My sister and I, we're so crazy lucky. 

Be My Valentine

We hope you have a Happy Valentine's Day!

Our Valentine's Day Nature table.

Love Y'all

JKFP

**These sweet little gnomes are pulling double duty today over at Sewtastically Made.

Learning: Science and Parking Lots

It's time for a little learning update!

I've finally figured out that Fisher loves to learn when he doesn't really realize he's learning.  Go figure.  Whenever someone tells him he's really smart (after a few minutes conversation) and they ask what grade he's in, he says "we homeschool... but not really."  It drives me crazy but he just LOVES to do it.  Whatever.  I'm learning to let go of the things I cannot control.  :)

Anyway, we have been having lots of fun with science!  One of the coolest blogs I've found for really fun science/art/math is E is for Explore.  I stumbled onto it via Pinterest. (yes, I'm a pinterest-er.  Yes, it really is that awesome.  I have an entire board for fun homeschool ideas.  Let's see if I can link it... http://pinterest.com/fippermom/homeschool-project-ideas/) 


Experiment Number 1:  Baking Soda and Vinegar

Take a muffin tin filled with colored vinegar and a shallow pan filled with baking soda and let the fun begin.  We started by squirting the colored vinegar into the pan of baking soda and then we observed what happened.

They tried making certain shapes.

They took turns and encouraged each other.

It was a lot of science and a little bit of art.

It took some concentration.

While they had quite a bit of fun with this they REALLY enjoyed it when we turned things around and started adding the baking soda to the vinegar.  It was time for video.




We experimented with different amount of each to see what provided a bigger reaction.  We mixed colors.  We continued to add baking soda until NO reaction happened.  We even talked a bit about how we were neutralizing the acid (vinegar) with the base (baking soda).  All in all it was a pretty good days worth of science.  But we weren't finished yet...


Experiment Number 2:  Oobleck

I had actually never heard of oobleck before.  I found this one on Pinterest too.  It was pinned from instructables.com which also has great information.

What is oobleck you may be wondering??  Well, it's sort of like slime, BUT it has properties of both solids and liquids.  It's wicked fun and super goopy. 

1.5 cups of corn starch, 1 cup of water, and food coloring

Mix it up.

Play with it.

This one was my personal favorite.  It was (there is just no other word for it) cool.  Liquid and solid.  You can form a ball with it then hold it in your hand and will "melt" back into goo.  You can apply force by poking it or laying your hand flat against it and it feels solid.  Keep your hand there and it will slowly sink into it like quicksand.  It was crazy fun. 

**Warning: DO try this at home but DO NOT pour it down the drain.  Dump it in the trash. **

That day was officially declared "the best homeschool day ever"!!


In other scientific news...

We've also been taking stuff apart.

The idea came from a super secret project
Fisher came up with.  Details later.

It's mostly been old broken radios and alarm clocks.  A few months ago we had the water pump on our washing machine replaced.  I kept it.  He took it apart.  He has loved every second of this and I highly recommend it for this age.

** Another Warning:  if you do this, make sure it's been without power for quite a while.  You do NOT want that shock!  Ours had been broken or unplugged in the garage for a long time.**


It hasn't all been science though.  I made a little sight word game that I found on (guess??) Pinterest.  It's a sight word parking lot.  I call out the words and he parks a car on the word. 

I even made one with letters for Pipey. 

The biggest change I made to the original was to cover it with clear contact paper.  I write the words with a washable marker so (thanks to the contact paper) you just take a damp rag and wipe the words/letters off.  Reusable!  I'm thinking math facts would work here too.  You can also use them as place mats. 

So there you have it.  We have been learning quite a bit even if we "homeschool...but not really".

JKFP

Spider Sitting

I have lost my mind.  Lost it.  There are very few things in this world that creep me out more than spiders.  Seriously.  I have had many a ninja style battle on my front porch with black widow spiders. (Long story short, there apparently is a black widow nest under our porch.  It's super fun.)  Anyway bottom line, not a spider fan. 

Rosie

Imagine my surprise when I find myself volunteering to spider sit for my dear mother-in-law.  She's been in Texas for a while and the kids and I have been watering plants and visiting with her house every so often.  Well, I went into the extra room one day and discovered a very thirsty Rosie.  I'd not even thought of her once.  Poor thing.  I know, it's weird to think too.  So home with us she came.

We can keep a better eye on her water and food this way.  I figure she'll earn her keep by educating my sweet children who are totally fascinated with her.  We're going to watch her eat crickets later.  Ugh.  Not sure how much I love her watching me drink my coffee though.  Or that whole cricket thing.

Enjoy your breakfast :)

JKFP

Ice Fishing

Our boy loves fishing. I swear he dreams in fishing and fly tying. He's been asking to go for months.  Well James and our friend Nikos cooked up a little surprise ice fishing trip last weekend.

They had a cozy little tent and a giant auger for drilling holes in the ice.

Apparently he also enjoyed skating around on the ice.

Checking it out!

This is AWESOME!

These pictures make me so happy.  He came home with tall fish tales and wanting to live on the ice.  Yep, well named.

Before the Storm

It's supposed to snow today.  As a matter of fact, I'm just starting to see tiny flakes here and there as I type this.  The storm could bring snow, off and on, for a couple of days.  We'll see. 

Anyway, I had wanted to get the kids out to run around before it was too cold.  And of course, everything on my morning list took longer than I meant for it to.  (story of my life)  SO...we decided to hit up the Junky Park. It's just two blocks away so we grabbed the frisbee, soccer ball, and a snack and hit the sidewalk. 

 

Mr. Fisher is at the point where he'd just prefer I NOT take 387 pictures of him playing at the park so I try and cut him some slack.  SOME.

ROCKIN' his Dad's Angry Birds hat.

Mad skills.

Piper, however, was in excellent form and she couldn't care less if I take 387 pictures of her.  She's so splendidly goofy.

Not to mention she's insanely cute.

We got lots of playing, climbing, soccer-ing, and frisbee-ing action crammed into just 45 minutes or so.

Then we hit the sidewalk heading home.  There was a really neat tree on the way with lots of funky roots.  Fisher:  "Mom, take our picture by this cool tree."  Me:  "You got it!"

Piper back to being a goof.

Fun times.  I love that park.  I don't know why we don't go every single day.  Maybe we should start? 

I came across this book the other day that I'm SO getting... Fifteen Minutes Outside: 365 Ways to Get Out of the House and Connect with Your Kids.  What a great idea right?  I'm putting it on my "to do" list...  going through that book, one at a time, with my kids.  Maybe even at the junky park.

Hugs, hot chocolate, and falling snow.

Kristin