freeeeezing fun!

Back in February, we had soooo many days of severe cold. School was closed due to cold weather (never snow) every. single. monday AND friday of the month. About halfway through the month, we decided to just have fun with the freezing weather, and do a couple of science experiments. 

The first one was blowing bubbles in the cold and seeing what would happen to them. We found that if we could keep a bubble from popping, in about 30 seconds, it would freeze! It was so cool to see the ice crystals form all over the bubble. The boys loved watching the crystals form and then whacking the bubble and seeing it break into pieces. So cool!

The bubbles are all really hard to see (sorry!) but if you click on the picture, they might show up better.

The next experiment we did (which I unfortunately do not have any pictures of, just a video that takes up too much memory to post) was to throw small cups-ful of boiling water into the air. The water instantly turned to mist! It was so fun.

We didn't really enjoy the looooong stretch of frigid temperatures, but we certainly made the best of it!

Valentines Day crafts

One of my New Year's resolutions is to give each boy half an hour of undivided attention daily. It has been somewhat challenging for me because I am a multi-tasker. I know I will not regret in the long run the moments that I take to play with my children. But there is so much to DO daily and sometimes I rationalize things. Anyway, in the month and a half since I have been doing this, I have seen such an improvement in my relationships with my boys. No, it's not perfect--sometimes that half hour seems to drag forever. Sometimes it's interrupted. Sometimes it doesn't happen at all. But when I do my best, they respond beautifully. 

It is usually more of a challenge for me to get Jed's one-on-one time in, simply because of the nature of our days. I have begun letting him have a rest (aka, watch TV for an hour) after lunch, while I eat my lunch, and then he is much more willing to craft or do homework or read or play with me. Everyone needs and deserves time to decompress after a day at school! We did a few Valentine crafts this month I'd like to share. 

First up are our Bird Valentines. We love watching the birds and always try to give them a little something extra this time of year!

 This was super easy--we just strung cheerios on pipe cleaners bent into heart shapes, twisted the ends closed, tied ribbons on the hearts, and hung them outside.

 Jed had a good time doing this and we talked about our favorite birds and listened to our bird CD while we did it. The "valentines" have been a good way to stretch the seeds in our feeders as well--we have some voracious birds around here! I also liked this craft because it was a good fine-motor activity.

Next up are our "love bugs."

 We gathered large pom-poms, foam hearts, pipe cleaners and googly eyes and glued them together to make little bugs.

 Jed looks super thrilled, but in reality, he loved these. We made several more after this, because Jed kept thinking of funny ways he wanted their antennae shaped or a different configuration of eyes, or a different color scheme.

Again, simple and cute seems to be working well for us.

Finally, we made Valentine penguins. This was a pretty basic paper craft but surprisingly fun for Jed. 

 I cut out two penguin shapes, two large white hearts and 6 small orange hearts. We glued everything into place and added googly eyes.

I am not sure why these photos won't rotate--argh. Anyway, I think they turned out really cute. We found some adorable books about penguins at the library and it was fun to be able to act them out with our valentine penguins.

We also made valentine cards for everyone...which I keep forgetting to mail. It still counts if they get mailed during February, right?

Fun at the Iosco County Museum

Thanks to the fire Dave was on a few weeks ago, he had some extra time off and didn't have to work Saturday. We decided to check off another activity from our summer bucket list and go to the Iosco County Museum.

 This gorgeous building sits on the shores of the Tawas Bay and houses the Iosco County Museum. We were happy to be the only people in the museum and received the undivided attention of the director. She was SO nice! She showed us the museum's visiting attraction, some dinosaur bones and fossils, and was more than happy for us to handle anything we wanted to. Jed got to use an antique cabbage chopper, a typewriter, a record player and play with Linkin Logs and a doll house with the tiniest furniture. The director also gave Hank a fun textured book with dinosaurs that he got to keep! Dave and I had so much fun and wished we could have spent more time looking. My favorite exhibit was a collection of taxidermied birds and a baby fawn that was given to the museum by a man who learned taxidermy by correspondence course.

The boys' favorite part of the day was exploring the carriage house.

 They enjoyed the stagecoach the most. Jed decided a stagecoach would be a great way to travel, as long as he didn't have to share a seat.

 We also liked this extremely classy hearse.

 I would love to have been friends with Mrs. Ward G. Dexel and been invited for a ride and gossip session in this carriage.

 Jed's absolute favorite was getting to be up close and personal with this train. Every time we drive through town, he points it out and tells me we need to go see it. He was so thrilled to finally be able to do so.

He also really enjoyed bouncing on this sleigh's seat. It was totally disgusting--so much dust poofed out when he bounced the first time.

For some reason, Jed also loved that little "cannon." He kept running to it after sitting on something else.

We had a really great day together. After our museum visit, we walked down to the harbor to see some of the big yachts and sailboats moored at the marina, played at the playground and poked our fingers in the fountain. I love simple, fun days like that!

St Patty's crafts # 5 & 6

Our fifth St Patty's day craft was a two-day affair. I hadn't really planned on it being that way, but Jed only wanted to do so much at a time, so that's what we did. Wednesday we cut a paper-towel tube in half and painted the halves green. We also traced around the tube on green construction paper. And that was all Jed wanted to do--possibly because he got some green paint on the floor while I was changing Hank's diaper. A little glob of paint gets spread everywhere when it gets on a boy's sock, and Jed wasn't too thrilled that I had him wipe up his mess, even if it was an accident.

Thursday morning while Jed was at school, I drew an additional circle around our tracings and then cut them out. Jed is getting good with scissors, but I figured it would be safer for me to cut out the center circles so they resembled donuts. And I cut out 4 little arms as well. When we were ready for our craft, Jed helped me cut some reddish-brown yarn into small pieces, and we painted little peach faces onto our green tubes and little peach hands onto our green arms.  

 Jed helped me draw two glue lines at the bottom of the faces and we stuck the yarn on for beards. We drew eyes and mouths on the faces and then slid our hats on the tubes and glued on the hands.

 Jed and his leprechaun

 Two leprechauns having a little chat

 Since these guys wouldn't hang well, we stuck them on the piano with our other St Patty's decorations.

 Jed's leprechaun up close. I love how cute these guys are! Their beards make me so happy.

We did our sixth craft this morning. Jed helped me draw a shamrock on construction paper, and then we cut them out and cut two shades of green tissue paper.

Once the shamrocks were cut out, we covered them with glue and then stuck on our crumpled tissue paper.

 Well, I crumpled mine. Jed is not a fan of crumpling the tissue paper because then his fingers get glue on them when he sticks the tissue paper on. So Jed carefully laid his flat tissue paper on his glue.

 I love doing these. They work for any shape and holiday and are quick and fun. One day I hope Jed will get over his glue issues--it didn't seem to bother him at all while we were sticking the beard yarn on the leprechauns yesterday--and want to crumple his paper too. But even if he never does, they still look fun.

 Here are our shamrocks on our crafty clothesline! We are certainly festive :)

St. Patty's crafts #3 & 4

Friday and Saturday we did some more St. Patty's day crafts. Jed had a blast with these ones.

 

Friday we did Marshmallow Rainbows. The rainbows were a little simpler than our paint chip rainbows, since "rainbow" mallows only come in pink, orange, yellow and green. Jed was quite bothered that there were no blue marshmallows.

I learned from my mistake with the paint chip rainbows and drew the line I wanted him to attach his marshmallows to instead of lines that the marshmallows should be between. It seemed to be easier for him to get the gist this time. However, when he saw the marshmallows, he immediately wanted to EAT them instead of glue them down. So this was also a good exercise in self-restraint.

 Because I am a really nice mom, I gave him a small bowl of marshmallows that could be eaten and we had a larger bowl of marshmallows to glue. He was THRILLED. 

We put dots of glue on the lines and then we just sat and stuck our marshmallows and tried not to eat them. My glue dots (pictured above) were a lot closer than Jed's since I have (barely) more fine-motor control. This was really good pre-writing practice for Jed, since he had to hold the marshmallow in essentially the same grip he uses to hold a writing instrument to avoid getting glue on his fingers. I am always happy to sneak in a little occupational therapy when I can!

 I think Jed's favorite part of this craft was smashing down the marshmallows on the glue. He has some very deflated marshmallows on his rainbow now! I really love how these turned out. So pretty!

Saturday, I helped Dave and Jed make Handprint Leprechauns. Jed thought it was especially funny that Daddy was doing an art project with us! Because this was such a quick project, I didn't take any pictures of the process. But I painted the palm of their hands with peach paint (for the face) and their fingers orange (for the beard) and then helped them press their hands on construction paper. Once the handprints were dry, we attached hats, hatbands and buckles cut from construction paper, googly eyes, and drew on noses and mouths. I think they turned out SO CUTE!

 Jed wrote his name with minimal help! He is doing so great with his letters!

And here is our project wall with the latest additions. I am going to have to pull out some more clothespins and make some room, because I still have a couple of crafts for this week. I am so glad we take the time to do these little crafts. Most only take about 15 minutes, but combining the crafts with holiday books we check out from the library has really helped Jed understand the holidays we're celebrating. It is fun to watch him get so excited about little things!

St Patty's crafts # 1 and 2

Yes, just like with Valentine's Day, I am trying to be better about documenting our craft projects. It's so thrilling, I know, but taking the pictures and posting them here saves me from having to keep the actual crafts from year to year! That way we can make them again next year. And just like with Valentine's Day, most of these projects came from Pinterest.

 

I didn't do a great job of documenting #1 at all, so you'll just have to bear with me. The first project we made were "texture shamrocks." I traced a shamrock on to green paper, then assembled green yarn, felt, and buttons, and Jed and I glued the different texture bits to our cut-out shamrocks. It was actually really fun to talk about the way the different things felt. Jed's shamrock ended up with only felt and buttons because he does NOT like getting glue on his fingers, and the yarn is too small to keep his fingers from getting dirty. Now that I am writing about this, it dawns on me that I have some dyed green pasta floating around that would have been a perfect addition to the shamrocks. Rats!

 

We did craft #2 on Monday afternoon. I snagged some paint chips from WalMart when we were running our errands and while Jed was at school, I cut off the 3 darkest colors from each paint chip. Then I drew a rainbow on a large sheet of paper and wrote in the color that was supposed to go in that section.

                               

When I told Jed we were going to make rainbows, he immediately rattled off "red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple!" He constantly surprises me with how much he knows.

 

Our glue had grown legs and wandered away, so while I was searching for it, Jed matched up the colors to the spaces they belonged. He was really proud of himself.

 Then we continued gluing all the paint chips in the sections until we had a whole rainbow! At first Jed wanted to stick the colors any old place, since the only places that were labeled were in the center of each section. But I found that if I drew a colored line along the entire section, he got the gist of what was supposed to happen. I have some yellow and gold fluffers that I wanted to glue to the bottom, but we needed a change of pace after we got all the paint chips attached, so we will save that for another day.

Above, you can see both our finished rainbow and our texture shamrocks. I thought both of these were really fun little crafts. Jed was super excited to show Dave his rainbow when Dave got home from work that night. It is so nice for him to have something physical to show off! And we are starting to look pretty festive again!

v-day art project #4

Our next Valentine's Day craft we made on Valentine's Day. I had seen it on Pinterest and thought it looked easy and fun to try.

 

We took empty toilet paper rolls and folded them into heart shapes (they were a little more like lips, truthfully), poured different colors of paint on to paper plates and dipped the tp rolls into the paint, then stamped away on a large sheet of paper.

I really enjoyed it. Jed stamped for a while and then (as he usually does) started finger painting. I think he really enjoyed seeing the hearts appear, though. We each made two pictures and it took us about half an hour. Lots of fun and little mess--my kind of art project! We used the finished product as place mats for our Valentine's Day dinner.

And then we hung them on our art wall with our other projects. I am loving how festive we are!

I really liked how these turned out. I am thinking about buying a large white canvas and using a non-squished tp roll to create some cheap art for my downstairs bathroom. Do you think it would look like "modern art" or would it be really dorky?

v-day art project #3

Today's art project is making melted hearts. Love turns us all a little mooshy and melty at times, so what better way to show it?!

 You will need crayons in assorted valentine colors, two sheets of waxed paper, scissors (or some other way to shave the crayons. I thought about using a vegetable peeler but didn't want to sacrifice my only one), a paper towel and an iron.

 Lay one sheet of waxed paper on a smooth surface (we used the ironing board) with the waxy side facing UP. Shave the crayons with your scissors or other peeler until you have a good amount spread over most of the waxed paper.

 I love how these little curls look--so pretty.

 Place your other sheet of waxed paper on top of the wax curls with the waxy side facing DOWN and top it with the paper towel. Iron gently over the whole thing until the wax melts--about 2 minutes, depending on how hot your iron is. I recommend the setting for synthetic fabrics, which is very low heat.

 Ta-da! Your wax is all melty and looks really pretty.

 Cut hearts (or other shapes, for different holidays) and voila! Melted hearts. I think these would be really pretty hanging in a window.

We just hung ours on our little arty clothesline to go along with our other projects. Our house is getting more and more festive!

This little art project was pretty fun, but after doing it, I think it's definitely suited for older kids. Jed didn't get to help much at all for this one. He did enjoy picking out the colors of crayons to use and poking the waxed paper with a straight pin that was stuck to the ironing board for some reason.

for the birds: valentine craft #2

I am trying to teach Jed that we make valentines for people we love and that the day is about showing our love for our family and friends, instead of just about red and pink hearts. Since we are still working on the concept of surprises, I thought it was too soon to make a valentine for Dave. So we decided to make "valentines" for the birds!

 

On one day we went for a walk to collect our pine cones. Jed had a great time helping me decide which pine cones would be the best and he was so happy to carry the bucket holding our booty. It was a chilly day but nice and sunny and we had a great time on our walk. Two days later we got down to business making the actual valentines.

 

This is a nice simple project to do with kids. Just smear peanut butter all over the pine cones after tying string around them and then roll them in birdseed. I tried to get Jed to spread the peanut butter but he is not one who likes to get sticky, so he wasn't really into that. He was much more excited about being a "scoopa tractor" with the birdseed. So, I spread the peanut butter and then he scooped birdseed over each pine cone.

 A finished "bird valentine!"

 We laid the finished products out on waxed paper until we had enough. Then we carried them outside and Jed helped me decide which of our trees to hang them in. We had a good time deciding which tree we thought the most birds would come to visit.

 We hung a couple in our cedar tree, a couple in our ponderosa pine,

 a couple in our flowering plum

 and one in our little yew.

 

Then we went inside to wait for the birds to notice our valentines!

It only took about an hour before I noticed the first adventurous chickadee having a snack. I called Jed over and we stood and watched it eating. Jed was so excited! He was thrilled to tell Dave and Nana all about our bird valentines later that night.

I have loved watching Jed become interested in watching the birds outside our window. Every time I see the chickadees having a snack, I call him over and we quietly watch them. He can recognize a chickadee easily now and knows its song too. I am anxious for other kinds of birds to come see us during spring migration!