Forth of July Week, Day 3

Today we made a fruit salad for our lunch.
I found the recipe in my Woman's Day Cookbook, in the 4th of July Picnic menu, and although it's the only recipe not red, white, and blue this week, it sounded really good. (And it was!!)

Today we made: Watermelon and Nectarines in a Lime Syrup.

It was really easy. Dice the watermelon (about 6 cups) and refrigerate.
Boil 4 Tbsp. water with 1/3 cup sugar until the sugar is dissolved, remove from heat and add 2 Tbsp. of lime juice. Let cool. When ready to serve, cut tangerines and add to watermelon. Add 2 tsp. lime zest to the lime syrup and pour over the fruit. Shake/toss and enjoy!

Here's the eating pictures:

(KN) 

(KM) 

(She said, "Mom I wasn't eating it yet, take a picture now... Hold on, let me get some on my spoon.)

My favorite part was the syrup, combined with the watermelon juice. I actually strained some out and added a little pineapple juice and had a nice little fruity drink.

That's all for now,
Jo!

Forth of July Week, Day 2

It's really easy to find red, white, and blue desserts, which are great don't get me wrong, but I wanted more than that this week. Luckily, I found this recipe in my Taste of Home magazine.
**I tried to link the recipe but it requires a log in- it's really simple: blend 1 c. lemon juice, 1 c. sugar, and 4 c. ice. Pour over blueberries, add cherries on top.)

It's a frozen lemonade, with blueberries on bottom and cherries on top.
It was super simple but a little more sour than we expected. We did decide we'd make it again but with less lemon juice/more sugar.

It made 4 so the twins got to share one. However, I only got cute pictures of one (where 2 straws are better than 1).

That's all for now,
Jo!

Forth of July Week, Day 1

This week we're cooking! (Which is kind of a mix of science and math- and it's fun and tastes good!)

Since we end this week on the Forth of July I decided that made for a great theme this week. So most of our food is red, white, and blue, but there is one that is just a great summer picnic food.

We started Sunday night, after my Big Ks were returned from their grandparents, with a poke cake.
If you don't know what a poke cake is, it's pretty simple. Start with a white cake (box or scratch whichever you prefer), when it's dry you poke holes in it and then pour jello (mixed but not set) over the top. The jello soaks into the holes and makes a nice marbled look.

We used a strawberry jello so the cake was white and red, and then we put a frosting (made from mixing cool whip with pudding mix & a little milk) and added blueberries for some blue.

And here's the eating shots:

(Even the twins got in on the cake action!)

That's all for now, 

Jo! 

While The Cats Are Away...

Here's what I've been up to while the Big Ks are gone for the week. 

Most of it has just been prep for upcoming activities. 

We have a week of rainbow games coming up, so there's been some painting: 

Also, I did some laminating of some math games (I didn't feel the need to take pictures of those, at least not yet). 

I also took the chance to make a birthday gift for my nephew.
He turns 3 next month and I found a cool sewing project for him here (there's also some cute photo's of the project in use there). 

Here's the final result: 

That's all for now, 

Jo!

Flower Week Day 7, Ocean Week Day 6

I just realized I never posted these photos (sorry!). 

For ocean week on Saturday we took a hammer to a few rocks and chose our favorite jagged pieces and then threw them in a water bottle with some sand and water- all week long while at Papa and Grama's the girls are shaking the bottle (when they think about it) and then when they return we will pour out the water and sand and see how the rocks look. I don't have any picture of this experiment but I will post photos of the rocks when we look at them again. 

For the last day of flower week we did a very simple math craft. I gave them each 5 flower centers with numbers on them. 

Then, for KK, she made a multiplication to equal that and represented it on the page.
For KL, she counted that many petals and glued them on. 

I had them pick their flower centers randomly when we started, so of course KK got 3 different prime numbers!! She made those easy by just gluing 1 petal on each of those centers. 

(The 16 has 2 to the left side and 8 to the right, and the 3 and 4 of 12 kind of all ran together but I knew what she was doing.) 

KL got a little tired because she had a lot more gluing to do, so by the end she was counting them out and handing them to me to attach but she still did the counting. 

That's all for now,
Jo!

Ocean Week Day 5

Today is more of a sensory bin, but we looked our animals up after fishing for them, so I can claim that it still fits the science theme... right?

We went fishing in a pool of gelatin.

This was super simple, I just took a big tub (that's been used for several different sensory bins), tossed some of our plastic ocean animals on the bottom and then poured unflavored gelatin, dyed blue to cover. It was a little cold to play with but it's summer so it was okay (mostly).

They took turns pulling animals out and then we looked them up in Papa's animal book (which is an awesome book!!).

(There was the occasional taste test, which I don't understand because the first time she tried it, she immediately spit it out. Luckily it's just gelatin and food dye.)

When they finally found everything, I learned my KL is a fan of catch and release because she tossed them all back in, after playing in the empty gelatin for a few minutes of course. 

That's all for now,
Jo!

Ocean Week Day 4, Flower Week Day 6

Today we compared salt water and fresh water!

We compared look.

We compared smell.

We compared taste (a picture taken a moment after this would have been better- but look at that dimple!!).

And then we talked density of water as we put an egg in each cup.

And since this wasn't "crafty" enough we went straight to our flower math game.
We started by coloring our "vases" (recycled Gerber yogurt cups).

Then added a little "dirt" (or ocean play dough).

Then they took turns rolling a dice to see who could fill their vase faster. I really wanted two dice so they would practice their addition, but we could only find one :(

Our flowers were just a set of floral picks, meant for a luau themed party (but I paid like $4 for 6 dozen). I split the picks evenly between the girls and they took turns rolling the dice to add to their vase until someone ran out.
And the winner:

KK- not that she looks too excited in this picture (I swear I can't get this child to smile for most pictures).

That's all for now,
Jo!

Flower Week, Day 5

Today for our make up we made shape flowers.

We discussed shape names, along with sides and angles for each.  And then let their imagination take control.

This really was very simple, I looked through my scrap paper and cut it into squares, circles, rectangles, and triangles and kept them sorted for easy use.

 You could definitely added other shapes if desired, but I stuck with ones I could easily cut out (I used a circle hole punch to make them easier).

That's all for now,
Jo!

Ocean Week Day 3

Today for our ocean week we made ocean play dough.
We practiced measuring (which is the wrong unit but oh well) and we watched a chemical reaction between the dry ingredients and the hot water (there's the science!).

We used what may now be my favorite play dough recipe. It was super simple and there's no cooking (beyond boiling water), plus it's so soft. And the amazing recipe can be found here.

First the girls added the dry ingredients.

(I let KL stir these together since she's littler. We also added some small silver glitter and big blue glitter with this step.)

Next you added boiling water so I let KK stir that in until she was having a hard time. (Then I worked on it until it was good enough to finish off by a little kneading.)

And here's the finished product, it made enough for me to be able to split it between the two girls and they both had plenty to play with:

(Without the flash so you can see the glitter better.)

I grabbed a beach themed play dough brand set that I forgot we had until making this, along with the plastic ocean animal toys I had bought, and some larger sea shells I had bought also for them to play with.

The first thing KL did was pick up shells to see if she could hear the ocean :)

And then they played and played and played some more.

That's all for now,
Jo!

Ocean Week Day 2

Today we were running a little short on time so we just did this week's activity: Ocean Sensory Bags.

These were super simple and fun, and allowed for simple conversation about the animal characteristics.

We started by buying cheap, dollar store blue colored hair gel.

(Don't ask me why but they really wanted this photo.) 

Then they had a blast emptying the bottle into a plastic bag. 

Then we added a little glitter, because who doesn't love glitter (as long as it's contained) and a few plastic animal toys I bought for pretty cheap from Oriental Trading. As we pulled out animals we talked about whether they lived in the ocean or near the ocean (there were seals and walrus and penguins, etc. - animals that live some in and some out). 

We sealed the bags and then we closed the bag and put it inside another just in case a seal broke. 

And away they went to play. 

Look at how they're studying the animals inside- I love that!! 

That's all for now,
Jo! 

Flower Week Day 4 & Ocean Day 1

Last week we encountered life interrupted and had absolutely no time for our activities! But to help keep us distracted from the pain of the interruption and allow my girls to experience what I had panned for them, this week will be more like a 2-in-1 (and next week they're vacationing with Papa and Grama so it gives me a little more Big K time before they leave for a week).

For our flower day we used our paintings we made earlier and hung them on a wall with an added stem.

Then I had the girls write equations (addition and subtraction for 6 yo KL and multiplication and division for 4th grade KK) on the leaves. Then they added them to the appropriate answer.

Action shots:

 (KK was using a white board to double check and work out her problems.)

This week is a science week, with an ocean theme.
So as a simple start we looked at a few different types of ocean creatures and a few books with information of other elements (such as sea weed and sea shells and the way the ocean floor looks). Then we did an art project that is a small aquarium.
We started with a paper plate painted blue (and another with the bottom painted blue and the middle cut out). We covered the hole with a piece of plastic wrap (or cellophane if you've got some).

We used green pipe cleaners for sea weed.

And scrap paper to make fun fish (along with washi tape). We also added some small seashells to finish the ocean floor. Then we taped the front on.
Here's the finished projects:

That's all for now,
Jo!