We are having lots of fun with Barb's Outdoor Challenge.

We have enjoyed several nature walks around the neighborhood collecting leaves and observing the change in season.  We found an Oak tree as our tree to follow for a year and watch all the changes it goes through.

Here are some interesting shots that our children took of the neighborhood foliage.


The kids thought this bark looked like a face!


Tom Sawyer misplaced the adult tree identification book, so we cannot identify these strange pods. Hopefully, we will identify them soon.  In the meantime, anybody out there know what this is ?


Tom Sawyer insisted on stopping every few feet and drawing anything that was NOT a tree.  Here he is drawing a picture of a stick.  He is our budding artist, after all. 

The kids have been complaining that we have not decorated for fall.  So, we took the leaves back to our house and did crafts with them.  We did the traditional crayon rubbings and pressing leaves between wax paper. 


While we were at it,  we made a table centerpiece with fabric leaves, pumpkins, and apples.


And decorated our own home grown pumpkin that weighed in at 68 pounds !!


Blessings,

Dawn

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We are doing the outdoor challenges with Barb. 

 We finally found some cattails.  They are in our local bird sanctuary, so it will be easy to follow them for a year now that we've found them.  The kids really wanted to touch them but they were too far away for us to reach as well as on protected ground .  I will have to keep my eye out for some they can feel.

Here is a picture of my sweet boy trying to climb a tree to reach the cattails.

Here are the children and my drawings of cattails.  Going clockwise~ Tom Sawyer (7), Me, Little Red Ridinghood (5), and Goldilocks (8).

Blessings,

Dawn

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  We are doing the Outdoor Hour Challenge  with Harmony Art Mom this year.  Challenge number 6 is Pumpkins.  We used some of the lessons from the Handbook of Nature Study on pumpkins.  Our pumpkins are doing so well!  We only had two plants come up out of the 8 we planted so we were a bit concerned that they would not give us a crop.  However, we currently have 6 nice sized pumpkins!  The children have really enjoyed watching the growth.  It seems like the pumpkin patch gets closer to the play gym everyday! The kids are waiting for the play gym to be consumed by the plant.   Below is pictures of the pumkins' progress and the kids' nature journals.

Blessings,

Dawn

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