Celery Rainbow Fish Art!

      I was surfing Pinterest one day when I saw a really cute idea for a fun art project; Celery Rainbow Fish! The basic idea is you take pieces of celery and cut them into short sticks that you use to dip in different colors of paint in order to make what look like fish scales. It's a really cute idea, and a good way to use up some of the last celery we have that we picked from Miller Farms a few months ago. The intention was for them to actually try to make them look like real fish scales do... but honestly I like how they turned out this way too! They had a ton of fun doing them (which is what I'm REALLY going for), and they are colorful and pretty. We sent our beautiful works of art to some people we love, and we hope they love them too! If you want to see the original Pin where I got the idea from, here is the link to the site: http://www.craftymorning.com/celery-stamping-rainbow-fish-craft-for-kids/

Camping/Archery Trip

Last week we decided to go camping for one last time before it got too cold, so instead of doing the normal beach trip to the lake at the campground (it was closed for the season... and brrrrrrrrrr anyway...) we decided to let the boys try their bow and arrows at the archery range by the campground instead. We found the bow at a thrift sale for $5 last year sometime, and it's been sitting around waiting for the chance to use it. We bought a few cheap target arrows to go with it and we were ready to roll. We went once, the day we arrived to see how they liked it... and they LOVED it! They actually did a really good job with it too; I was impressed for sure. They ended up loving it so much that we went back the next day again instead of going fishing. They are already looking forward to going again soon!

The boys also had a blast during this trip because; A. There is a park RIGHT next to the camping spot we always try to get, and B. There was another family next to us camping with 3 other kids their age that homeschool! They were SO excited! LOL! I only took pictures of the boys at the park since it's always weird to creepily take pictures of kids you don't really know... but the point is they had a blast. :-)

Kindergarten Book List

     I think I've mentioned in a few posts about the ridiculously long list of books I wanted to read in Kindergarten, and how I got through most of it, and I'm finishing it up this year before I start on the ridiculously long First Grade book list... Anyway, I kept a list of all "my" books that I read with the boys this year. Now, if you remember, by "my" books I mean the ones that go in "my" shelf on the bookshelf. It's books that I've chosen either before going to the Library, or while we were there. If it wasn't a book based on a TV show or superhero; I included it. Well, I finally got around to taking my list and making it into a bunch of jpg images so that other people can enjoy some new, different books for a Kindergartener or even younger! If you have any questions about a certain book, or the list at all, feel free to ask! There are a lot of great ones on here, and many I'd never heard of before! Enjoy!

Twin Test Kitchen: Apple Pie

     We were looking through Pinterest for new meal ideas (and what I really mean is I was looking for meal ideas when the helpers came along and saw food on my computer screen....haha) and Wyatt saw an apple pie. Immediately he remembered that he had wanted to try baking a pie, and I had told him we'd made one in the past. So, of course now we HAD to make a pie!

     After we got all the ingredients from the store, we organized our ingredients from the recipe I found and got started. We, and the recipe I used, decided to just go with a frozen pie crust, especially our first time. I can't imagine the three of us attempting to figure out how to make a pie crust... so I figured it would be much less frustrating, and probably more delicious this way. Here's the link to the recipe:

     First thing we did was get everything we needed out, and then I peeled the apples and cut the side of the apple off the core so the boys could cut up the apple into chunks. This was their first time ever cutting anything (butter knife of course) and they loved it! Plus they did a pretty good job!

After all the apple was cut up we mixed all the rest of the ingredients with the apple and put our pie together. Once it was baked it actually looked really good, and tasted good too! The boys learned that they don't like cooked apples, which pretty much ruined it for them, but Andrew and I thought it was delicious! :-)

Science Experiment: Acids and Bases!

     Wyatt asked if we could do a science experiment from his science kit, so we went looking for one that looked interesting. We settled on an acids and bases lab because we had all the materials, and it sounded like fun to pick out lots of different liquids we could test to see if they're an acid or a base. Now, I did my best to try to explain, at a 6 year old level anyway, what an acids and bases are, but, let's be honest, most of it was kind of like I was speaking Hebrew to them or something...lol! They do know that they've heard of acids, and that there's a scale of acids and bases, and that bases are sort of "opposite" of acids, and are at the other end of the scale. They understood as best they could, and we moved on to the fun! Here are some pictures of them testing out different liquids! We made an pH indicator with red cabbage powder provided in the kit, and got to work! I also included a picture of our chart we made (so charting was involved too!). Chances are not all the answers are 100% right, but we had fun, and they did learn something, so we'll worry about being correct with acids and bases in a few more years. <3

Library Days - 6/19 and 7/3

Here are the library books from 2 of the last 4 weeks... I always end up in such a hurry on library days that I end up forgetting to take a picture. When we come to the end of  Kindergarten when we start First Grade material in August or September, I'll put up a word file of all the books we read (that weren't superhero type books for fun) this year! It's so long it's crazy!

The boys really love the choose your own adventure type books, so we had Scooby Doo and Batman ones that week! Plus they think the Ducking book is hilarious so we had to get that for the third or fourth time. 

This week's collection of books is pretty small since it was 4th of July week! Still read some good ones though; with their favorites being the rock book, the ninja turtles and the Peabody and Sherman. 

The boys love to collect rocks, so when I found this book I knew they had to see it. They really liked it, and had it out comparing their rocks to the different types of rocks listed in the book, which is exactly what I had hoped would happen! I may even look for some more fun rock collecting books! Until next time! :-)

Library 6/5 and My Book System

     I haven't been doing great in the remebering to take pictures before going to the library area... but one week I remembered! Lol! Here are the books from a few weeks ago.

There were a few of the random choice books this week, they were all pretty good, nothing super exciting in their eyes anyway. The favorite book was actually from this last week, and I forgot to get a picture so I went with my buddy Google, and found one!

This is a book about a little boy who has too many toys (much like my kids)... and his mom finally has had enough (again... a little close to reality here...) so she tells him he has too many toys and needs to get rid of some. So of course a toy negotiation starts happening and eventually some toys are sorted out and put in a box. In the end, Mom goes to get the box, toys are everywhere, and we find out what we've always known... kids would rather play with a box! Super cute book, and we all liked it.

Now, you may wonder how in the world I manage to get the books back on time and not have a billion dollars in library fees. Well, part of it is my "OCD" that doesn't allow things like this to happen... so I set up a handy dandy system! The boys have a book shelf that has four shelves. I've divided it up into certain shelves for certain books. The top shelf is "my books" or the books I picked out for them to read (sometimes it's overflow from their shelf too, but mostly my choices). The second shelf is "their books" or the books that they picked out from the library; mostly Scooby Doo and Superhero books are found here. Finally the third shelf (4th shelf is just our books), is the "books that have to go back this week" shelf. Our library lets us check out books for 3 weeks at a time, so by the third week, there are certain books that need to be read so they can go back. Every Friday when we go to the library, when we get home, I check the list on our account on the library's website to see which books have to go back next week.  I take those out of the top two shelves, stick them in the newly emptied 3rd shelf, and then refill the other two with the new books. Make sense? Who knows. Honestly you just deserve a high five for reading all that... so I'll stop now. Lol! If anybody want's anymore information on my system, just let me know. :-)