Tessellation / Wednesday Won!!

So we've been participating in the Leap Frog online summer camp. Each week they have a photo contest in which you may submit up to 3 photos each week. The photo must include your child with their project. The first week, I failed to remember to submit a photo on time. The second week we submitted our 3 photos but we were outshined by two adorable little boys and their birdhouses. This week I was determined. It was puzzle week filled with worksheets. So as the photos started popping up of dozens of beautiful children and their worksheets, I knew we needed to do something bigger. There was a project that looked different and difficult and in my mind meant that if we could pull it off we had a good chance at winning. And the project began!

Tessellation. A Tessellation is a shape that fits together, like a pattern or puzzle. The activity had two Tessellations that you could choose from, one being a fish and one a bird. Or you could make your own. Challenge excepted! Wednesday's favorite animal at the zoo is the giraffe and I thought, hey, long neck, long legs, I can figure something out. It had to be measured perfectly so that they all fit together perfectly. Once I made the pattern piece, Wednesday said that it could be a horse, and so the idea of making multiple animals from this one design was born. With the pattern I then traced it onto a poster board size piece of paper. By this time we are 3 days into this project. After the paper was full we then put faces and legs on all the animals. It was so much fun to figure out all the animals we could make. There are giraffes, zebras, horses, bunnies, monkeys, pigs, snakes, fish, and random mixed up animals. Oh and Wednesday's favorite animal, the spotted doggie on the bottom. After the animals were done with crayon, she then used watercolor to paint them. It took about 2 hours to paint it all. When it was all finished I snapped a picture and submitted it. We checked today and she won!!!! It's great to be able to show her that hard work pays off. One full week of putting together a fun project and now she will receive 3 games for her Leap Pad! I'm so proud of her for being so imaginative and sticking with it until it was finished!

Original Pattern.

Drawing the Animals

Painting

Painting

Painting the last one.

Her winning picture!

Lemonade Stand

We did a lemonade stand today. Wednesday has been wanting to do this for so long. I put the word out that I was having one to see if any friends wanted to join. Sure enough one of my BFFs wanted to join with her daughter. I was so thankful to include Christina in this. She is a little older than Wednesday, which helped so much. They enjoyed making money. Even though I spent a pretty penny on all the essentials, it was good for them to learn responsibility. Plus Christina learned some math skills as well.

 

 Our Lemonade sign

  

 Our pop sign, we sold just as much pop as we did lemonade.

Our stand before we got the unbrella table out. 

 

 

Wednesday and Christina

 

 Taste test.

 

 Teamwork, these two work so well together.

Making Lemonade

I love lemonade! You would be surprised at how something as simple as making lemonade can be a learning and bonding experience. Have you ever been to a grocery store that has those child size carts? Do you have a child that hates sitting a cart or likes to run away when you go grocery shopping? Those child size carts are a great invention! My daughter has been asking to make lemonade for a week or so. I decided to make this a project. I took her to the store with the small carts and gave her a list.
Lemons
Sugar
Water
Sounds basic, right? Since we had time I had her find the items and put them in the cart. When we had found them all, we went to the self check out where I had her scan and bag the items. The cashier lady was so impressed that gave her 2 stickers. She then pushed the cart to the car, and loaded the trunk.
Later we made the lemonade. Making it was more of a joint effort. And it turned out delicious.

Bird house craft

This summer we are participating in the leapfrog summer camp. This week was all about caring for animals. Not only is there dozens of print out worksheets to do, there is at least one craft each week. This week we decided to do the birdhouse craft. We happened to have everything needed already. I recommend just using things that you already have.
What you will need:
Milk carton (a cardboard type carton works best, soy milk, orange juice...)
Scissors
Stick (we found a stick outside)
Paints, crayons, markers, construction paper, glue, or whatever you want to decorate you birdhouse with.
Twine or wire
Basically, cut a hole that a bird can fit through. Put the stick below the hole and decorate. Some can add a roof, or a window. This is largely up to your imagination.
What I did was I cut the hole, added the stick and painted it all white a day in advance. We used poster paint. I laid a drop cloth down on our outdoor table and let her go to town. She asked me to add a bird and a window and the words "Bird's Inn". We let it dry outside for a few hours and we hung it in one of our trees. Since I used wire for the hanging part I was able to carry a ladder outside and let her hang it. I think she was very proud of that project.

Science projects

Talk about a full schedule. Some people might think I overload my child. But the fact of the matter is that all the summer programs are only available in June and July.
This week she had science camp for four days, 3 hours a day. They did all kinds of things. One of which was to stick a daisy in water with coloring in it to see what would happen. Interestingly enough even I learned something. Wednesday has a thing for mixing colors, so she mixed what looked like all the colors to make black. So of course she was waiting for a black flower to emerge... Well by day four she had a flower with blue stripes and yellow spots. The flower had only picked up random pigments. So, if you ever do this experiment at home I encourage you to mix some colors. I find that a lot more interesting then putting a flower in red water and seeing it turn red. Sadly I did not get a picture of it because by the time it was to be taken home it had broke its stem.
Also in science camp they made volcano. I must share with you this project! Usually when you think of a homemade volcano you think of paper mâché. This was much simpler.
You'll need:
Plastic bottle ( we used a small one)
A strong paper plate
A large bowl
Flour
Water
Cocoa powder
Baking soda
Vinegar
Put the plastic bottle in the middle of the plate. In a bowl mix the flour and water until its a nice dough. Form the dough around the bottle, leaving the hole of the bottle open. After it looks like a mountain then sprinkle some cocoa powder on it for color. Because of the heat I set it outside and once it's dry it's time for eruption! I put a good amount of baking soda on the bottle (the more baking soda the bigger the eruption). Put the vinegar in a container that your child can use to pour it in the bottle. Encourage them to pour it all in at once, pouring it slowly will cause it to erupt inside of the bottle and that is not fun. When it's done, you can pour it out, rinse it out and do it again.
Note: it does not need to be dry to erupt it, some children hate to wait and that's fine. Just know that it will be much more messy, but it should not hurt the volcano.

Frog craft

Since I sign my daughter up for every possible learning class, we tend to do a lot of crafts. Here is a simple one.

What you will need:
* a paper plate
* green paint (marker or crayon)
* green paper (or a paper colored green)
* googly eyes ( or make your own eyes)
* red or pink skinny balloon
* stapler, tape, and/or glue

This is how you make it:
Take the paper plate and have them paint it green. While they are doing that, cut out two arms with hands and two legs with webbed feet. Once the painting is done, glue on the eyes. (if the paint is still wet, the eyes may stick to the paint) Attach the arms and legs to the frog. Staple the tongue to the frog. And done!

Berry picking

I've been noticing lately that mulberries are ripening. One of my many great memories from childhood is berry picking. Wether it was mulberries, strawberries, gooseberries ... It doesn't matter. I do remember that the most fun way is to pick wild berries. The thrill of the hunt as you will. My mother was a master of free adventures.
Today, after I picked Wednesday up from camp, she was asking to go to the park and have fun. I was dreading this request because today is extremely hot and muggy. After we had a snack, it came to me. Berry picking! There's a local park that has wild blackberry bushes scattered throughout the paved trails. So I grabbed a basket and a small food container and we were off to hunt berries. We were able to almost fill our container.
Now, you may be asking, isn't a pint of blackberries only a couple of bucks? Yes, it is. But that is not the point. The point is to teach your children where your food comes from. There is something rewarding about knowing where your food comes from and that you went there and got it yourself. Plus it is a very productive adventure that cost me nothing.

Growth spurts and hot weather

Wednesday has been growing like crazy this year. So much so that all the summer clothes that I had kept from last year were all too small once the heat came. I spent any extra money on some summer essentials for her over the last month.
Then good news! There are benefits to growth spurts! The carnival! Finally no more squeezing into kiddy rides because she can now ride on her own. Plus she can now ride the scrambler with me. I was so excited that I bought us wrist bands.
Bad news, sweltering heat! 89 degrees to be exact. So we rode everything once and now we are relaxing for a bit before we brave the heat again. It's amazing how a slushie and air conditioning can feel so good on a day like this.

Mall Trip

The mall. I'm not sure what to think of the mall anymore. In high school it was my favorite hangout. I would go two or three times a week. Then when I was out of school I avoided it because my size was not same in high school even though I still wanted to dress like I was. After I had my daughter it wasn't till I had lost all my pregnancy weight that I fell in love with the mall again. Now that I have a four year old there just doesn't seem to be reason to go there unless we absolutely need something. I find it over priced unless there is a sale going on. The love just isn't there anymore. Even so, I see the excitement in my daughters eyes when we walk into this giant place filled with things to buy. We just needed one thing but I still walked around for a bit.

I'm back, yay!

I gave up blogging as well as sharing photos and videos due to faulty computers. Now my husband finally broke down and bought me an IPhone. It seems like forever. I'm sure my Facebook pals are completely sick of my zillion photo uploads. Sorry, guys, I can't help it. I am completely in love with my daughter and I take photos every time she looks adorable. Just wanted you all to know I'm able to blog again and I am so excited!