Prison Art

First, a little history:

Last night, after the kids were in bed, we were watching Lockup: San Quentin Extended Stay. It is a documentary about the lives of prisoners who are serving long sentences in San Quentin. The prisoners necessarily have to be very creative in finding ways to spend their time, and some create amazing works of art using the meager supplies available to them. Some of them make amazing sculptures using only toilet paper and water.

Now, today is an average day for this time of year - 93 degrees - and the kids wanted to play with the hose to cool down. I went out to check on them after a little while, and this is what I found:

Here they are soaking magazine pages in water on the sidewalk and then scrunching them up into little balls. Then they laid them out in the sun to dry:
At least we know that they will not die of boredom should they ever end up in prison....

Pismo~

"Best Vacation... EVER!!" -Madison

Song: Island in the Sun by Weezer

2yo + scissors = :-(

We don't have pets - we have Webkinz. These stuffed animals and their virtual world take the place of real pets in our home. I like that I don't have to feed them or clean up after them. We also have one very mischeivious two year old:I do have to feed and clean up after him. I don't know if he goes looking for trouble, or if trouble just finds him - but whichever it is, he and trouble are never far apart!

The other day, somehow some scissors were left were he could find them, and this happened to Madison's beloved pet, Goldenrod:After a few quick stitches I managed to get him fixed up...
...but the poor puppy will always have a little scar on his nose now, thanks to Kaden.

Leaves and Ladybugs

Outdoor Challenge #17

For this weeks challenge we were to gather leaves, so we went for a walk through the empty field near our house. We gathered leaves from all the trees we saw ~ here Madison and Hunter are collecting leaves from a giant old oak tree:We also saw some ladybugs on some weeds out in the field - we talked about why they might be attracted to those plants and discovered some fuzzy little bugs also on the weeds. When we got home we looked them up and it turns out they are wooly aphids.

On the way back, Hunter climbed down into the irrigation canal and discovered some tadpoles. He reported that they are just heads and tails at this time - no legs yet. Back at home we made some rubbings of the leafs we had collected and labeled the pictures:

Kaden says...

"When I grow up I will be red juice, and I will go in the fridge, and you will drink me!"

Sewing Project~

In the latest issue of Living Crafts magazine were the instructions to make this nifty little backpack: I let the kids pick out their own fabric, and Hunter and Madison each took turns sewing (and I did some, too!):And here are the finished products!
I don't sew a lot - all I ever really do is an occasional hemming... so I was pretty proud of myself. The kids love their little bags ~ they are just the right size for carrying a few special things wherever they go.

Glumps

While we were reading Don't Bump the Glump and Other Fantasies yesterday, Madison was inspired to copy Shel Silverstein's illustration style...

So, here we have -

the Wachamay: the Flatchafay:
the Flamsake:

and the Dodo:

Outdoor Hour Challenge #16

Okay, so we are kind of jumping into this in the middle, but since I finally started a blog, I couldn't wait to get started.

The Outdoor Hour Challenges are weekly assignments to go with the Handbook of Nature Study, and this week's assignment was to plant sunflowers. Since we just received our sunflower seeds from Cornell University's Celebrate Urban Birds project, the timing couldn't be better.

So here is Madison, planting sunflower seeds:

Here is Kaden watering them, after they were all planted:And where is Hunter? Well, he has been sent inside, since the question of who would get to water first started a mini war between the boys. I decided that Kaden would get to water first, since he didn't get to do as much planting, being two and all.... Hunter was not happy with that decision and started to throw a fit, so I sent him in to calm down.

However, Madison did find this adorable little millipede: He fell off her hand right after posing for this picture, and she spent the rest of the time searching for more.

Hopefully in a few weeks we will have some little sunflower sprouts.... we'll see if we can remember to water them!

Snails...

Our yard is crawling with these slimy little guys... They really gross me out, but the kids love playing with their friendly little "pets". I think if we could find a way to sell them, we would be rich!

The other day we came home from running some errands and before we went inside, Kaden ran around and gathered up a few snails from the front yard. He set them down in the driveway behind the car, and then told me to "back up!" He wanted me to squish the snails with the car.... I never know what he will come up with next.