CSN Giveaway and Apple Activities

I have another surprise for you all! To show my THANKS to all my followers The CSN Store has offered one lucky reader a $35 gift certificate. This is a store that sells everything from Corelle to Mellisa and Doug to apple peelers. Just leave a comment below and join me on Facebook. This giveaway will be open until 10/2.

We have been using our apple peeler like crazy this year. The girls really enjoy using it too. We purchased a huge crate of seconds at the farmer's market to make applesauce, and freeze. The peppers were also included.

Olive enjoyed adding 100 apples to the tree in this math activity found here and here.

 Jem sorted apples by color, found here.

Homemade Dog Biscuits- Simply Healthy

Here's a little known secret about me....after I was a reporter, but before I was a Mom, I started an all-natural dog biscuit bakery. I made doggie birthday cakes and biscuits for all occasions,  like the cakes shown above. Our most popular treats were "peanut butter barkers." Here is a "Simply Healthy" dog biscuit recipe that I know your four-legged friends will enjoy.

 Homemade Peanut Butter Barkers

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup wheat germ or ground flax seed
1/4 cup brewer's yeast
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons canola oil
1/2 cup peanut butter

1/2 cup chicken or beef stock

-Combine together (add more flour if too sticky), roll out onto floured surface, cut into shapes with cookie cutter.

-Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes, turn off oven, leaving biscuits inside to harden and dry for 2 hours.

Taste-tested by these two cuties! These adorable pound puppies love to sleep on Olive's bed. I must say these two dogs are pretty smart as they join us everyday in our homeschool classroom!

 

Meet the rest of our family: A blue Betta named Alligator. I say to Jem every morning, "go feed your alligator."

 We also have a cool White's Tree Frog named Frosty, and two Green Frogs named Baby, and Micro. Frogs are actually a lot of fun to have and easy to take care of. Let me know if you want more info on frogs as pets.

Pumpkin Mosaic Craft & ABC Twiggles Winner

These fun pumpkin plates are easy to make and will give you some extra free time while the kids craft.
You will need:
-paper plate
-orange construction paper cut into squares
-black construction paper for the face
-1 green pipe cleaner for the stem
- a glue stick
Have fun making a mosaic pumpkin face.
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Thank-you all who entered the giveaway for a year subscription to ABC Twiggles. I would like you to know that I checked out your blogs and I now follow you too. The winner is:
Christy said...No Time Like The Present

I could only see the A activities but they were really great!!! Thanks for the chance to win! Congratulations!

It's Pumpkin Time!

It's my favorite time of year around here! We made pumpkin playdough and used little twigs and evergreen to decorate our little balls of fun. You can find the recipe here from an earlier post. We added orange food coloring, nutmeg, and cinnamon.

I found a good lesson plan on pumpkin life cycles over at Montessori Mom that went along nicely with our book.

 We read The Pumpkin Book, an educational story about the life cycle and origins of pumpkins, by Gail Gibbons.  You can also find a fun paper plate life cycle activity at My Montessori Journey.

It's also nice when you can find a garden or pumpkin patch where the pumpkins are still attached to the vine to get the full effect of the cycle.
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Reposted from 2010

Crabby Craft

What you'll need to make this crabby craft is just a paper plate, wiggle eyes, pipe cleaners for legs, a hole puncher, scrap paper to make the claws, and two brads so the claws can move. Fold the paper plate in half and use your hole puncher to punch four holes on each side. The girls wanted to add pom-poms for a fancy crab.

Katy No-Pocket- Before Five In A Row

Katy No-Pocket is an adorable story about a mama kangaroo who is in need of a pocket to carry her baby. This book is illustrated by H.A. Rey, who is famous for Curious George, and written by Emmy Payne.

We worked on letter K and added picture of like kite, kangaroo, and kettle to the K pocket.

A cute little finger play.

We matched animals with their homes.

We learned about animal families. A female Kangaroo is a boomer, a male- flyer, and a baby- joey.

What lives in a tree? We also used aprons to carry our baby animals around the house.
You can find cute lapbook ideas for Katy No-Pocket at homeschool share and Christian homeschool hub.
Linked Up:

Homemade Bubble Bath- Simply Healthy

We love to take bubble baths at our house! Here is a Simply Healthy recipe you can make at home with out Parabens and the other icky stuff that can be found in most products.
Lavender Bubble Bath
  1 quart Water
 1/2 cup Castile liquid soap (They have this at my Public's.)
  2 oz Coconut oil
  1 oz Glycerine (If you can't find this, use dove dish soap.)
  add a few drops of lavender essential oil and mix a little with your bath water. Enjoy!

                                                        Simply Healthy

Everything Apples

An apple mosaic with a paper plate.

Apple peeling and coring, making applesauce to eat.

Apple pie playdough with my favorite recipe here.
Perfect Playdough
1 c. flour
1/2 cup salt
1 T. cooking oil
1 T. cream of tartar
1 c. water
Food coloring of your choice
Add-ins of your choice (i.e. spices, extracts, glitter, etc.)

Stir ingredients together into a saucepan. Over medium heat cook the dough until it pulls away from the pan. Lay onto a cutting board and knead well, it will be hot to touch. Allow to cool and enjoy.

We also plan to finish our life cycle of an apple tree from My Montessori Journey.

Plastic Bottle Fish

These lovely recycled plastic bottle fish are perfect to hang in a window and can even go to the pool as they are waterproof. Just save a water bottle and cut the bottom off, use leftover plastic wrap to stuff inside, and staple shut. What a nice simple craft to start your Monday off right.

Making GOOP

The weather is getting lovely so be sure to take this messy fun outside!

What you'll need:
2 cups -White Glue
1/1/2 Cups -Warm Water
4 TBSP. -Borax
1 Cup- Cold Water
food coloring- we used green.

Mix glue and water in a separate bowl and borax and cold water in a separate bowl. Mix 2 bowls together and add food coloring or tempera. Stir well, then kneed. Store in air tight container. Do not use near carpet as it's glue.


(This fun recipe can from a preschool teacher a few years back.)

ABC Twiggles Giveaway

Pick a letter, any letter....ABC Twiggles will have just the activity to help you teach your kiddo about the alphabet. This is a BIG giveaway my friends! You can win a year subscription to this wonderful site.

ABC Twiggles provides a multi-sensory curriculum for teaching children the letters of the alphabet. It contains a wide variety of materials and resources like letter puppets, letter flashcards and posters, sandpaper letters, banners, games, mazes, crafts, and even lesson plans for the week.
Here is an idea on what we did with the letter A- check out this blog post.

• Hear the letter
• Feel the letter
• Taste the letter
• See the letter
• Write the letter

For a chance to win a year subscription to ABC Twiggles ,  take a peak at their website and tell me your favorite letter of the alphabet.
For multiple chances to win:
: Subscribe or follow my blog
: Tell a friend to enter the giveaway
: Post about the giveaway on your blog
:Give yourself an extra entry if you are one of the first 10 people!

So you could have 5 chances to win! A winner will be announced on 9/28!
Good-Luck

Learning About Shells

Since we live near the beach we have a lovely collection of shells. If you take a close looks you can see on the shell board that we are learning about bi-valves (two halves that fit together).
Oyster- circular grooves
Scallop- symmetrical
Ark- zig-zag streaks
Cockle- asymetrical

At our house we get pretty creative with shells. Olive loves to make ornaments and necklaces out of them, while Jem loves to paint them. Pictured above is a sand dollar and an olive shell (the state shell of South Carolina). 

 This was one of her amazing Mother's Day necklaces for me!
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I will be hosting a great BIG giveaway on Thursday....so please visit again soon!

Homemade Recycled Paper

Making Homemade Recycled Paper
Step 1: Shred about 2 cups of scrap paper and put in blender.

Step 2: Add about 1 cup of water.

Step 3: Blend well and add 1 tablespoon of cornstarch.

Step 4: Drain slowly through a strainer or wired mesh. Allow to dry in the sun.

This is a great idea for teaching the 3R's- Reuse, Reduce, Recycle.
I should add that our paper turned out thick. You can draw on it, but it would crack in tiny pieces when folded. It would make a nice embellishment to a card.

Happy Grandparent's Day

Grandparent's Are Special

Grandparents sprinkle fairy dust,

On every single day.

They make life more magical,

And turn grey clouds away.

They make childhood last forever,

And grow more precious through the years.

They always have a story,

And can help us calm our fears.

Grandparents are special,

They link us to the past.

They know what is important

And show how long love lasts.

Happy Grandparent's Day!

Love, Karen 

Sippy Cup Central Mom

Homeschool Photos

Olive reads a book to her sister...little sis says, "read me more!"

Jem measures herself with blocks.

Olive building steps for her castle.

These are just a few reasons why I'm glad that Olive is not in Kindergarten from 8-4pm, five days a week.