Outdoor Nature Hour 17

We are slowly trying to get back into the swing of participating in the Outdoor Nature Hours.  We went outside on a hot, humid afternoon last week and gathered some leaves from trees around our yard.  We learned the parts of a leaf, drew them in our nature notebook and pressed them in our homemade flower press.

Our nature time began with a few seconds of sitting in out garden quietly and listening to the sounds all around.

We heard...
bees buzzing
doves calling
rooster crowing
and an unidentified bird calling

After our quiet time the boys gathered some leaves from the trees in our yard.  They choose
pecan
sweet gum
dogwood
oak
purple coneflower (flower in our yard)

The boys choose a couple of leaves to draw in their nature notebooks.  After drawing the leaves we placed them in our homemade leaf press.

Here they are choosing a leaf to sketch in their nature notebooks

We observed the parts of the leaves...

petiole

midrib

veins

blade

the little ones also observed that the purple coneflower leaves were rough and the others were smooth.

Here we are a week later taping the pressed leaves into our nature notebooks and labeling the parts.

 

Summertime Pictures

Summertime is for climbing trees

 

and eating ripe tomatoes off of the vine

 

 and playing on jungle gyms

and slides

Starting with Sketch Tuesday

I am very slowly making plans for a little more school in our schedule since the garden is about gone.  So yesterday, I headed over to Harmony Art Mom to read all about Sketch Tuesday.  Her challenge was sketching something that you would see in a restaurant.  I didn't exactly follow that idea because I had some perfect fruit in the kitchen that needed to be sketched before we devoured it.  I had purchased some water color pencils at Hobby Lobby and the kiddos were ready to put them to use.  I really loved how easy they were to use.  I thought the boys did a wonderful job sketching.  It had been awhile since we had practiced sketching and I thought Bo did exceptionally well.  Boo sketched the pear and tiger melon all by himself and mommy helped him sketch the pineapple.

Here is Bo's sketching.

 

 Here is Boo's sketching

Outdoor Nature Challenges 14, 15 and 16

We have been so busy with gardening, freezing and canning that I haven't posted much lately about our nature challenges.  We are still enjoying God's beautiful creation, it's just has not been very structured lately.  The sunflowers and zinnias in our garden are beautiful and the boys love running out each morning and gathering the vegetables.

We gathered some wildflowers earlier this spring and pressed them in our homemade flower press.  They turned out really well and we taped them into our nature notebooks.

 The boys practiced drawing and photographing the sunflowers growing in our garden.

Happy Birthday Miss LouLou

 

Miss LouLou turns three

Here's the birthday girl...

•  she loves her baby dolls
• she loves helping mommy in the kitchen
• she loves her baby sister
• she loves riding the John Deere gator
• she loves playing with her brothers
• she loves listening to mommy and daddy read stories
•  I love waking to find her snuggled in our bed some mornings...she wakes and comes to sleep with us at night
• when I look at her...I can't help but smile
• when I think of her getting so big...tears well up
• I'm so blessed to be her mommy

Some things I love...

 

I love this boy decked out in his orange...standing next to his orange sunflowers

I love this baby...with her fat rolls and drool

We're Still Here...

harvesting from our garden...
picking berries...
freezing and canning summer's bounty