Photos April/May - Part 1

In spite of all of the busyness of writing end of year reports and prepping and teaching the Housebuilding Summer Camp, I haven't forgotten that I have photos from April & May of our homeschool co-op year still to share!

So, here is Part 1:

reading Pelle's New Suit

feeling raw wool from my brother's sheep Molly

washing the lanolin and dirt and grass out

of the raw sheep fleece

you can see the dirt in the water

washing until the water runs clear

a finished knitted elephant

pattern in A First Book of Knitting for Children

coloring the United States in the order they joined the union

(reviewing Geography & History at the same time)

using the United States Control Map to help with state identification

West Virginia split off from Virginia over the Civil War, 

so this state formed surprisingly late

(VA went Confederate, WV went Union)

we see Westward Expansion in action

Arizona was the last of the continental U.S. states

and, finally, AK and HI in 1959

there were just a few short months where the U.S. flag had 49 stars, 

but my mom found one in this house when they cleaned it out!

adding lanolin to our hands and forming little wool sheep

from clean wool batting

learning how to comb wool with wool carders

the seed of the mango has the sweetest flesh around it

joyful Fruit Salad making

new books constantly arrive for our classroom...

this is one is The Street Beneath My Feet

symbolizing article, adjective, noun in Grammar

a deep dive into < mb > in SWI
this is the LEX Grapheme Deck by Gina Cooke

reviewing the Waseca Biome materials for U.S. Geography

before we look at the Tall Tales of each region

a sweet mama cat & baby cat

this student scaled the patterns up and down herself

laying out a Scale Model of the Solar System

in Riverside Park

working as a team to measure and place each planet

the rocky planets are close together...

the gas planets are significantly farther out

Zac and I visited Fort Massac State Park

to see the Spinners & Weavers Guild monthly demonstration

feeling mohair fiber

of all the tall tales, Febold Feboldson (Nebraska)

was the class favorite... lots of very dry humor

working on a rough draft for the MLB

digging for worms in the vegetable garden

a Farm Day hike to Cache River

(here it is just a creek)

a crawfish carrying her eggs on her belly

Talib gives a spontaneous science lesson

planting tulips from the Nature table into the garden

fruit salad with Honey Ricotta on the side

using the Movable Alphabet with compound words

Word Study material from Montessori Research & Development

finding robin eggs in the yard each day

these were April 15th

factoring with the Algebraic Peg Board and Pegs

Saturn artwork in Science Club with glitter glue dots

for the ice crystals which make up its rings

the joys of carding wool!

creating a beautiful design with the colors

it looks like a garden of flowers!

tearing paper to make pulp for papermaking

wrapping eggs in onion skins for dyeing

it is very tricky to use string to hold the skins in place

and actually this is not needed 

place the wrapped egg bundle in panty hose, twist, and secure 

you can also simply place onion skins loose in the cooking water

they are so pretty after dyeing

building a huge bird nest sculpture out of sticks

soaked paper before blending...

and after blending!

our rainbow of colors

place a large stack of folded towels on the floor

and use a cookie cutter as the mold

Zac's handmade paper Easter egg

everyone had a turn making an egg

simply spoon in the pulp and then press the extra water

out with your fingers, then leave the shape to dry overnight

we also dyed eggs in shaving cream

with beautiful swirls of food coloring

leave the eggs to rest for a bit before wiping off the extra

shaving cream; the eggs will look marbelized

wiping the shaving cream off carefully with paper towels

the older children tried dyeing with red cabbage

we wrapped these bundles with layers of rubber bands

and then boiled the eggs in water

you can see the blue color from the cooked cabbage

they are steaming HOT when you open them up

so be extremely careful!

the blue swirls are subtle at first but will get darker

if you leave the eggs to rest on the hot wet leaves

of course, older friends wanted to do the papermaking...

and the shaving cream eggs...

who could resist putting their hands in this???

climbing the mulch mountain on a rainy Spring day

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