Monday, November 23, 2009

Well. My blog's been pretty quiet I know, but we have been very busy. We've been working on some Christmas gifts that I would love to put on the blog but unfortunately those gifts are for some of the people who read my blog, so... we can't do that. I can tell you however that I found a great little etsy shop that has the most adorable patterns for felt toys. It's www.buggabugs.etsy.com . I'm in the process of making a few of their toys and they are so cute! I highly recommend them. I can't wait to see my daughters face when she sees a whole pancake breakfast play set. She's gonna love it. We've also been busy with "school". Our nature classes are back on schedule so we will have some photos up soon. We are also studying Native American stories and continuing our math lessons from A Little Garden Flower and we will be doing some cooking and baking this week for Thanksgiving, of course! Among the baking will be my favorite fresh pumpkin pie recipe. Here it is for anyone who would like it:
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Fresh-Pumpkin-Pie/Detail.aspx . I make a few changes though. I use brown sugar instead of honey (I don't really measure it, I just add it until I think it tastes sweet enough) , I also add nutmeg and I use more spices than it says to. This really makes a great pie. Also I cut the top off my pumpkin and cut slits in it then bake it in the oven at 350 until it gets soft (you can pierce outside with fork) then I clean it out and puree it. It's much easier this way. Well, that's all for now. Hope everyone has a fantastic Thanksgiving!

Friday, November 6, 2009

Playscape

Ahh. Yaya and I have found our new favorite thing... needle felting. This playscape was inspired by the little fairy you see pictured. Yaya got this as a birthday treat at her friends party and we just had to make her a place to live. We used a 9x9 square of wool felt and felted the roving on top to make "grass" and a little stream. Yaya wanted a rainbow cave for her to sleep in and a fuschia colored tree. I think it turned out pretty cute. Our next playscape project may be just for mommy to try her hand at felting and will be a bit bigger. If I ever find the time that is:)





Thursday, November 5, 2009

Needle Felted Pumpkins








These little pumpkins were so easy to make. I couldn't find a tutorial online that I liked so I just made up my own way and it worked out pretty good. I started with a small ball of yarn then just wrapped some orange wool roving around it and poked lightly with a felting needle. Then I felted the top and bottom more securely. I wanted my pumpkin to puff out so I didn't needle it too much. I also wanted it to be more round at the bottom so I then felted the lines of the pumpkin from top to bottom and this created a round bottom look. The kids didn't want to make the lines so they just poked theirs all over with the needles. Then we made some vines and leaves for the top. This was very fun and easy enough for my 4 year old.










Homeschoolers Halloween Bash












We had a great time at our Homeschool Halloween Party! Grandma was visiting so she got to go with us too. It was so nice to have her here. The kids had some great treats, played games and ran around like crazy with their friends. I think their favorite game was the toilet paper mummy wrapping. Yaya was an expert mummy wrapper :). Little JJ was too cute toddling all over in his little "Freddie" outfit.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Bean Bag Frog


Yaya is so funny! She and her brother were sewing little bean bag frogs and she looked like a little old lady in her dolls stroller. I just had to take a picture. They really like to sew and she does such a great job for a 4 year old! This was a pattern from our Earthchooling curriculum. It's such a simple little craft and now we will have bean bags to toss as we say our times tables!

Flamingo Road Nursery


Well, this was the closest we could get to fall here in South Florida. We were lucky enough to get a cool 75 degree day so we headed to the nursery for some fall fun. Yaya and P-Nut had a hay fight and picked out some carving pumpkins. We were going to go on a hay ride, but unfortunately the horses were taking a break (which we didn't find out about until we had already waited a half hour in line) so we missed out on that. It was a fun day though and we really enjoyed that fall weather. I wish it would come back!

Bergeron Park-Davie, FL




Well, I'm a little behind on our blogging so I'll try to catch up this week. We will start with our trip to Bergeron Park in Davie Florida. This park was inhabited by indians as far back as 5000 years ago. There are several archeological sites on it. It was surrounded by water at one time and the southern tip served as a canoe landing for the indians. It has one of the highest elevations in South Florida, a whole whopping 28 feet above sea level. We saw a cute Gopher Tortoise and the kids had a fun time digging for indian artifacts. Yaya found pine cones and she thought they were the coolest things ever. P-Nut found "quick sand" and lost his shoes!