Environmental Science Center

A. loves coming to ESC. She loves the story time, crafts, and seeing her home-schooled friends.

Thank You's For The Teachers

My son is in pre-school part time, so we wanted to make something for his teachers. J. was very excited to make something with his hands! We decided to use Jar Mugs (so you could see through what's inside and also drink from), sugar hearts and herbal tea. 

It took us a couple of days to figure out the right consistency for the sugar and the time for drying. By the end it turned out to be so easy to fix and so fast to dry - I could go on and on molding sugar hearts!

So, the consistency - DO NOT melt the sugar! That was our first mistake :) 
Add little drops of water, a drop at the time, and keep mixing until sugar is the same consistency as the snow! If you can pile it up in the middle of your bowl and it doesn't fall apart - you are done. 

Then we used our heart shaped ice cube tray, like this one: 

Pat sugar into each space tightly. 

Set it out to dry, either over night, or just turn your oven on and set the ice cube tray on top of the stove where it's warm. It dried this way in 10 -15 min! 

When dry, don't just flip the tray over - it will break sugar hearts as they fall out of the tray. Put a plate over the trays and gently turn it upside down, making hearts fall out of trays into the plate on their own. 

Here our hearts: 

I had some felt in appropriate Autumn colors and cut out squares and leaves. 

Used scrapbook paper and our printer to make these: 

 Here is our finished project: 

Superhero Birthday Party on the Budget

Our son's Superhero Birthday Party had to be on a budget and it turned out so cute! To tell you the truth - I like it that way! :) It's like a game - trying to find the best deal on things and trying to simplify things. I sincerely think kids love simple and fun. That's all you need - fun!

Fun comes from ideas, creativeness, and desire to do it. I know that there are lots and lots and lots of blogs and ideas out there. This is a realistic, non-pinterest Birthday for one special Superhero :) Look through and see if you would like to borrow some of my ideas! ;)



Here's how our Superhero Birthday Party went:

For space, we did our birthday at the church we attend.

I used the back of a banner from last year's Firehouse birthday and J 's coloring book my friend gave him. Turned out to be a cute banner! (for the original banner I just cut equal triangles of colored paper, patterned it in order I wanted, and sewed through on my sewing machine! I think all together is about 30-40 min project).

For all the games - I used what I already had at home. I also printed check lists for each child to mark the accomplishment of each achievement/obstacle gone through. In the end, they all received a Superhero Certificate. I just found one on Google images and used a stack of nicer printing paper I had. I think it was a photopaper from Staples that I got with a cash back offer (you buy paper and then submit for a refund online).

For food we had chips, hotdogs, carrots and broccoli (with dressing), strawberries, blueberries, cheese and pretzels, watermelon stars. All these things I price-matches to some stores at Walmart to get the best deals.

 Kids helped me with the bottles - they loved that job! I took the original labels off, which you don't have to do at all I later realized. Then I cut strips of colored paper, hot glued around the bottles, and then hot glued the superhero symbol. Kids were handing me bottles and labels and organized finished products.

 Our tradition of having a Costco cake. We started ordering with our wedding. Unfortunately they don't do cream cheese frosting anymore, only filling. We had lots of left overs (as usual) and this time we froze it. It froze so well and was delicious cold!
For the decor - superhero figures from the dollar store! Cost: cake $18, figures $6, candle (already had) $1 - $25.

First, we fed all the kids.
Oh, yes, we used to own a popcorn machine, but you will be surprised to know - almost no one touched the popcorn! 

'Save the girl from fire' obstacle. Kids had to jump on each pillow and save the girl.
This roll of red table cloth was given me by a fellow freecycler last year. This is a second birthday we used it, and I think it's finally all gone :)

'Test Your Aim' obstacle. That's where kids' soccer ball got in handy (along with oatmeal containers).

'How High Can You Fly?' Obstacle.Who doesn't love a trampoline? :)

'Catch the Dynamite'  I rolled up foil into balls and have craft sticks at home. Kids had to poke these 'dynamites' and bring them to the basket.

'How Strong Are You?' I purchased these two balls from a neighbor for a dollar total. They have fairy pictures on one side, but with a marker I wrote 50 LBS on each ball.
These kids are super strong to lift 100 LBS with such ease! :) 

Pappas couldn't do it ;)

This was a cute one. We already had Hawk gloves. My husband and I crafted some "walls" out of Ikea roll paper for kids' crafts. Two dads were holding up each piece of "wall" and kids had to break through it. They loved this challenge!

Oh, wait, I am sure this was kids' favorite! We pulled out a rope from the car and daddies were the Villains. Kids had to prove that superheros are stronger and can win. They pulled one side of the rope and Villains pulled the other.  Just guess who won? :)

One more obstacle: defuse the bombs! Oh, kids had a blast stumping on these air-filled water balloons! (dollar store, from this summer ;)

Picture wall - pinned black paper on the wall and sticky notes for the windows. Scrapbook paper clouds.

Thanks you's.
For Thank You's I made each child a mask they could decorate and a cape. Capes were made from discounted over-sized t-shirts I found at Walmart. I cute the t-shirts in half, cutting off sleeves and sides. Then I used some of my ribbon collection to pull ribbons through the neck hem. I ended up making two capes from each t-shirt. Then I had kids decorate them with permanent markers and superhero stickers I found for a dollar at Old Navy (out of all the places!).

My husband also bought some Superhero snacks and I printed 'Thank you' notes and just staples them together.

 Even cleaning up was fun! :)
ok, for some time. Cleaning up is never really fun :)

Science Experiments

My children LOVE doing science experiments. One of our favorite books for that is More Science Secrets. This book is SO simple and very inexpensive. My daughter can read all the instructions on her own (wording is very simple) and actually follow through every step.
 

If you do have or decide to purchase that book, on page 6 they have an experiment called "Follow That Ball!" where they prove gravity with a heavy small ball, long ruler or tape measure, and a pail filled with wet sand. For the wet sand I used Brookstone Sand my daughter received as a gift for her birthday. but you can use regular sand and just pour some water over it for it to get moist (you want it to be moist, so you that your ball will make a shape in it when falls).You can also use brown sugar.

Here's a worksheet to go with it:

Wonderful Art Blog!

A and I are studying World's Greatest Artists and I found this amazing blog that will help us in our curricula.

5 Tips To Change Your Attitude

I ran across this post today and really enjoyed reading it!

Math: 15 Minus Worksheet