Posted in Random Ramblings on Sep 30th, 2008 4 Comments »
After a long creativity dry-spell, I am finally getting back into doing some crafts because I am suddenly inspired by this:Great 2-5 yr old gift. To turn these: Into these bean bags! What fun! And by using pre-cut, color-coordinated “charm squares” it was easy enough even for the craft-challenged like me! LOL! The two matching [...]
Posted in alaska on Sep 30th, 2008 17 Comments »
(photocredit:Ed) This was the view from our porch last night. It’s a little blurry because of the wind, but in addition to the gorgeous Northern Lights, can you see the big dipper? I thought that was pretty neat. Ed and I stayed up a couple hours, from 1-3am, just watching the show swirling above our [...]
Posted in Random Ramblings on Sep 29th, 2008 13 Comments »
Our first real Alaska winter is here… Ready or not.
Posted in nature study on Sep 26th, 2008 3 Comments »
Ok, so I’ve had several people ask me where we get all this nifty animal stuff to stock our home nature center, so I thought I’d address it, and hopefully give you some ideas of where you can get similar things. We do have an assortment of our own stuff: fur, bones, teeth, leaves, seeds, [...]
Posted in alaska, Curriculum or Lack Thereof..., nature study on Sep 24th, 2008 7 Comments »
I am a little behind in posting, but here are some pics of the kids’ reindeer-related activities from monday: Labeling a photo with the “parts of a reindeer:” We watched a slide show and read about the history of reindeer in Alaska. Then Superboy read about how to make Eskimo Ice cream (hint: yuck!) while [...]
Posted in Curriculum or Lack Thereof... on Sep 23rd, 2008 20 Comments »
Both JBug and Superboy have expressed interest in studying Alaskan animals, and I wanted to do it in a way that invited inquiry, rather than a teacher-directed approach. What better model than those wonderful hands-on nature center displays we all love so much? So I borrowed a few things to add to our own growing [...]
Posted in alaska on Sep 22nd, 2008 1 Comment »
Please hold while we turn our school room(aka dining room) into a full-on nature center for a little while. Inspired by this post from Angela at Three Plus Two, we are doing a temporary remodel. We are surrounded by skulls and pelts and antlers, tracks and scat and hooves… It is totally wild! Check back [...]
Posted in Random Ramblings on Sep 21st, 2008 39 Comments »
Yesterday we lost a dear friend, our beloved pet Buddy. We are not sure what happened–we think perhaps he was poisoned somehow. All we know is one day he was fine and the next he was not. Buddy was a good dog, gentle and patient and sweet in a way that only a golden retriever [...]
Posted in alaska on Sep 18th, 2008 11 Comments »
This picture is in the Denali park slideshow I linked earlier, but I just love it so much I had to give it it’s own post: We met this gentleman in Denali park. I have no idea who he really is, but we call him Santa of the Wilderness, and JBug was completely mesmerized. He [...]
Posted in Curriculum or Lack Thereof... on Sep 17th, 2008 3 Comments »
There are a bunch of blog challenges out there, including Poetry Friday, Sketch Tuesday, Works for me Wednesday, Green Hour, and more. I’ve thought of participating in these kinds of things, but could never really get into them. Until now… For the past couple of weeks the kids have been doing the weekly challenges over [...]
