Hello again! I didn't mean to be gone so long, but I did get my in-home child care licensed in the meantime!! Fun projects have all been put on hold, but here is one we managed to squeeze in a while ago: snap painting, from the irresistible ideas for play based learning blog.
Hope you all had a great summer and I look forward to sharing more of our activities with you.
We spent both days this weekend at the Family Farm Tour in and around Asheville. These are the farms we visited:
1) East Fork Farm in Marshall- they have a great guest house that is almost completed and the cutest baby bunnies! They also did a fun questionnaire for the kids that asked questions like "How many eyelids do rabbits have?" (Did you know they have three on each eye?). Each kid got a free pencil to fill out the answers and a gift when the questionnaire was finished.
2) Spinning Spider Creamery in Marshall- I think this was my favorite! We got to try lots of goat cheese (and bring home some of the Mountain Magnolia variety), see a sheepherding demonstration and hear a bit about how the cheese is made (the kids were getting antsy, so we didn't hear the whole thing). The above photo of Asher was taken at this farm, during a playful moment with their gentle goat Violet.
3) Wild Mountain Apiaries in Marshall- Upon arrival, there was a table with a big bee hive (enlosed safely in a wooden structure... I am sure there is some sort of technical name for this!) that Esme' was enchanted with. I am sure she would have stayed there for hours if I had let her. Instead, we went into the gift shop that was stocked full of beeswax candles and honey. The kids tried a sample of honey and a drink called honiger (a mixture of honey and vinegar and water?), I bought a bottle of propolis tincture and then we walked around sampling wineberries and hearing part of a talk about beekeeping. Definitely worth the bumpy drive to get in!
4) Hop 'n Blueberry Farm in Black Mountain- This farm was, in my opinion, the prettiest of all the ones that we visited. The kids were let down due to the lack of blueberries to pick, but we will keep it in mind for next year and will probably go there on the first day instead of the second.
5) Venezia Dream Farm in Asheville- I loved the drive out to this farm! The alpacas were very shy during our visit, but Esme' and Asher both enjoyed walking around the child-sized pond on the property. The photos of Esme' and Asher below are taken from this farm.
I stumbled upon a lavender festival, held at Mountain Farm, while browsing blogs a few mornings ago. I adore lavender and have wanted to make lavender wands with the kids for a while. When I saw them listed as an activity at the festival, I knew it was a festival for our family!
They have a gorgeous lavender labyrinth!
We had been at the festival for about ten minutes before it started to downpour. As the ominous clouds rolled in, we looked at the kids (the baby goat kind!) and enjoyed some lavender poundcake. We then headed into the gift shop to stand in the crazy long line with our lavender purchases (including a cup of chocolate lavender ice cream!) and stay out of the cold rain. I am not afraid of the rain myself, but Asher is very sensitive to cool, rainy weather (with the help of Chinese herbs, this is changing!).
The woman who was going to teach the lavender wand workshop decided not to because of the rain. We bought a bunch of lavender (that we handpicked) and used the tutorial at 5 orange potatoes to make the wands ourselves. This is not really a craft suited for small children, but they did get to pick the lavender from the labyrinth, help pick the stems they wanted for their wands, and choose the ribbon. Asher ended up decorating his wand with stickers, too... I'd put a photo of it on here, but he has stashed it somewhere!
Ahh, I am in lavender heaven. Can't wait to find some recipes for the lavender honey!
I loved this post at The Artful Parent and couldn't wait to try it with my kids. Asher and I made the one in the photo above and he enjoyed it so much! I am sure we will do it again, especially since the flowers are putting off moisture under the contact paper (we didn't dry the flowers first); I expect mold any day now.
Here is the one that Esme' did all by herself. We put it in the dining room, which is a sunny and bright way of adding a bit of privacy to the room!
I have been wanting to make the egg paint from the small things blog since I first saw it a few months ago. We had enough extra eggs to make a go of it yesterday, and I am so glad that we did. I didn't feel too bad about using the pastels either, because: a) nobody uses them and b) I got them for 50 cents at a yard sale. The kids both thoroughly enjoyed making the paint- from beginning to finish. It was actually one of our most successful projects in terms of child involvement and joy.
The colors were rich and vivid and the texture of the paint made for interesting paintings. Even I was drawn to playing with it! Below is a photo of my painting and below that is one of Esme's. Both kids did several paintings yesterday and then woke up this morning wanting to do more!
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