Summer Units - Ice Cream!

It's summer vacation, and it is so wonderful to have both kids home every day again! This was our first year with one of the kiddos going to school full-time, and we sure missed her! We are going for an unbusy summer, full of lots of unstructured play and outside time. But we're squeezing in just about a half an hour each day to have some learning fun too. We kicked off our new routine with an ice cream theme, and here is how it went:

Monday - Math (and Music)

We started off with a fun I-Spy game from Gift of Curiosity. Both Little M&M and Honey Pot had fun counting up the ice cream cones while I prepared the main activity.

I began by cutting out four flavors of ice cream from felt. It looked so cute, I had to take a picture of it before I ruined it with my awful handwriting...

Here is the complete activity. Today's skill to practice was addition, which Honey Pot had learned a bit of in Kindergarten. I left this propped up against the window, and when the kids were done with their I-Spy, they got right to work!

First Honey Pot took her turn...

So proud of her work!

And then Little M&M gave it a whirl. During the school year he attended preschool part-time.

But he too is pretty great with Kindergarten math, and he was so pleased with himself!

He returned to this activity again and again throughout the day.

And so did Honey Pot. What a sweet, hands-on way to get in some learning!

Monday is also our music day, so this is also the day Honey Pot practices playing the piano!

Tuesday - Literacy and Library

Tuesday is our reading and writing day. Storytime begins next week at the library on this day, but we still went and picked out all the books about ice cream that we could find! As always, the Gail Gibbons book was very informative and a little above their comprehension level, so I paraphrased as we went along and we still learned quite a bit about the history of ice cream! The favorite of course was the Elephant and Piggie book, which Honey Pot read to us. I love these books by Mo Willems. Perfect beginner readers!

To get in some practice in pencil grip and tracing, we used these pages from KidSparkz.

After reading all of our ice cream books, it was time for Honey Pot to practice her writing. I printed a simple draw-and-write page from a website called Writing Templates, And then I asked Honey Pot to write about her favorite part of the Curious George book.

Super cute ice cream truck!

And Little M&M, our preschooler, practiced writing his name in his notebook!

Wednesday - Craft (and Computer)

We tried a puffy paint recipe today, using 1 part school glue and 1 part shaving cream. The kids and I had so much fun painting with it! We each chose an ice cream flavor, and shared the bowls of paint. We added green paint (food coloring would also work) to make mint chocolate chip, brown paint to make chocolate, and left one white for cookies-and-cream.

We were sure to glob it on thick so it would keep its texture! Then we added real sprinkles.

Here are the final works of art, before they dried:

And a couple close-ups so you could see how they dry nice and thick!

Looks good enough to eat!

On this day we also hop onto the computer or ipad to play a game or two. At school, computer lab was one of Honey Pot's favorite specials, so I wanted to let her continue that fun at home.

Thursday - Science or Sensory

Today we went into the kitchen to explore ice cream science! We followed the printable instructions from this blog, but used rock salt instead of regular. I had read that suggestion from multiple other sources. We mixed up the milk, vanilla extract and sugar in a quart-sized bag, and placed it inside a gallon-ziploc bag with ice and rock salt. Then we shook it up for several minutes!

After just a few minutes it started to get reeeally cold, so we placed a towel over it to continue shaking it.

Then, after just a few more minutes, we noticed the milk starting to solidify!

I carefully opened each bag, making sure not to let the rock salt touch the inside of our quart bag. And then I scooped the ice cream into three bowls (the recipe made 3 fair scoops). And it tasted perfect! It was regular vanilla, and we jazzed ours up with some chocolate syrup and sprinkles. We look forward to trying other variations of the recipe!

Kid-approved!

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Mary Poppins Birthday Party!

Honey Pot chose Mary Poppins as her party theme this year! Here is the invitation we sent out to family and close friends:

And I found this adorable glittery shirt on Etsy. Honey Pot loved it, and received so many compliments!

Here are a few of my decorations. The top left was hung on our front door, the banner and penguin above the buffet table, and I also added a quick Mary Poppins silhouette to our preexisting wall of silhouettes in the dining room.

As guests arrived, they were invited to draw a picture that they wanted to jump into, just like Bert. The chalkboards are actually placemats. So each child was able to take a placemat home with them at the end of the party.

Here are a couple guests jumping into their pictures! "You think...you wink...you do a double blink. You close your eyes, and jump!"

The food was a lot of fun to put together. Last year we went French for Honey Pot's Aristocats birthday party. This year we created a sweet, English tea! We provided deviled eggs, chocolate chip scones, regular scones with honey butter or jam, assorted fruit, strawberry cheesecake bites, orange chocolate chip shortbread cookies, lemon poppyseed shortbread cookies and assorted tea sandwiches (PB&J, cucumber, or chicken salad). It was a huge success!!

Of course we also served coffee and tea (iced tea, as well as a variety of hot tea choices). We were super brave, and also used our fine china for kids and grown-ups alike!

For dessert we had "Let's Go Fly a Kite" funfetti cupcakes and a "Spoonful of Sugar" which was actually my famous Oreo Cookie Truffles. Dessert was a hit!

Party Game 1 = Mary Poppins Balloon Pop. This was so much fun at Little M&M's Good Dinosaur party that we had to do it again! We created an umbrella shape out of black balloons, each with a tack taped up behind it. As the kids threw bean bags at a balloon it would pop, revealing a piece of paper with a number on it. The child with the highest sum of numbers at the end of the game would win a chocolate bar medal. For this game, Little M&M won!

Party Game 2 = Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious Freeze Dance. We played/paused the upbeat song, and anyone who was still moving when the music was paused was out. In the end, we had another chocolate bar medal winner!

Party Game 3 = Step in Time Limbo. We played another classic Mary Poppins song, while the kids limboed under a pool noodle. There was no winner for this one though, because most kids just went under the limbo bar however they could, nevermind the rules!

Party Game 4 - Carousel Horse Race. I created cute pool noodle horses to represent the carousel horses in the movie. The kids had to race across the obstacle course to return their horse to the carousel (ball pit pool). The hurdles were made out of pool noodles. It was meant to be an outdoor game, but due to weather, we had to have it inside. We managed just fine in the basement!

Here are the kids riding their horses. It was a spectacular scene, and the kids loved that they could take their horses home with them!

And finally, for the party favors I made a tape measurer sign that said, "Thank you for making this party practically perfect in every way." Each child was able to take home two bird seed ornaments and a handful of chocolate coins, my homage to the "Feed the Birds, Tuppence a Bag" song. The bird seed ornaments are a recipe we use every Christmas to create a Night Tree for the animals.

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Spring Flowers

Books

We borrowed these six books from the library this week to help us psych up for spring and flowers! Little M&M asked me to read Huck Runs Amuck and Fran's Flower every day, multiple times a day. They made us laugh, and were super cute. Another I must mention is My Garden, because we love Kevin Henkes!

Quiet Bin

With the busy holidays and winter season, we allowed our quiet bin routine to slow down. But recently both kids have been asking for them; they just love the activities! So I threw just one bin together for our flower theme, and we used it when we had time.

First up was a Flower Number Line. I used my flower cutouts and taped them to toothpicks for the kids to practice number order with floral styrofoam. For Honey Pot, we also extended this into addition practice.

Also in the bin I included this invitation to use stamps and ink pads. The kids love using stamps from my paper scrapbooking supplies. They had fun with these.

And finally, Little M&M helped me to make a new batch of playdoh, and we used it alongside two flower cutters, a plastic flower pot and our playdoh tools and accessories.

The two kids had a lot of fun making and decorating cutouts.

Two kiddos hard at work!

Color-Changing Flowers - Science Experiment

I had been wanting to try this experiment out for a while. One day I finally brought home a bunch of white carnations from the grocery store, and asked the kids to help me dye water with food coloring.

We placed a couple carnations in each glass, and watched them gradually change color. The blue was the first to begin to change, within just a couple hours!

Over the next few days, we started to see some other colors as well.

Over the course of a week or so, we trimmed the stems down, and changed how many flowers shared a glass, to try to get optimal color changes. It was so fun to watch!

Fruit Loop Craft

Little M&M has been asking to do a craft with Fruit Loops. He really enjoyed making rainbows for St. Patrick's Day last year, and has wanted to use them again ever since! I decided the kids and I should make some flowers with them.

Honey Pot and I added other elements to our pictures, such as the sun and butterflies. They all turned out very cute!

To look back at our G is for Garden week, click here!