Outdoor Hour Challenge ~ Signs of Spring

We went for a walk this afternoon, in our usual spot, past the farmer's field near our house. I gave the kids the Spring Nature Walk Scavenger Hunt page and told them to try to find the items on it during our walk.  Adrienne took charge with the clipboard and started delegating to her younger siblings who would be looking for what. I just backed away and let them do their thing!

They saw lots of mud, some dry, some squishy, some really wet:

some new green grass, poking through the mud, which counted as "something moving in the breeze" and something that they smell:

A bright red bug that we need to identify:

They heard many birds and saw a few as well, like this robin:

They saw and heard water running in the little creek (one spot had a little current):

They felt many things during their scavenger hunt:

something warm from the sun - sticks and twigs

something cool in the shade - metal fence

something moist or wet - mud

something soft or smooth - rock

They also had a lot of fun playing in the muddy part of the creek, and crossing from one side to the other (many times)!

I had a lovely time watching them, taking photos, and sitting with Orion (our dog)!

We agreed that we need to do this scavenger hunt again in a few weeks, since we didn't notice any wildflowers, blossoms or new leaves on the trees. We also didn't see any bees or worms.

This was part of our Outdoor Hour Challenges. You can read more about this particular Signs of Spring one here.

Wordless Wednesday ~ More Clay Art by Adrienne

Sketch Tuesday ~ Something that blows in the wind

Visit Harmony Art Mom to see all the other windy sketches!

Book Sharing Monday :: The Composer is Dead

For the last couple of weeks, we have been doing an informal unit study on the orchestra. We will be attending an education concert in April at the Windsor Symphony Orchestra and I thought it would helpful to learn a little bit more about the orchestra before we go. I will be sharing what we are doing in a seperate post.

One book that we have really enjoyed is written by Lemony Snicket, with an accompanying CD by Nathaniel Stookey. The title is "The Composer is Dead" and the book is an excellent story that takes us through the different sections of the orchestra.

"We were doing bird imitations," said the Flutes, the shiniest and highest pitched of the woodwinds. "It seems like that's all we ever do. Whenever the orchestra needs a bird, there we are."

Earth Hour 2010

We participated again this year in Earth Hour. We played Uno and Ghost in the Graveyard. We also took out a few light sticks and the kids had a lot of fun with them.

We enjoyed reading this morning the reports of all the different countries around the world that participated too. We will continue in our efforts to "live green" and hope that even our tiny part will make a difference.

Journey North Mystery Class Update!

Now the fun begins! Adrienne and I have so much with the Interdisciplinary Clues every year. This time, Andre is joining us.
We calculated the approximate longitude for each of the mystery classes with the Longitude Clues using the time of sunrise on the equinox for each location in Universal Time from last week and it helped us make our guesses this week.

Here are our guesses so far, using the longitude clues, the weekly photoperiod collected since February, and the interdisciplinary clues. We could be wrong, this is early on still, and in the past, we were wrong with our first guesses...

Mystery Class #1: North America
Mystery Class #2: Central America
Mystery Class #3: Antarctica
Mystery Class #4: Marshall Islands or New Zealand (South Islands)
Mystery Class #5: Indonesia
Mystery Class #6: France or Spain or Belgium or Netherlands
Mystery Class #7: Queen Maud Land in Antarctica
Mystery Class #8: Arctic Ocean
Mystery Class #9: Island of Sumatra or Maylasia or Thailand
Mystery Class #10: Japan

Are you participating in Journey North Mystery Class? Leave me a comment if you are!

Wordless Wednesday ~ Clay Art by Adrienne

Iditarod Update!

The Iditarod Race is now done! We kept track through the race of all our selected mushers. Here are the final results.

Adrienne had picked Zoya De Nure, and she scratched early on in the race, at Rainy Pass. Adrienne decided to not choose someone else and just follow along Celeste's pick and mine.

Andre had picked Lance Mackey again, and again he won! Andre was very pleased!
Lance Mackey finished the race in 8 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes with 11 dogs.

Celeste's choice was Celeste Davis. She was the Red Lantern by arriving last in the race. Celeste was still very happy about this and she showed a lot of interest during the race, wanting to fill in the log with all the information. Celeste Davis took 13 days, 5 hours, 6 mn to finish the race and had 9 dogs.

Michelle Phillips was my choice. She also was able to finish the race. It took her 10 days, 8 hours, 31 minutes. She had 11 dogs at the finish line and placed 27th.

We didn't do as many activities this year based on the Iditarod, but we did read a few picture books and followed the progress every day of our selected mushers.

Sketch Tuesday ~ Spring Flowers

You can see many more spring flowers from others that participated in Sketch Tuesday here.

Book Sharing Monday :: The Monsterology Handbook

Dr Ernest Drake's Monsterology Handbook: A Practical Course in Monsters is Andre's pick for our Book Sharing Monday today. He loves this book. He has also the Dragonology Handbook in the same format and has completed the "course". This Monsterology Handbook is set up like a course, even has a course curriculum instead of a table of contents. The course includes Beasts of the Earth lessons, Beasts of Water, Beasts of the Air  and Semi-Human Beasts. The lessons include homework, which of course Andre has no issues with!

Don't forget about Earth Hour this Saturday!

Children's Museum in London, Ontario

The girls and I spent the day in London, Ontario a couple of days ago.

The Children's Museum was a lot of fun for Celeste. I personally wouldn't call it a museum. I think it would be better named "Children's Discovery Centre". It was a huge playground for Celeste, which was wonderful for her.

The museum is divided into different rooms. We visited the Dinosaur room :

We liked this whale tail on our way to the Arctic room:

and this stained glass window:

The museum had a special exhibit on the Winter Olympics. The girls tried out a couple of the stations set up, skiing and paralympic hockey:

on the podium!

Celeste's favourite section is next...

She loved the little town set up there, playing in the grocery store, the McDonalds, and the house.

There was an interesting space area too:

Adrienne and I enjoyed watching the Poi demonstration at the end of our visit, on the museum's grounds.  Poi comes from New Zealand and is mesmerizing to watch. One of the performers skipped with a rope full of fire! There was also a fire breather. They handed out some of their tools at the end of the performance for the kids to give it a try (without the fire part!). Adrienne loved it!