Nature Notes

We had three great spottings today in the wild. On our daily walk, we were surprised to hear--in broad daylight--an owl calling from far off. It turned out to be a Barred Owl . You can hear it at: Barred Owl - Whatbird.com

Then, while we didn't actually SEE it, we must have startled some small rodent or shrew scuttling under the fallen leaves right next to the road we walk on. It had a raspy squeak of an alarm that it sounded many times. We hoped it would show itself, and finally we started poking around. Within seconds however we saw movement 10 or more feet away. It hadn't taken any time for it to be outta here!

It was an especially well-timed event as we have been reading about the Rodent family for many weeks now using Thornton Burgess' Animal Book for Children. Just today we had read about shrews, and came to know that in point of fact, neither shrews nor moles are rodents! They are in their own group, the Family Insectivora, or "insect-eaters." Now that I think of it, they don't have gnawing teeth, the hallmark of Rodentia. Learn more about the Northern Short-tailed Shrew.

Then towards evening, Father Robin, who was on his way to the mailbox, almost stepped on a little garter snake. He called out to me, but it wriggled away just before I got to it.

Baby Garters http://www.flickr.com/photos/mcwetboy/ / CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

As I was planning to lead a Bible study of God's creation at our Pioneer Girl meeting that night, I thought having the little snake available would have been the icing on all the natural materials that I had collected for observation. I could just hear the girls scream!! :D More on Garter snakes

Even on the WAY to the meeting, our luck continued as I warned myself that, with Mother Nature hitting us from all sides today, that I better turn on my high beams to avoid really being hit--by a deer! No sooner was the switch flicked than a large bird of prey--owl or hawk--swooped across the road right in front of my car!

Before leaving, I did capture a possible kind of stink bug (in the kitchen) so we would have something from the Kingdom Animalia to observe. The girls actually fell quite in love with the ugly little thing. It was long and thin with large, heavily jointed legs, brownish gray in color all over. It moves slowly and deliberately and its friends like to hang near my windows (where they get caught in spider webs!) The odor it emitted wasn't even unpleasant. It did not have the standard shield shape, so it may have been some other kind of beetle. We had a grand releasing at the end of the meeting.

I think the girls got the message: God's world is very cool when you stop and take a look.

Science Fair Display Board

And Here is MeiWei's final project (most of it).

All the kids, right down to the kindergarteners, did a superb job! Watch out, world!

Coop Science Fair!

For six weeks, our coop met on Friday afternoons for 2 hours of PE, art, and this season, Science. Since it was Mother R's idea to have a science fair, MotherR ended up teaching it. Such is what happens to people who have a popular idea.

The focus was on the scientific method--you know, lite stuff. Each week we explored another step of the process. If you've forgotten, it goes like this (with small semantic variances): Problem, Research, Observation, Hypothesis, Experiment (within which lies Materials, Procedure, and Data collection), Results, and Conclusion.

The kids in my group were between 3rd and 6th grade. We had lots of fun (I think) doing experiments and discussing the progress of our projects. I made sure we made messes and blew things up. But in the end, I was not sure if the fair would fly or fail.

MeiWei was very gung ho with a hypothesis of her own making after a subject near and dear to her heart: doing laundry. She postulated that clothes hung outside would fade at the same rate as clothes in the dryer.

The materials were purchased: a half dozen t-shirts in an array of colors, cut up into pieces that would be divided between line-drying and machine-drying. But after a couple of loads, the scientist ran into weather problems that prevented collecting enough data. The trending forecast was not good. With a week to go it was time to bail.

Experiment 2 was out of a God-send of a book entitled Last-Minute Science Fair Projects (Scholastic): When Your Bunsen's Not Burning but the Clock's Really Ticking . She chose (with a little urging by Mom who thought the mommies would be interested) "Young and Lovely: Does Vitamin E Really Prevent Aging?" Three rose petals were treated to either a dip in water, a smear of vitamin E oil, or plain old air and then baggied.

Sho' nuff! After several days the "E" petal was still fresh while the others had shriveled to brown little wormy things.

Research showed it's best to apply topically, so I'm headed to that health food store and get me some youth in a bottle!
Like MomR always says, "You never stop learning!"

Learning To Sew!

MeiWei had her first experience with the sewing machine a year ago when she made a Christmas present of a patchwork polar fleece dog blanket for Mr. Bingley (dog print natch). Mr. Bingley loves it and carries it around to show to visitors.

Right off the bat, MeiWei showed such considerable skill with controlling the speed of the machine that she "seamed" (haha) ready for something more advanced.

We decided on flannel jammie bottoms, otherwise known as lounge pants by lazy teens. MotherR, using her 30 years of sewing knowkedge, wanted a really simple pattern and found it in Simplicity "It's So Easy" # 2738 (CLICK HERE to order from Joann.com.)

She picked out a very loud, surprisingly pink, not-surprisingly puppy print which she planned to hem in glittery pink ribbon.

She finished the pants in three sessions of about an hour each. (I had to force her to stop--not the usual routine.) She then went on to make the matching button-front top, trimmed in more glitter ribbon and heart-shaped buttons. Here she is with her runway escort in the pants:

Next project: making them for gifts!

All The Way Home

Everyone asked me when we were in the "paper chase" stage of adoption whether I would homeschool this one like I had the older one. My resolve not to was strengthened the more I got to know MeiWei's head-strong ways.
    "If I homeschool her, at the end of the year one of us will wind up dead, " I would lament. (Note to social workers: it would be me by a self-inflicted wound with a Sharpie. Please do not prepare a file.)
     But the decision was clear: if she didn't get out of the classroom now, the damage might be irreversible. But what did MeiWei want??
     One day, we were driving around and I brought up the homeschool topic. (Driving around is always a great time to embark on topics of giant proportions and remain seemingly casual about them. It was while driving around that Tai-tai made the connection--haha--about how babies are made.) MeiWei knew that Tai-tai had been homeschooled, so I thought I'd test the waters and see if it would interest her. I used the journal episode as a springboard.
     "You know if I was your teacher, I'd let you write whatever you want, " I reflected.
     "OH, MOMMY! WOULD YOU PLEEEEAAASSSEEE BE MY TEACHER????"
      I guess it was settled then.