Greening Sam and Avery

Day 308: planting day part 1

Garage sale madness!!  We spent hours today hitting up a ton of great garage sales all over our town today. Sam and Avery were both such troopers, even when it started to rain on us. The rain drops started falling and I said "oh girls I think we better head home" and Sam responded "oh those are just little drops mommy we can keep shopping!"  Love that!

Anyway, between the rain and the shopping we were also able to get some seeds in our garden today! Sam and I planted the carrot patch, a small group of sunflowers and some marigolds. Sam had a blast "helping" to dig all the holes and watering the seeds. I am happy that we got our first session of planting behind us.

Now, most of the time I am pretty patient with Sam. Willing to let things get messy and chaotic when we are working together on projects. But today was VERY hard for me. She did not understand the concept of needing to measure out where to put the seeds, trying to carefully place tiny carrot seeds in a line or gently watering the freshly planted seeds instead of dumping a whole watering can in one spot! I lost my patience very quickly.

I think I struggled today because gardening is new to me. Not general gardening, I grew up helping my mom out in her very elaborate flower garden. We trimmed, weeded, transplanted, split, watered, etc. all of her flowers and plants. But we never did much with vegetables. The careful planning, planting, watering, tending, etc. that is required with veggies is all new to me and I am terrified of messing this whole thing up. I would like to see some real produce come out of this garden and so my stress and nerves turn into becoming a bit more of a control freak than I would normally be.

I need to get over this. I am sure the plants will be fine. Carrots will come up. No they may not be in a perfect row, each plant exactly two inches apart but the excitement and joy that Sam gets when she pulls on that plant to see a bright orange carrot at the bottom will make it all worth it; even if that is the only one!

So, the lesson of the day for me was to relax! Let go of the expectations and perfection. I need to treat this year as a bit of a practice year and be okay with myself if we don't see a huge bounty from our garden this year. The outside time, bonding and learning that we are all doing is making the experience worth it no matter what.

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The Nitty Gritty!

Relaxing is easier said than done! SO if you have any other types for this newbie gardener OR great gardening with kids posts or resources that you use I would love to hear about them. Please share!

I am hoping to add more resources to the Gardening with Kids page on the sidebar so if you share something that fits you may just get a permanent link over on the side!

Thanks!

Day 296: market day

Does going to the farmer's market make anyone else to want to jump for joy? I don't know what it is but all the sights, sounds, smells and tastes of the market just make me SO happy. I LOVE MARKET DAY!

Today was our first time to go since it opened for the season. Sam was very excited about the donuts. Chris and I knew it wouldn't be the very busy market that will appear in about a month but that there would still be yummy baked goods, some veggies and lots of flowers.

The sights did not disappoint.

 
 
 
I just love knowing where my food came from and who the farmers are! Makes my heat happy!!!!

 
One reason that I love the market is that it is the perfect atmosphere for learning and listening. When you stop in at a farmer's booth you can ask questions, to the person that actually GREW your food. Today I overheard lots of different people asking about when certain things would be in season, what part of the state farmers were from, how they got this or that to look this way or that way, and much more! And the smells....OH the smells! Hot bread, fresh cheese, beautiful fresh cut flowers and all the produce.

Farmer's markets are good for all the senses!  Next time you go think about how you can encourage your kiddos to use all their sense while they are there. Ask them questions about how things smell, what they see, what they hear and how things taste. Embrace the experience in as many ways as possible.

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The Nitty Gritty!

If you want to extend the market learning experience be sure to check out these market day books!

And if you have older kids you could think about having them draw or write about their experience when they get home. If you are like us and plan on going to the market A LOT throughout the season then you could have them keep a little book of all their drawings and/or writings about the market. Might be a neat project for the whole summer!

Happy Market Day!

 

Day 275: moo!

What an adventure we had today! It was the UW Science Fair and while most of it I was pretty sure would be too old for Sam and Avery the Cattle Milking Demonstration did catch my eye.

Wasn't I just asking on Facebook about finding a working farm with big animals in our area that we could visit? Love the timing!

OH! Before I move on to pictures from today I know you are all anxiously awaiting the results of the PlayOutdoors Deuter Backpack Giveaway.  The winner has 24 hours to email me with an address so that I can send the information on to PlayOutdoors to get your backpack to you.

And the winner is.....comment number 123......TAMI S.!  Yay! 

Okay, now back to today's adventure.

Not the most pleasant picture but I wanted to show what we were really there to see!

After the cows we walked to the UW greenhouse and had a good time walking through their conservatory and student greenhouses.

The BIG hit from the greenhouses were the plants we were allowed to eat off of! Sam hunted and hunted with one of the workers for the last of the beans for her to pick and enjoy. She did share ONE with her daddy.


This made Chris and I even more excited to see how she will react when we are picking and eating food from our own yard!

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The Nitty Gritty!

Both girls were very captivated by the cows. I think they could have stood there watching them walk in, get milked and walk out for hours. It was really a neat process. By very limited farming experience means I have no idea of machines like these and set ups like there are commonly used but the cows were pushing there way to get into line to get milked and didn't seem to mind the process at all (both of which surprised me having been through nursing and not been a huge fan!).

But this experience did get me thinking... When do children learn where there food comes from? Do schools still do field trips to farms to see how beef, pork and chicken are raised? How grain is processed and mass amounts of vegeatables are grown? But, what they would see at a local family farm would not be the REAL situation for probably a majority of the food they would actually eat. With my environmental studies degree I have read and research the food industries; I KNOW where my food comes from, what has been done to it and what it really looks like (most of which is why I choose to eat the way I do!). But I learned all that in college and because I chose to. How do other people learn this stuff? And is it okay that there are some people that don't know?

I truly feel that more people really knew, I mean really knew, what happened to their food before it hit their table they might choose different options. And how do we reach those people that are okay with the "ignorance is bliss" mentality? 

Day 251: again, seriously?

I could be sad. Depressed actually. And mad. Really mad. But I am trying my hardest to embrace what has beFALLEN me.

More snow.

Chris woke me this morning and said did you see outside. I knew exactly what he meant.

The best part of this whole thing was that Sam looked out the window and said "OH NO! Not more snow!".

HA! Hilarious.

But anyway, I know spring is coming so I am trying to enjoy what I am hoping will be our last major snow fall.

So, I decided to go back through what we did this winter and figure out what snow activity we had missed. Duh. Building a snowman. Can you believe it? Well, when Sam got home from school I had every intention of bundling them up and taking them out to build a big beautiful snowman. When I told Sam our plan she quickly informed me that they built one at school and she didn't want to do it again. Awesome.

Plan B. I went back through my google reader starred posts (anybody else have a TON of things in there?) and found snow ice cream! Woohoo. Sam was very excited about this one.

 
Don't you love that face? Have no idea why she looks so disgusted!

We used a big bowl of snow. I was a bit over zealous when we gathered snow so we had to transfer some out of the big metal bowl into a smaller bowl. Then add a 1/2 cup sugar, dash of vanilla and a cup of milk. We had to add a bit more milk as we were stirring to get the ice cream consistency.

 
 
Yum. Can't think of a better way to enjoy the snow!

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The Nitty Gritty!

I made sure to have Sam, Avery and I collect snow from an untouched area and we didn't dig down too deep. I think it is probably only good to do this when the snow is very fresh, but I won't go into what might be in old snow because my daughter has been eating it all winter and I just don't want to think about it!

I think it would be fun to try and make some flavors next time we do this. Maybe add some fruit puree!

I NEED spring! But I will continue to try and live in the moment, enjoy what I am given and not be too wrapped up in waiting for the future.

 

 

Day 219: her own garden

I take NO credit for this idea! Kara left a comment back on Day 215 and I just had to try it out!

Sam planted her own garden today and it was great scissor and gluing practice.

Sam worked on her garden several times today and I have left it out so that she can work on it again if she wants. Avery checked in on what we were doing several times and Sam had fun pointing things out to Avery and telling her what was in her garden.

Great activity Kara! Thanks so much for the idea. I hope you try it out with Eva.

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The Nitty Gritty!

What we used - big piece of poster paper, brown marker to draw the garden frame, seed catalog (same one that we used before), some grocery store ads, kid scissors and glue stick.

The learning part of this that I loved, besides the cutting and gluing practice which is always good, was in describing to Sam what things she could cut out and "plant" in her garden. At first she was just cutting out random things, a bottle of ranch, meat ads, etc., so I had to explain that gardens have only plants in them, things that can grow. I allowed her to put any plant in it however, fruits, veggies, trees, flowers, grass, anything that was a plant.

With older kids or a classroom I can see a lot of learning with this activity. Explaining what can grow in your specific garden and why, arranging things in the garden, how many of each to plant, etc. I also think this is a great first step in spring time garden planning for older kids. If you have enough space to let each child have their own area of the garden then they could each create their own garden plan that they would then follow later in the spring when they did the planting.

Would love to see and hear about other gardens that get planted!

Day 98: field trip - Schuster Playtime Farm

Pumpkin patch was amazing!  Not entirely a natural field trip, but the pumpkins were actually still on the vein and we could cut them off ourselves so that is all I really wanted.

The Schuster's Playtime Farm reminded me of the pumpkin patch that the Little People Big World family runs.  Just a little bit of everything and an overall fun place for kids! 

We did the corn maze.

We let Sam pick every direction so the 10 minute maze took quite a bit longer but she did eventually get us out.

I love how serious she is taking the water pump duck races.

We fed goats!  And saw chickens, lamas, sheep and turkeys.

And walked the beautiful grounds.

Oh yeah!  And we picked pumpkins!

Hauling out the loot!

Since we went during the week we missed out on the concession stand, hay rides, haunted forest, corn canon, horses, pigs, barrel train and pig races.  But what they had was already overwhelming so we will save the weekend visits for when the girls are a bit older!

Sam's favorite part was the water pump duck races which we had to go back to several times but I would love to go back sometime without the kids and try the 2+ hour corn maze that they have!  That would be awesome to try.

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The Nitty Gritty!

I found out about the Schuster Farm from Mom in Madison. It is so great reading a blog that is local to me because the places that she goes with her family I can actually check out!  She always has the latest on local events and what's going on in Madison which is a huge help to someone that has just moved here.

So do you go to a pumpkin patch to get your pumpkins?  At our last house we didn't have a pumpkin patch within an hour so we didn't get to go to one.  It is quite possibly one of my favorite things about living in this area is the access to pick-your-own farms.  We have visited more farms this season than ever before and it is fabulous! 

Would love to hear about how and where you get your pumpkins! 

Day 97: exploring pumpkins

Tomorrow we are headed to our first pumpkin patch for the year.  I have two baking pumpkins in the kitchen that tonight I needed to bake to get ready for making pumpkin bread tomorrow. So, I thought why not let Sam have fun with them and help me clean them out before I bake them.  It would be a fun way to get her excited about seeing even more pumpkins at the patch tomorrow.

I grabbed a bunch of her kitchen utensils and pots so she could have things to scoop with and pots to put seeds in. 

The seeds were more stuck in there than I had remembered so I had to be pretty hands on, helping her with the scraping. 

But once we got them out she had fun getting messy and playing with them.

Great way to get a second use out of the pumpkin!  And entertain Sam for a little while as I was working on dinner.

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The Nitty Gritty!

If I did this again I would scrap out all the insides but leave them in the pumpkin.  This way Sam can be the one that scoops them all out but doesn't have to get frustrated that the "strings" won't come loose. 

I think this would be fun (messy!) with a bunch of kids.  Maybe around thanksgiving when you need to bake pumpkin pies!

We did get outside time in today as well.  We had a long bike ride and daddy took the girls to the park for a while as well.  So far so good on getting our Vitamin D for the week! 

And so excited!  One of my readers did the acorn painting project!!!  YOU HAVE TO GO CHECK IT OUT.  I am so jealous of their huge acorns.  The paintings are great.  So if you read about my failure of trying that project and would like to see what it is suppose to look like head over to Time to Craft. She is a wonderful crafting, creative, amazing mom!  Thanks so much Cheryl for trying out the project for me!

Day 94: apple picking a second time

 

Nana mentioned to us (after seeing the previous post about our trip apple picking) that she hasn't been apple picking in a very long time and would love to go.  So we decided we would find another apple orchard near us and go again.  We used up all the ones from the first trip anyway! 

I am going to overwhelm you with pictures today! 

A great picture of both of us!

A great visit to the EpleGaarden Farm.

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The Nitty Gritty!

Family visits can be a great time to check out new local green attractions, natural areas or parks.  Young kids are typically more comfortable in unfamiliar circumstances (such as the first time hiking, camping, on water, boating, or picking food) when they are surrounded by people they know, trust and love.  Family members can also help handle some of the organizing, stress and planning of a new or different outing.  They can give you a break or help handle cranky kids. More adults is always a helpful thing!

So the next time grandma and grandpa or aunts and uncles come to visit skip the mall or theme park and try a green activity instead.

 

Day 78: field trip - Appleberry Farm

We went apple picking today at a local pick-your-own farm outside of Madison.  Sam was excited all day to meet up with her daddy after work and pick apples right off the trees. 

The second we got there she looked at every tree and asked where the apples were. 

One of the best things that we did on this field trip was to get a map for Sam.  When we were in the gift shop I noticed that they had really cute picture maps showing the different features on the farm.  Sam watches some Dora and those that are familiar with Dora will know about The Map.  So I knew that Sam would think it was great to follow a map on our trip. 

We showed her where she was on the map and where we had to go, then we showed her some of the features that we would need to pass along the way.  She loved it.  She held on to it the entire walk out to the apples.

And we picked a lot of apples!

 

 

 

 
Then we played on the tire swing.

 
 
 
We found a toad.

 
And Sam climbed her first tree.

 
It was a great trip. 

There is the most adorable little gift shop that we got cider, apple butter and some adorable hand knit hats for the girls.  We were running out of time so we didn't get to check out the animals that they had there or the pond, just reasons to go back later!!

Places like this, that are just 20 minutes outside of a great city, are why I love where we live.

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The Nitty Gritty!

It is always great to show kids where there food comes from, so pick-your-own farms are very valuable.  If you have pick-your-own anything near you I would say take advantage of it.  Yes you will leave with more of one kind of food then you would normally buy at a grocery store, but most of the time it is cheaper then at the grocery store and with a little bit of research and effort you can find a way to save it (canning, freezing or baking) and use it over time. 

Any field trip that you go on it is always a good idea to see if they have a map of the facility.  Kids are very good, especially when the maps are simple and use lots of pictures, at following along with where they are on a map.  It can also be a great way to keep them busy during the in-between times on trips. 

 

Day 38: squirrel tightrope (guest blogger)

So Abbie is gone all day today, working an overnight program for a Boy Scout group.  Since she had to leave at 7am this morning she asked me to fill in for her for the day.  So be prepared, that means you have the B team today  and Dad has to fill in.  Hopefully I can live up to her standards. 

She left me with a few easy options to take it easy on me, but I figured since I got the whole day to myself and it was my only real responsibility for the weekend that I would take a shot at an actual project.  I decided that we would set up a Squirrel tightrope in hopes that we could watch a squirrel or two. 

So for this project I needed a long rope or twine, some string, and a bunch of peanuts.  Sam and I sat at the kitchen table and she began helping me pick out which peanuts we wanted to use for the squirrels. 

 

I had her help me and showed her where on the string to put the peanut and then I would tie the peanut to one end of it.  She really enjoyed this part, but really didn’t like it when I had to tell her that certain peanuts wouldn’t work.  Obviously Sam wasn’t able to really help tie the peanuts, but I think all the projects Abbie has been doing with her gets her really excited to help and try something new.  She hung in there a lot better than I expected.

 

After we had tied all the peanuts to the strings it was time to tie the strings onto the twine.  This is when she officially checked out and left me to finish the job.  “Ok dadda, I’m all done.  It’s your turn now.”

After I had finished tying all the peanuts to the twine, I called Sam over and we headed outside get it all set up.  We don’t have many trees in our backyard, so instead of tying it between two trees I set up to tie one end to the climbing wall on our swingset.  My mistake for the day (it was guaranteed to happen) was having Sam carry out the tightrope.  Not sure that I could have avoided this either, but once I got it out there it was a tangled mess.  Can you see the spot that really annoyed me?  I took this picture right before Sam decided to pull....just perfect!

 

I would strongly suggest that if you want to do this to avoid having to move it once you get it put together.  Maybe tie the strings to the twine/rope once you are out in the yard.  Sam played in the yard as I spent some time detangling the strings.  Sam loved helping me to hang it and thought it was so funny that I was tying it to the swingset.  

The final touch to try to get the squirrels to notice it was also Sam’s favorite part.  I had brought out a couple extra peanuts and we got to crush them and spread them out under the tightrope.  We have been monitoring the backyard off and on all afternoon waiting to see if any squirrels decide to give it a go.  So far we haven't had any takers, but we really don't have a lot of squirrels around either.  Maybe there will be some tomorrow.

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The Nitty Gritty!

This idea came from one of Abbie's books: Fun with Nature Take-Along Guide.  It really is a pretty simple project, and I bet it would have been a lot of fun if we had a lot of squirrels in our neighborhood.  Obviously with older children they can be more involved, but Samantha really enjoyed being a part of this one.