April 2021

The kids love to dye eggs, not to eat them but they like to make them pretty! I ate them for snacks or made some yummy buffalo chicken cobb salads.

 

Flowers!!! The kids and I get so excited in the spring. It is fun to check the garden daily and look for shoots coming up.

 Prehistoric life

We started a unit on early life on earth. After we read about the precambrian period August chose some of the things to draw. 

Grandma Nancy came for a visit so we did school outside for the day and enjoyed a pizza lunch on the deck!

Riley's student notebook

The kids asked for another tea party so I made some yummy cranberry orange scones!

Playing sequence together.

Nora added some hand shaped wings to Betty the bee and she had fun coloring Cathy the cat! After she was done with Betty she flew her around the room!

Riley's student notebook for the Cambrian and Ordivician Period! There were some great videos to go with this week that the kids and I loved. I love her drawings for this one. Iowa was under a warm shallow sea during this time period. We are going to take the kids to the Rockford fossil park this summer!

 

August's student notebook for the Cambrian. I like that the Hallucigenia is smiling.

More spring flowers! The girls enjoying time outside.

Riley's Student notebook for Silurian and Devonian life. We learned that there were many varieties of armored fish that swam the seas! Fish started to walk on land for the first time too. Riley did some great drawings of the Dunkleosteus, it was a monster of an armored fish with an unusual blade jaw. I like her fish with legs too.

Riley's student notebook Carboniferous and Permian. There were a lot of interesting things in this time period too but we all loved the giant dragonflies that were some of the big predators of the time.

August's student notebook for Silurian and Devonian. Then for Carboniferous and Permian. I love to see that he draws! The faces are really funny!

More spring beauties! I really love seeing all of the things that are blooming in the spring. It was a wonderful time to be reading The Secret Garden. They explored our garden looking for new plants coming out of the ground and pretended to be in the secret garden with the red breast robin. Riley even made herself a skeleton key out of tinfoil to pretend with.

Riley wanted to make a dandelion crown.

Done!

Riley got to meet Gretchen, her pen pal! It all started with Riley wanting to send out some Christmas cards and I gave her Gretchen's address. She is my Mom's neighbor and a friend. I loved to play on her tire swing when I was growing up.

Gretchen shared this great picture of herself as a child. She remembered that she did not like the  brown shoes that she is wearing in the photo. It was really fun to get together with her in Ottumwa! Riley can't wait to go back and visit.

We are at Aunt Stacy's house to visit and they had a little birthday party for Riley. It was a fun visit. Next time I will have to get more pictures of the kids running around together next time!