Summer School

I know I haven't written in a while, but we've been very busy.  We're taking a little break from our Before Five in a Row work to participate in a Virtual Book Club.  Each week there is a theme with several books to read and different activities that correspond with the book/week's theme.  It has been so much fun participating!  Everyone has really enjoyed doing the activities and reading the books. 

Bugs

The first week the theme was bugs.  We read several Eric Carle books as well as other books about bugs. 

 After reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar, we made name caterpillars.  Micah has been very interested in letters lately and the sounds that they make so he really enjoyed finding the letters in his name and making a caterpillar out of them.

 Later in the week, we read The Grouchy Ladybug and made our very own ladybug out of a paper plate.  Micah is also very into painting lately and we've done a lot of painting recently so he loves this.

Another activity we did was spraying letter bugs.  Brad drew a bunch of bugs on the sidewalk and put letters in each bug.  We would call out a letter and Micah would find it and spray the bug until the letter disappeared.  He loved doing this.  Who am I kidding?  He loves anything that has to do with water!

Garden

The second week we read books with a garden theme.  I didn't think I was going to like this theme, but the books were actually really good and Micah even tried a few vegetables because of what we read!

Micah was supposed to use these shapes to make shape flowers.  He liked watching me make the flowers, but when it was his turn, he just wanted to make a train.  He told me what each shape was...the track, the "trugger," the wheels, the coupler, etc.  Seriously, my little boy is obsessed with trains!

One day we pulled out the paints again and let Micah paint with some potatoes.  He thought it was the coolest thing, especially after reading Growing Vegetable Soup.  Now, when he sees the bag of potatoes he asks if he can paint. 

This doesn't really have to do with gardening, but one morning Brad made this redneck waterbed that I've been dying to try for a long time.  Both of the boys loved it!  Micah thought it was so cool that it was squishy and the water kept moving around.  This is definitely an activity that we will do again!

 Sunday morning after church, Micah was coloring in a coloring book and he found Dumbo.  He especially liked the pictures with the circus train in them (see?  OBSESSED with trains!).  So, he turned around and asked me if I could make Dumbo's train with his Duplos.  He loved that I used a tall line of the single Duplos to make the whistle.  Once it was done, I told him we should find Dumbo and put him in the train.  He loved that!  Then, he wanted me to make a car for Dumbo's mom, then I had to make more cars for the other animals on the train.  Then, I had to add a track and a railroad crossing.  He even grabbed some cars to wait at the crossing and he wanted a person to be the conductor.  This was the first time that I've really seen his imagination come out like that, I loved it!  Making this train for him was totally worth it!

That's what we've been up to lately.  Keep reading to see what we're doing with our next few weeks of the virtual book club!