Cool Science Experiment!!

For science, CLB has been exploring force and motion. He's read about Sir Isaac Newton a bit, and watched a short biography about him on biography.com. But reading and watching about force and motion only goes so far. I wanted to show CLB how this all fit together. I was absolutely delighted when I found this experiment on the blog, ordinary life magic. Although the potential for mess was high, we just couldn't pass it up!

The idea behind this experiment involves Newton's First Law of Motion...an object at rest will stay at rest unless acted upon by an outside force. CLB knows these words, but he hasn't seen them in action! First, I set up the experiment, without telling him what we were doing. I was going for the WOW factor here, and man, does this experiment have a lot of WOW. So here's the set up:

The potential for mess here is HUGE!!!

Yes, that is a RAW egg perched on top of a small paper tube, on top of a tin pie plate, on top of a glass of water! And guess what I did? I knocked the pan away with a mighty karate chop! POW! Before I did that, I asked CLB what he thought would happen. His hypothesis was that there would be a mighty mess to go along with the mighty karate chop! But what actually happened was:

YEEESSS!

The egg fell straight down into the water, which broke it's fall so it didn't break!!! I have to admit, I was a nervous wreck doing this. I really wanted it to work, but I wasn't so sure about my karate chop capabilities! This experiment works because the karate chop knocks over the pie plate and the lip of the plate hits the paper tube, knocking it over in turn. However the egg hasn't been knocked over (acted upon) by either my hand, the pie plate, or the paper tube. Since there isn't a force acting on it except gravity, it falls straight down to the water. 

You should note that you absolutely have to line the paper tube up with the opening to the glass so that the egg falls into the glass and not on the counter. And you need to make sure to hit only the pie plate with your karate chop. If you hit the glass and the pie plate you do end up with a mess, as CLB found out when he tried it:

Egg down! Egg down! Actually, the egg did crack but not too badly. Cleaning up the water was more of a pain than the egg!

If I were you, I would definitely give this one a try! Hey, what's a bit of mess compared to showing your kids how cool you and science are!?! But, just in case you're worried about it and just can't bring yourself to try it, CLB took some video of our third attempt of this. It's a bit shaky (he is only 8, so his videotaping skills need a bit of work), but in 45 seconds you can see exactly what happens and how exciting it all is to Crazy Little Kids!

Spelling City!

Just a quick shout out: SpellingCity.com is offering a free 30 day premium membership sign up for new members until August 31st. I've used SpellingCity, the free version, for the last couple of years and loved it, but never thought to pay the $30 a year for the premium version. Since we started playing around with the premium membership, I've been able to see all the games that CLB can play to help his spelling. And I can group the lists how I want and set up assignments for CLB to do on his own by a certain date. We're loving it! I'm not affiliated with the site at all, just a happy homeschooling mommy who can't believe she didn't try this out earlier!

To get the free 30 day trial, just go to SpellingCity.com by August 31st, click the "Sign Me Up" button and enter the code BTS13 at checkout. Easy peasy lemon squeezy!

Circles and Faces!

Just a quick little post from little old me! Just about done wrapping up the first week of school, and I wanted to share these cute little snacks we made this week. CLG has been making an "All About Me" book, and one of the first things she did was to look at different faces and then try to draw her own face.

Give her a break...she's only just about 4!
Handout is from the book Learn at Home Grade K

She's been having great fun putting all of this together, and the activities have been right up her alley (Love love love the Learn at Home series!) Our favorite one this week, though, was making a snack that looked like her face. We started with a rice cake:

And lookie there...it's a circle! This led to a completely different conversation linking to our study of circles this week!

I gave her a choice of jam or peanut butter to put on the rice cake to help glue the face on. She chose jam, so I spread that on for her:

Looking yummy!

For the eyes and nose, CLG added yogurt covered raisins:

Cute as a button!

Then an apple slice for the smile and grapes for the ears:

Yes, I know, her "ears" are actually cheeks. Again, she's not quite four!!

CLG loved making her circle face snack almost as much as she enjoyed eating it! Oh, and CLB just couldn't resist making one either:

Now, him, he's in 3rd grade...I gave him grief about the "ears" a bit :)

This snack was adapted from an activity in the book, Learn at Home Grade K, published by American Education Publishing

Peanut Butter Fudge

We've completed our third day of school and all is well in our world, so I thought, "Dag nabbit, we worked our tails off and did a great job! We deserve a treat!" Since our State Fair starts up tomorrow, I also thought about all the yummy treats I'll be eating there. One of my favorites is the fudge from the dairy building...mmmm! Yum yum! That seemed to be my second good thought of the day, so I decided to whip up a batch of Peanut Butter Fudge. It's a super easy recipe, adapted from one of Alton Brown's, and it is the sole reason I still buy peanut butter in the big 40 oz containers. Two at a time!

NOTE: I don't generally cook this up with the Crazy Kids. It requires the use of one glass bowl, heated up in the microwave for 4 minutes. Since the bowl gets really hot, the Crazy Kids just get to sit back and watch while I put this together.

First, make sure you use a large glass bowl for this. The ingredients are going to expand in the microwave, so you need room for that. In the glass bowl, put in a cup of salted butter (2 sticks) and one cup of peanut butter. Then add another big wallop of that peanut butter! Seriously, you can't go wrong...just do it!

You know this can't be good for you! But who cares today!?!

Put the bowl in the microwave and nuke it for two minutes. Then take it out and stir with a wooden spoon.

You'll notice I barely take this out of the microwave. The bowl is already starting to get super hot, and I keep it here away from the Crazy Kids.

Back in to the microwave it all goes for another 2 minutes. The mixture will expand this go around, so cross your fingers that you picked the correct bowl size!!

  

It had me worried there for a minute!

Take this mixture out of the microwave (carefully! Use oven mitts and put it on a pot holder! It's hot!), and stir in one teaspoon of vanilla.

Mmm, don't forget to smell the vanilla!

Then, a cup at a time, mix in the powdered sugar. The amount of sugar you end up putting in is going to depend on how much peanut butter you ended up adding, so add your sugar a cup at a time. Again, remember to mix with that wooden spoon!

This is the first cup

This is after the third cup. The mixture is starting to get some body to it.

Once the mixture starts thickening up, add the sugar in only about a third of a cup at a time. Once it starts pulling away from the bowl after you mix it, you've added enough.

Perfect!

Plop it in a buttered 8x8 glass pan and refrigerate until cool.

Mmmmm!

You might want to leave just a bit in the bowl to tide you over until the fudge is cooled down! 

Nom! No one will miss this little bit...go on! Indulge!

Seriously, this is one of the simplest recipes I know that satisfies my sweet tooth! And the actual work time on it is less than 10 minutes! Who can resist!?! Certainly not me!

Recipe:

Quick and Easy Peanut Butter Fudge

adapted from a recipe by Alton Brown

Ingredients:

1 cup salted butter (2 sticks) and a bit more to grease the pan

1 cup peanut butter, with more added for good measure

1 tsp. vanilla

3-5 cups powdered sugar

Add the butter and peanut butter to a large glass bowl and microwave for 2 minutes. Take the bowl out of the microwave, stir with a wooden spoon until combined, and then microwave again for another 2 minutes. Take the bowl out of the microwave with pot holders and place on a pot holder. Add the vanilla and stir with a wooden spoon. Add powdered sugar, one cup at a time, and stir (again, use that trusty wooden spoon!). When the mixture starts thickening up, stir in powdered sugar about 1/3 of a cup at a time. When the mixture starts pulling away from the side of the bowl while you're stirring it, you've added enough sugar. Pour the mixture into a buttered 8x8 glass pan, and refrigerate until cool. Cut into bite size pieces and enjoy!!

First Day of "Home" School Traditions

So today was our first official day of homeschooling for the 2013-14 school year! Yay! The Crazy Kids were excited, I was excited, the entire house was excited! I figure everyone has different ways to celebrate the first day of school, so I thought I'd share some of ours.

The big one for me is that the first day of school is just for us. We don't plan on meeting up with friends at the park or attending any kind of group activities. Don't get me wrong...I sooooo do not have the "stay at home, don't socialize" kind of Crazy Kids! We have a very vibrant social life, with many different activities and friends to share them with. But on the first day, I want to let the Crazy Kids ease into school, not dart through lessons and then yell, "Hey, come on, it's time to go play with friends!", or, "It's such and such a day, time to go to (fill in the blank...it could be anything from the Y to a playdate to a co-op class!)." Nope, slow and steady on the first day! It helps us enjoy the day and each other, and always reminds me how lucky I am to be with my kids all day and able to homeschool them.

So like everyone else we know, we take our first day of school pictures and gather our materials. But before we start, we always ring the bell. My grandmother's apple bell. I love this bell...it's so pretty! And the crazy kids especially love to ring it rigorously and joyfully! First day of school!

Ring the bell for the first day of school!

We may forget to ring it every day as the school year goes on and we get more and more wrapped up with our work. But you can bet on that first day, that apple bell's a-ringing!

Once the bell has rung, we can't forget to put our first jelly bean into our jelly bean containers. I have to admit, I always do forget, but as I said in a previous post, the two Crazy Kids love this countdown to the Hundredth day of school and never miss a day!

Jelly bean #1!!!

Then we ease into our planned activities and school work. Sometimes this involves learning new procedures or schedules for the year. I try to start with anything that's going to be with us all year as soon as possible. This year, I'm hoping CLB will learn to ask for help with his writing when he needs it instead of simply waiting for me to step in and give suggestions. So right away, we went over the new schedule for writing, and I'll keep it up on the white board until he's comfortable with it or until I need to make changes to it to help support him more.

If this doesn't work, and CLB doesn't ask for help, then I'll make sure to change it up!

Once all the paper and pencil (and markers, paint, shaving cream, etc.) work is completed, we have a little fun! We always go out to eat for lunch, and I usually let the Crazy Kids pick where they want to go. This year, I didn't even bother asking where they wanted to eat, because every time I do ask, it's always "MCDONALD'S!!!". We try not to go too often, so going on the first day of school was a special treat! While we were there, we also worked on a scavenger hunt for CLG. She was supposed to look around to find circles while we were out and about and find circles she did! 

My chocolate milk cap, Mooom!

While we eat, I always check in with the Crazy Kids and see how the first day went. There have been times when CLB has felt completely overwhelmed on the first day and others where he is left wondering if that was all we'd be doing for the day, because it surely didn't feel like much! I'm happy to report that it seems as if we reached a happy medium this year. Over lunch, we also talk about our first service project for the year and how we can accomplish it. This year, we had already decided to do Operation Christmas Child and thought it would be a great idea to head over to the local Target to pick up items for our shoe box with the money the Crazy Kids have been saving. I like starting the year speaking to the Crazy Kids about how they can help other people in our community and across the world. I feel it's important for them to realize that not everything revolves around their little Crazy selves and although they might be little, a little bit of something can make a big difference and is definitely better than nothing!!

Some of our donation picks for Operation Christmas Child. Yup, more pictures for the circle scavenger hunt!

You can fit a lot in a shoebox! And lookie there, I was able to buy some school supplies this year. Ahhh, my zen moment!

This really was a big day for the Crazy Kids, and they enjoyed themselves and I enjoyed them! But before we finished up for the day, we all thought there was one more thing we should do to celebrate a successful first day of school:

ICE CREAM!!

I think this is going to be a new treat we add to our list of things to do on the first day of school. Oh, and look at that:

Nom!

Another circle! Whoda thunk!?!

Last Big Bit of Summer Fun!

Just a short blurb from me today. I'm tired, beat and worn out! A great way to be when our homeschool year starts in just a few days, right!?! Well, I have a good reason for being worn out...we went to the beach yesterday. And not just any beach! A beach with an old fashioned amusement park!

This little piece of kiddie heaven is only about 45 minutes away from us, but (and I cringe to admit it) we haven't been there once in all the times we've lived here! The reason? I'm a super nervous Nellie when it comes to driving too far from home! Fortunately, I have a fantastically wonderful friend who completely understands this, and she told me that we have to go, so we're going, no ifs, ands, ors or buts! Sometimes that's just what I need to beat the anxiety...a good kick in the pants! 

So we went, and I drove and my fantastically wonderful friend just kept being more and more fantastically wonderful while she looked after her child and helped me with the Crazy Kids! Seriously, I cannot believe how much fun it is going to an amusement park/beach with a kind hearted mom. Other moms are telepathic and just know when you need help with your crazy kids! Anyway, we had a great time, the kids had a great time, and I conquered my fear of driving to this place, so we will be going again and again! And it was a fantastic way to end our summer season. But now, I'm tired, beat and worn out (in a happy way), and, oh yeah, I have a bit of a mess to clean up before school starts!

Guess who forgot to take off her little pink crocs when we got back from the beach!

Fun Touches for the School Room!

So in less than one short week we'll be starting up with our new homeschool year. We're all very excited! The school room is cleaned up and looking great, lesson plans have been put together, and we are ready!

This year for the school room bulletin board, we decided to have a wise old owl theme. I found a cute little roll of owl ribbon, and thought strips of that around the board would look lovely.

So cute!

I wanted an olive green background, but the two Crazy Kids were adamant we have brown. Since it's their room, too, who am I to argue! And, turns out, I think the brown looks much better than the olive would have! I just bought a yard of cloth from JoAnn Fabrics (our JoAnn's allows multiple coupons on one purchase, so, for us, it's the place to go!), cut it to fit the board and stapled it up there. Then I cut strips of ribbon to go over the border of the board because heaven knows I cannot cut fabric in a straight line! The ribbon hides the crookedness beautifully! I stapled them up, too, and voila! decorated bulletin board!

Hmmm, maybe I should have ironed the cloth. And would you look at that! Crooked ribbon. I'm hopeless with straight lines!

We also decided to start the year off with the Book Tree again. I did this with the kids last year, and apparently, it was a huge hit. I cut out an outline of a tree and used double sided "removable" tape to stick it to the school room door. I put the word "removable" in quotes because, later in the year, when I tried to remove it, it didn't remove. It took about an hour to scrape everything off the door! This year, I'm laminating the entire thing!

I know, it looks like something from another planet, but the tree actually looks fantastic once the leaves and apples get put on there!

Once school started, every time we read a book, we wrote the title and author's name on a leaf or apple and taped it to our tree.

These look wonderful on our tree!

The tree does tend to get overgrown after a bit, since we read so many books. Last year, once that started happening, I planned on taking it down and being done with it. But the Crazy Kids loved it so much, they asked me to continue with the idea. So for each season or holiday, we made another display for our book titles. It was lots of fun to see the displays grow, so we'll be doing it again this year!

Our Spring book display from last year. The Crazy Kids loved watching the flower bloom!

And finally, our school room would not be complete without our Hundred Day Jelly Bean Jars!

Yum!

I actually keep waiting for the Crazy Kids to be sick of this activity, but still, after three years, they look forward to it! Every day, we put in one jelly bean to mark the time. On our Hundredth Day, we put the last jelly bean in and have a little party. Of course they get to eat jelly beans, but not the ones that have gotten all sticky and stuck together in the jars...we do a craft of some sort with those. But it's a fun way for them to start their school day and seeing the jar every day reminds them of how much they've accomplished and the fun party they'll be having soon.

I love our little school room and, although I am not a terribly good decorator (not at all, actually), it is fun to do these little touches for the kids. It really gets them geared up for another fun homeschool year. What do you do to get your school room or space prepared? I'd love suggestions!!

Just say "NO!" to school supplies

We are really close to the beginning of our official school year. As a result, I have been tearing apart the classroom and putting everything back together in a more organized fashion. Our school room looked like a huge pack of puppies came flopping and rolling and wrestling in every drawer, on every shelf, heck, basically in every nook and cranny of the school room. The mess makers were quite adorable, but very thorough.

As I was going through everything, I was thinking of all the school supply shopping I'd be able to do once I cleaned everything up! It was my mantra..."As soon as you get this organized, you get to go shopping for school supplies! So get it done!!" I'm a sucker for school supplies and the only thing I like better than buying them is buying them for pennies, dimes and quarters! Yay! Shopping is fun!

But as I started cleaning and organizing, I noticed something. I have apparently been going nutso every year with the school supply shopping, and as a result, we have sooo many supplies that the school room is packed to the gills!

We have enough crayons and markers to last us a lifetime! And yes, all those markers work!

I have mentioned that I have TWO Crazy Kids, not 5, right! Why on earth do I have all these scissors!?!

This just about says it all...and yes, these are all the ones that work! You should have seen what I threw out!

We have so much paper that I can barely open the storage drawer!

I don't know what I was thinking each year I went shopping. Not much, apparently, except "YIPPEE! Here we go!!" Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on how you look at it!), I'm thinking about what to do this year!

So after doing all this thinking, I have made the decision (sob!) not to go school supply shopping (sob sob!)! I'm avoiding any kind of office supply store or back to school section as if my life depended on it. It'll be hard, but I'm just saying NO! (SOB!) Wish me luck!

The Ivory Soap Experiment

I've been seeing this Ivory Soap Experiment on Pinterest since I first started pinning. I've constantly said to myself, "Okay, I want to do this with the two crazy kids", and then I get busy and end up forgetting about it, until I see it on Pinterest yet again. Since we've been having a very low key afternoon, I decided that this is it! Today is the day to do the Ivory soap experiment! Finally! Oh, and like I said, it's all over Pinterest, so you can go there if you want more information or pictures. I originally saw it on the blog Our Chocolate Milk, so I followed their instructions.

So the first thing I did was to show the kids a bar of Ivory soap, and then told them that when this soap is made, it gets whipped up so that air pockets form. I cut it in half and let them take a look and examine it:

CLB was convinced he could see all the air pockets! Neither kid liked the smell of the soap, though...crazy kids!

I reminded them that the soap was made of water and that there were air pockets trapped in the soap, very similar to the water trapped in a kernel of corn. Then I asked them what they thought would happen if we microwaved the bar of soap. They were a bit mystified at first, so I asked them what a microwave does. Once they realized that I was talking about heating up something, especially kernels of corn, they shouted out, "Popcorn!" (it's actually great fun popping corn on the stove with kids so they can actually see the popping...another blog entry I suppose). So CLB's hypothesis was that the soap would blow up (so dramatic!). CLG was hoping the soap would magically transform into something she could eat (she is little after all, and we were talking about popcorn!).

So we had our hypothesis and decided to conduct our experiment! I cut the halves down again into quarters, and put one quarter onto a glass pie plate:

Do this with your kids! Don't let your kids do this by themselves or you'll end up with a mess!

Then we stuck the pie plate with the soap into the microwave and nuked it for 90 seconds. It probably could have stayed in there for only a minute, but I wasn't sure, so I followed directions. The kids were so surprised when it started puffing up, even though we had just talked about it!

Okay, I know, not the best picture, but you can see it starting to puff up. It happens right away, so don't take your eyes off it!

Here's what it looked like when it came out...so neat! Very light!!

Both crazy kids loved picking it up and feeling it's weight and texture. It was a bit warm when it came out, so be sure to test it before letting little hands play with it.

CLB especially enjoyed playing with it. At this point, he also wondered if it was edible like popcorn. Now he is old enough to know better! Another reason to do this with kids, not just letting them do this on his own!

All in all, this was a fun little experiment that both kids enjoyed. Not too messy and you can really build up the suspense if you like! Oh, and I believe it's still usable as soap! So guess what my wonderful husband gets to use to wash up with:

Fluffy soap, all for you, Hon! <3