Pineywoods Fair 2017

It was Kids Fair Day this past Friday, and my cautious 3 year old rode some fair rides all by herself!  She didn't scream or yell or even look scared!  The look on her face was either shear determination to hold on or joyful smiles as she rode around.  So proud of her.

Our day started with learning about our first responders in our community.

Sweet Pea started her morning getting strapped to a stretcher and placed into an ambulance where the guys showed us different ways to take heart beats.

After the ambulance tour, kids were able to see different firetrucks, all the compartmnets on the truck, and time how long it took a fireman to put on his gear.  To pass the test to become a fireman, the men must put on all their gear including oxygen equipment in 1 minute 30 seconds!

After the fire trucks, it was time to tour the Sheriff's police car!  Hopefully this is the only time Sweet Pea will be in the back of a police vehicle. :)   The Sheriff also showed us some of his protective gear that he has to wear in certain situations.  All the responders were so nice and patient with all the kids!  Love our little community!

After the tour with the responders, it was time to ride some rides....for FREE!

This was such a great experience for all the littles.  They didnt have to wait in line, and they could ride a ride a billion times in true toddler fashion.

Sweet Pea's first ride was the motor cycles.  I was really worried she was going to scream and try to get off in the middle of the ride, but she was determined to hold on and ride that bike!  So proud.

Her absolute favorite was the jeeps I think.  Daddy and I might have to discuss getting her one of those electronic jeeps for Christmas...

Look at that face below! "Crazy drivers on the road..." hahaha!

Our day didnt end there either!  After riding the rides for awhile it was time to go to the petting zoo.

We went to the petting zoo back in July and it was a disaster.  Sweet Pea didnt want to touch one animal, so I was already in the mindset that she was going to bolt when I put her in the zoo.

I was so wrong!

She let the animals approach her and she pet just about every single animal in there!

There was a little goat that just wanted to smell her hand, a donkey who followed her around waiting for Sweet Pea to pet his face, and a Mama Llama that enjoyed her neck rub. 

What a wonderful day!  We were able to do this all before lunch, and Sweet Pea and I both took a great nap in the afternoon after this adventure.

I feel so blessed to live in a town where my little girl can have so many wonderful experiences.

Preschool Homeschool: Cloud Study

This month we are studying the weather and seasons during our Preschool/Homeschool time using  our Mother Goose Time curriculum.  On this particularly glorious day, we studied Clouds.  

There weren't many in the sky, but there were tons on our little table.

We started our study with me asking Sweet Pea a few questions:

What do you think a cloud feels like? 

"Soft."

What do you think is inside a cloud?

"A rainbow" was her first response when I asked indoors.  

However when I filmed her, she responded with "rain drops."

We then did a little STEAM activity outside, suggested by MGT,  

which had Sweet Pea engrossed for a long time!  

All you need is a container, water, shaving cream, colored water (we used blue), and a medicine dropper or pipette.

The shaving cream sits on top of the water resembling a cloud.  As Sweet Pea added more and more blue water to the top of the "cloud," it became more saturated, eventually releasing some of the blue colored water below the cloud thus representing rain. 

We had some great cloud discussion too and I am so glad I captured it in the video below.

Time to get messy and feel that cloud!

In 3rd grade my Language Arts teacher, Mrs. Carrier,  always placed shaving cream on our desks on Wednesdays to practice our spelling words.  It was so much fun! I obviously never forgot the experience...or her.  As I watched Sweet Pea play with the cream "cloud" on her table, I remembered all the wonderful writing practice I did.  I encouraged Sweet Pea to write the letter C with her fingers in her "cloud" of shaving cream.   

She had such a fun time writing and  drawing in her clouds.  

She was constantly saying, "I need more clouds."

By the end, she was covered in shaving cream, sweaty, dirty and wet.  She immediately took a bath and after lunch took a nice nap.  However, our cloud study didn't end there!

Mother Goose Time included a wonderful Invitation to Create!  We were inspired by a picture of clouds and using a pipette and watered down white paint Sweet Pea could make her own picture however she wanted.  I added some tape around the cardstock  to help create a nice border/frame for her artwork.

We went back outdoors to complete this art project.

I used watered down white tempra paint and she had a lot of fun dropping it on her paper and blowing out some of the bubbles that appeared on her paper.  The only problem with white tempra paint is it turns into pink when it dries on dark colored paper.

We still need to read the book It Looked Like Spilt Milk to finish our Cloud Study.  We'll do that during our bedtime reading.  Loving that our Homeschool time can go all day as needed.