Monday Morsels: Inside

The kids have been spending a lot of time outside on a small patch of ice they found in the woods.  

They dragged their skates back there a few times, but mostly its been fun to just shovel, sweep, and slide around in boots.  We also have a very tiny sledding hill.  We still only have about 6 inches on the ground, but its nice and frozen so the sled goes alright.   

This is typically the time of year when we're all feeling more than a little stir crazy.  With this year's non-winter it has been so easy to get around that we're still going strong and feeling inspired inside and out.  (No bets as to how long this feeling will last--we're all still hoping for more snow, but I suspect in a few weeks that feeling will progress into the longing for green we always feel mid-March.)

Morsels:  

* I took the pattern blocks out in an attempt to distract Kale from trying to steal all of his brother's Legos.  Juniper quickly joined us and built this patterned structure.  It kept toppling (which may have had something to do with building beside a two year old) by the 5th one she decided I had better take a picture because it would never last longer than a second.  I love how the colors and patterns mimic the funky hat box in the background.  

* We watched "Dolphin Tales" for a family movie night last week.  It is a cute story about a dolphin who gets caught in a net and has to has her tail amputated.  It has a happy ending. The boy in the movie was a lot like Wylie, and it was no surprise to me that he loved the movie.  He has been talking about it everyday since, and it has been the topic of much pretend play.  Here is a recent patient to our own Marine Animal Hospital.  Refreshingly, the movie showcases a homeschooling family, who are not depicted as strange or as missing out on anything.  In fact, their "learn what you love" life style is celebrated in the movie.  

* These pants were almost finished for a Solstice present, then hidden away and forgotten until last week when Wylie ripped through the knee of another pair of pants.  Fortunately all I had left was the pockets, so that night I got to work and viola, new pants for the needy.  They are a light weight corduroy, which will no doubt rip through the knees before summer, despite the triple layer I added to the knees.  They have a flat front and elastic waist back, with a partially adjustable waist. (Which is a fancy way of saying I left a small opening where I can get to the elastic to tighten/loosen if need be).  This is assuming the boy will ever get bigger around the middle instead of longer and thinner which has been his trend.  He's been wearing them for about a week straight so I guess he likes them.  

* Toddler snacks without grain/dairy, heavy on the protein.  We haven't completely given up dairy and grains, but we've made some huge steps in that direction. And I'm feeling a little less daunted by the task, having vowed to be kind to myself, and just do what I can  toward eating/preparing foods that will be gentler on our systems.  I've been serving a lot more high protein snacks (below: all natural apple chicken sausage, home grown alfalfa sprouts, and apple slices).  We've also been enjoying the almond flour recipes here thanks to a tip from a friend.  We especially liked the orange, chocolate chip scones.

*  A creature loving friend of ours turned 4 this week, so we put together a little critter collecting 

kit for her.  We used pistachio shells as lady bugs, I sewed up another of Maya's Buckets with some bug print corduroy I have been carrying around for years, and Wylie and Juni each added their own creations.  Kale got a similar, though simpler version of the "bug bucket" for Christmas.  

*Kale's lady bugs.  (sticking these ladies into a strip of clay worked well to hold them still while he painted). I added the spots with a sharpie.  

* Juniper made a little blank "bug book" for drawing pictures of the bugs collected.  The cover is construction paper folded in quarters so its thick, and we stitched plain white paper inside with the sewing machine.  When she opened it our friend exclaimed, "oh Juniper, how did you make this?"  Wylie added a tiny bug built of Legos and a spare magnifying glass.

After all that inside work we're ready to head back out into this unseasonable weather.
Clearly some of us think its warmer than others!

check out my bee boxes at the end of the deck.  the bee class begins in two weeks,
and the bees should come in time for mother's day.  yippee!

Happy Monday