Week 2, Day 1

This week's theme is Nature and Art, and the kids love it already. This morning's nature walk was at 9am since it was going up to 33 today, and it was already quite warm when we left. I had envisioned doing our nature walk in the back woods, but it was far too hot for socks and pants, so we stuck to the side of the road. This was perfect for everyone - the dog got a walk, and the girls collected wild flowers. The girls also learned about Wild Parsnip. They learned how to identify it and what happens when it comes into contact with skin and sunlight. I don't think they will be going near tall grass anytime soon. Wild parsnip can cause blindness and severe burns. Ottawa has issued a warning to the invasive plant on its website: http://ottawa.ca/en/residents/water-and-environment/plants-and-animals/wild-parsnip

When we returned, the girls learned how to arrange their flowers on a sheet of parchment paper (no wax paper available today), and press them into a book. We will give them a few days to dry out and then make suncatchers.

We then retreated to the basement to do some ABC Yoga - 26 poses, each beginning with a different letter of the alphabet. Letter N was "new pose", and each of the girls got to invent a new pose. They came up with "giraffe", "rock" and "bunny". I'm not sure when most kids appreciate yoga, but in my group's case, it is somewhere between 4 and 6, as the 3 older (6.75, 5.99 and 5.75) really liked doing different poses. The 4 and 3.75 year olds did not enjoy the activity at all.

The girls found a large piece of cardboard this morning while playing and it was decided to turn the box into a door, so that we could have a new entrance to the dramatic play area. The girls set to work after lunch with some blue and green paint, and finished the sky and the grass around the door. The door itself will be painted tomorrow.

As there are more of them this week (HR is here now, and will be the rest of the month), they are more easily entertained by each other. They especially enjoyed water play this afternoon.