Grow A Flower Game

While shopping for Jack's birthday presents I couldn't resist purchasing this oh-so-fitting game for our germination study. The Grow A Flower Game is intended for 5th grade and up, but Grace and Jack were able to keep up with the jist of the game. It did a wonderful job of reinforcing where the various parts of the flower are located, while providing a large amount of facts on the purpose of each flower part. The game is a bit like Monopoly in that it would take forever for someone to acquire all 13 parts of the flower to win, so we set a time limit.

Spooky Sticky Science

Last Friday, the children and I toured The Science of Gardening on the excellent Exploratorium.com. If you've never poked around the site, you are in for a treat. While we continue to scratch the surface of germination, we've had a few detours along the way (what would homeschooling be without myriads of detours). Jack has become very interested in the Venus Flytrap. Exploratorium had a very educational set of mini videos on the Venus Flytrap that would peek any boy's interest. If you are looking for spooky science...check out Peter's Savage Garden.

Look Closely In Your Backyard

It is amazing what you can find in your own backyard. A couple of days ago, the kids and I went for a backyard nature walk. There is an untouched piece of wooded property behind our property line that we sneaked around in. This was where the real gems were...purple mushrooms, fallen logs covered in moss, every square inch swarming with little lives.


The children and I were on a hunt to specifically find things to decorate a riker mount with for a fall theme. The bright red seeds, holly berries, and red leaves set off the Golden Rod Grace spied. My favorite find - those purple mushrooms. Jack's favorite find was a real surprise - two surviving morning glory seeds the children had planted a couple of months back, with the first flower in bloom. We left the flower on the vine.

And voila, the finished project.

The Art Of Germination Science

If the seed germination experiment doesn't work, at least we could say it made for a colorful presentation. Grace and Jack really enjoyed putting the germination study together this morning. Now my only concern is...Will it survive the 7-14 days of man-handling? If naming petri dishes names like "Lovey" is a sign of good care to come, then we should make it.

Ink Blots...But With Leaves

Today at the park Jack came to me with a small white oak leaf. Showing me the fallen leaf, he said, "Look ma, the leaf looks like one of those sting fish."

That morning we had just watched together as a family our 3rd Blue Planet CD about the ocean. Included in this CD was a clip about an extremely large manta ray combing the deep ocean for food. I looked at the leaf, and Jack was right. It did look very close to a manta ray in form.

The children love the Blue Planet DVDs. They have been so much more educational than a half hour of "Miffy" or "Dora" before breakfast in the morning. Watching their cartoon choice in the morning, the kids become lumps, but with the Blue Planet DVDs they are on the edge of the couch asking 101 questions.

The Autumn Joy Is Blooming

Autumn always makes viewing bug behavior way too easy at our house. We have three incredibly large Autumn Joy plants (really bushes) that attract every type of insect you can imagine, and they are just beginning to open their large heads full of tiny blooms. Right now, there are constantly butterflies in the yard, but the Autumn Joy is attracting some new ones. Our main blog picture above, is a butterfly Grace spotted while doing the Slip n' Slide today. She remarked that it was new to the yard, and the light was just perfect for a photo.

I really like the name of this butterfly, "American Lady".