Submarine Play

Spring break week! I am so glad to have some special time with the kids this week. Love it! We stared off with this simple submarine play exercise.

This morning I asked the kids if they could construct a simple submarine. My little ones often experiment with different items to see if they will sink or float, but today the challenge was focused on the older ones.

All you need to create your own submarine play stations are:

a large glass container
numerous small items (silly bands, marbles, legos, beads, buttons, coins…)
an empty plastic spice container
water.

The kids ran all over the house collecting things that would fit in the small vessel that would become the submarine. I loved listening to all the giggles as they were discussing which items would work.

The kids found that it took quite a number of items to get the submarine to sink to the bottom. They also thought it was interesting that objects that would normally sink would float inside the sub.

We talked about density and how the air inside the container made the heavy objects buoyant. Kaleb decided he needed to remove the air out of his container to get it to his sub to submerge. It was fun watching the kids figure out the problem. Eventually they decided if they filled the sub with water there would be no room for air. I love watching the process kids go though when left alone to explore. After their brilliant discovery of using water, I explained to them that real submarines also use water to submerge themselves. After numerous attempts using different amounts of water and a combination of different objects, they each finally created a perfect sub that stayed in the center of the jar.

Here is a link to a fun list of great experiments that my kids love.

St Patrick’s Day Lunch

My kids love special lunches, especially holiday lunches. Sometimes that just means a quick note or a funny joke. This year when Kaleb opened his lunch box, he was surprised by a special St. Patrick’s Day lunch. Yep, you guessed it…a green lunch and added a couple of jokes written on shamrocks. Simple, but Kaleb loves it and it makes him feel extra special.

I used shamrock cookie cutters on the apples, kiwi and tortilla PB and J sandwiches. I really wanted to use the green tortillas, but decided that Spinach and herb did not mix well with PB and J:) There are also green grapes, green olives, pear sauce and only the green gold fish (I just separated them out of the bag from their colored friends!). I also made lime shamrock shaped Jello Jigglers, but they were not set yet. They will be added in the morning. I try to make the kids lunch the night before so there is one less thing to do in our already rushed morning.

I would love to hear what you put in your kiddos lunch and what you do to make the kids feel extra special. So far I only have one lunch to make, since Bree is half day Kindergarten and Annika is home with me, but that will change all to quickly! I would love to get Bento Boxes for the kids school lunches, but this works for now.

If you don’t want to miss out on any of the fun we are having at Housing A Forest, make sure to follow us on Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter.

Shamrock Sprouts

How to Grow Sprouts on a Sponge

I found this great article on how to grow sprouts on a sponge. We thought it would be fun to try making our own St. Patrick’s Day Chia Pets. It was so simple, and my kids loved their little shamrock sprout sponges.

Shamrock Sprouts:

A household sponge (we choose green sponges)
Seed packet (we used lettuce, spinach, and broccoli seeds)
A water mister
Shallow plate

St Patrick’s Day Activity

Trace a shamrock shape onto the dry sponge with sharpie. Cutting the sponge was a bit more difficult for the kids, but with perseverance they managed. We found the sponges were easier to cut when wet. Also, the kids used adult scissors because theirs were not sharp enough.

Soak the sponge once again, you want the sponge to be damp, but not dripping. Scatter the seeds across the top of the sponge, gently poking the seeds into the holes. We tried growing spinach, broccoli and lettuce seeds. Place in a sunny window. Keep the sponge moist by misting with water, don’t let the seeds dry out. We found it helpful to turn a clear plastic container over the plate at night to keep the moisture in. During the day the kids wanted to check on the progress, so we left the plastic off. Mist often with a water sprayer.

Soon you should have your very own sprout garden. I can’t wait for the snow to melt, but for now this little cheery garden will have to do. The kids loved watching their sprouts, and they thought it was interesting that seeds could grew without soil.

Looking for more St Patrick’s Day Crafts? Check out our

Stained Glass Shamrocks

Glitter Shamrocks

Rainbow Q-tip Painting

Shamrock Cookie Cutter Stamping

Racing Balloon Leprechauns

Shamrock Crystals

Credit Card Art

Watercolor Crayon Shavings

Watercolor crayons are a great medium for kids to play with and they are very versatile. When I was going through our art supplies I came across a set of secondhand watercolors that I was given while I was in art school. Needless to say they are very dried out and don’t work like the newer variety. I love this simple Watercolor Crayon Shavings project.

So we decided to try a little experiment since they no longer worked how they were designed to and I LOVE the results. We dampened a piece of water color paper with a spray bottle and simply sharpened the water colors directly onto the wet surface. You will need a sharpener with a large hole to fit the crayon.

Once the kids were happy with how the shavings looked we gave the paper another quick spray. Pretty, but not spectacular. I think that was because our crayons were dried out. Not giving up we sandwiched the colors with another sheet of watercolor paper, sandwiched again with newspaper top and bottom and gave it a quick iron. Similar to how you would iron regular wax crayons to create stain glass. The results were two beautiful speckled, colorful sheets.

I thought this would be a great project to try with our preschool co-op. Some of the kiddos are a bit younger and were struggling with using the sharpener. So I gave them containers of the different watercolor shavings and they sprinkled it onto their paper. The older kids sharpened their own directly onto the paper. Since I did not bring watercolor paper, we tried it with construction paper and thick card stock. The results were still OK but not what I was hoping for. The paper needs to be wet and heated for the colors to come alive and regular paper is not designed for that. We tried sandwiching the paper with wax paper and it worked better, but the colors peeled off with the wax paper. All that said, if you try this just stick with watercolor paper and you will be much happier with the results.

I will be linking to these parties

Family Date Night

My kids love family date night and ask us when we are going on our next adventure. Spending time together as a family is something that we value and encourage. As an added bonus we don’t have to plan in advance and find a sitter!

With 3 kids and 2 adults there is always a variety of ideas and inevitably someones feelings get hurt because their idea was not chosen. So we came up with a simple rating system that works for our family. All five of us think of a different activity that we would like to do. One of the kids make a chart of all the ideas and we rate each activity with o-5 fingers. We found that the kids were changing the number of fingers they held out based on how others rated the activity, so closing our eyes works for us. We simply count up the total number of fingers for each activity and mark the total. The activity with the highest rating is what we do. This simple system helps everyone to feel like their opinion is valued.

Tonight the vote was to go to an indoor climbing place that also had an open gym. Everyone had a blast! The kids loved climbing and exploring. We engaged with each of the kids, but we also stole a few precious moments for ourselves. While the kids were off climbing, we plopped down on the floor with a cup of coffee and played a board game. OK admitting that sounds really geeky, but we love playing games. Yes, there were a few strange looks, but it was fun! We find that it is important for us to spend time as a family, but also show the kids that we love spending time together as a couple as well.

I would enjoy hearing what activities your family love to do together and how family date night works in your house.

Monthly Archives: March 2011