Easter Party

Easter is my very favorite holiday. It is such a humbling thing for me to think about. I love being able to focus on what Jesus did for me. What God did for me (for everyone) by sending his one and only son to suffer. Something I don't deserve,and can never be good enough for. Something he didn't have to do, but because he loves me he did. What an amazing God I serve!

I decided to have an Easter party! It was lots of fun! Here you can see our simple spread! Sandwiches, Chex mix, fruit and dip, hard boiled eggs (dyed of course!) and donuts for dessert!

Zeke asked if our glasses were plastic...I laughed and showed him that they make "music", proving they're not plastic! They both tried to make music, but it didn't work for them.

Before Mark came home from work I decided to take some pictures of the kids in all their finery! If you're wondering what's up with Zeke in these photos, while I was getting dressed Zeke and Brie were playing wheelbarrow... he fell and hurt his rib. Don't you just love Reuben's expression!

Reuben had his first ear infection this week. Titus was looking in Zeke's ear saying I think you have an ear infection! Too funny!

Here he is trying to get a closer look, to confirm his diagnosis!

And here are all 4 of them looking towards the camera! I am so amazingly blessed! Look at those gorgeous faces! I look at their faces and it takes me back to what my savior did for me. Something so amazing, something I can never repay, something I don't deserve,but something he did anyway. I LOVE YOU LORD JESUS! Happy Easter everyone!

Lego Quest

(Click the picture to enter your own creation!)

Zeke and Titus worked together this week! They both want to be police officers so they can arrest people! (watch out bad guys!)

Brie is going to be a fashion designer, not a fashion model!

Capillary action

This was a fun experiment! I saw this idea several places, but I think this blog gave me the most information. In her post she links up to this site, which explains why/how this works. (Zeke had a hard time understanding it, but next time hopefully it will sink in!) You start with white carnations. I bought 5 of them, you could use more or less. I bought mine from our local flower shop, and almost had a heart attack. (I guess I'm really cheap!) I paid $10. I thought you could get roses for $1, so for a carnation it seemed like a lot! I never buy flowers, so I'm probably just really out of touch! My point is if you have a grocery store that has flowers it may be cheaper, of course like I said I never buy flowers so maybe it wouldn't be! Fill up your vases with water, and add your food coloring. The more you use the better it will turn out. (20-30 drops) On the Steve Spangler site I linked to up above he suggests cutting the ends off under water, it helps to prevent air bubbles getting in the tube. (you also want to make sure you cut at an angle!) Once you're done trimming and have your color in your vase you can put the carnation in. There is a process called split end, just like it sounds take the end of a stem and slice it up 5-6 inches. You put one end in one color and the other end in another color. We chose yellow and blue. Can you see the 2 colors? After I took the pictures, I was moving it around and the split broke. I just put it all into the blue. In case your wondering, it ended up being a green and blue flower! It was really cool to see it change again! Brie also put a red one into the blue to see if she could get a purple one. It did change, but wasn't really purple!

We had 2 reds, the split, green and orange.

This is a couple days later. It really changed color! They were beautiful, I forgot to take pictures of the other ones before they left my house. They were just as vibrant as this red one!

Titus Jack

I can't believe that you are 4. You are a very sweet natured boy, kind, loving and very silly. You love trucks,diggers,dozers,any kind of vehicle. You are just sure that you'll drive a truck someday! We love you so very much Titus, and pray that the Lord continues to bless you. Happy Birthday Titus Jack!

Plants

We are on our last topical study for the school year. I can't believe we are almost done with our school year.

We started this study by reading what a plant is. Talking a little about the parts, how they take in water and explaining photosynthesis. My hubby had this great idea...I was having a hard time coming up with ideas, so he suggested doing an experiment on the the "sower" passage found in Luke 8. Here is how I prepared.

I took a toy bin that wasn't being used and set to work. I used 4 types of "soil."

I took sand from the sandbox representing the seed that fell on the path...

I used some lava rocks representing the seed that fell on rocky ground...

I used some weedy soil representing the seed that fell among the thorn...

I used our soil out of the garden here to represent the seed that fell among the good soil...

Next we went outside with a few seed packets and the bible. We read Luke 8: 1-15. We talked (a lot) about what the different soils represent. The sand (or path) grows nothing, birds steal the seeds away. Think about those who hear the word, but the devil snatches away. The rocks may grow something, but it won't have strong roots and dries up. So think about someone who says sure I believe in God, but they have no real faith. The weedy soil grows well at first, but thorns and weeds choke them. Think about someone who is a believer, but makes no time for God. Things of the world become more important. Finally, the good soil grows good, strong plants that mature and multiply. Think about someone who is a Christian and is committed to God and his way. They grow strong in the Word and produce fruit in others.

So after talking we took our seeds and planted them. I'm not sure anything will come up, because we planted these pretty early and they've been outside. I'm afraid with it being 30's overnight nothing will happen! We did this 2 weeks ago and I just asked both kids (separately) they could tell all about the soil representations. So even if nothing grows they hopefully won't forget the parable!

Lego Quest

(click the picture for more information) This weeks theme was "wearable." Zeke made sunglasses. Brie made a crown.

More ocean

After a 5 week study we finished oceans, and we learned a lot. Here are a few more pictures from some of our experiments/projects.

This experiment came from Bill Nye's ocean book. Did you know that a squid can squirt it's ink in the shape of it's body. That helps it to escape from prey. So we colored a picture of a squid and then the kids tried to get the "ink" to take the shape of the squids body. They couldn't do it, but it was a great reminder that God makes everything...and he created everything to work the way it does!

The following experiments are from our Awesome Ocean book...

Fill a tall glass almost to the top with water. Insert a drinking straw about 1" into the water and slowly blow a bubble. Both kids declared it's pretty easy. Now push the straw farther into the glass so that the end is just 1" from the bottom and slowly blow a bubble. The kids said it was much harder to do, because of the pressure.

We learned that every minute in the day (in most places) air presses against our bodies with nearly 15 pounds of force. It's equally distributed throughout our bodies so we don't notice it, unless the air pressure changes. (think about being in a plane and how your ears get blocked) In the ocean, changes in pressure are more noticeable, because water is much denser than air. As you can see in our experiment we filled a bowl with water, put a plastic bag up over our hand and wrists. (secure with a rubber band) Dunk your hand into the bowl of water and there is enough pressure to make you feel like your hand has been shrink-wrapped.

(and if you're noticing that the water looks white, I had a little accident! I was pouring coffee creamer into my coffee, and poured it into the wrong thing! Please tell me other people do things like this.) =)

Another pressure experiment...using a pushpin poke 4 holes in a water bottle. (vertically, and about 1" apart) Fill it up and set it down in the sink. Then observe how the water is coming out of the holes. The hole closest to the bottom makes the straightest stream...why? Because it's under the greatest amount of pressure.

One of our last days of our ocean unit was beautiful, so we went outside and painted some ocean scenery. We briefly talked about horizon lines thanks to this post! (if you are looking for art ideas, visit her blog, she has some great ideas)

The finished project..Brie's is on the top, Zeke's is on the bottom.

I think we all enjoyed our ocean studies. We could have easily made it a longer study! Imagine the fun we could have had if we actually lived near an ocean!