School is Out!

The girls are officially out of school for the summer. I am super proud of them as they continue to show how smart they are. Becca made honors all year and came home with 5 achievement awards. Kenzie did very well also with an outstanding report card and a great little memory book that her teacher put together.

It's just a matter of time before we are on our way to visit family and friends in Colorado! Let the summer fun begin!!!

Mostly Moths

We get a bunch of moths hanging out on the farmer's porch every morning. The girls enjoy checking them out, especially Kenzie who is on a current insect kick. These two were especially large and fun to look at.

I love luna moths because I think they are so pretty!

Lady Slippers

I think I may have posted about this before but Lady Slippers are my favorite wild flower. I feel very blessed to have many growing in the woods right along the backyard. Here are some of the pictures I took recently.

During the month of June there is a lupine festival in northern NH. Lupines are probably my second favorite. We went to the festival two years ago and I have wanted to go back ever since but we haven't made it back yet and the outlook isn't looking too good for this year. There is a chance we might make it up there this Sunday, but I am not holding my breath. The festival is three weeks long, which seems like plenty of time, but the weather and other obligations always get in the way. Oh well, there's always next year!

I did buy some seeds while we were there and I finally planted some this year. Maybe this time next year we'll have some of our own lupines in the backyard to go with the lady slippers.

Little Scientist

Mackenzie has become quite the little scientist lately. She is always looking for something to do and she wants to be learning something in the process, so video games and TV don't really keep her attention for long. So I picked up some science experiment books for kids. She went through and marked all the ones she wanted to do-(which was just about all of them). And several times a week when she comes to me and says"I'm bored" I tell her to go pick an experiment. Luckily most of the experiments involve household items. The one she chose yesterday was the floating grape, which she learned about density.

It involved mixing sugar with water to get a grape to float. After laying out all the materials I let her do it all by herself then just asked her some basic questions and made sure she understood what was going on. After completing her experiment she wrote her findings down in a notebook.

The first cup is just plain water and the grape sank. The second cup has water with some sugar mixed in and the grape floats at the surface. The third cup is filled with sugar and water mixture and then just regular water poured on top. Don't stir! This causes the grape to float on top of the heavier sugar water!

The book we have been using is The Everything Kids Science Experiments Book by Tom Robinson in case anyone has any budding scientists!

New Glasses

Becca got some new glasses! They look super cute on her!

Odiorne

I chaperoned a field trip with Kenzie's class to Odiorne and the Sea Science Center. It was lots of fun, though the weather was a concern. Luckily the rain held off and we a had a great day. The kids got to explore tidepools, pick up critters in the indoor touch tank, see a big blue lobster and have a picnic lunch outside.