We just finished a very cool unit study on spiders. We only spent about a week on it, but we made some very fun lapbooks and learned a lot about spiders. The unit study started accidentally with a large black spider I found on the kitchen window screen. I didn't want him (or her... as it turned out) in my kitchen, so I caught it, and since it was such a big spider I decided to save it to show the kids. One thing kind of led to another and pretty soon we had two mama jumping spiders and two egg sacks, which eventually hatched out about a million cute little baby spiders. (Yes, even baby spiders are cute!)
Here is R getting up close and personal with a (dead, but very well preserved) funnel web spider. It really was amazing to look at it close up... The spinnerets were very easy to see, as were the tiny claws on the legs. We never could see his eyes though....
And here is one of our "crops" of baby spiders.
Before S came back we also went to a great pizza making class at Whole Foods. The kids got to make their own crust, fill it up with toppings, then watch as it cooked in the huge pizza oven. Afterwards we sat outside and enjoyed the sunshine and the wonderful pizza. Mmmmm.....
M and R, ready to start baking--
Another exciting thing that happened (although probably only exciting to me!) is we had a load of hay delivered. Since we sort of ended up accidentally getting a horse, I only had enough hay in the barn last year for the goats... so I've been having to buy small loads of hay once a month or so to feed Grant. Hay is very expensive here right now, and I hated having to drive to the feed store (30 minutes away) every few weeks to stuff my minivan full of over-priced hay... I really wanted a load of hay, enough for a year, neatly stacked in my barn. Then, no matter how many blizzards we have this next winter, I'll know I can feed the animals (and don't have to drive through snowdrifts to get to the feed store to do it!) Before I could buy my load of hay though, I had to wait for it to grow... Finally, just a few weeks ago, my neighbor had his fields cut and baled, and I placed my order. Then we had to quickly clean out the barn...
That whole underneath area (where Rose is) had been full of a boat, odds and ends of lumber, lawn tools we never use... you name it, it was stuck in that corner of the barn! It took one whole dirty, sweaty, afternoon to empty it out...
Here comes our hay! One hundred and fifty bales of timothy...
It took him five tries to back that flatbed into our barn...
Tossin' and stackin'... We paid three college kids to unload and stack it. They unloaded and stacked all 150 bales, it took them just over an hour... and they charged us $10. each. What a bargain!
There it is... a year's worth of hay for one horse and two goats. Actually that's almost a year's worth, it wouldn't all fit in that area so the last 25 bales are stacked in the feedroom. ......let it snow, let it snow, let it snow....
S went back to her foster home today. I'm not sure that it will last, but things seem to have calmed down again... at least for the time being. Foster mom backed down from her ultimatum to social services (thank goodness) but things are still very precarious for S. Fortunately her most recent visit with us went well, M didn't destabilize as badly as he did the last time she was here and R enjoyed having someone to play dolls and horses with. It will be very nice to be back to just two kids again though...
I'll have to finish this later... it's getting late and I'm worn out!
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