Minecraft Blocks

I've had a hard time being 'present' lately.

It's easier to get my stuff done when Toby is playing Minecraft or watching Youtube tutorials, but then I feel guilty for not spending actual time with him. However when I do try to organize an activity he takes very little interest and counts down the seconds until his screen break is over.

In the midst of our rut I came upon a post in our Facebook homeschool group that someone was selling off a bag of 90 wooden craft cubes. I love building blocks, and as a result we have LOTS and no reason to get more, especially when they're all cubes and you can't necessarily do much with all cubes.
And then I thought - Minecraft is cubes...I could paint them.

I dragged Toby along when I was picking up the blocks and I can tell he's looking at me thinking "Whyyyy???" So I hold up the bag and say "I'm painting these. To look like Minecraft blocks. So you can play with them."
His eyes lit up for the first time in a long time and he began listing off which types of blocks he wanted me to make.

The project begins.

Lots of stones.

This project quickly became more about me doing something creative for myself, than about making a toy for Toby.
37(?) blocks had to be stone coloured for various types of ore and stone. After painting them grey I used a sponge and a darker grey colour to add the store textures, but I don't think I got a good picture of that part.

First batch: Lapis Lazuli, Redstone, Gold, Emerald, Diamond,
Cobblestone, A furnace, and TNT  brick to blow them all up

Some of them evolved into reversable blocks to reflect things you can do in the game.

Working furnace, large chest, lit jack-o-lantern, and snow bricks have
spots so they can be used with the pumpkin for a Snow Golem.

Crafting box with the chest.

The beginning of wood planks so we can build a house.

Toby, at this point, sits at the table and watches me paint and counts the seconds until the paint is dry enough for him to snatch up and play with. He says "Mom, this is so cool casue it's like I can play Minecraft, WHEN I'M NOT ON THE COMPUTER!"

...Yes....Yes, that's the entire point there Toby... ;)

Dirt and grassy dirt blocks, and the set is complete,

Toby approved.

Homestead nestled by a hill with a jack-o-lantern to mark our location.

 Minecraft geology.

Final brick count:
1 Crafting table

1 Furnace

1 TNT
1 Pumpkin

1 Emerald ore

2 Chests

2 Snow blocks

3 Diamond ore

3 Lapis lazuli

4 Redstone

4 Gold ore

4 Mossy cobblestore

6 Coal 

6 Iron ore

10 Cobblestone

10 Dirt
10 Grassy dirt

22 Wood planks

While we still have small battles over computer time, it's nice to see him enthusiastic about something again. Grampa and Grama sit and play with him so he can talk endlessly about Minecraft without them all staring at the computer. Grampa invented Duplo Creepers which I haven't grabbed a picture of yet, but I will.

All in all it was a fun project which everyone thinks I should mass produce now. Pretty sure there is all kinds of copyrights involved with doing stuff like that, we we'll see what comes of it.

Can-do

For a long time I've been going through a phase (is it a phase??) of constantly picking out the things that Toby CAN'T do and that I CAN'T do as a result.
I know I've talked a lot about being frustrated, and Toby's frustrations with dealing with day to day life (like putting on clothes).
I am constantly frustrated that we can't just get in the car and TRAVEL, because I know an hour in, things will go downhill.
I get frustrated sometimes with homeschooling, and wish he would just be ok going to school.
Though he's never been screened for anything, he displays many 'signs' of Aspergers, which in one way has made me take a different approach to dealing with him, but also frustrates me because there's still a long list of things we can't do.

So, what I'm attempting to do, is create a long list of all the things he CAN do. And maybe somehow the positive can outweigh the negative...

He can count by 2s, 5s, and 10s.
He can look at a set of items/dots (like a dice or Lego bricks) and instantly tell how many there are, up until about 8.
He knows odd and even numbers.
He can tell left from right.
He can tell horizontal from vertical.
He knows the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.
He can visually identify over 30 species of birds.
He can identify about 10 bird calls.
He can (more or less) make himself a pot of macaroni to eat.
He can read.
He can name the planets.
He knows the sun is actually a star.
He can tell you how clouds are formed.
He can dress himself (even if it's not weather-appropriate..).
He can talk for almost an entire day straight...whether this is a positive or not I don't know, lol.
He can identify eight shapes.
He can readily identify four 3D shapes, but knows more if we're talking about them.
He can negotiate. Which again, is not always positive in my favour, but it's a skill...
He can play really really well with other kids, if he's in the mood.
He has a really good memory.
He can identify a good handful of insects.
He can readily identify about 5 types of tree, but knows names for many more.
He can plant his own garden.
He can name almost any fruit or vegetable I show him.
He can be very observant, and often picks out tiny details in random things.
He can manipulate Lego into almost anything.
He can count to 100.
He can count backwards from 10.
He can tell you the difference between synonyms, antonyms and homonyms.
He can draw very detailed pictures (even though they're still very 'pre-school' looking, there are TONNES of included details).
He can play soccer really well... but mostly just wants to play it with me.
He can use a hammer.
He can use a drill.
He can use a screwdriver.
He can ask really interesting questions.
He can colour really well.
He can help out at the store (when he's feeling helpful).
He can identify most car makes by logo.
He can identify all large truck makes by logo.
He has become rather adept at Minecraft…whether I like it or not…
He can build a campfire (minus actually lighting it).
He can eat at a restaurant without causing a scene.
He can leave a store without throwing a fit.
He can operate a camera and take pretty good photos.

Small Talk

I'm an introvert.

Sort of.

I've recently been introduced to the term 'ambivert', which is kind of a limbo area between introvert and extrovert. You possess all the introverted qualities of needing a personal bubble and quiet time and preferring to be an observer, but you also occasionally REALLY enjoy being at a bar or a concert or having deep multi-hour conversations.

One thing that rang very true for me was that, even though us ambiverts enjoy talking, engaging in small-talk is very hard and tiresome and riddled with anxiety.

I like rambling. Hence why I blog (and why they sometimes get wordy and carried away.. sorry about that). So I find it hard to keep my feelings contained to short answers and not get in to divulging information that other people really don't care about, or that I don't need to share with someone who used to go to college with my grandparents who I haven't seen in like 10 years.
I begin to feel that small-talk is like lying.
And I have a hard time with that.

"Hi! How are you doing?!"
"Just fine, how about you?" Actually I'm not all that fine, I've been pretty sleep deprived lately. Full of anxiety for unknown reasons. My son's been pretty moody lately so it's kind of wearing us all down. And I just asked how you were because it's habit… I'm still not really remembering your name, though I'm sure I should know it.

"Congratulations by the way!"
"Oh thanks!" Wait, why did you say that… are you referring to me having a kid? That was like 6 years ago...Have I talked to you since then? Did I do something I forgot about? Did I get an award? Oh, wait, you must be talking about taking over the toy store… we'll go with that and hope I'm right

"How is all that going?"
"Pretty great, yeah it's been a lot of fun!" I'm really hoping you're referring to the toy store. And it's actually been pretty stressful lately just trying to keep up with everything. Another reason I've probably been not sleeping properly. There's a lot on my mind.

"And how's little Toby doing?"
"Oh he's pretty good. Smart kid. Growing like a weed" He's fine today, but yesterday he was not fine. not fine at all. He harbours a lot of low self esteem and anxiety that turns to aggression. I'm not sure where it comes from. We manage, but it's tiring to stay one step ahead of it all the time.

"He must be in school by now right? How old is he?"
"He's 6, and actually we're homeschooling" *Braces for potential reactions to 'homeschooling'*

"Oh…homeschooling eh?"
"Yeah, it's going pretty well… we're having fun with it so far" I'm only really homeschooling out of survival. He had a really hard time adjusting to getting up everyday and leaving the house. He's been responding better to homeschooling, but I sometimes feel like he's not getting enough stimulation. Other days he seems to find enough to learn about of his own, so I try to cling to those days and remember that he's 'only' 6.

"Well it was good to see you again! Say hi to your Grandma for me."
"Yeah, will do!" Since I don't really remember who you are, I'm not sure which Grandma you're referring to, and I don't call either of them 'Grandma' so that just makes it more confusing. I'm realizing now I didn't ask you a single question for this entire conversation so it probably seemed like I was a lousy conversationalist. Sorry about that. I'm going to go look really interested in this thing over here so nobody else talks to me and asks me all the same questions and I have to repeat all this over and over and over again.

First Day of 'School'

 First Day of School

7:30 am - Wake up... barely

7:50 am - Get actually woken up by Toby crawling in to bed beside me

8:00 am - Grumbly stomach forces me out of bed

8:30 am - Do dishes and wonder if I'm ever going to make the zucchini relish I've been saying I was going to make for two weeks.

8:35 am - Find lost Lego piece upon request

8:40 am - Resume dishes

8:45 am - Take apart stuck Lego pieces upon request

9:00 am - Get roped in to building Lego

9:20 am - Receive text message asking if we are free to play at the last minute.
(Yes, anything but more cleaning!)

9:35 am - Bake banana muffins

10:30 am - Leave home

11:00 am - Learn about electrical circuits 

11:15 am - Discover that reading upside down is WAY better than reading sitting up

11:20 am - Finally get the circuit to work properly

11:30 am - Disappear and play make-believe games

12:05 pm - Look for the moon through the clouds... or possibly just spy on the construction equipment driving up and down the road

12:30 pm - Remember that it's lunch-ish time.

Spend an hour eating sweet potato soup, jambalaya, watermelon, and banana muffins

1:30 pm - Go outside at kid's request (and now that it's done raining)

Kids disappear and play games in the tree fort and on the swings

2:15 pm - We're presented with a garden harvest

2:30 pm - More harvest shows up at the table

2:35 pm - Break open some beans and determine that they are too far-gone to eat, but not ripe enough to harvest the seeds yet.

2:55 pm  - Find a dead mosquito on the table and study it up close.

3:00 pm - Go inside because it's now wet and cold. Have another snack of muffins.

3:15 pm - Kids disappear to 'rehearse for a play'

3:30 pm - Watch performance of 'play'

3:53 pm - Realize what time it is and remember that dinner is a thing that needs to be made at home.

4:15 pm - Actually leave

Home - make dinner and cut up zucchini to maybe get the relish done tomorrow...

Growing Goodness

A month or so ago I read a piece about making a list of the top five things you want your child to learn.
This doesn't necessarily mean 'math/science/history', though not dis-counting those, but can also entail morals and values that are strong in your family.
It's harder than you think. There are so many things  you want your kids to experience, it's hard to narrow it down to only the top 5, especially when you drop the barrier between 'school subjects' and 'life lessons'.
While I have not narrowed down my list whatsoever, the one solid point, that I actually got from the original piece I read, was that I was my kids to know how to grow and prepare their own food.

At first you think, ok sure, how hard is it to stick a seed in the ground? You trying to turn them into a chef with all this kitchen mumbo-jumbo?

Maybe to some it sounds less important than knowing how to manage finances, or memorize the periodic table.

But someday, and I think we're seeing hints of this already, it's not going to be easy to find good, safe food in our grocery stores, if at all.

I was brought up living next door to my Opa, whose entire life has been agriculture. He tended kilometers of tomato greenhouses when he lived in Holland, and even ended up looking after his brother's gardening jobs when they skipped out to go swimming. When he moved to Canada all he knew how to do was farm and moved across the country earning money at what he did best. For years he worked on the Holland Marsh here in Ontario, and has become one of the provinces foremost experts on carrot and onion crops.
This spilled over into home-life where we would grow over an acre of experimental vegetable varieties each year that had to be kept in top shape in order for the trials to be worth it.
In his 'retirement' we still manage almost as much garden space, but mostly 'personal' experiments now with some new variety of potato or another.
I wasn't in the garden much when I was little. But I still watched. And Toby has a drive to just dig, so we were given our own plot when he was young. I knew a lot from watching, but still learned a lot.
Keep your rows straight so the irrigation hose doesn't have to jog.
Keep your rows even so raking and weeding the paths is easier.
Keep the dirt on the paths loose to prevent weed growth and not trap the vegetables in the ground.
Label everything.
Keep track of the day you plant every year.
When the food is ripe, pick it every day.

This style of farming may sound daunting. And I'd be lying if i said it wasn't.
Sometimes I wish I didn't know what I know so I didn't have to be so picky.
But the truth is, it works. Nothing fails. Everything tastes good.

This is what I want my kids to learn. I want them to know what real food is. I want them to know where food comes from so they understand how much work it must take to fill the shelves of a grocery store. ALL the grocery stores. I want them to be able to feed themselves and their neighbours if there is a food catastrophe some day. I want them to know that cooking is not terrifying. I want math lessons based on kitchen measures and garden hose lengths. I want them to grow good things as they 'grow good' themselves. I want them to know what sharing goodness feels like.

I wanted to have a booth at the farmer's market this year, but in the end decided it wasn't the right thing for us. What we're planning to do instead is be 'open' here saturday and sunday mornings with fresh produce and snacks and my sewing projects waiting at the end of the lane. Ideally we would have started already, but life has a way of getting away on you. In the next few weeks we hope to be back on track, and I hope that those in the area can come say hi :)

The 'S' Word

Socialization...

Lately, while shopping with Toby on a weekday, I've been getting random people coming up and making a 'pleasant' remark about 'skipping school with mom today'.
I awkwardly laugh, while Toby pretends they don't exist, and say that we homeschool.
Surprisingly, over half the people I say that to think it's awesome and tell Toby how lucky he is (remember, these are random strangers who initially came across as being accusatory), and roll their eyes to me and say something along the lines of 'They make them start school too young anyways'.
The other half kind stand for a moment unsure of what to say and usually end up saying something along the lines of 'ooooh' and then 'Do you think you'll send him next year?' and then 'I guess, as long as he's getting enough socialization...'

I have to bite my tongue in front of Toby because I don't want to turn it into a big deal, or make him feel shamed, or embarrass myself. So I shrug and smile and just say we're having fun with it for now, and then leave quickly.

For one thing, I have no idea if I'll send him next year or not. It's kind of up to him. And asking a 5 year old to make up their mind 6 months in advance is a pointless burden. Yes, I'd like him to go. Yes, I'd like the time to myself. However, I wasn't really getting time to myself last fall anyway. I have to be up early, and at the school on time, and back home at a certain time, and it all flew by too quickly. Now we can stay home if we want, or spend the whole day in town if we want. I can work extra days or work late if someone's around to look after Toby, or because of the nature of my job, I can just take him with me for a few hours.

As far as the dreaded 'S' word...
My biggest fears going into this was socialization and math.
The math fear went away pretty quickly after reading some really re-assuring articles about primary math lessons (after that though, I'm still nervous), but the socialization worry comes and goes depending on how things are going. Some weeks I'm in knots over the fact that we haven't interacted with any kids in, like, forever. Other weeks I think....so?....he's fine.

Having one of the former-type weeks, I happened upon this blog on a website that has constantly been the soothing emotional back rub that I need on this journey.
If you're one of those people like me who aren't intending on clicking over to read the blog, It's on Simplehomeschool.net and it's a great eye roll at the notion that homeschool kids are missing out on being 'social'. Honestly I feel like writing more is redundant because that blog says everything I feel.

Anyway, I got thinking a lot about what socialization actually means, and why western civilization seems to think that the only way to get it is in a room of 30 kids your own age.

so·cial·i·za·tion

  [soh-shuh-luh-zey-shuhn]  Show IPA

noun

1.

a continuing process whereby an individual acquires a personal identity and learns the norms, values,behavior, and social skills appropriate to his or her social position.

Hmm...Nothing about the necessity to be with 200+ peers while learning this.

I TOTALLY get how it can be good to be in situations like that for kids to get used to instruction and listening and dealing with chaos, etc. I know some kids crave being in a big group. And small parts of me still wishes Toby would just...go...but then I know how anxious he gets when confronted with chaos. I know That he takes his time eating good food, and can't finish his lunch in the 15 minutes they're allotted. I know he takes a LONG time to warm up to things.
Which, at the time, were all reasons I wanted him to be in school - to 'snap out of it'.
Now I see how happy he his daily and how much he's actually learned in the last year.

If socialization is about learning about identity, values, behavior and social skills....I think we're good.

Identity: Toby has started to be particular about what he wears, even down to his underwear matching his pajamas. He changes from 'play clothes' to 'town clothes' if we go somewhere in the middle of the day... a notion that used to make him kick and scream until mommy decided that we really didn't need that chicken for dinner after all, or finally gave in and dragged a dirty, barefoot, pajama-clad toddler to the grocery store.
He knows what he's in to and what he likes to eat. He has a favourite colour. He knows he's 5 and a half. He knows he's a boy and is drawn to very boyish things. He knows who everyone in his family is and who he is in relation to them.

Values: We talk frequently about acceptance and responsibility and the environment. It was Toby's idea to pick up litter on our road on Earth Day. He still comments (and has since he was two) whenever he sees garbage on the ground that he wishes people would just learn to put things in a garbage can. He's very helpful and caring. He knows the value of home-grown food. He's asked if we can plant a bee/butterfly garden to give a place for the bees to go that's not near where we play where they will be happy.

Behavior: I always said I'd never ever bring my kids to a restaurant until they were at least 6. I had witnessed too many meltdowns and embarrassing behaviors while out to dinner through my teens.
However Toby's first taste of 'eating out' began when he was about 9 months old. Yes, he crawled all over me, but then he nursed and settled down. Then I read him a book. Then the waitress brought him his own bowl of (free) cucumber slices to suck on. A few months after that he was introduced to the merriment of french fries. He's grown up knowing how to be patient and behave in a restaurant setting, without me ever having to raise my voice or threaten to never come back.
He frequently grocery shops with me and has always preferred sitting in the buggy to walking beside me because he can see things better from up high. Including him in this task has taught him to behave and be patient while things get done.
Behavior also isn't just about being quiet and patient. It can be about knowing when to run and be silly. He knows grass is for running. He knows slides are for racing and laughing. He knows that being among other kids means waiting his turn and not climbing up the slides or running in front of the swings.

Social Skills: While he still is hesitant to strike up a conversation with strangers (which is maybe a GOOD thing) he talks non-stop at home, using gestures, expressions, and eye-contact.
He has ALWAYS shied away from people in public, but as my mom keeps reminding me, I did too. I still do. But that doesn't make me anti-social and it doesn't mean Toby is doomed. He's only 5.
I admit I've been frustrated with him. Sometimes I want him to just acknowledge a friendly hello, or walk two feet away from me and play instead of insisting I be glued to him indefinitely. I think part of my reason for wanting him to go to school was so he would just not be touching me for a few hours.
The last two weeks, however, have been a pleasant surprise for me. After weeks of moodiness and clinginess and suspected growing pains, he's quietly transformed into this different person.

He gets himself dressed entirely on his own instead of flopping and whining on the couch that he needs me to do it. He goes and plays outside on his own which it a TOTALLY foreign concept in this house, and I love it. He spent the entire day with Anthony while I was at work and they even had a play date, in which Toby was allegedly polite and co-operative to the other kids/adults. Yesterday he walked away to find a table to eat at while I waited for our 'fast food'. He has never EVER walked more than a few feet from me in a restaurant, let alone wandered across a room of strangers without asking me to come. He did the same thing at a small grocery store we were in - he volunteered to put the buggy away, and wove through two lines of people to do so. He wanted to buy something at another shop we were in and used his own money and marched up to the cashier by himself to do so.
Like.... who is this kid? And can he stay around a while?

There's nothing in the definition of 'socialization' that implies you have to be in a giant group of your own age to learn any of these things. Yes, playing with other kids is fun and different than playing with your parents, but should that be a thing that's forced if they don't want to be in that situation?
Kids who end up homeschooling end up interacting with a more diverse age range of 'peers'. They learn early on about household responsibilities and how to carry them out. I think maybe they can end up having more respect for their elders and what they do, than you can ever learn in school.

I'm not at all criticizing those kids in school, or the parents who send them. I know there are certain things that you can't truly understand until you're faced with a situation. Up until last November I was adamantly against myself homeschooling. There was NO WAY it would work out.
There was also NO WAY I would ever co-sleep with my kids, before I had a kid...
There was also NO WAY I would nurse past age 2, before I had a two year old...

Different things work for different people.
This is what works right now.

And I think we're kicking 'socialization' in the butt.

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One Thing Leads to Another

One thing I do like about homeschooling is that we can make a lesson out of anything, and what started out as one thing can turn into another. At Easter, Toby dyed eggs for the first time. Since then he continuously crawls up on the counter and starts poking at the box of food colouring (that STILL hasn't been cleaned up.... sigh...), or coming out to where I'm working with the bottles in his hands asking if we can do more science with them.

So ok fine, I poked through some books and online for colour mixing experiments and came across this paper towel one. The outline on the site just used a few colours, but I figured we'd do a whole colour mixing lesson. Once Toby figured out which were the primary colours, he coloured one of each on each side of our rows.

Next we tented paper towel from the coloured cups into the empty cups. We watched the colour crawl slowly up the paper towels and noted that the paper towel was wet before the colour crept up, which meant that somehow the paper towel is separating out the water from the food colouring, which my inner geek finds FASCINATING.... I'm sure there's a 4th grade science fair project in there somewhere...

 It took about an hour or so, but finally the colours made it up over the hill to mix at the bottom of the empty cups. We talked about how the paper towel was kind of like a straw or a sponge and it sucked everything wet up until there were no more dry spaces.

I asked Toby what else soaked up water like a straw.

"Umm... me drinking with a straw."
"Yes, but what ACTS like a straw, and brings water up from the ground?"
"Mmmmm... plant roots?"
"And what do you think would happen if we gave all our plants coloured water instead of clean water?"
"I dunno, nothing? Would they turn colours? CAN WE DO THAT?"
"Dunno, let's try!"
So off we went to town to find some white flowers, and more food dye.

When we came home several hours later the paper towel colours looked amazing.

So now armed with a completed colour mixing palette, we mixed colours again and put them in rainbow order...

And added our daisies.

After several hours we only had a faint tint at best, which was a little dissapointing. Even after an over-night they didnt look much better.

Then I actually read online instructions for how to do it right, and apparently warm water makes the colour absorb faster, and I had used cold water before. This time I also used half the water and twice the food colouring to guarantee some results. After a few hours we noticed a big difference, and after 24 hours the results were spectacular.
(My inner geek would also like to note that in the case of orange and purple, the plant separated out the mixed colours at first, with the tips of the petals taking the lighter primary, and the centre of the flower taking the dark. The longer we waited the more they mixed though)

Toby the asked if we could do the coloured baking soda and vinegar fizzies again. I don't mind doingit but went online again for other ideas and came across this blog.

Though the science behind it isn't really explained, I would assume that by mixing the baking soda and epsom salts, the baking soda would react, but the epsom salts make it last longer. Also the lemon juice acts as the acid and smells way better than vinegar.

Some small fizzies at first....

Then we got more confident in our fizzing..

Then we thought we should make prints like we've done with coloured dish soap bubbles. The dried result was pretty cool because the baking soda and salt dried with the colours and made little star patterns.

Then we got carried away....

 And Toby wanted to know what it felt like to have baking soda explode in his hands. (this was just from a small dusting he had leftover on his fingers and a ton of lemon juice)

 So we 'accidentally' packed in science, art, play, problem solving and math into the past week.... makes up for being outside 'doing nothing' this week :P

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Wordless Wednesday

Easter and Earth Day

It seems the monotony of the last month has caught up to us... or maybe it's because the snow's gone... but the last few days have been packed full of activities.

We don't usually do much for Easter. We used to decorate eggs like crazy when I was younger and we've dried them and kept them because some of them are pretty outstanding, but because Toby is allergic to eggs I've never really pushed the egg decorating thing.

This year though, he's old enough to look at it as an art project and not just as something he's left out of eating.

First of all he reminded me that we bought baby animal cookie cutters to make Easter cookies, so we did that. He keeps staring at these photos of ornate cookies and lamenting that we never put icing on ours, so we decided to paint-ice these ones.

A lesson in colour mixing before we begin.

Our masterpieces.

After our eatable eggs were painted, we coloured our real eggs.

Toby's first time dying Easter eggs.

I wanted to use natural dyes, but didn't plan ahead on this one at all so I scrounged together what I had. I found some frozen blueberries that we used for blue/purple, we used tumeric for yellow, and I tried to used some leftover artichoke water for green, but when you mixed in the vinegar (to act as a fixative on the eggs) it turned a horrible shade of apple juice.... so we used green food dye for green...

Ended up looking pretty good!

(Toby's favourite colour is green, can you tell?)

I hard boiled the eggs, foreseeing one being dropped, which it did. Toby was mortified, but I said it was ok because we could do something cool with it.

This Martha Stewart Spiderweb Eggs idea is in a book I have, so we tried it.
You're supposed to cook the eggs with the blueberries, so ours wasn't as dark, but still cool!

Because we used vinegar in the egg dye, Toby eventually piped up "Isn't vinegar supposed to explode or something when you put stuff in it?"
I confirmed that he meant baking soda, so we experimented with the leftover dye and a big bowl of baking soda.

SCIENCE!

The reason I've included Earth Day in this post is because Toby, knowing that the eggs we did would need to be broken so we could eat them before they went bad, still didn't want to get rid of the shells.
I said they're hard to take off in one piece when they're boiled.
He said he knew that, but maybe we could make an art project out of them instead of throwing them out.

So today he drew a picture of the Earth and we made an egg shell mosaic.

Our Earth Day  activities also included a clean up of the road in front of our house and discussions about littering and looking after the planet.
We thought we'd maybe wander around and get a couple grocery bags of trash, but we ended up with 6 grocery bags, plus three garbage bags we found in a ravine and a bucket full of dried cement. GROSS PEOPLE.

Happy Earth day everyone!