Mail from...New Mexico

Here is a state that our family knows A LOT about.  And we absolutely love it.  Every October we make the 9+ hour drive to the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta.  And while we're there we cram in as many amazing sites and attractions as possible!  Some of our favorites are, of course, the Balloon Fiesta itself...

but also White Sands National Monument...

and Tent Rocks National Monument...

In New Mexico it's impossible to ignore the history of the Native American people, so for our lesson we looked at examples of Native American artwork. We looked at the patterns in Navajo rugs, the different shades of turquoise, and horsehair pottery (my favorite, crafted by burning horse hairs onto the finished piece).

We attempted making Indian hieroglyphics and learned a valuable lesson to scrunch the paper before you do the drawing.  By the time Beck got done scrunching his drawing 20 times it had all but disappeared (which did drive home the point of erosion and aging, but made him pretty mad).  

 And, of course, Beck got excited learning about New Mexico's state bird, the road runner.  Raise your hand if you had no idea that the road runner was more than just an over-intelligent animated character.  I certainly didn't.  But here's a random fact for you:  The commuter train between Albuquerque and Santa Fe is called the Road Runner after their unique feathered friend.

Sadly, my kids had never seen a Road Runner cartoon, so we watched a few of those, too.  In case you've deprived your children, like I had mine, here's a little taste to whet their whistle...

Can you tell we really, really love New Mexico?  

Mail from...Massachusetts (Happy Thanksgiving)

My first job away from home was on Cape Cod in Massachusetts, south of Boston.  While there I fell in love with New England.  Fortunately I still have all my photos from then because we haven't received our Massachusetts postcard.  It was fun this week looking through them with Beck.  And, of course he wanted to know if I saw a Black-Headed Chickadee (the Massachusetts State Bird) while I was there.  I can't say that I remember specifically that I did...

Sorry I'm not posting my own photos here,
 my scanner is being temperamental

Plymouth Rock
Have you been there?
 It's one of the most disappointing landmarks I've been to,
but still a cool part of history.

Since the 1st Thanksgiving took place in this great New England state, I decided to go ahead and study it without a postcard to go along with it.  Somehow I am always too slow to get the fun popular seasonal books at the library, but this time it worked out okay.  Instead of silly picture books, we ended up with three non-fiction books that tell the real story of Thanksgiving.  Beck & Peyton have been so quiet and patient while we look through them, and I've caught them pretending to be Indians that help the Pilgrims find fish and food and arguing over whether there was turkey at the 1st Thanksgiving.  This time being to slow at the library has worked out for me.

To go along with our stories, I printed out some Thanksgiving printable crafts at artistshelpingchildren.org.  I've provided the links to each one below...

Pilgrim Boy Foldable Paper Craft

(They also had a pilgrim girl)

Indian Boy (and Girl)

Turkey

(This one was not worth the stress, 

and now I can't find the link, so I think it must be a sign)

Hope you have a Happy Thanksgiving!!

Not So Spooky Pumpkin Patch

For some reason, book learning has really been a struggle this week, so today I decided to let my boys do a little hands-on creating.  They were excited the moment they saw me pulling out the "painting sheet." (Painting Sheet=cheap vinyl tablecloth I started using for craft-time a long time ago.  It protects the table and makes for super easy clean-up.  It was cute today to see the kids relate the tablecloth to painting without me saying anything.)

Drawing inspiration from an egg carton craft project I saw a couple weeks ago, I gathered the supplies and sat down with my kids to make pumpkin patches!

Usually I choose crafts that don't require a lot of preparation by Mom beforehand, but today I decided the headache I could avoid by doing some of the work myself seemed worth it.  Those steps included:

• Cutting a 12-egg carton in half so each of my boys would have 6 "pumpkins"
• Cutting a green pipe cleaner into 12 short pieces
• Poking a small hole in the top of each "pumpkin" where the "stem" will go
• Hot Glue the "fence"

The boys got to:

• Paint their "pumpkins" and their "fences"

Okay, so Beck got a little confused and painted his paint plate
 before I re-explained it to him

• Push in their stems 

• Draw on their faces

We were running out of googly eyes,
so each boy got one pair and  then  drew the rest of their eyes

• Pick, cut, and glue on the straw

You could use craft straw, but we had an adventure outside finding dry grass we could use instead.  On the way back home from the field down the street, we had a close call with a snake and barely avoided stepping right on top of it.  The boys LOVED that!

• Choose the best place to display their pumpkin patches for everyone to see.  They decided outside on the front porch so that Daddy would be spooked when he came home.  

Aren't those the cutest "spooky" pumpkins you have ever seen?

Mail from...Texas

I spent many, many summers working in Alaskan hotels, and so have heard my fair share of proud Texans try to incorrectly assert that they live in the largest state in the nation.  And, while, I've driven through Texas several times and would agree that it is a massive amount of open space, my alliances have to stick with my northern roots on this one...nonetheless, Texas is a great state and I was very excited to introduce it this week in kindergarten.  

Since the Texas state bird is the mockingbird, and we already studied it during Arkansas/Apple Week, I decided instead to focus on the Texas state mammal (how many other states have a designated state mammal?).  If, like me, you've done any driving in the Lone Star state, you know it's not just a stereotype that the same animal could also be designated the official state roadkill.  And as roadkill goes, I'm going to declare that the armadillo is absolutely the most disgusting!

For the lesson, we looked at armadillo pictures and learned that armadillos like to burrow into the ground and use their noses to hunt for bugs.  We learned about the many different types of armadillos and then more specifically about the nine-banded armadillo which is the only armadillo native to the United States.

Texas State Mammal: Nine-Banded Armadillo

Beck's favorite was the Pink Fairy Armadillo which appears to be green and pink-two of his favorite colors. It also happens to be the smallest of the armadillos.

Unfortunately I had no time to get to the library this week, but I did find this online story about an armadillo named Arturo.  It wouldn't have been my first choice, but Beck liked it and it did teach how armadillos defend themselves in scary situations.

Clara and the Armadillo

My new favorite website is learn create love because it's full of printable cut-out templates and this is the one we used today...

Armadillo Printable from learn create love 

I really do love Texas.  I'm really glad I didn't go the cowboy route with this week's postcard.  I'm really glad Beck had so much fun learning about this odd little creature.  And I'm REALLY glad I'm not going to have to look at any more photos of this creepy little mammal for a very long time!

Have you been to Texas? 

 What is your favorite thing there?

Mail From...Connecticut

Last week was a slow week, but we did pull out the postcard from Connecticut.  This particular postcard focused on the past whaling industry in Mystic, so we focused an art lesson the subject of whales.  I found this great tutorial on Pinterest...

...and this is what we came up with...

(Btw, the Connecticut state bird

 is the common Red Robin)