Jessica's Week

With as much fun as we had this week it’s hard to believe I only spent a single day celebrating the topic last year. I found Earth to be a unit as much about working together as it is about our planet, we all have a part to play in protecting mother earth and it was great to collaborate with friends discovering what that means. Perhaps I haven’t said as many positive things about Ts Montessori school as I should have, but we have borrowed from many of their concepts and boy oh boy did they nail it with Earth Day. In addition to a school musical based around the topic, the parents were asked to prepare some activities for an “Earth Day” party. The teacher helped them recycle newsprint into new paper, one parent helped the kids make bird feeders and another taught them to pot their own plant. I had the movement station so we started by passing around a globe ball thinking of things in nature to be grateful for. Then we pulled out the parachute and tossed on “the globe ball” to move along to some Earth songs. I put together a simple recycle sorting game in which the kids learned the difference between paper, metal, plastic, and glass. My hope is that they will all go home seeing these items everday and be encouraged to help mom or dad recycle them. I did use real soup cans (with tape around the sharp edge) and glass bottles….if your heart beats a little faster at the mention of this you are not alone, mine did too….but the 3-6yr old age group did amazingly well at handling carefully and not breaking anything. I’m sure my hovering and constant reminders didn’t hurt 😉.  We finished the movements with some earth based yoga cards…I did pay to download them but since it was for a group party the $4 didn’t hurt too bad lol.

We were able to reuse these activities a second time when my new farm school group celebrated the holiday. I’ll be posting about the co-op endeavor soon but for now it suffices to say I am currently in charge of planning a monthly field trip. For April I set up a tour with a local recycling drop off center. The kids got to see how items are sorted, smashed or broken down, and compacted to be shipped off. Everything is volunteer run so we will def be back when Taegan is a few years older to help out but for now it was still cool to see so many people working together doing recycling on a large scale. In addition to touring the center we went to a local park to clean up trash. I brought some bags and gloves but fortunately or unfortunately there really wasn’t much litter around to be picked up. The kids had fun collecting what they could before the playground pulled their attention away. Perhaps next year a walk around a local neighborhood would be a better call.

In addition to the celebrations we had with friends I tried to take the learning a bit deeper at home. Taegan loved the sensory bin I created with pollution and an oil spill. She very carefully cleaned all the oil out of the water with a pipette and learned just how careless pollution can affect sea life. An easy experiment involving cheerios went a long way to understanding where our garbage goes. I did a few letter sound trash pickups and other earth day spelling/math activities, but math and letters are just not as interesting as science at this age and that’s ok. Taegan may be a bit behind some on these “core” materials but she loves learning and in the grand scheme of things that’s what I believe to be most important for the pre-k stage.

Ana's Week

Earth Day is something I try and get the girls passionate about every year because I think it is a super important holiday, but I would argue my husband is even more passionate about saving the Earth than the three of us combined. Therefore, I really did my best to give him an opportunity to get involved in what we were doing for this unit, and the girls absolutely loved having their dad invested in their school week. Zach took the girls to the park one afternoon while I was busy and they collected loads of trash and recycled what they could. Aria was so proud that she was saving the park. Then, later in the week we had a surprise turtle visit in our garage, so my husband put it in a box and we took it to the park to set it free. We actually got to save wildlife during Earth week, which was awesome!

Last week we did a gardening unit, so Earth Day was a great complementary week to that unit. Not only did we spend the week watering the plants we planted last week and talking about how good for the Earth it is to plant plants and trees, but Aria seemed much more invested in saving an Earth that she recently, literally had her hands in. Just spending time outside, walking together, and watching our garden grow gave us true excitement to keep the Earth in beautiful condition!

The favorite activities of the week involved Aria taking recycling that we saved and making artwork out of them. She decided one morning to create her own pop-up book and she chose a cut up popcorn box as her cover, not even realizing the irony of her choice. She also made a purse for herself and her sister, a watering can, and a trumpet. I love the concept of taking our recycling and reusing it in creative ways so that Aria has a true concept of how we can reduce waste and reuse items rather than send them straight to landfills. I think I’ll probably continue pushing Aria to use recycling for her art projects all year long (and perhaps it will save me some money on paper)!

Aria loves the planets and anything space related, so on top of recycling sorting and other recycling related activities, we did some planet activities. I highly recommend the Earth crayons, which actually recycle small pieces of green and blue crayons (the ones my kids don’t want to use and therefore sometimes get tossed) by melting them in the oven to make mini Earths. They turned out even better than I expected. It was also quite easy to create a sensory Earth out of blue and green dyed shaving cream, and the kids played with toy animals in the shaving cream filled cake pan for quite a while outside.

The water pollution experiments for the week really worked great and conveyed to Aria just how difficult it is to save a body of water and the animals in it once it has been polluted. She really got invested in saving the fish sponge from the pollution and was frustrated when she couldn’t, so it really enabled me to explain why littering is so bad and why people get punished for littering.
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There is so much more that you can do with this unit. From a religious perspective, we talked about creation and our duty to take care of the Earth because God gave us that job, but I think most people on this planet with kids believe that we need to take better care of the Earth so that our kids and future generations get to enjoy the same beautiful Earth that we get to enjoy. I’m so grateful for a day to not only push us to be better about protecting the planet but also to celebrate the beauty of the world around us! ​

Ana's Week

​Doing a gardening unit really is the perfect way to kick spring off with your kids. While my husband and I are not green thumbs by any stretch of the imagination, or perhaps because we are not, we really enjoyed using the girls to help us garden as we figured it out for ourselves. No guarantees that anything we planted will actually grow, but the girls loved digging and putting seeds into holes. Plus, my husband and I were able to get the yard cleaned and weeded and the windows scrubbed all while the kids helped with the gardening and got several hours of outdoor time. I love when we can combine school and chores into one, and I’m super glad that the kids seem to agree!

Because early in the week was wet and cold, I was really glad that I planned plenty of indoor activities in addition to the gardening outside. We planted an amazing Fairy Garden Kit that came with grass and bean seeds. It incorporated art, gardening, and pretend play, so it was probably Aria’s favorite activity of the week. Plus, the grass grew very quickly, so we were able to see the grass grow from seed to plant within the week. We also planted an indoor garden with beans, basil, and peppers, and Aria can’t wait to see which if any of those vegetables grow. Hopefully she will be excited enough to try them all!

Another fun activity was one that I came up with off the top of my head in the dollar store. I found fake flowers and their matching seeds and had Aria match seeds to flowers and learn flower names. We did the same with vegetable seeds- matching vegetables to their seeds and examining the vegetables to see if the dried seeds matched what we saw (aka, yes in carrots and corn, but no in lettuce and carrots). We then planted the flower seeds in a flower box and the vegetable seeds in our large garden box.

Aria became fascinated with drawing and making flowers during the week, so I did an impromptu flower lesson one day. I drew a basic flower and she copied what I did (at least, until she decided that a queen caterpillar needed to be next to the flower). She then spent the rest of the week drawing and painting flowers on everything she could find. I love that she loves art so much and is always happy to learn and create!

The only thing we didn’t get around to doing was creating a toddler compost bin because I couldn’t find the materials in time! But I am so excited to do this over the summer and get the kids to help create our own gardening soil. I’ll keep you posted on if this works, because I would be personally so delighted to find a cheap compost bin alternative!

Middle of the week, Aria got inspired and decided to build a jungle on our kitchen table. Of course, it took several hours and meant we didn’t do much of our schooling for the day, but she had a blast building trees and drawing flowers all over the jungle, so I felt it didn’t stray too far from the material. Plus, it was just such a fun, creative jaunt. Check out Creative Galaxy on Amazon if you want your child to be super inspired- it works wonders with Aria!

If you have some gardening you need to get done, I absolutely recommend getting your kids involved. Not only is it fun for them to play in the dirt and sprinklers, all of which are easy to incorporate into the day, but I think pickier kids are more likely to eat plants that they feel they grew themselves. Aria looks into the garden every day so excited to see what will grow, and I can’t say I disagree. Looking forward to some yummy summer fruits and veggies in the next month! ​

Jessica's Week

Our big gardening project this year was running an irrigation line from the house out to the garden (maybe 700ft away). Dave dug the ditch and laid down pipe and we gave Taegan the chore of filling it all back in. Big task, but split up over several days it was totally doable to ask a four yr old to shovel in all the dirt and stomp it down level. The yard is still a little messy but we found some interesting bugs and I’ll be very thankful not hauling my little green can to and fro in the heat of summer.  For a reward she got to pick out her own small flower plant from the local nursery to plant in her garden (We have a special raised bed in the garden devoted to kids where she can plant and dig to her hearts content without disturbing any of our edibles). I just LOVE when a “present” is something the whole family can enjoy like pretty garden plants. 
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Another chore turned learning activity this week was compost stew. This one was completely unplanned but it just so happened one of the gardening books I checked out of the library was titled “Compost Stew”. It was all about the many things you can compost. Now I have to be honest, I sadly don’t keep a compost pile. I’ll have to admit my own laziness when it comes to tending and turning a pile of smelly refuse. Just because we don’t officially compost however, doesn’t mean we can’t add some nutrients to the garden on a small scale. I took a couple fresh banana peels, used coffee grounds, and eggshells (all from our breakfast) and let her grind them up with some grass clippings and dead leaves. Mix into water and presto...ready made compost for the garden!

We did have a couple rainy days that were not so great for working outdoors but moving the garden theme inside turned out to be just as fun. It’s one thing to know how to count numbers, another to recognize them visually, but at least for my child there seems to be a whole new skill set involved with learning to visually order them correctly without assistance. We worked on this skill a lot this week by “planting a number line”. Walmart sells mini terra cotta pots for only .30 so I put together a sensory bin with some black beans and split peas for soil. It was great to plant toob flowers and veggies but after free play I made some number flowers by gluing a cupcake liner to popsicle stick and sharpie-ing on a number. T enjoyed planting each number and lining them up over and over. I was proud she even reasoned that the flower color created a pattern and could line them by color pattern as well as numerical order. We used silk daises to order the letters of her name and a few other sight words. So much learning just by planting!!! I highly recommend a gardening sensory bin. 

Jessica's Trip:

New York City is known as the fast paced city that never sleeps, that’s pretty pretty much how I feel after spending a couple days there. Drained me for sure but it was a very exciting 48 hours. We were lucky enough to stay on a top floor of the Marriott Marquis overlooking Times Square. Excellent view and very central walking distance to lots of attractions as well as subway stops connecting to almost all the lines. Unfortunately none of the kid friendly broadway shows perform on Monday so we had to skip that but we did catch a breakfast performance at Ellen’s Stardust diner (with broadway grade performing waiters and reasonably priced chow) and that’s a must do when we go back again in the fall with Ana and Aria so you know it’s good! On the other side of Times Square we hit up National Geographic Encounter, an aquarium themed electronic animation experience. The cutting edge technology made it a unique perspective on ocean animals though it was, perhaps, a little dark and not quite as fun as I’d hoped for the price. Still, given the fact we had a rainy morning...and it was much closer than the Brooklyn Aquarium I’m glad we stopped by. Right next to Ntl Geo you’ll find a gem in Gulliver’s Gate which houses the largest interactive museum of miniatures from around the globe. We each received a metal key lanyard to unlock interactive moving pieces within museum...and there’s a lot of them. Some are a bit lackluster (tiny hard to find moving dump truck etc) but this large museum is a great representation of monuments from NYC as well as every continent and most countries around the world and you keep the key. For littles I would like to create an accompanying scavenger hunt with big obvious landmarks to check off. They give you one which has some harder to find stuff (maybe 8+ appropriate) but it would be nice to have something educational for the younger crowd to help them understand what they are looking at and where it's located. To burn off excess energy without losing your kids in congested a Times Square area head to Tom Otterness’ structure “playground” after visiting the above museums. It really is an interesting work of art and lets be honest a kids idea of art appreciation def includes a statue they can climb and play on. 

For some kid friendly shopping without leaving TS we checked out Disney store and M&M world. Both mostly just overpriced toys/clothes but Disney had a few neat photo opps and for $20 at M&M we had fun personalizing a cup of m&ms...choose your colors, add three choices of graphics, very kid friendly machine for you to dump candy in, press buttons and presto the finished product magically fill your cup with chocolates.

Within walking distance from TS is Rockefeller center, a natl treasure at Christmas obviously but also fun in the off-season. We created our own mini-figure family at LEGO, played wii at Nintendo, and did an affordable spa day with a new doll at American Girl. Top of the rock is neat, a cheaper and less crowded version of the Empire State Building and ice skating at the rock runs through April! I highly recommend calling ahead to schedule a tour time for nearby FD NY. Sadly I didn’t realize they only do 1-2 presentations per day but T still had a nice time exploring the museum and meeting one of the city's real heroes. 

We didn’t have time to explore much of lower Manhattan except for a cab ride to Tribeca for dinner at Ninja New York. Pricey but great food for adults and lots of fun for the kids. You venture through dark corridors where ninjas pop out to show off their moves then arrive in a Japanese setting where a magician performs table side till the food arrives. Most dishes are served with dry ice or flaming dragon head style presentation. Our jr ninja got a crash course in martial arts and practiced moves on her uncle all evening. High-ya! 

Uptown has a lot to offer families and I felt very safe alone with a little there. Central Park is beautiful with rock formations to climb, tons of wildlife...we spotted a family of baby turtles, and awesome playgrounds like Ancient (an Egyptian themed space). The Swedish cottage marionette theatre does a (almost daily) puppet show based on children’s classics, the Conservatory water has remote controlled boats to drive, and of course there’s always the zoo. I’d like to plan another trip and spend at least one full day in the park and at all the hot spots just beyond its borders. For example less than one block from Central you’ll find the Natural History Museum, MET And Guggenheim, and the plaza hotel where you can take tea with Eloise. If you still have more time (which we def did not ;) you could also check out the milk & cookies kids spa or drop in on The Ant Farm for educational play time. 

To round out your NYC trip homeschool style I recommend pairing it with a pre-trip lesson. We went very general this time around, I had no idea how many super accessible children’s books are about or set in NYC!!! I bought the NYC toob before our arrival and printed a Manhattan map to drive the TOOB taxi/subway around exploring the different monuments. We got excited for NYC food by eating an apple, bagel, and homemade pizza and then compared our food to the stuff we got from the source. I researched a little about the city’s history and let T use recycled materials to create her own skyscraper city. We can’t wait to go back! My plan for next time is to hone in on the arts of NYC and visit most of the museums, see sculptures, and take in performance art. We could easily fill a homeschool lesson with corresponding material and get a large dose of the culture NYC is famous for. Stay tuned for more Bright Lights Big City blogs from our family!!


My Attractions List: 

National Geographic Encounter: (Times Square) https://natgeoencounter.com/
Tickets range $30-40 including kids, for a 90min 3D animation based experience under the sea. Geared slightly more towards older kids/adults but still fun, though prob overpriced bc of location.


Gullivers Gate: (Times Square) https://gulliversgate.com Largest collection of miniatures you can travel the world in under an hour viewing almost every landmark or monuments in an interactive way. At only $20 for adults and free under 5 this exhibit was pretty awesome! 



M&M world (Times Square) 
https://www.mmsworld.com/locations.aspx#newyork


Disney Store (Times Square)  for events click: https://stores.shopdisney.com/ny/new-york/777/?utm_source=Google&utm_medium=Maps&utm_campaign=Google+Places


Ellen’s Stardust: (Times Square) reasonably priced diner food (and a few kid friendly specials like a rainbow bagel sandwich or fruity pebble pancakes) where waiters perform show tunes for the entire restaurant...cool decor and falling confetti make it a hit with kids but expect a wait and note it is very loud/hard to talk inside. http://www.ellensstardustdiner.com


Alice’s Tea Cup: (upper west and east) Alice’s 1 is where we went. Kids borrow fairy wings and are sprinkled with pixie dust upon arrival. Some mild Alice in wonderland decor. Real tea cups and pots and some caffeine free fruity “teas” for littles as well as an extensive tea and scone menu for adults. Expensive and not as cool as I’d hoped but nevertheless here’s the info: https://alicesteacup.com


Serendipity: (upper east) BEST dessert EVER!!! Frozen hot chocolate. Make a reservation or expect a wait but this place is phenomenal. They also offer a ridiculously huge hot dog....fun lunch for kids http://www.serendipity3.com


Ninja New York: (Tribeca) As much theatre as food this place is an experience. Magic, flames/knives/smoke and of course Ninjas ensure your kids will be well entertained. Order an adult ninja drink for a free ninja star souvenir. www.ninjanewyork.com


Lego Store: (Rockefeller): Lots of legos (duh) and a few picture worthy statues but the highlight here was creating your own mini figures with bucketloads of unique pieces (3 figures will cost you $10). 


FD NY: (Rockefeller) climb in a fire truck, try on gear, and learn what to do in a simulated fire. This is a great opportunity to meet real NY hero’s and learn all aspects of fire safety. At $2-6 dollars the presentation is affordable and located right near many other popular stores in Rockefeller. While walks in self guided free tours are welcome, I advise calling ahead to find a presentation time that fits your schedule...times vary and they are not listed online but I’ve been told it’s AWESOME. http://www.fdnysmart.org/firezone/


American Girl: (Rockefeller) complete with restaurant (only open for lunch weekdays) where your doll can dine beside you, a spa equipped for doll and girl manicures, hair dos, ear piercing and more. Dolls are expensive but the new slightly smaller Wellie Wisher dolls are geared toward a younger age group and go for half the price of original AG. Look for their Amazon TV series, “The Wellie Wishers” to amp up your littles excitement before visiting. https://www.americangirl.com/retail/new_york_city.php


Eloise at the Plaza: (Upper East) Fanciest and best set-up I’ve seen around town for a young girls tea party. Events are sporadic but the shop is open daily with Eloise movies playing, toys to play with, and boutique clothing for sale. http://www.theplazany.com/eloise/


Central Park: http://www.centralparknyc.org/things-to-see-and-do/

Marionette Theatre 

The Pond Area

Conservatory Water

Castle (under renovation till 2019)

Central Park Zoo/petting zoo


Natural History Museum: For age specific events click: https://www.amnh.org/learn-teach/pre-k-to-grade-2


MET: click this link then scroll down to download a complete list updated seasonally with family friendly programming https://www.metmuseum.org/events/programs/met-creates/childrens-classes


Guggenheim: https://www.guggenheim.org/for-families


MoMA: while this modern art museum may not be your first choice to bring the littles (there are some nudes etc) the museum offers sell-out age specific tours which start at age 4 and incorporate movement with themed art creation. See the schedule at: https://www.moma.org/visit/families


Children’s museum of Manhattan: (upper west) from what I’ve heard this really isn’t anything unique or special especially compared with other children’s museums but still had to include bc of its “kid friendly” value. http://cmom.org


Milk and Cookies Spa: (upper east) schedule a sweets themed spa service at  in advance by clicking here: https://milkandcookieskidsspa.com Building is fairly small but walk ins are usually accommodated and reviews are good. 


NY Public Library: Beautiful architecture for adults to admire and classic Pooh exhibit in the children’s library on ground floor will entice littles. Find a storytime that fits your schedule by selecting Schwarzman building and narrowing to children’s events here: https://www.nypl.org/events/calendar?keyword=&target%5B%5D=ad&target%5B%5D=ya&target%5B%5D=cr&city%5B%5D=bx&city%5B%5D=man&city%5B%5D=si&location=36&type=&topic=&audience=&series=


New Victory Theatre: Broadway shows for kids at a fraction of the price http://www.newvictory.org


Staten Island Ferry: 25min beautiful free boat tour of NYC. Departs from Whitehall st in lower Manhattan http://www.siferry.com


Ancient playground (Central Park): http://www.centralparknyc.org/things-to-see-and-do/attractions/ancient-playground.html


Bryant Park: juggling, storytime, puppet shows and other free entertainment accompanies the carousel, lawn games and board games, an art cart full of fun, and its right beside the library. http://bryantpark.org/things-to-do#calendar


Ant Farm in the city: Nature focused educational center with art, music, cooking classes, play areas and an indoor petting zoo. There are programs and memberships for regularly but also lots of neat options for those of us just dropping in. For a full list of drop in activities click here:  http://theartfarms.com/drop_in.php


Let’s Dress up: the full princess experience https://letsdressupnyc.com also check out the princess crawl article at: https://mommypoppins.com/new-york-city-kids/special-occasions/25-ways-to-play-princess-in-new-york-city


Make your own food kids restaurants: https://mommypoppins.com/kids/nyc-restaurants-kids-make-food-unos-jimmy-max-blue-smoke

Jessica's Week:
This was another mash up week I decided to try, and it worked much better than my heroes unit. The overarching theme was health and safety. We broke that up into healthy habits for our body, fire safety, tricky people/emergency situations, and keeping our planet healthy (since this week fell around earth day). Fire safety and earth day were the clear favorites but I feel like T took something away from each day. 
Healthy habits was fun because we did several germ experiments and covered the house with glitter in the process. We also exercised with some cool ABC movement cards and did lots of fake sneezes/coughs during a dolly tea party teaching them good manners and habits. 
For fire safety day I taught Taegan a family escape route which she LOVED practicing over and over. Basically, if the smoke alarm is going off or there a fire outside her door I taught her to crawl to the porch door of her bedroom, run out and around the house, and wait in the driveway for mom and dad. We did some stop, drop, roll exercises with felt flames stuck to her clothing which she had to roll off in the grass. We also dropped in on our small town volunteer fire dept to meet Cinders the firehouse dog and check out a real engine. There’s lots of sensory activities involving a spray bottle and fake flames great for a three year old so clearly this day was full of flaming fun! 
Instead of trying to explain stranger danger (which seems to be ineffective for younger kids based on what I’ve read) we talked about tricky people/situations. How people may ask you to show a private part or go somewhere with them/take something from them that mommy might not be ok with. If you ever feel funny, bad, or unsure about a person or situation you run away and tell a parent. If you can’t find mom or dad find another mommy with kids, teacher, or uniformed community member (police etc). I kept it as simple and straightforward as possible....And spent a little extra time praying this lesson never need be put to use. Not a particularly fun lesson but we practiced with pretend scenarios....and talked about other ways we can stay safe (holding moms hand, not playing in streets or parking lots, always staying in sight of your adult at a playground/museum etc). 
I taught T how to call 911 in case mommy got hurt and no one was around to help her on a giant cardboard keypad. We also practiced our phone number song (to the tune frere Jacques ) in case she got lost.
Finally it was Earth Day!! After all the heaviness of safety stuff it was nice to end the week on an upbeat note. Keeping our planet healthy is just as important as keeping ourselves healthy and there are so many resources to teach environmental responsibility from a young age. I saved a large box of recyclables for T to practice sorting in hopes this can someday become one of her chores when we drop off at the recycling plant. We also reused “garbage” to make a beautiful flower and did some community service park cleanup. Conserving energy and water was a concept my little took a strong liking to....she left us all in the dark and told me I wasn’t allowed to do dishes or laundry anymore but hey I’m kinda ok with lightening my chore load lol 
Though I might spend more time on safety and earth day next year this was a great way to introduce a lot of concepts to a young child in a short period of time while keeping things as fun and lighthearted as possible! I’d recommend the unit to anyone especially working or busy parents who might only have a weekend to go over these important life lessons. 

Jessica's Week:

Well, it didn’t quite feel like Easter around here between the weather and simple fact that we just finished putting away all our St. Patrick’s day supplies but we sure did our best to make the most of a shortened Easter season. We made it to seven egg hunts around town (several of them required kids to shovel or kick frozen eggs out of the snow lol….there’s a first time for everything)  and tried some unique ones here at home too. Taegan needed new figures for her outdoor fairy garden so I bought another Tinkerbell busy book and hid the 12 plastic fairies in clear eggs with tiny glow sticks. We did this hunt in the basement after dark using only a flashlight. It was really magical to see all the tiny fairy lights glowing and T LOVED switching her flashlight on and off trying to navigate around and find them. We hid a few eggs with candy wrapped grapes in her bedroom since Easter fell on April Fools Day. Taegan was amused with the first egg but got a little upset by the rest 😉. I ended up sneaking one grape back out to substitute for a chocolate just to brighten her mood lol. We did a few more traditional hunts but instead of filling the rest of the plastic eggs with candy I opted to purchase some small lego sets and divide their pieces/figures among eggs. The bunny left empty lego boxes inside her basket with instructions to find all the hidden pieces. A perfect way to avoid stocking up on sweets or tiny junk toys. Hidden in the grass at the VERY bottom of her basket was a tiny egg with only a slip of paper inside. It started a riddle hunt that took T around the yard hunting for clue filled eggs that led her to a second more exciting Easter basket carefully hidden behind a tree. I realize this sounds like a lot for one four year old but I LOVE holidays and wanted it to be extra creative since we skipped our annual Easter party this spring on account of cold wet weather.  

We did some big stuff to appreciate the true reason for Easter as well. I finally found a resource that did a nice job of making Passover meaningful and achievable for Christian kids. Taegan helped me prepare a Seder plate and cook a special meal to eat like Jesus did so many years ago. After we ate we read about the Garden at Gethsemane and how Jesus spent his last night. Then on Good Friday I put a red dot on our palms as a reminder of Jesus’ sacrifice. We did a neat nature hunt in the rain which involved gathering a palm leaf, thorn branch and other meaningful symbols of the Easter story. We asked daddy to help fashion a simple wooden cross with predrilled holes. I gave T five post-its and asked her to draw pictures of sins or something naughty she has done and felt sorry for. She chose: not being responsible (refusing to pick up her toys), selfishness (being unkind to a friend), disobedience (not eating her dinner),  poor attitude (throwing a temper tantrum), and  fear (refusing to jump to her swim teacher in pool and not showing bravery). I was impressed that they were all very different and recent instances of sin and all things she was legit showing remorse over. She nailed her sins to the cross as I explained how Jesus paid the price for our sin when he was nailed and died on the cross. You need only confess to him, ask for God’s forgiveness and try to do better in the future then you can receive new life in Christ. For a preschooler, I think this activity was as close as we are going to get to her understanding salvation. It also made Easter morning extra special as we moved away from the somber mood of GF to celebrate our risen Lord in all his glory!
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The week was filled with dozens of other Easter learning activities from resurrection eggs to jellybean syllables and balance scale bunnies. You can read more about all those in the pdf but I wanted to focus this blog on the stuff even non-homeschooling families can do to enhance learning and life for their children. So I hope you take some of these celebration ideas and run with them….and be sure to comment with your own creative Easter suggestions below! 

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Ana's Week 

This year, Easter felt extra special in our house. Partly because we have two girls who both really embraced all of the activities that we did to celebrate the holidays, but also because Aria has really embraced her love of Jesus and all of the stories about him. It’s really awesome to watch the kids do all of the silly Easter bunny games and hunts out there, but I am really proud that she seems to slowly be learning the reason for the season even at such a young age. My mom also surprised us on Saturday with a short Easter visit, so it was fun to do some activities with her and attend church all together. Easter has lost some of its magic for me since childhood, but after this year, I feel renewed excitement in celebrating Easter Sunday and what it really means while still having a blast and being silly!

We started and ended the week with doing some great Easter crafts together as a family at a local pottery place called Bare Ware. The week before Easter, we went to a story time and made Easter bunny hand print plates. The girls had fun, though Aria was more invested than Skylar in actually doing the work. While there, Zach saw some eggs to paint and thought they were cute, so we went back the next week, picked up our plates, and each painted an egg. They have amazing customer service there and were sweet enough to give us a new free egg when Skylar broke her first one. I love activities that the whole family can do together!

Many of our favorite Easter activities this year were based around silly science experiments and food activities. We did some awesome peep science experiments, and for a person who hates peeps, it was fun to watch them get destroyed! The peep playdough didn’t quite turn out the consistency that it looked like it should have according to the recipe we used, but the girls enjoyed getting their hands dirty and getting an opportunity to use their Easter cookie cutters. We dyed Easter eggs three ways, and I have to say that even though making natural egg dye is harder, it turns out far prettier than the store bought eggs. Plus, Aria really loved all of the steps that it took and helped with each part. The easiest and most beautiful by far was whipped cream dyed eggs! Aria loved the beautiful tie dye colors she created. And if I haven’t mentioned my love of the show Creative Galaxy before (it is an Amazon show), let me mention it now. The show is all about an alien who makes crafts, and at the end of each episode they show children how to do the crafts themselves at home. Aria watched the show and decided that she needed to make a cauliflower bunny just like Arty and told me all of the veggies to cut up for its face. Then, she proceeding to eat the veggies and even try some raw cauliflower. I’m always so happy when Aria can get inspired to create…and eat her veggies too!

I still absolutely love the resurrection eggs, and I think they really helped Aria to learn the story of Easter even better this year. While Skylar had her weekly My Gym class, Aria entertained herself by looking through the eggs and showing other kids who were off for Easter the parts of the Easter story. The Easter prayer jellybean jar was also a fun treat, and Aria would pick up a color, ask what to pray for, and then pray according to the instructions. I was so proud of her. We also took Jessica’s idea from last year of making a resurrection garden and made our own with hand painted crosses and some of our Bible figurines. I love it when we can create a physical example of a story, as I am personally a tactile learner and believe Aria is one too.

If you’ve never watched Veggie Tales, I think the movies they make are such a great complement to the season and make learning about Easter so fun for kids. Between the Bible unit we did and Easter week, we have watched a number of Veggie Tales movies, and I love when we can keep the media really clean and moral based in our house!

As we do each Easter, we finished the week with a visit from the Easter bunny, a scavenger hunt (this year I used a really cute Christ-based one that you can see in the Miscellaneous section of the lesson plans), and an Easter egg hunt. We did a few candy eggs, but the big prize was the basket of toys (bubbles, craft supplies, learning toys, and the absolute favorite was a David and Goliath set). We followed all this of course with church! What a great celebration…already can’t wait until next year when we get to celebrate again!

DC for Dummies by Jessica
 
My husband David, travels to D.C. several times a month for his job. A big perk of homeschooling for us has been that we can often accompany him and get to enjoy a nice hotel, unique learning experiences, and the big city culture/lifestyle without paying a dime! At first, D.C. seemed overwhelming, not particularly child friendly, and somewhat difficult to navigate. Now that we’ve ventured out around the town a half dozen times however, I’m understanding the basics of how to D.C. without losing your mind…..or your child 😉 So while I'm not a local I may be able to help some newbie DC dummies like myself improve their experience. 

Here’s some of the most Toddler/Pre-k Friendly sites we’ve enjoyed

-Smithsonian Discovery Theater http://discoverytheater.org//
If you want more than just seeing the National Mall sights plan your trip around a discovery theater show. From Tot Rock to chemistry to theater to animal encounters these affordable performances are sure to wow your littles. 

-National Building Museum
Tour the museum to learn about architecture but also visit the building zone for a 45min play adventure with all things construction. Storytime is the 1st Tues of each month. https://www.nbm.org/exhibition/building-zone/

-National Postal Museum
This is one of my favorite free museums for kids. There’s soooo much to do here. Storytime is currently Mondays at 10:30 and check out this link for all the other tot friendly exhibits https://www.mommynearest.com/edition/washington-dc/article/everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-national-postal-museum

-National Zoo
A free zoo? Say no more right, its actual not one of my favorite places to visit in the city….off the natl mall, in between metro stops=a long walk, and though many may disagree the zoo doesn’t seem quite up to par with other city zoos to me…but still a nice kid friendly activity if you have the time.

-Dulles Intl Airport (Gravelly Point Park)
If you happen to be flying in or out of Dulles check out the indoor play aviation themed playscape (similar to a mall playground). If your not flying but have a little who loves planes pack a picnic, perhaps some headphones, and head over to Gravelly Point park. There are very few places where you can see planes less than 100 feet overhead. Here you can stand in their path as they roar overhead directly at you and very low. It can be loud and I guess a little scary for some but most kids will love it. Park in the boat landing lot. And walk over where there are picnic tables and a field, or just bring a blanket and sit on the grass.
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g30242-d618397-r125344912-Gravelly_Point_Park-Arlington_Virginia.html#
 
-Museum of Natural History
https://naturalhistory.si.edu/
Free Dinosaurs, Mummies, Live Butterfly exhibit which is only free on Tuesdays, and taxidermy animals of the world, this is a great museum for kids and adults alike. Check out the Children’s Discovery Room (link gives location: https://www.si.edu/Exhibitions/Discovery-Room-5658) Don’t miss a ride on the carousel nearby in front of the castle as well.

-Air and Space Museum
What kid doesn’t love a space museum?! Again totally free, lots of events and storytimes and for the toddler crowd Big Birds “One World One Sky” planetarium show is a MUST!!  https://airandspace.si.edu/visit/families

-National Museum of the American Indian
We LOVED this free museum. Especially around thanksgiving it’s a great way to teach about the first americans. Food in this museum café is the better than many restaurants around and legit cultural. Kids get a passport to stamp and visit tribes from all cultures to build an igloo, make pretend dinner in an adobe outside their teepee, create native crafts and more!! Check the calendar for story, puppet shows and more http://nmai.si.edu/visit/washington/imaginations/

-National Museum of American History
Wegmans Wonderplace is where you’ll want to navigate to within this free museum. It’s 0-6 friendly and though not one of my personal favorite spots lots of play happens here. http://americanhistory.si.edu/wonderplace

-United States Botanical Garden
What we love about the gardens is that in addition to free beautiful botany, kids can literally dig, plant, water, and grow their own greenery. Improvements are currently being made to the childrens garden and it was awesome before so I can’t wait to see the new exhibits.  Storytime activites, junior botanist backpacks, and more info can be found here: https://www.usbg.gov/kids-are-welcome-us-botanic-garden
 
-The Monuments
It’s really hard to come to DC as an adult and not go see the monuments….it can also seem really hard to drag young children around for miles to look at some buildings and statues they don’t understand and cant play on. There is a solution to this dilemma but it involves some planning. This blog: https://currentlywandering.com/2013/12/05/how-to-bike-or-walk-the-national-mall-with-kids/
Recommends doing it all on bike. GREAT IDEA!! The paths all connect and are wide enough to easily accommodate bikes and strollers. Most weekdays the mall is uncrowded and even preschoolers could pedal along on training wheels at their own speed without causing a problem. Pack some snacks or lunch and a few fun kids books about our country’s history stop along a reflecting pool to eat. We played a learning game along the WWII memorial running from state statue to statue to work on the names, flags, and other info about each one using a US Map and flag pins I brought along. I also let my daughter bring an old Iphone I have (a kids camera would work too) so she could take her own pictures at each monument. We are putting together a photo album of all her images and then back home she can match them up to TOOB statues and work on learning the names. Highly recommend saving the Washington monument for dusk, its more deserted at this time and the colorful lights around the bottom shining up are so much fun for kids to run through and play on.
 
-Live Music in the City
Boogie Babes https://greaterdcdiaperbank.org/boogie-babes/ offers the opportunity for kids to explore different styles of music and instruments singing and dancing with friends at different locations around the city each week. Check the site for upcoming performances.
 
-Tudor Place
On Tuesdays this historic mansion in Georgetown opens its doors to families for a 45min session of songs, storytelling, and pretend play. Afterwards tour the gardens and enjoy the history of this grand estate. I’ve also heard Hillwood Estate and art museum offers a similar program for preschoolers.

-Scramble (Alexandria)- https://goscramble.com/
A European style play structure, this place is one-of-a-kind at least in America. Basically imagine a huge version of McDonalds/Chick-fil-A playground but large enough that parents can accompany children EVERYWHERE….including on the second story without ducking uncomfortably. With a room of giant balls (each representing a planet) and tube spaceship, Egyptian pyramids and secret catacomb tomb room, and great barrier reef complete with see through moving blue goo floor everything here is learning themed and designed to challenge gross motor skills. Even the themed playrooms have giant foam blocks to build a racecar in the garage or play coffeeshop or veterinarian. For older kids there is a full size indoor soccer field too. We LOVE this place, and its metro stop adjacent (Van Dorn St stop in Alexandria).

-Wolf Trap Children’s Theater in the woods (Vienna) http://www.wolftrap.org/tickets/ctitw.aspx

-Rock Creek Park- just north of the National Zoo you’ll find this gem of an outdoor paradise. Look online for track an adventure (guided maps with different activities and adventures for kids of varying ages). There is also a planetarium here, various nature center kid friendly events, and best of all guided pony trail rides!!! If your kiddo loves horses like mine in the summer months you can spend $20 for a 15min ride through nature on horseback for ages 2.5 (30”) and up.
http://www.kidsinparks.com/rock-creek-park
http://www.kidfriendlydc.com/2012/04/23/rock-creek-park/
 
-National Harbor and Gaylord (Alexandria)
Another of my favorite places around DC the national harbor offers a giant ferris wheel, build a bear workshop, a store devoted to marshmallow peeps, and outdoor amphitheater that does movies and family exercise classes etc regularly. At the harbor you will also find the Gaylord hotel with beautiful indoor garden setting and kid activities galore. We visited at Christmastime for Rudolph ICE! Show (complete with indoor snow and giant slides made from ice) and also took time to ice skate, cookies with Mrs. Claus, Build a Bear scavenger hunt, and Christmas musical light show.

-Tot Parks- these are everwhere around the city. Often hidden among brownstones and not always listed on maps or city park websites these play areas are worth the adventure of seeking out. Parks often include communal tyke cars/bikes, sand boxes, and unique playground equipment and relief for parents when the little ones tire of roaming monuments and historical sites. If you know the area you’ll be visiting look closely at maps and search tot parks online to find locations nearby. If not, just keep your eyes open and venture into the city blocks with neighborhoods and your sure to find the occasional treasure.
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-Pirate Cruise- I currently know of two companies that do a kid friendly version of the “tourist boat tour”. One is located in old town Alexandria, the other docks in Georgetown. I believe both only run in the summer months or weekends but if you want to take a Potomac boat tour this is not to be missed!! Kids can dress up, there is music, face painting, water cannon battles, and treasure hunts aboard. Trips last about an hour and cost around $20.
 
 
 I'll post more on the metro, kid friendly eats and hotels soon!