Hello Spring: Ladybug Release and Brunch

To welcome spring, we decided to have a ladybug release party and brunch with all our friends.

The brunch was pot luck style so everyone brought something yummy to share. The ladybug portion of the celebration involved the release of 2,000 ladybugs. The second I cut open the net bag they had been stowed away in, the bugs were crawling out all over me then one by one they started flying off into the air or unto the body of one of the many preschoolers who surrounded me.

Once all the bugs had evacuated the bag, I carefully sloughed off my body, any remaining bugs and the kids went ladybug hunting, searching the grasses with magnifying glass at hand.

We also had bug rubbing plates as an additional activity or for those who didn’t appreciate the possibility of being covered with the spotted insect but most of the kids didn’t mind at least getting within an arms length of bug examination.

I think this ladybug activity is seriously one of my most favorites to date! Since the food was pot luck the event cost a mere $10 for the bag of 2,000 ladybugs which I picked up at my local garden store. Worth every penny indeed!

A word of advice: if you do this acivity at home make sure all the kids are gathered around ready with their empty baby food jars and magnifying glass at hand before cutting open the bag. Those lady bugs won’t be waiting around for an audience before flying off into the wide world…(or a couple feet away in a sunny patch of grass). Also make sure your camera is charged and strapped around the neck of an assigned photographer. That way you won’t have to send one of the parents in your home on a camera hunt while the ladybugs have their best camera face on. (Of coarse I am coming up with this scenario completely off the top of my head, I have a good imagination ;)

Most pics here were taken by a couple friends of mine, Katie Murihead and Trent Covington, who were both gracious enough to take photos of the event.

Innards

Okay…labeling this project with something like ‘innards’ might be a little much for the preschool variety. I suppose you can change the name of this homemade slime-like substance to ‘Halloween Goop’ or ‘Ghoulish Goo’ really anything that doesn’t cause your youngster to imagine they are rolling their fingers around in inner body sludge! I am assuming though, that they are not the ones reading this so I am going to give you a recipe for innards.

You will need two ingredients; corn starch and water (oh and food coloring if you wish). This combination creates a really neat effect, giving you a putty that is sort of in-between a liquid and a solid. I thought a video demo would do more justice than pics so I have attached one here. Don't be scared when you see how messy we are in the video, we had been playing with it for quite some time—like an hour!



I did not measure out my ingredients, I just tested until it was the right consistency but if you are particular about that sort of thing, I’m sure you can find something online. This might be fun to combine with other Halloween sensory fun like peeled grapes for eye balls or wet spaghetti for brains...you get the idea.

Sunny Sunflowers

We had a great time at the September Make. Mason’s mom, Lis taught us how to make sunny sunflowers using paper plates, crepe paper and real sunflower seeds. Lis even concocted and engineered a creative way to build a stem out of paper (leave it to a product designer). If you were unable to attend this make would be a great craft to try at home. It’s as easy as ONE…

TWO...

THREE...

Just Beachy

Thank you to those who were able to attend last months “beach in a bottle” activity. It was an eventful one to say the least. If you were not able to attend here is the recipe to make your own personal ocean from a 16 oz clear plastic bottle:

Step 1: Fill bottle with a little less than ¼ cup full of sand *

Step 2: Pick out 8-10 of your favorite mini seashells and add to the sand mixture

Step 3: Fill the bottle half way with pre-tinted water…not to dark as it will prevent you from seeing the shells and not too light because the sand could suck the color right out.

Step 4: (Optional) add a pinch or two of glitter and perhaps some fun fishy confetti

Step 5: Fill the bottle to the top with baby oil and you’re all set. Oh wait! I almost forgot; don’t forget to glue your lid with some high hold glue—we’re not mixing drinks here silly!

* I highly recommend forking out the cash for some high grade sand if you choose this as one of your ingredients for the project. Some of the bottles we created at the make became way too cloudy and mucky by using good old-fashion play sand.

One more thing, if you still have a few plastic bottles lying around the house, here are a few other projects I enjoyed making with my mom as a kid:

QUIET BOTTLE: Throw some light karo syrup in a bottle with a little glitter and sequence to keep the kiddies entertained for hours (or at least 5 minutes) as they watch the sugary syrup drip and droop in slow motion to the other end of the bottle as it’s tipped from side to side.

I SPY BOTTLE: If you have a handful of miniatures lying around, pop them into a bottle with some white rice to create an instant game of “I spy.” We have one we made with colored rice which works fine too. Remember, your miniatures don’t have to be doll house quality, think; penny, paperclip, button, small battery…or anything else you have lying around the house.

TORNADO TUBE: This one is great for kids of all ages. You will need 2 clear plastic bottles (you could go for the 2-liter bottles for this one), water, glitter, sequence, (or something of the sort) and a tornado tube, also called a cyclone tube or vortex tube, which can be found at your nearest teacher supply store or specialty toy store. In Denver try Timbuk Toys. You will fill one of the empty bottles with tinted water and the other ingredients of your choice. You will then connect the two bottle together vertically (openings together) with the tornado tube. Give your connected bottles a little twist and a tornado will form in a matter of seconds, turn it over and start again! You have probobly seen this trick but if not you can check out a video HERE.

Photography by Charissa Spendlove

Cress heads

Unfortunately I forgot to take any photos at the last make activity but I am submitting proof that the event actually did take place.

I personally found this project to be one of my favorites for making with a 3 year old. It wasn’t one of those drag-on projects that sound really fun at first but end up becoming a time-consuming mess. All we did was wet a little cotton, sprinkle a little seed, paint a little face and voila—all through! Our seeds began sprouting by day 2 for an almost immediately satisfying result plus we learned a little bit about the science of gardening along the way.

(a photoshoot casuality)

After a few weeks of plant care, we decided to play a little barber shop and enjoy an egg salad sandwich with cress!