Fun with beeswax

We had fun with beeswax today. Below are scenes from the activity.

Making a sword for his "guy". See the care that goes into it?

It takes a lot of concentration, apparently.

The one with the 2 acorn is his. The acorn is shield and hat.
I made the robin and the "giant" to fight with Prime's "guy". :)


He is super happy with his creation.

J's creation: a do-do bird, made with feathers, pine cone and beeswax

J has always wanted to write with her feathers, so today she wrote it with paint. We haven't had a chance to use Chinese ink yet. Save that for another day.

She is making up her own language: "Hebew". She says she wrote the "Hebew" password and the rule.

Unexpected fun

J woke up this morning and made a little person with a cape using wool stuffing. Then she skipped off to make a needle felted girl. For a while, she was afraid the needle might hurt her but this morning she was feeling brave for some reason.


There she goes, making her little person. She says she is going to give it away.


Here is the finished product. Then I decided to glue it to a piece of paper, protect it with saran wrap and make a Popsicle stick frame. J found a magnet that came off so we glued it to the back and now it is on our fridge.

Later, J went outside and had a little building fun... another unexpected fun. She is going to write and share more pictures about that on her blog. I really like the flowering crab apple tree. It will be ever prettier in a week when the flowers bloom.


Then, as we had planned, we can finally do some digging and prepare the soil for some planting. J was super excited about it and couldn't wait to dig.


Prime already tired out after only a little digging. He came back after a little while only to be lured out again by J with the promise of sharper shovel. So, he is sharpening his shovel.


I think they are playing more than digging. J says they are like the family who pulls up the turnip. :-) Prime finally doing some pulling and real work. It is not easy work; good thing we have daddy. :)

Later, their friend A, came out unexpectedly, and the kids had fun jumping on the trampoline. Our Mexican primrose is really blooming... so pretty... I love the light pink.

My first math gnome

I'm feeling under the weather but I still want to do something, so I tried to make a math gnome today. I'd say it was a success as I'm not crafty but I can copy. If I can make it, you all can make it. You can find the tutorial here on Elizabeth Foss's webiste. Her instructions are also very clear as I need easy, clear instruction with lots of photos to be able to understand.

J tells me to make 2 and leave her 2 to make herself so check out her blog for gnome updates if you like at a later date. In Enki, he is called "Paddy Plus".


I had a hard time taking a good photo more than anything else. If you don't want to do much sewing, you can also get ideas by taking a look at other gnomes Elizabeth Foss made. Those, the signs are made with markers.

I also want to post our little science experiment with the white carnations, after our celery experiment fell flat. As many of you have wisely told me, the white carnations (I almost typed wise carnation) :-P worked so much better. The result can seen in about less than 1 minute, especially the green one. And even the red, you can't see it on the petals, but you can tell as the whole flowers changing color and it's a pink hue. It was really pretty. J did this in her kinder class so she knew how it would turn out and wasn't too excited. Prime didn't care much about flowers. Is that a boy thing? He will later though, I think. :) So I am the one who was most excited. LOL!


Just playing with my camera, seeing if I need the flash.

"fun day" and making more "plaything"

Today, we went to visit another homeschooling group's monthly "fun day". For this month, first it was open gym and then it was a visit from the police officer to discuss about safety.

I think it was a good experience for the kids as they enjoyed the open gym time and quickly found a little group to play ball with. J also made a friend, R and she was excited about that. She said they wore similar sneakers and that's how they started talking. :)



I also met few other moms and felt very at ease with them. I even got invited to go to this nice lady's house for dinner and fellowship with other Chinese-American homeschoolers. But unfortunately we already have plans. That is so cool as we all speak English (even though some of us can speak Chinese (whether its mandarin, Cantonese or a dialect) but we all prefer to speak in English. However, I'm excited as I will probably be able to go in the summer and meet some other Chinese American homeschoolers. There are not many of us out there at least not where we live and the notion of "homeschooling" is fairly new in to most C-A. Plus most Chinese families have both spouses working.

Later, I decided to check out the newly opened Hobby Lobby near us since I heard they are owned by a Christian family and they donated a large amount to help start the church we go to currently. (Not our particular church, but the 1st one in IL). Anyone, we got a whole bunch of stuff and was like, oh cool, oh fun, oh let's get this and that in the store. The kids were most excited about the wooden man and immediately began drawing on them as soon as we came home. I will let J post her finished product on her little blog.


J cracks up at her own drawing; Prime working hard on his.

Yarn dolls from Enki craft

Today we made yarn dolls. This is K craft from Enki education. I almost forgot about these until I saw another Enki family made them. So we decided to try them out. Too bad I don't have any green yarns for today. Oh, well.

Any how, here is our 1st attempt at making this. The first one is mine. The fuzzy pink is J's. That yarn was too soft, not a good yarn for this project. A thicker yarn would work much better but J wanted to try anyway. I also found that tying off the ends to make a little fist/feet works better and then the doll can stand. Otherwise, it can only sit. This is good practice as it does take some patience and the child need to good at tying knots for them to do this independently.

Now if I can some how persuade Prime to make one. He shows no interest and says, "I don't like dolls." oh, well.

Labor of love: no-sew blanket

I had originally wanted to send my friend a no-sew blanket for her new born baby as a gift. Finally, I had a little time yesterday and brought the materials. Of course, J and Prime wanted to make one for themselves. So since the little ones (pillow blanket) are 1/2 off, I brought each of them one. Last night, we experimented with Prime's Pooh bear blanket and he just loved it and has been carrying around with him ever since. My kids love, love blankets. I think that comes from a natural extension of living in a state that has a cold winter.

Anyway, J wanted to make her blanket today and so we did. I tell you, it was a lot of work and their blanket is a really small one! I think it is much easier to just buy a blanket. But it was a good learning experience for the kids.

J had trouble cutting the fleece in the beginning as it is not easy to cut the fabric. Plus, I think my scissors are not the best but after some practice on scraps, she was able to cut and did cut. Prime worked on knotting the blankets. So that was good thing for him. Those fine motor skills!


The kids working hard on the blanket. Prime wanted to help too! He is tying the knots.

J with her new no-sew blanket. Prime making good use of the scraps. He says TMNT have a headband just like that so he put it on too. He did that all by himself. J was surprised the scrap stretched that long. :) I was surprised he knotted it himself.