My son has been really interested in boomerangs lately so I decided to look around for ways to make one. I found this video online which showed an easy way to make one. The video tutorial uses paint stirring sticks so we headed over to the Home Depot. The problem was that the sticks are now really thick so we just decided to try the fat popsicle sticks. Ours didn’t really come back to us the way the boomerang in the video did, but we still had fun trying. This boomerang does come back about halfway. It could just be the way we are throwing it. Overall, it was a fun and easy activity using up things we already had in the house.
Today it was raining so we had to come up with some fun things to entertain us inside. Here is what we did. First, we played Blue’s Clues where we put 3 handprints on items around the house to give glues as to what we wanted to do later. It was much harder for the kids than I thought. It was all Frank’s idea though so he was really interested. Then we played checkers. Finally, we played with the dominoes. The kids built those long lines that you knock over, buildings and boats. Frank played for over an hour with those.
Filed under: Crafts, Educational Stuff, Fall, Games, Halloween, Holidays, Kids
Tonight we did a very exciting ghost science experiment. This idea came from an old AIMS lesson plan. The goal is to get the ghost to spin like a helicopter. First, we tried just dropping the ghost to see how it fell. Second, we added a paper clip and then dropped him. Next, we bent the arms forward and dropped him. Last, we dropped him with one arm folded to the front and one to the back. In the lesson plan it suggests throwing the ghost in the air and blowing him up. We skipped that part just because it was easier to be dropping the ghost from the top of our stairs instead of throwing it up into the air.
I saw this idea on thiswebsite. We made this spiderweb by wrapping yarn from chair to chair. Then the kids crawled through the web. We ended up having one person be the spider in the web waiting to catch a bug. Next time we will make the web bigger so it is harder to catch a bug.
I like the idea from the Make and Takes site where they have to get a spider or something from inside the web without touching the web. Next time we will do that.
Today after Frank did his homework we did some fun Halloween things that I have been meaning to do all month. Here are the boys doing pumpkin bowling. We just stacked blocks and then rolled a little green pumpkin that never ripened. I have seen some really creative ideas for pumpkin bowling out there if you want to go all out.
Yahtzee is a game we like to play at home. Sometimes it is a little hard for Frank to understand so we made this simpler version. He had so much fun that he wanted to play 3 times.
Filed under: Advent Calendar, Books, Christmas, Crafts, Games, Holidays, Kids, Winter
Today’s activity is a fun and simple game that I found inJack and Jill Magazine. It just involves the game board and then two pennies. It was a great game to teach about coins too. We talked about what was on the penny and how much it was worth. You could also use dimes or nickels to reinforce their values too. If you can’t find this game, it would be pretty easy to make your own.
I am always trying to find ways to keep my kids from using the computer or watching too much TV. This weekend Frank has learned to love the board game called Stratego. He could play it all day long if we played with him. He has totally forgotten about the computer for now. The game is for ages 9 and up, which he is way younger, but still understands for the most part.
