Legoland!

We went to Legoland yesterday!   An online carseat friend sent us passes, so I surprised Levi with a day of fun.    Its a 2 hour drive from us, so I threw Levi in the car in the morning, it took him over an hour to even ask where on Earth we were heading.     I stealthily called the Kids Place Live radio station that we had been listening to all morning, and had Kenny Curtis announce that Levi was heading to Legoland.   He was so surprised!  It was great   

Our day, mostly in pictures:  

A new lego shirt I made, on my embroidery machine

 Lego guy, I think this is a lion from Chima or something.

 We went right to the back of the park, and ended up with almost no lines all day except for Coastersaurus and the Safari ride, which were still both only about 10min waits.   

Ford Car - we kept seeing kids trying to open the doors!

Driving School

Techno Cycles  - you pedal to go heigher

Roller Coaster car

Kid powered tower

Hero Factory

Batman and Robin

Pirate show, with very cool waterskiing

 Miranda Valentina, star of the waterskiing show

Pond with pumpkins and woodland creatures (made from lego)

Mini Land

St Augustine, see the real thing here

Levi in the stocks

More lego guys, making "bunny ears"

They have a neat greenhouse with actual growing things and some lego farming stuff.

A cow to milk - I was surprised that its not made of lego! 

 Levi and I with a giant lego pumpkin

 4D movie

Granny Apple Fries.  These are made from apples with cinnamon and sugar on them, and minus the whip cream, Levi could eat them.   I found a recipe that looks similar here. 

Gator Lego guy.  I think this is another Chima character. 

This skunk guy was one of Levi's favorites.  It was next to a bathroom and made loud fart sounds followed by "soooorrry"  

Knight by the dragon rollercoaster

Red and black creepy guy that Levi wanted a picture of. 

Some more mini land: 

Tiny orchestra, they even had lego violins!

Pizza guy, Buddy and Nai Nai are in Italy so I'm going to send them this picture.  

And for our last ride of the day, we went up in the Island in the Sky and got a view of the whole park  

It was a really nice day, we were able to go on all of the rides, and see 2 shows, no crowds and lots of fun! 

Frogs lapbook and unit study

At Levi's request, we learned all about frogs!   For this unit study we read a lot of books, did some art work, jumped like frogs, made a lapbook, did some math, and I even made him a new outfit to wear.  

We found these little guys in our backyard:

I made Levi a frog outfit.  He chose the fabrics for this one, the shirt is super bright "hurt your eyes" neon yellow.  The shorts and applique are a vintage paisley fabric that I think I got at a thrift store.   I wasn't too sure about the combination, but I think it works in the end.  He loves the result! 

Here are (some) of the books we read, the rest were from the library.   Also seen here is a frog puzzle, a model of a frogs internal organs, and a box of model frogs with cards to match.  

Here is the finished lapbook:

Cover

Inside

Inside

This is a frog lifecycle book we put together and he colored.  And a color-by-number multiplication I found.  

This is the artwork we made, I used the lesson plan from "Art Projects for Kids".  I really liked the idea of using a partial template for him to trace, and having him add his own feet to the frog.   We used lemon juice to make the spots on the frog, which were more subtle than I expected.   The frog drawing on the right is copy work from Draw, Write, Now.   The drawing technique for this one had you start by drawing a triangle, and then adding the frog detail on top.  I thought that was a good way of helping figure out placement for the different frog parts.   His handwriting on this is really nice too!

Check out my Frog Pintrest board for even more ideas!

Resources:

Book printable from Worksheet Place
Frog water color painting idea
Frog collage/painting art from Balancing Everything
multiplication color by number worksheet from education dot com
How to draw a frog
lapbook from Homeschool Share
"Froggy" books reading response sheets

Book List:

Frog by Michael Chinery
Why the Frog Has Big Eyes by Betsy Franco
From Tadpole to Frog by Wendy Pfeffer
All About Frogs by Jim Arnosky
Tadpoles and Frogs (Usborne Beginners)
(I Can Read About) Tadpoles and Frogs by Ellen Schultz
It's Mine by Leo Lionni
Frogs by Gail Gibbons
Frogs, Toads and Turtles (Take Along Guides) by Diane Burns
Frog and Toad by Arnold Lobel

Fall Plaid

        This outfit was inspired by the fall, not that Florida knows its supposed to be fall!  (It was 90 degrees today!).   Project Run and Play has a "plaid challenge" so I went with plaid fabric, using what I had on hand, brown with teal sparkly pinstripes, and red/cream. 
        I used a ton of embroidery designs from one of my favorite embroidery designers, Lynnie Pinnie.  There are NINE embroideries on this outfit! 
        The knee patches are corduroy, and stitched with darts to give them a "knee shape".   The other fabrics are two different plaids, and some solid brown.   The pants also have a roll up option, with the red plaid stitched inside.   And to top it off, a couple of faux leather buttons.
        The top has a loose, comfortable fit with raglan sleeves accented with a pop of green.  The embroidery designs were first stitched on fabric, and then satin stitched to the shirt.

Levi says he "loves these pants" and that the shirt is comfortable, so that makes me happy!

It was bedtime for my model, so he added some poses of his own!

Levi's Birthday Interview

I just realized I never posted Levi's 6th birthday interview!   Here it is:

Bouncy Ball Making

Do you remember the kits where you make your own bouncy ball?   I had one as a kid, and I found a kit for Levi, and gave it to him for his birthday.   
Its a quick project that he can do almost entirely on his own, and it gives a fun result!  I got this kit from Fat Brain Toys.


Here is what you get: 

Put the mold together, and pour in layers of powder (like sand art).  Make sure you tap it gently after each layer, this ensures that you won't have a gap at the top when you set the mold.

Then put the whole thing in water for 1min, let it sit for a little bit, and un-mold.  The kit I had as a kid required hot water, but this one is nice because you can use cool water, so the kid can do it himself.

Ta da!!   

He loved the bright colors and the rainbow/tye dye effect.