Monthly Archives: August 2011

The Swedish Crayfish Party

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The school term is starting, and Autumn is nigh, but before we say goodbye to the summer, we end with a traditional…

Swedish Crayfish Party!

Each and every child tried, at least to handle – if not eat, a crayfish…

…and the decorations (including the essential moon lantern), were enjoyed by all…

‘The Crayfish Party’ is a Swedish tradition, as are the decorations that go with this tradition…

…. the apple bobbing however, is optional…!

(As was the fun water fight that proceeded to follow) – Maya made sure she was well protected! 

Thanks to Eva & Jonathan, and all your many and lovely children for a fun evening ! 🙂 

Beautiful Bugs – And Chocolate Ones Too!

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Inspired by the following book ‘Matts and Mia find mini beasts’ , we decided to go on…

a mini beast hunt…

Armed with magnifying glasses and homemade clipboards…

And Leon armed with a camera – we found a mass of different creatures!

Maya captured them all…

Ants

Woodlice

Earwigs

Slugs

Mosquitoes

Daddy long legs

Stink bugs

Spiders

Worms

Flies

And beautiful bugs…

We saw them all!

But we couldn’t end a mini beast hunt without making chocolate bugs at the end….

They’re easy to make – and all you need is chocolate!

3 oz white chocolate

3 oz dark chocolate

Melt white chocolate, add 1 tablespoon golden syrup and mix to a paste.

Wrap in cling film and put in fridge for an hour.

Repeat with the dark chocolate.

After an hour, take out and leave for 5 mins to ‘warm’ a little.

Then start to mould!

Cut each chocolate piece in to six pieces, setting one of each color aside.

Take each piece and mould in to an oval shape, making a cut 1/3 across for a head, and the other way on one side for wings.

When all pieces are done, use the remaining chocolate in the contrasting colour to make eyes, spots and stripes.

Then eat! 🙂

Caterpillars & Butterflies

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During the last few weeks, on our nasturtium plants, we’ve been watching….

…caterpillars grow…

…and grow…

LOTS of them!

Now they’ve all disappeared.

So we’ve been making caterpillars…

…and butterflies…

…of all sorts…

(and birds too!)..

…In anticipation of seeing our butterflies emerge…

I think I saw the first one this morning! 🙂

Big Outdoor Art

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Summer is a time to try out BIG outdoor arty mess…

‘Splatter Painting’

Stretch out a long strip of paper in the garden, strip off those clothes – and flick those brushes! 🙂

‘Spray Painting’

Hang up a couple of old sheets and just fill up a few bottles of diluted paint in spray bottles! 🙂

‘Giant Marble Painting’

Tape paper on the bottom of a paddling pool, dip balls in paint, pop in pool and pick up pool to move around balls! 🙂

Our Fairy Garden

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Maya has always had a little fascination with fairies, and so, much inspired by the wonderful blog ‘The Magic Onions’ we’ve been building a little…

…FAIRY GARDEN!

Maya decided, as it was summer, the fairies needed a beach, and somewhere to swim.

The shell floating upside-down is a boat for them, and we used an old bird house we built some years ago, for a house.

Inside the house there’s a bath made from shells, and a chair and table made from small pebbles…

This old ceramic shoe fits in nicely for the fairies to hide in (and the snails for that matter!)…

A neighbouring house is made from a milk carton, covered with lolly sticks, a tiny flower pot contains flowers and we found the tiny watering can.

Obviously whoever lives here just loves flowers…

Have you seen the washing line?

One morning we just found it there! Maya wondered if fairies used rose petals for wings?

To enable the fairies to reach the beach, a little path (made from sea glass and some ceramic mosaic stones) has been made, over which lies a rose arbor.

There’s also a swing, made from a flat stone, hanging from our ‘flower’…

Now, most of the above ideas came from ‘The Magic Onions‘, where you can also enter a fairy garden competition!

However, our last addition to the fairy garden (for now) is the making of a house of sticks and on sticks , inspiration from here, originally via the Crafty Crow...

This will enable the fairies to have safety in numbers when the current ants nest, which lies below, exceeds in numbers! 🙂

Where Can You Find….?

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The Giant…

Cinderella’s castle…

Three bear’s porridge…

One of the Billy Goats Gruff…

A dwarf…

The house of a troll…

And a very old fashioned playground…

At ‘Sagostigen‘!

This literally translates to ‘story path’, and we came here a few years ago (and I see now that I seem to have taken very similar photos then!) – but this time we took Farmor, our swedish grandmother with us – who dutifully read the stories…