Letter L !

Letter L  …

… can be LOVELY and LACEY…

And letter L can be LEARNING to walk on the LINES ….

… and LISTENING to stories about LADYBIRDS…

‘What the ladybird heard’ – Julia Donaldson

‘The bad tempered ladybird’ – Eric Carle

‘Ten little ladybirds’ – Melanie Gerth

… playing with LADYBIRDS…

... and using LADYBIRDS for maths…

(use these ladybirds in any way you like – counting, addition, division..)

L is for LEAVES

We observed their veins and compared their edges.

The LARGEST leaf was the rhubarb.

The LITTLEST was the apple.

L is for the LICKING of a LOLLIPOP…

… for LEGO…

… and for LION…

LASTLY, L is for LEMON…

…and the making of LEMON juice…

Enjoy L !

🙂

How To Make Nettle Soup

Maya learnt to make nettle soup at ‘Mulle’ (the forest school) last year.

She wanted to make it at home with Alfie and her friend Hanna.

First they collected lots and lots of nettles (wearing gardening gloves of course)…

….the neighbours must have been pleased?!

They put them in to a large vat of cold water to wash them (and stirred and stirred)…

Next they separated the leaves from the stalks….

…..and boiled the leaves in water for 5 minutes…

…with the lid on of course…

….for safety’s sake they printed out the recipe before getting the ingredients ready…

Ingredients for 4 portions :

2 litres nettles

1 litre water

2 cubes vegetable stock

2 tablespoons butter

3 tablespoons flour

1 deciliter (about one cup) cream

 

Next step was to sieve the leaves from the water. 

Keeping the water, the leaves were chopped in to smaller ‘pieces’…

Knead a ‘ball’ with the butter and flour.

Boil up the nettle water again adding the stock cubes.

Put in the butter and flour mixture.

Stir and let soup mixture simmer for around 5 minutes.

Put in nettle leaves and cream.

Serve!

The verdict?

Absolutely DELICIOUS!

🙂

Letter F

Letter F….

…. is for FLUFFY, FEATHERY, FURRY F….

F is also for FRUIT

and FRUIT kebabs…

F is for FISH…

(three paper plates cut and stapled accordingly)

so FUN to make…

…and some FANTASTIC FISHY books…

‘Hooray for fish’ – Lucy Cousins

‘The Curious Fish’ – Elsa Beskov

‘Fish is fish’ – Leo Lionni

F is of course, also for FLOWER…

Home made FLOWERS…

(lolly sticks with paper flower heads taped on top)

…to make in to a FABULOUS  FLOWER bed…

(stuck in to an egg carton with play dough)

FLOWER dissection…

…and the sorting and observing of (old) FLOWER seeds…

F is for FINGER painting…

 FINALLY, F is also for FROG…

…and the FINDING of FINE FROG babies…

🙂

Leon Grylls? Maybe….!

When Leon turned 5 he received a small tent for his birthday.

Two months later we went camping with some friends in Bodega Bay, California.

Leon spent the night in his own tent.

First time camping, aged 5, all night long in his own tent.

Wow!

Nearly six years later he has been a passionate scout for three years, he has camped in the wild numerous times, he has trekked for hours, he has cooked food over a campfire hundreds of times, he has ski-ed down mountains and across lakes, he has ice skated across lakes and built snow dens in the wild.

And now, he adds caving and abseiling to his list…

You see this small crack he’s looking in to ?

Well, that’s his leg going through…

There’s a lot of spiders hanging out in there too…

Finding your way through in total darkness may be tricky, even with a head lamp, but this handprint gives you a clue to the entrance and exit…

Then, after all that squeezing through the darkness, there’s time for a little abseiling…

Before reaching his final destination…

A boy with a mission…

A boy full of the joy of life…

Is it any wonder that he is fast becoming inspired by Bear Grylls?

An adventurer is the making?

Possibly. Quite possibly!

🙂

A Farming Weekend

Last weekend we had an amazing time.

Staying on a farm!

Actually, we didn’t just STAY on it – the kids WORKED on it!

Here is the farm from a distance…

….and here is the little cottage we stayed in….

Run by wonderful Inger, ex-preschool teacher and now farmer, and her husband Bernt, they have an ideal to educate children about how a farm functions.

First we met Nora the dog…

…and copious cats….

This little kitten Alfie became particularly fond of…

Leon adopted a new found fondness for cows.

Cleaning their poo daily with Inger…

Checking they had enough food, and sharing it out between them if not…

(Here you can see him walking between the cows, Nora the dog following obediently)

Taking the cows out to the field every morning…

…this little calf had a stubborn streak…

In the end the others also braved the cows…

…and they soon became a favourite…

The chickens however, also became a favourite….

Not only were the eggs collected and the chickens fed, but lots and lots of dandelions were dug up for them – their big treat…

Leon helped Inger to feed the lambs and sheep three times a day…

(as did Maya later)

Maya got to ride the pony…

And Alfie just loved, loved, loved the hay loft with all its swings…

Actually, what am I saying?

ALL the kids loved it!

And spent HOURS in there….!

And if you needed some peace and quiet, you could always walk across the fields to the ‘kåta’…

At the end of the weekend even Ted was a budding farmer…

Thank you Inger and Bernt for a fabulously educational weekend – we LOVED it….!

🙂

Letter W!

Letter W….!

Is for WHALES making WAVES in WATER…

It is also for whale song.

And the story of ‘Jonah and the whale’ in this book.

W is also for WASHING…

…WEAVING…

And also for WEEDING…

… a good way to find WORMS…

…for starting a WORMERY.

W is also for WIND.

After observing the WIND blowing the trees, a flag and bubbles we blew,

we made a WINDMILL and read this WONDERFUL book…

 And finally, W is also for WAGON…

 …and delicious WATERMELON!

🙂

Letter V !

Letter V !

Was VERY fun!

We studied an African VIOLET…

…which we then painted, and tried to mix as many different colours of VIOLET as we could ….

We made a VOLCANO from mud…

…which we ‘exploded’ using water, white VINEGAR, red food coloring and bicarbonate of soda…

We painted VASES using clean jars…

We learnt about VULTURES through a youtube clip (National Geographic) …

Inspired by one of the ‘Land before time’ films (‘The Wisdom of friends’), we made a..

…VALLEY of dinosaurs…

I just love it!

We tried to make the VALLEY in to a V shape using blocks, with material over.

Finding a book with V in the title proved difficult, so instead I made up my own story…

...about a girl called VIOLET, dressed in VIOLET, who liked to pick VIOLETS in the VALLEY. One day there was a VOLCANO that destroyed all the VIOLETS, but in the end the VIOLETS grew back stronger, and the little girl VIOLET took some home to put in a VASE.

Though this story was simple and short, as I told it I drew the pictures. The kids loved this!

Soon Alfie was drawing his own rendition of the story!

🙂

Wonderful Walpurgis!

 A little late but none the less….

On the 30th April every year, Swedes celebrate ‘Valborg’.

‘Walpurgis‘, as it is otherwise known, is a celebration to welcome the Spring.

Swedes come together to watch a big bonfire burning away the old leaves, twigs and branches from the last autumn and winter, making room for the new plants to grow.

We usually go down to our local lake to celebrate, in support of Leon’s scout group who organise it.

Although the last two years have been cold, rainy and windy – this year it was warm and sunny…

…and this year Leon was proud to be ‘working’ on the chocolate wheel….

Maya was treated to a candy-floss by our next-door neighbours…

 ….the homemade zip-line and obstacle course (made by the scouts) was enjoyed by the older kids…

…while Alfie had a go at the ‘fisk dam’ (fishing pool)…

…and Ted just enjoyed throwing stones in to the lake…

The fire was beautiful…

…and because the sunset was so wonderful, I’m putting up another photo of it…!

🙂