Thursday, September 6, 2007

Nature Study...a Slow Start!

I've been learning about nature studies, nature journals and such, and I truly want to incorporate more of this into our days to come. Growing up I was a girly-girl and never really given the opportunity (nor took the initiative) to appreciate God's wonderful creation. I have three boys...how can I not do this?

We are going to start slow. My plan is to create a nature journal we will take with us each time we visit the Hill Country - 4x a year hopefully. We will gather leaves and flowers to press in our books. We'll take photos of bugs and other things they find interesting that can't be put in the journal (like "cacti-pie" - Thatcher's word for cacti, no matter how much we correct him!). At some point I would like to encourage them to sketch things they find but maybe dh can help in this department until any of the rest of us can draw the tiniest bit!

In the meantime, here are some photos I took in our backyard the other evening as the boys were playing. While pondering these ideas I was struck with the realization that I don't have to wait until we leave our home to experience and appreciate nature (told you I was a girly-girl!).


This is a plant we started growing last year from an avocado seed. It grew on our kitchen counter for months before we transplanted it, and to all our surprise, we haven't killed it yet.


We found these eggs on the edge of Beckett's swing. We've been checking on them to see what hatches...nothing so far, although as I am typing this I am realizing we forgot to check the last day or two. Oh, drat!


This little guy (or gal) kept his web right outside our back door for a little over a week. It was fun to see how it changed each day.

None of the boys showed much interest in any of this except Thatcher who loves to have a reason to get the water hose out. It's not really about the plant - just a reason to get wet! Hopefully that will all change.

6 comments:

Sleep-Deprived said...

Let me encourage you with the bugs. We started catching and observing a bug here and spider there just recently. We released the spider after a week (I got tired of catching flies for it!) Two nights ago my husband caught a grasshopper and the thing had the AUDACITY to lay 100 eggs by morning. Now we have the eggs and glandular sac covered in dirt in it's container in the kitchen awaiting spring (a shorter lifecycle would have been nice). But I have to admit it's been quite interesting and all three of our boys make frequent stops to visit them.

Darcy @ m3b said...

Since you're a girly girl like me, here are a few things that helped me. A bug vaccuum - though shall never need touch a bug. Binoculars - some paths are meant to be left undisturbed. Duct tape - oft underestimated tool. Wrap around socks/pant legs, sticky side out, helps catch ticks. All else fails, you can do nature Study like Lee and I. Online. ;) LOL

Robin M said...

How fun! We catch bugs for our frog, but otherwise James just likes to spray them with the hose. He really isn't into nature studies as of yet. I keep trying, though.

Robin

Jessica said...

With 3 boys, you're going to have plenty of natural nature study! I relaxed about it after a while even though I feared that I was not sharing the beauty of God's creation with our children by not focusing on it.

Your studies are very similar to ours, although yours might be more basic. The kids see or discover something, we try to learn a little more about it. If they don't, we don't.

Danny is willing to sit and listen to the crickets, cicadas, frogs, birds and whatever else is talking, for at least a good 10 minutes. I can talk in hushed tones to him and tell him about something and he'll be entranced. These are times I wish they didn't grow up.

There are fire-belly frogs at Walmart! I truly debated whether or not to get one for the kids. It needs a warming lamp and live food so I decided to read up on it some more. We've tried a guinea pig- it wasn't our thing. I'm terrified of birds. Can't they just stay too little for critters smaller than a cat?

:) Jessica

Katrina said...

You should pat yourself on the back. I left bug collecting to my dh! Pretty soon we had a whole collection of bugs pinned to a styroform board. We also had fun learning about frogs as they'd hop into our garage. My kids caught one small frog and brought it in the house. As they tried to show me what they had the stupid thing hopped out of their hands and onto me. Lets just say I gave a good show screaming and jumping around our dinning room!

Lisa~ said...

LOL I like Darcy’s suggestion.... they sell those bug vacuums at target every now and again.... *Ü* No touchy the bugs....