Disclosure: I was sent these products in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Have you been watching Shark Week? It ends tomorrow. Now I will admit to not watching it because I see enough about sharks in the news (just saw this on the news as I write this post) with all the sightings around Cape Cod and off the shore of Boston. However I love how this week gets people thinking about these amazing creatures and nature in general. To keep this going I am sharing some great resources about nature and helping you get your kids loving it. To begin we will start with a DVD for younger kids that includes a bit about sharks. It is Thomas Edison's Secret Lab: It Always Sharkest.
Disclosure: I was sent this book in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. It is summer time and I always find summer to bring on sharks. Between the shark sightings in the news and the internet going crazy for Shark Week as well as television. Well Shark Week starts on Sunday. Today I am going to share an amazing resource to learn all about sharks. It written for kids ages 9-12 years old. It is a book from National Geographic Kids. It is The Ultimate Book of Sharks by Brian Skerry with Elizabeth Carney and Sarah Wassner Flynn.
On Pi Day I shared a round-up of science books including two that gave some names of women in science that I had not heard of. I decided to do some research and found books on some of them as well as other great women of science. So to end Women's History Month 2018 I thought I would share a bit about these amazing women. Let's start with Marie Tharp.
Disclosure: I was sent these books in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Well, this year Pi Day was a snow day for most of the schools around me including Hazel's. Luckily by late morning it was safe to be on the roads. We headed out to celebrate Pi Day at the Capital One Cafe where they were serving pizza pie and various pies. Did you know that Albert Einstein as born on March 14, 1879? And of course there was also the sad news today that Stephen Hawkings passed away this morning. (Source) In honor of all of this I thought it was time to share the pile of science books I have been collecting!! We will look at experiments, the human body, pinball, dinosaurs, underwater and space. Plus some of these books have ties to Women's History Month and more!! We will start with dinosaurs since chronologically that makes sense. The book is from the series Science Comics and it is Dinosaurs: Fossils and Feathers by M.K. Reed and illustrated by Joe Flood.
Disclosure: I was sent these books in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Last week I shared the first half of my mega science book reviews. I promised the second half of the mega review this week and today is the day!! Last week we focused on general science, transportation and space. This week it is plants and animals. We will start with How Plants and Trees Work by Christiane Dorion and illustrated by Beverley Young.
Disclosure: I was sent these books in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. This Saturday we are going to STEM Saturday at Hazel's school. In honor of STEM Saturday I am sharing several science books with you. We will cover animals, plants, space and more!! Are you ready? We will start with some general science and information books. Our first book is What Would Happen? by Crispin Boyer.
Disclosure: I was sent copies of these books free of charge to review. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation. Let's have a staring contest! Ready!! This is the concept of our first book, Don't Blink by Tom Booth.
Disclosure:Candlewick Press gave me a copies of these books free of charge to review. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation. Friday was Hazel's last school day!! So we have begun our summer vacation!! Today I am going to share some books with you that are prefect for summer!! So if you are looking for some summertime fun reading check these books out. The first book is And Then Comes Summer by Tom Brenner and illustrated by Jaime Kim.
Disclosure:I was sent these books to review free of charge in exchange for an honest review. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. Saturday is Earth Day and to get ready for it, we have been having fun with many different books that go along with the Earth Day theme. I started sharing some on butterflies with you last night. Today we have many more on different themes. We will start with 23 Ways to be an Eco Hero by Isabel Thomas.
Disclosure: I
was sent these products free of charge. All opinions in my review are my
own and I did not receive any other compensation. As always I am
providing links to the book for your convenience.
Hazel counted the days and realized she has eleven days of summer vacation left. We are trying to enjoy all of them!! So today we are going to share some animal fun with great activity books and kits!! Let's start with Disney Zootopia Collector's Tin.
Disclosure: I
was sent these books free of charge. All opinions in my review are my
own and I did not receive any other compensation. As always I am
providing links to the book for your convenience.
Have you seen Disney Pixar's Finding Dory yet? Hazel and I went to see it this weekend. We loved it. It has of course put us in the mood for ocean life!! Today we are sharing three different under the sea activity books/kits. But first a quick fun and easy craft that we did at Lakeshore Learning on Saturday before going to the movie. We made talking fish or fish clips. They had the fish shapes cut in two pieces to decorate and then glue to a clothespin. Hazel made the rainbow fish!!
Disclosure:Candlewick Press
gave me a copy of these books free of charge to review. All opinions in my review
are
my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my
reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.
We have been having so much fun with animal books from Candlewick Press lately. We looked at insects, emus and hippos, Australian animals, bears and endangered animals and kangaroos. Today we are sharing two more animal books. The first is a fun book with many animals who are trying to figure out what the big blue thing on the hill is and how to get rid of it and the second is about seals.
Disclosure:Lark Crafts
gave me a copy of this book free of charge for this review. All opinions in my review
are
my own and I did not receive any other compensation. They also sent me a copy to giveaway! As in all my
reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.
We have been having a heat wave here in Massachusetts this week. It ended today with some much needed rain. However it made me not want to give up the feeling of summer. Hazel is back in school now and I actually took a part-time job to fill my days a bit while she is there, but I still want summer back. How about you? Well I found a wonderful way to preserve some beach memories and they are from Coastal Crafts by Cynthia Shaffer.
I fell in love with many of the crafts in this book. I love the candle on the cover, but could not find the right jar for it. I'm still looking. We do not need anymore pillows, so I skipped those for now as well. We did however enjoy making some stationary. Some of the book stationary are pictured on the back cover.
Now Hazel and I frequent our local Gymboree store often. Someone Steve graduated from high school works there and through our visits to her we have gotten to know basically the whole staff. Hazel feels at home there and loves to go in to see if there is anything new in stock. She loves their clothes and has quite a few. A couple of weeks ago we noticed the Starfish Wish Two-Piece Short Pajamas .
Last week I chaperoned Hazel's class field trip to Seacoast Science Center in New Hampshire. It was a fun place for the kids to learn even more about the ocean and really end their ocean unit. They ended it the next day with watching Finding Nemo. Hazel liked the science center better. The time at the science center began with a demonstration/class for the kids. First an employee presented about tide pools and the animals found at different levels of the tide pool and then they divided the kids into two groups to have some hands-on experience with the animals.
Disclosure:NCircle Entertainment gave me a copy of the DVD free of charge and is supplying
the one for the giveaway free of charge. All opinions in my review are
my own and I did not receive any other compensation.
Today I get to review a wonderful Octonauts DVD. The Octonauts is among one of Hazel's favorite shows. She recently told me she wants to be a scientist who studies animals when she grows up. (Of course her idea of what she wants to be changes all the time at this age.) She loves any show that helps her learn about animals. The Octonauts is one of them. It amazes me the information she retains from the show. Every once in awhile she will come out with one of the animal facts. I love it!
The DVD we are reviewing today is The Octonauts: Deep Sea Mission. Its official release date is September 2nd, however there was an early release on August 5th through Walmart and Sam's Club. If you follow the link you will be taken there. Of course you can pre-order the DVD and find all the other Octonauts DVDs and other great DVDs at NCircle Entertainment's website. Now as I mentioned Octonauts are one of Hazel's favorites. She loves learning about the animals and the six episodes on this DVD are wonderful. They explore the Midnight Zone and the creatures that live in the deepest part of the water. I love the fact that Hazel knows about the Midnight Zone and knows some animals. I'll admit every once in awhile I google one of the creatures just to make sure they are actual creatures and not just made up, because I have not heard of them. (I recently googled spookfish from one of the episodes on this DVD. The images on Google are great, but none that I can legally use here, so you will have to Google it yourself.)
Disney Junior has some of the creatures from Octonauts available as color sheets and creature information cards. They have not kept up with all of their seasons though. Above is the one of the spookfish. Hazel had fun coloring it. Another part of watching all the Octonauts episodes and DVDs that I love is that Hazel wants to explore more sea creatures. Our public library recently had a program with The Whale Mobile. This is a group of people who come to a location with a life size model of a real humpback whale that has been seen off the coast of Massachusetts and you can go inside the model and see the size of things like the heart, lungs, stomach and ribs. It is so neat. They teach a bit about whales. It was really interesting. To give you an idea of the whale here is a picture of Hazel next to its head.
I love this DVD and all the Octonauts DVDs for the lessons they teach Hazel and how they get her so curious about the sea. Yes, our dinner conversations are sometimes about which is the largest creature in the sea. And yes, Steve and I are learning from watching them with her. And we actually enjoy the shows unlike some children's shows.
Now I get to offer you a chance to win this amazing DVD. Follow the Rafflecopter and enter to win! Winners must live in the USA or Canada and be 18 and over and follow the rest of my Giveaway Rules. Good luck!!
Disclosure: I was sent these craft items to review
free of charge from Oriental Trading.
All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive
any other compensation for this review. I added links to the particular
products for your convenience, but not for any compensation.
So while at Cape Cod last week, Hazel and I were in one of our favorite shops and I saw a pretty wreath made with white starfish. It looked very simple. It was a chipboard wreath form painted white with white starfish glued all over it. I showed it to my mother and Hazel and said we could make that. The owner of the store even commented how he considered getting out his glue gun to make one. I think it was on sale for about $17 dollars. I remembered the wonderful starfish I had received from Oriental Trading and thought let's make one when we get home.
Disclosure: I was sent these craft items to review
free of charge from Oriental Trading.
All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive
any other compensation for this review. I added links to the particular
products for your convenience, but not for any compensation. Well, Hazel and I went to visit my parents this week and I got lazy on here. Sorry. I started writing a post last night, but never finished it. I'll safe it for next week. Of course visiting my parents always brings beach ideas since they live on Cape Cod. Although we did not go to the beach this trip, we did check out one of our favorite stores that always has fun shell artwork. We are inspired to do even more with these products that Oriental Trading sent us.
Disclosure:NCircle Entertainment gave me a copy of the DVD free of charge and is supplying
the one for the giveaway free of charge. All opinions in my review are
my own and I did not receive any other compensation.
Now Hazel loves the Octonauts. It is one of her favorite shows to watch and she is so excited they are now making Octonauts DVD's and even more excited that we got a copy of the latest one to review before it is released on June 24th. Its suggested retail price is $12.99.
Octonauts: Calling All Sharks! has six episodes of The Octonauts on it including Cookiecutter Sharks, Giant Jelly, Lost Lemon Shark, Hungry Pilot Fish, Dwarf Lantern Shark, and Porcupine Puffer. Although Hazel has seen all of these episodes on television, she still loves to watch them and loves that she can watch them any time she wants. I love having her watch this DVD since each episode teaches about a sea creature. She loves learning about them. She actually has been telling me and testing me on facts she learns from the show. Plus I actually do not mind watching this show with her and neither does Steve, so needless to say we are all happy to have the DVD to watch with her.
Since so many of these episodes involve sharks, I thought I would share our shark exploration crafts again. We showed the layers of teeth in one craft and the feel of their skin in the second one.
Now NCircle Entertainment has also been kind enough to give away a copy to one of you. All you have to do to enter is follow the steps of the Rafflecopter and my Giveaway Rules. This contest is open to US and Canada residents!
Disclosure: I was sent the seahorse craft kit to review
free of charge from Oriental Trading.
All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive
any other compensation for this review. I added links to the particular
products for your convenience, but not for any compensation.
