Sharing Saturday 13-34

Thank you to all of you who shared with us last week and to those who came to be inspired by the amazing ideas shared! If you haven't had a chance to visit them, you should!! I know I am exciting to try out some of the activities.

Now that the end of August is upon us, I have decided I cannot pretend summer is not ending anymore. Well the end of August and Hazel starts school this coming week. So, in honor of her school starting, I figured I would feature a few of my favorite back to school posts from last week (there were quite a few, but I just picked three to share with you).

1) From For the Love of Spanish: Back to School en Espanol // School Supply Flashcards in Spanish
2) From Rubber Boots and Elf Shoes: How to Build a Classroom
3) From Jelly Fish Jelly: Notebook Handbag

Here are a couple of my favorite non-school posts. Ok, Hazel would LOVE both of these!!

1) From Making Memories with Your Kids: DIY Lipstick made with Crayons
2) From We Made That: DIY Washer Necklaces

Then we had two posts about postcards. Since they were on an unusual topic, I figured I would share them with you!

1) From Wesens-Art: Video Cases for Storage
2) From The Crafty Scientist: Louisiana Postcard Art

Thank you to everyone who shared last week!! I hope you will join us and share again!! If you are featured here , please feel free to grab a featured button to display proudly on your blog. 

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From Your Hostess:
This week we shared some great DIY party crafts and reviewed Shindigz Party Supplies, shared our second Donald Crews book for Virtual Book Club for Kids, shared an Algerian Snow White, shared some great books for math lessons in nature, shared our homemade xylophone and shared a great story on friendship for Flamingo Friday.

 

We have some exciting things coming up this week!! I cannot wait to share my post on Sunday with you, so I hope you will stop by tomorrow!

 

Now for This Week's Party  
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Flamingo Friday--Fish and Flamingo: A wonderful story of an unusual friendship

Today I am going to share a book Hazel and I have been enjoying. It is a tale of an unusual friendship between a flamingo and a fish. The book is called the Fish and Flamingo and is written by Nancy White Carlstrom. The two became friends and talked every day about their lives. One day the flamingo tells the fist about flying at sunrise and the beautiful pink sky. The fish tells the flamingo about coming to the surface of the water at night time and seeing the glowing stars. Each wishes to show their friend the beauty they have seen, but do not know how to do it since the friend is not awake at the correct time.

One day the flamingo tells the fish that she will be leaving with her flock the next day. She tells him to be at the same spot at the same time the next day since she will be flying overhead and will wave to him. The fish is so excited and he tells all his friends and has them come with him. 

At the time the flamingo flies over with her flock, the fish and his friends look up and see a pink sky. The fish thinks that his friend has found a way to show him the sunrise and finds it so beautiful. The flamingo looks down and sees many fish and as the sun comes out the silver on each fish sparkles and the flamingo thinks the fish is giving her the gift of seeing the stars. 

Neither friend knows that they have given their gift to one another, but they both feel so honored that the other has.

For this book, we tried out soft pastels. Hazel immediately drew a sun and I suggested we draw the sunrise. She and I added pink and smudged it all together. Then I worked on the ocean. I made it blue and then added some silver. The silver did not shine enough, so we added some glitter glue to be the fish showing the flamingos the stars. I loved how it came out and how well it goes with the story.

Making Musical Instruments--Homemade Xylophone

We found a fun book at the library. In Nifty Thrifty Music Crafts by Felicia Lowenstein Niven has wonderful ideas to take recycled objects and make music. Many of the ideas are familiar, but some have new twists. Hazel cannot wait to make a ukulele, but we need to finish our box of cereal first. This book also has rhythm blocks, panpipes, finger cymbals, colonial drum, American Indian clapper, tambourine, rain stick, maracas and a ukulele. We are definitely going to try the ukulele at some point. I also like the rhythm blocks, but we will see. Anyway we started with the xylophone. 

Now we have a xylophone, but making one is part of the fun of the homemade one. To make one you need empty jars, a wooden stick (chopstick, pencil or a stick) and water. You can also have food coloring--Hazel will tell you this is one of the best parts.

You fill the jars with different amounts of water and can add food coloring to each one. We made different colors in each one and tried mixing colors to practice what colors would make the secondary colors. We used different jar sizes, but they could all be the same.

Then you hit the jars with the stick to play it. Hazel had the best time experimenting. She tried hitting the sides where the water was, the sides where the water was not and the tops. Then she asked if we could put the lids on. Apparently I did not take a picture of this, but in this picture you can see the lids all around.

With the lids on she hit the sides and the lids to see if they made different sounds. She had so much fun with this activity. She did not want to dump it out so she could play for Daddy. She also asked if we could do it again. My little musician is always happy making music.

Needless to say, we will be doing this again. I think she liked the homemade one better than her store bought one.

Math Lessons: Math in Nature

Today I am sharing some books to combine math with nature. Now as a math teacher I know the importance of seeing math everywhere. It allows the student to really see why mathematics was invented. People needed to understand the world around them and mathematics helped them do this. 

Donald Crews Part 2: Ten Black Dots

We have a winner!! Congratulations to Doreen W. for winning the Room on the Broom DVD!

Today I am going to share our second book for this month's author in the Virtual Book Club for Kids. This month's author is Donald Crews. Last week we shared Carousel. This week we are going to share Ten Black Dots. If you do not know anything about the Virtual Book Club for Kids, you can check out my post last week or click the button on the left which will take you to the Book Club's Facebook page.