Playing Uno

One of our favourite games is UNO. This time we tried to say the numbers and colours in Spanish. After Austyn tried a magic trick.

Inspired by Angry Bird RIO iPad Game

 Austyn gets inspired by movies or games sometimes when he is thinking up things to build or play. This is a game he made that was  inspired by a popular iPad game. He made the birds to hurl through the air.

Austyn made a bunch of built up obstacles to topple with the birds.

 Here is what the game is, in case you are interested. It's based on a movie that is going to be released soon.


Here is the movie trailer.

Isn't it interesting how something that doesn't really seem like an important activity (video games) can turn into something amazing!

Canadian Pioneers Mini Co-Op - Week One

We had our first Pioneer Co-Op. It was fun! The turnout was great! This is the group watching and answering questions about Little House On The Prairie. This is an American story but similar to our own Canadian Pioneer Living.

We set up pioneer craft stations. There ended up being two cloth doll making stations. The kids learned that the pioneers made their own toys and couldn't go to a Walmart to purchase them. They usually used scraps that they had left from clothes to make dolls for their children.

They learned about corn dolls and about how the pioneers in Canada believed that they were for good luck for the next growing season. Here they are making their own small corn dolls.

They learned that children made games to play. Here they are weaving a little basket with yarn to play a game. We had to improvise on some of the items that kids used in the old days because we couldn't get them right now cheap enough (ie. peach pits). They will continue this project at home and/or next week. 

The kids got to play Pioneer games. Bobbing for apples was fun.

They played an indoor version of horse shoes. The weather didn't cooperate. 

They played an altered version of this Snap Apple. In pioneer times we'd use apples but to switch it up a bit we used doughnuts.

There are always kids who need something to do. They either aren't interested in an activity, are too young for it, or just need a break. They can go to this corner to play. We had log cabins to build and little puzzle boards to weave strings through.

I spent most of my time in the kitchen talking to the kids about how the pioneers would bake their own bread and we also talked about what they might have used for food colouring. We didn't have an oven so I used this simple recipe for making play-dough and each of them took a bag of play-dough home.

Junior Scrabble

Today we played Junior Scrabble, but it was a milestone for Austyn. We used the advanced side! He did fine, but I did help a bit. He had a hard time getting use to the idea that he had to use a letter already on the board and he had trouble visualizing the word when it ran vertically down the board instead of horizontal. He did a great job for the first time and his spelling is great even with little formal practice.

I should mention that he had another milestone. He usually hollers for someone to come in the room and read the screen when he is playing a video game but today he decided it would be easier if he just read it himself. He was so excited about this that he was hollering down the stairs telling me all about it. LOL!

“It should be noted that the games of children are not games, and must be considered as their most serious actions.”~ Michel de Montaigne