A Book, A Craft, and a Plate with Kate

Ready for the next selection in our summer book club?

I chose one of my all time favorite books off of our home book

shelf....by one of our favorite authors,Lynne Cherry

Our Book..

How Groundhog's Garden Grew

Now, if you are not lucky enough to own this book,

go get it out of your library, but I have to tell you,

you are going to want to keep it.

We have groundhogs here in New Jersey,also called woodchucks,

in our yard in fact, and I sure wish someone would teach ours to

grow his own, instead of eating mine.lol

Our Craft..

This week we will be making a book mark for our summer reading club.

I will be using this pattern for a Groundhog book mark.

but feel free to go all crafty and do something like this instead.

I will also have Princess spending time out in our garden drawing

what's growing out there this week, as well as some of the wildlife,

so feel free to expand on this idea as much as you want.If the arts/crafts stuff doesn't do it for your child, how about appealing to their little scientist, I know they've got one in them.

Perhaps, you can have your children save seeds from whatever you are harvesting from

your home garden right now.

Please remember, this is not a competition. This is about sharing books

with our children and having a little fun while we do it. If you just want to read

the book together, that is fine too. So jump in, read the book, do the craft, and eat a a snack.

Take pictures of how it looks in your corner of the world, and link back here on Wednesday.

Our snack, or Plate portion this week will be a zucchini muffin

like this or these.

We have way more zucchini than I can remember in a long time, and

I need to cook them, but Princess L-O-V-E-S them.

I often take any recipe for a muffin, and add zucchini or other veg

to it..they never go to waste. I shred my zucchini and freeze in containers for during the winter

when I can add them to almost anything I am cooking for her, and of course more muffins!

My legal department (The Law Offices of Mouserman and Meowerstein),
insists that I put another disclaimer here:

I AM NOT A PROFESSIONAL, PLEASE TRY THIS AT HOME!
((BIG HUGS))KateinNJ

PLEASE DO NOT FORGET..THERE IS STILL TIME TO ENTER

THE JUMPSTART GIVEAWAY Princess will be pulling a name out

of her hat on Monday July 20th as soon as she wakes up.

That means you lovely readers have until midnight NJ time (EST)

To leave a comment here or on the post about it, telling me you want it.

You can also write a blog post about the giveaway, linking back here

and let me know you did so, or become a "fan" of Jump Start on Facebook.

Please let me know if you do any of the above..you get an entry for each one.

Good Luck..I just know your children will enjoy the new virtual world they have created

as much as Princess does.

A Book,A Craft, and a Plate with Kate

Welcome to this week's edition of A Book, a Craft, and a Plate with Kate This week we read A Summertime Song, painted water colors for our craft,

and made strawberry ice cream for our snack (or plate).

Princess was happy to have a surprise visit from her Nana as we got

started painting in the backyard.

She hung the paintings on the garden fence to dry...

Here is our home made strawberry ice cream....

If you joined in, please put your link

to the blog post here...

Jump Start Product Review

Good Morning !
Today I want to share with you my first ever Product Review .
The wonderful people at Knowledge Adventure,makers of Jump Start came to me a while
ago to ask if I would like to have Princess try out their product
and review it on my little blog. Princess loves working and playing on the computer,
so I told them I would love to do it. They sent me the discs (we got 1st & 2ND Grade)
and a 3 month subscription for the Virtual World. Princess loves it!
It teaches over 50 skills, reading,writing and math, logical thinking ..
in a fun way.They take special care to address the variety of learning styles as well.
I even get a report on how she is doing e-mailed to me.
There is even a blog it has great ideas for having fun away from the computer as well.
My feeling is that they really get that many of today's parents want our kids to have the best of both worlds. We do want to use all the great technology available to allow them to learn and explore the world, but we also want them to unplug and really get outside and explore too.

We have been enjoying this learning game a lot, and I would happily recommend it to any of my friends,family and readers. Interested in checking it out for yourself?

I thought you might be, so the wonderful Cherie at Jump Start has offered to give away

a FREE 3 MONTH Subscription to their Virtual World Learning Game to one lucky reader !!

Want to know how to win it? I'm going to give you three chances to win..

1. Just leave me a comment here about how much you'd like to win it.
2. Write a blog post about the contest and link back here (be sure to let me know it)
3. Become a fan of Jump Start on Facebook (again be sure to let me know)
   

I will have Princess pull a winner out of her hat next Monday.

You have until midnight EST to enter.


Here is Princess with her "Jumpy"

Good Luck!!

Life around here

This is a brief synopsis of life around here during my blog break swinging

camp fires

a mysterious visitor (more on him later) we made pizza

The Fourth of July

Time spent outside

National Backyard Camp Out

this is the first year it didn't rain in I can't remember how long..

the fireflies seem to enjoy the company. Here's our camp site in the morning..

A sure sign of Summer

another sure sign..

we found a little splashing pool on clearance

the tent came in handy almost all week...

yoga
snuggling the Pumpkin is always a hit..

monopoly
The Hermit Crabs..can you spot the "naked" one?
Do you ever think about what is going on when your blog friends
are not blogging? I do. Since I was gone from blogland for so very long,
I thought it would only be right to post a bit about what life looked like here
while the DSL was down. There was more,of course, but I thought just this once

I would leave out talk of my tantrums, and concentrate on the pretty bits.

I hope you enjoyed it, and that you will come back tomorrow for my Product Review and Giveaway!!

A Book A Craft, And a Plate with Kate

I'm Baaaack.

The DSL connection has been restored,my sanity is still hanging by a thread,

but I have decided to just jump back in and blog. lol

I hope there is still someone out there reading...I guess we'll see.

This week's reading club selection is...

A Summertime Song

Now, I know some of the boys might find this book a bit "girlie",

but even if they don't care for the book, make the ice cream..

if not strawberry..another flavor. Just do it.

It's summer, and the memory will stay with them all of their days.

I promise you.

The Craft...

watercolor painting

(see below for an alternative for young kids)

If the boys find this too "girly" as well,

how about taking them outside to do their watercolors

Plein Air

of the bull frogs and such?

The Plate..

Homemade Strawberry Ice Cream

recipe

Please don't get overwhelmed, if you've never done it before,trust me,

it is easy. I do it..so can you, don't believe me?

I have links...

how to make ice cream at home

ice cream at home

Still not buying my ideas? Go buy some, serve it up and enjoy!

Really this is supposed to be fun..it's not a test of wills,

it's NOT a competition.

If you join in please come back on Wednesday, when I will have a

lovely link for you so we can all ooh and aah together at how different

the same process can turn out for each family.

Legal Disclaimer...I am NOT a professional..please try this at home!!

Because I was unable to be here last week for the reading club, I give you another craft idea.

Ice Cream Cone Craft

Please come back Monday, when I will have a product review and a GIVEAWAY!!!!