Fairy House and Imagination!

A few months ago, Aubrey asked to build a fairy house like the girl in the new Tinkerbelle movie.  After taking some wood from my dad's workshop (a little too nice for a fairy house, but free), we set to work to try and figure out the simplest way to build a beautiful fairy house.  Of course I had my wonderful husband help out, especially with the power tools!  When it was done, we started painting it as a family.  Aubrey had a lot of fun and was creative with the paint! 

After the fairy house was finished, well, it sat for a couple of months.  Finally, I was inspired enough to help Aubrey find the perfect spot!  She planted a couple of mini-pumpkin seeds outside the garden this year, and she felt that the perfect spot would be by the plants.  When she had placed it where she wanted it, she exlaimed "We need to find stuff that the fairies will like!"  So off we went, gathering pinecones, flowers, and mulberries for the fairies! 

Aubrey helping cut the sides.

Before the paint.

The finished project with fairy offerings!

Beautiful wildflowers by our house!  I couldn't resist including this picture, it will be very refreshing to look at once winter and the snow are here!

Aubrey and her first mini-pumpkin!  She keeps saying "It is gonna be soooo huge, Mom!"  I have had to explain numerous times that it is a mini-pumpkin!

We haven't gone back to check for fairies yet, but I know Aubrey is excited!  I love that this fosters her imagination and creativity.  I'm sure that we will be checking it frequently to see if the fairies have left anything for us.

What's On Our Trays This Week?

After site searching, I am really liking the montessori type of approach for homeschooling Aubrey this year.  I love the independent learning aspect and a simpler approach to learning.  So I took some time and cleared out her toy shelves in our family room.  I picked up six trays from Target and got to work on setting things up for the week.  Since I taught for so many years, I already had ideas of what I wanted to do, but I wanted new and fresh ideas as well.  Between searching the web and looking through some old teaching books, I got the creative spark!  I am really happy with our trays this week.  Aubrey has also been enjoying them! 

The set-up!  The bins and other toys on the cube shelf will stay over the weeks and be swapped out as they get boring.  The trays will be changed weekly.

File Folder Letter Games:  A and B

A and B Letter Puzzles

B Letter Search

Color Farm Animal Matching

Shape Sort and Stack

Folding Washclothes

Peeling Crayons (for crayon melting next week)

Cutting  Between the Stickers (which turned out to be cut out the stickers in circles)

Now that the family room toys have been simplified, I will try tackling her room!  My goal is to store many toys out of site.  That way when she gets bored with toys, I can swap them out!  Good Luck to me!

Linked to: 
 Living Montessori