It was botany day at the Front Porch Library–some days I feel ridiculously ambitious.
We began with a non-botanical read aloud, “The Water Gift and the Pig of the Pig,” a title so long I was amazed the publisher allowed it. It was a book about a man with the gift of finding water with a dousing stick and the offspring of the pig (the pig of the pig) that had gone around Cape Horn with the man when he lived on water. That brought on a discussion of dousing…and pigs.
I then boldly set out images of the different types of leaves from simple, to compound, to bi-pinnately compound. Palmate leaves, alternate and opposite leaves–then we went out to collect. Olivia found a leaf long enough to double as a jump rope–one that could easily accommodate two jumpers. Brianna found the bi-pinnately compound, Nandina–a fairly invasive plant but a great example of bpc leaves.

Some of the kids have a love-hate relationship with nature. It is hard work creating enthusiasm for mold, collapsing acorns, worms, but I tried.
Time to change direction. Alex and Charlie cleared a table for Scrabble. Charlie worked the add-an-S angle beautifully.
Briana, Olivia and Klark sat at the other table and I broke out food colors and tubes of marzipan (told you it was a real shift). Briana made an ostrich with a chick in the nest at its feet (a pair of chopsticks died in the making of the legs)/ Olivia made a mermaid tail that sat upside down on the table as if the tail was just breaking the water. Klark made a brown blob and a purplish blob. He mashed the two together and went back to experimenting with the (okay, I have no idea what it is called, but it is that glass-ball thingy that looks like it has lightning in it) The boys enjoyed the mild shocks and passing the shocks on to each other.
It was an exuberant gathering, and I have the upside-down and leafy living room to prove it!