Ms. Amy's Blog @Child Central Station

It is hard to believe that it is really spring around here, with all of the recent snow fall! However, when you live in Upper Michigan- if you are going to have a good harvest- you need to think spring and garden even when the snow keeps falling! I am so excited to be co-hosting  this lovely BLOG HOP with The Usual Mayhem to get me energized and thinking spring!  I was raised on a hobby farm- and my dad taught me that you start your seedlings on St. Urho's Day, unless of course you are Irish- then you start them a day later on St. Patrick's Day.  Our sprouts have been doing exceptionally well- and we have 2 greenhouses up and running with all of the plants! You see- most of the time, when we plant with the children- we end up with A LOT of sprouts. Typically when I would put in 1 or 2 seeds- they often use 5 or 6. Then, when all of the seeds take- voila- massive amount of plants to separate and transplant. I think we have about 70 tomato plants going...

Our square foot garden is growing like CRAZY! (One of our sun flowers is somewhere between 9 and 10 feet tall! I think we need a ladder to measure!) The cauliflower is growing.... We have PUMPKINS growing vertically!!!! Fresh broccoli is also on the way! I would have never imagined that crowding things in a square foot garden would be so productive! Look at all of these fresh tomatoes! We've already harvested a couple of cucumbers, summer squash, and beans! YUM! Yeah for summer, and yeah for square foot gardening!

We've been busy. I try to share a glimpse of what is going on regularly, but sometimes it seems like there is just so much more to share! Tonight, I'm going to give you a few quick photo updates! We are still going full force with our fort building . The children have been working hard on their indoor forts, but have also begun to work on plans for some outdoor building. The prospect of spring being right around the corner does not look good. We have a five day forecast that includes wintry mixes and chances of snow. We had a lot of fun playing with our food again. We "painted" our waffles with a few drops of food coloring added to water. (Make sure to use new, clean paint brushes.)  Dane had a great time at the pinewood derby. His car "kept coming in fourth" (of four cars in the wolf division.) He was so excited to have a cool car and to receive a participation medal. He still isn't interested in making a car to win, he is much more interested in...

If you've been following along, you'll know that we started to sprout a few seeds about a week and a half ago. In Upper Michigan, starting seeds indoors is almost a necessity considering that the outdoor growing season is so short. You can see the start of our project here .  We have been taking photos daily to document our observations. ( You can see our full photo stream on Facebook.) After about 9 days of sprouting in the plastic bags in the window, our peas and beans were ready to be moved to dirt. The children did a great job planting the sprouts in our fiber pots. We have been watering them daily with our spray bottles. The children have been carefully observing the changes and growth of the seedlings. We have also been testing another experiment with some seeds. We planted a bean seed in each of these test tubes: water, sand, and soil. (This photos if from day seven of the experiment. We take a photo with a number each day so that we will have a record of ...

We've been having unreal temperatures around here for this time of year. Yesterday it was 61 degrees Farenheit! Can you believe it, 61 degrees in February in Marquette! The sun was shining and the snow was melting like crazy. We had all kinds of "slush puddles" (the snow form or mud puddles) to jump in! Tomorrow it is supposed to be in the mid-to-low 30s with "FLASH FREEZING" It is crazy how our weather changes around here! Many of us have been soaking up as many rays of sun as possible, as winter seems to go on forever around here! Being that we could not all escape to a tropical island, we decided to bring one home. (Well, a small piece of one...) For Valentine's Day, we bought a palm! It has been a wonderful welcomed addition to the area a top our stairs. The bright blue sea color with a wonderful palm puts us on our own little island if even just for a moment! The children are loving it. Of course, they think that we need a few more so that we can ha...

This is a photo of a milkweed plant. In June, I asked my dad if he thought that they had any growing on their 40-acre farm. I wanted to have a place to gather some for food in the case that we were able to get some monarch caterpillars from a friend of mine. When I finally took the time to look up milkweed plants, I came to realize that I've been killing milkweed all summer long. It keeps sprouting up in my flower beds and I have been pulling those weeds!!! GAAAAAAAAACKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK! Live and learn, I guess. Fortunately, my darling hubby thought that they looked pretty cool and let a patch of them grow near our shed and near one of the liloc bushes. Now, we don't need to have someone bring us monarch caterpillars, we have been able to find our own! Here is Dane pointing to a tiny little egg sitting on the back of this leaf. We gathered some eggs and some tiny little caterpillars to watch them transform with all of the children. Most of them are quite small. The largest one f...

One of my favorite activities to do in the warmer months is recycling paper. We save all of the unclaimed art and scraps of paper from other projects in a big tote. When we have a large amount, we fill the sensory table with scraps of paper and scissors. This first stage of the process often takes a day or so. The children are given the opportunity to come and go, cutting and ripping whenever they choose. (Some people use a paper shredder if their goal is make homemade paper. We try to do our without the aid of electrical tools.) In order to make great paper, it is necessary to cut the paper into tiny pieces. The smaller the better. This give the children ample opportunity to work with scissors and to tear paper which is very important to building their fine motor skills. We cut and we tore, and we cut and we tore... (You will notice that the majority of the paper is white. We usually reuse our colored scraps for other projects adding only a small amount into our recyclin...