Of dead rats and eyeballs.

The dissecting began tonight. Ainsley's first words this morning were "When is Daddy goin' be home to dissect?"

It was a longish day.

When Matt got home, the girls had the craft table cleared and set up for dissecting. He'd told them he'd do one of each of their specimens tonight (they each picked two from the magazine). Hannah picked her cow eyeball and Ains picked her rat, and they got started.

Did you see that? Over there on the left hand side? Here's a close-up.

Damn, he's cute! Sat there through the whole thing, giggling and pointing and trying (unsuccessfully) to get his hands on innards.

I wasn't sure how the girls would go from the idea of dissecting to the actual act of dissecting. We were ready for them to sign out as soon as they realized that they'd have to cut into these things. Not hardly. They are their Daddy's kids.

They were so excited to see the body parts that they'd learned about through computer games and board games.

This first time, they were simply interested in organs (below is Hannah inspecting the small intestines) and the bones ("Can I pull out the bones?" said Ainsley - definitely their daddy's children).

But my husband, he's very knowledgeable and one little question would lead to lengthy answers and even diagrams drawn on the paper table cover.

Which led to Hannah abandoning the rat for her cow eyeball

and Ainsley explaining things back to him - in hilarious three-year-old fashion - with her own diagrams.

Luckily, he realized what was happening and sucked Hannah back in with lungs and a heart. Not often you get to type that sentence out. ("I'll look," she said, "but I won't listen. That's boring and I want to do the eyeball.")

He had them being really hands-on (not that he could stop them) and they loved handling the different organs and cutting them open to look inside. It was really fascinating and I wished that Matt could have kept talking as in-depth as he had been because I was learning a lot.

But it was time to move on to the eyeball. Talk about fascinating. Matt explained to Hannah what different parts had malfunctioned in her Grandpa and Great-Grandpa's eyes which was cool. We learned so much about how the eye works by taking it apart, consulting the eye dissection pamphlet, and handling the different parts.

It was perplexing at times.
And required some up-close inspection.

It was fun.

"Now I want to do the snake!" said Ainsley.

Not tonight. After clean-up, it was time for dinner. During dinner Ains got busy making .... something.

What is it? "It's a spaceship for Donald Duck. It's a swirly twirly spaceship so he can get around."

That's all I got.

It was a science kind of a day - plus we went outdoors.

If I had to classify most of our days around here, I'd say they were artsy kind of days, full of dancing and singing and crafting and pretending. But not yesterday.

Yesterday had a very scientific feel about it. It started out while I was milking the goats and Hannah asked me how the goats make milk and if we fed them chocolate, couldn't that make them make chocolate milk? Makes sense, with the way I explained it to her.

Then we came inside and while I made macaroons, she and Ains made their own special candy using anything that looked like it would be good. Cinnamon sticks, sugar, chocolate chips, salt, candy sprinkles, soy sauce, lemon juice and baking soda.

Lemon juice and baking soda.

That was science right there. Bubbly candy!

Then, as I was doing dishes, I hear 'Let me move it farther your way. Now get on it. We're balanced now!' - on the teepee poles.

Then playing a new game that we just got.

And then again and again. With Ainsley putting lungs on feet and noses on shoulders and kidneys on knees. Lots of giggling.

Gray putting a screwdriver in every screw he could find around the house.

After dinner we opened the big ol' box we got from Home Science Tools.

That was exciting.

Those, my friends, are dissection boards. Dissection boards. I don't dissect. I tell myself I'm morally opposed to it, but it may just not be my thing. I certainly feel morally opposed to it. So the cow eyeball, crayfish, and snake that are sitting in bags on my table? The girl's father can help them with those.

But we got other things too. Things like scales and weights.

And so much more. A portion of our homeschooling budget, well spent.

It was rainy, cold, windy, and snowy. SNOWY. Apart from chores and horse riding we didn't get outside much. But I'm participating in the Outdoor Challenge, so I'll document what we did do. There was dog training to be done,

and pushing around wheelbarrows.

Very important, that.

Of peat moss and oil.

And salt and water.

Today was water play day, apparently.

Seeking to contain it somewhat, I remembered some Steph's water experiments from a (long) while back.

First we did the hot water/cold water experiment which was 'awesome' for them when the two colors combined and made purple, and so cool for me when we switched hot to the top and the colors wouldn't mix. At their age, the girls were not so impressed. "So the colors stay separate. That's not exciting, they were already separate. It's only awesome when they join together and make purple."

Then we did salt volcanoes. Water and oil and salt make magic. And mini lava lamps.

Very, very cool. Had to do that one many times. The water gets saturated with salt pretty fast when you have three kids playing.

Then they played with the food dye. "Look, we made roots!"

They made brown water. Which Ainsley had to study.

That magnifying glass is an extension of her hand.

Because we were on a roll, we moved on to our experiment package from The Young Scientists Club.

My father got us this once-a-month subscription as a Christmas present this year. Best. Present. Ever. (Except for that little tool set he made for Hannah when she was three years old that had real tools and wood. That girl didn't go anywhere without her hammer and screwdriver for months.) He asked me what I wanted, saying that he'd prefer it to be an 'educational' gift. I'd been looking into this program for awhile because it reminded me of one that he was subscribed to when *I* was a kid. We used to get these packages in the mail and they'd have the best experiments in them - I still think of them every time I see a manila envelope. Those experiments (if I remember right) were aimed towards teenagers (I only ever got to watch them being done - that's what happens when you're #8) and these are aimed towards younger kids, though I think a bit older than my girls.

Last week we got our first kit. As the first kit, it included a little magnifying glass, ruler, notepad, and even ... a sand dollar. Random. But very welcome.

This first kit was filled with recycling experiments.

First we expanded peat moss pellets in water. This was surprisingly (or not, when you think about it) exciting for the girls, to watch these solid, thin circles become large, squishy, dirt-filled nets.

To one of these we added carrot peels and to the other we added a small piece of plastic bag. Actually, a piece of one of the plastic bags that the peat moss came in. Hannah has predicted that at the end of the week, when we check on them, the carrot peels will still be there and the plastic bag will be decomposing. This should be interesting.

Next we made paper. From paper. The irony of this was not lost on my five-year-old. "Why are we making new brown paper from a brown paper bag? Why not just write on the bag?"

Quit thinking and do the experiment.

The pulp was fun to play in. We had to use the next batch for paper.

So after blending and shaping ...

we had two 'new' sheets of paper drying.

Included in the package were four pieces of brand new colored paper that they said you could use to make new colored paper. That did not go unnoticed by my daughter either. "I thought they were teaching us how *not* to waste." Bear in mind, this is the girl that drives her daddy crazy because she doesn't want him to throw anything away. "I might be able to use it for an art project."

It didn't escape my attention either that included in this 'recycle/take care of the earth' package there were no less than four plastic envelopes.

They recommended using the new paper that you made as labels on recycling boxes. Problem is, we don't buy pop (so no aluminum or plastic there), we save our large yogurt containers for potting veggie starts in the spring, we save most other plastic buckets (like ice cream buckets) to organize stuff in the craft room or the shed... We buy very little prepackaged food, so all of that wrapping is nonexistent. Any paper goes to the fireplace. Any organic matter goes to the compost pile. We're still looking for something to recycle.

Now I'm going to sift through the links on the company's 'Kit 1' page and see if there are any other cool experiments to do.

It was a fun experiment package, but I expect the next ones to be much more exciting. And we have a sand dollar.

Wooly Weather.

Our nearest city was hosting a 'Cabin Fever' day and one of the activities was a weather show at the planetarium.

The planetarium? There's a planetarium? Awkward. My constellation loving child (see: Family Dog Named After Her Favorite Constellation) would probably have loved that back when she was obsessed with them.

So we went to the weather show, Hannah and I. On the way there, she listened to three or four books on tape that I'd randomly chosen at the library - Orcas, fables, and Wooly Mammoths. After the Mammoth book, she said "I want to go to a building where they have lots of dinosaur bones all set up so that we can look at them. Can we do that?" Sure, honey, I'll look into it. I already have some ideas (thank you Steph!).

Then we walked into the museum/planetarium and look what greeted us.

I was in a state of giddy shock, as was Hannah. Serendipitous, indeed.

Hannah wanted me to take a picture of her by it's leg. "It could crush 25 people! It could even crush my daddy!"

We have never been in this small museum before - didn't even know of its existence. It has quite a few fun things. Footprints,

skulls,

big teeth.
We're going back. There are two more rooms we didn't explore. One of those we won't be exploring with the girls until their current exhibit is gone. Check it.

Go ahead, click on it to blow it up. "High Plains Hamlet", they call it. "An Idaho Frontier Tragedy." Gruesome, I call it. Cowboy and Native skeletons riding horses. A dead Native - or white guy, I didn't get close enough to see which it was - with arrows all over him, including one sticking out of his groin. A massive poster with scalped men. I don't even want to know how many bakus we would need around her bed to combat what she would see in that room.

So, yeah, she didn't go in that room.

Butterfly camouflage project. And a few magic tricks.

My official entry for Ordinary Life Magic's science experiment extravaganza. (This drawing goes until December 31, so you have a few weeks - even a week after Christmas - to get yours done.)

Last week, I was flipping through my Janice VanCleave Big Book of Play and Find Out Science Projects when I was overpowered by two little girls who saw me flip past - wait for it - BUTTERFLIES!!! I didn't stand a chance. So we did a camouflage project that involved two of Hannah's favorite things - paint and butterflies.

First we grabbed a piece of construction paper. No drab, realistic browns for my girls. Pink was the order of the day. We cut a four inch strip off the top, folded it in half and cut a butterfly wing shape.

Then we put a drop of paint on one wing and closed the wings to make symmetrical dots - blobs, really - on each side.

While the paint was drying, we cut leaf shapes out of the remaining portion of paper...

and used a few pipe cleaners to give our clothespins antennae and legs.

Ainsley pulled one of those "Wow. Really!?!" moments when she turned her leaf over and drew two circles on it. "What is that?" I asked. "It a capillar in a cocoon," she answered, "when I turn over leaf, there will be a buttuhfy." All right, then.

When the butterflies were dry, we put them on our leaves with the wings folded up,

and then with the wings flat,

to show why butterflies keep their bright markings on the top of their wings.

Then we put the wings in the clothespins for some cute butterflies.

Cute craft, and educational too! Probably not what Ms. VanCleave *or* Ms. Stephanie had in mind, but at this house, 'tis what you get. It's the stage we're in. Please tell me it will pass.

That evening, Hannah wanted to do a magic show. This included two of her favorite tricks - baking soda and vinegar explosions and putting out a candle without blowing on it (covering it with a jar). She asked for a new trick, so I taught her one that also uses a flame in a jar.

Did you know that you can pull water from a plate up into a jar that's top-down on the plate?

First, gather a plate with a lip, water, a small piece of cardboard, small, crumpled piece of newspaper, match, and a jar that will fit over the cardboard and inside the plate. Pour the water into the plate up to the edge of the lip.

Put the jar on the plate upside down to show that little, if any, water goes into the jar. Take the jar back off the plate.

Now here you have to start working quickly. Put the cardboard piece on the water and put the crumpled newspaper on top.

Light the newspaper on fire and quickly, but gently, put the upside-down jar over the newspaper so that the flame is inside.

As the flame burns the paper and eats up the oxygen inside the jar, it creates a vacuum that sucks the water up into the jar.

And there you have it.