Caterpillars were this weeks theme. Lucas my 3 yr old loves The Very Hungry Caterpillar book we read it this summer and he was hooked. I have to read it at least once every evening before bed. He can even read it to me as he's memorized the book from me reading it over and over again. I even found a Very Hungry Caterpillar t-shirt in his size on Ebay. Won it for less then $5 including shipping. Sad it's not that popular anymore. It is in this house. I even purchased the book a few weeks ago since I renewed it from the library at my limit.
Here he is in the shirt. We also found a caterpillar car at Kmart of all places. Grandma found a caterpillar stuff at her local Dollar store and mailed it to us. Our dollar store only had one for $5 and it was huge. Point is he looks everywhere for anything caterpillar so I knew this week would be his favorite.
This is our weeks reading list. I found most of them at the library. With the Abraham and Very Hungry Caterpillar being apart of our little growing library at home. To sum up the books: Don't Worry Bear is now on order to purchase. This was Lucas' favorite. It's about a bear and a caterpillar. He loves Winnie the Pooh everything and now Caterpillar everything. I wonder why he likes that one? Hum? giggles. Houdini is cute but more for older children. Edward liked that one best but not enough to own it. Clara Caterpillar was cute. I enjoyed it but the kids not so much. Arabella Miller was cute it all rhymed and I saw the author's fun in writing it but the kids just didn't love it. Abraham was good it basically sums up the Bible story of Abraham. It did scare them when he tried to kill his son. That was the only bad part of that story. If you don't own or have never read the Very Hungry Caterpillar shame on you! Its great you must purchase or go and read it at least once in your lifetime or once for your children's sake. Its a true classic.
Yes those are real live caterpillars. We ordered them during Animals week and they arrived last weekend. We got 10 caterpillars for $10 including shipping. We bought that Butterfly Garden from Ebay. They sell it at Walmart for $14.99 but I paid $9 including shipping from Ebay. All you get is the garden cage for the butterflies and the mail in voucher for the caterpillars. So in all it was $19 for the cage and caterpillars.
Lucas loved the caterpillars and sat on the bar stools most of the days just staring at them like this. He wanted to hold them but I told him you had to leave them alone. He listened and never shook or touched the jars as much as he wanted to. So proud of him. Truly you can't open or touch them or they will die.
Edward wasn't as into them as Lucas was but he did think they were Awesome and Cool!
Watching the little caterpillars. They truly were fascinating and totally worth the $19 paid for the set!
Only after about 3 days they started climbing to the top and hung upside down like a J shape and then they turned into what you see above. Cocoons!
So as soon as they all turned into cocoons we had to transfer them to their cage. This is what you get at Walmart for $14.99. Now you have to wait 7 days or more and their cocoons will become clear and they were emerge as butterflies. Next week's theme is... guess? Butterflies!! That's right!
A snack we made were caterpillar cookies. I took food coloring and dropped some on the bottom of my small bowls from the dollar store and then placed frosting on top. So the boys could enjoy stirring and seeing what colors it will create.
I got this all at my local dollar store. You need white frosting $1, pretzel sticks $1 broke in half, small bite size cookies $1 recommend chocolate chip, food coloring I have in pantry, knifes, and small bowls $1 for a 4 pack at the dollar store. White table cloth $1. I like an easy clean up. While I set up and took pictures the boys worked on caterpillar coloring sheets.
Lucas didn't know what colors to color the caterpillar I told him it didn't matter. He said Mommie yes you have to follow rules! So he went and got his caterpillar that Grandma bought him and colored the sheet using his stuff as a guide. He did this ALL on his own. I felt proud!! Still do. :)
Coloring his caterpillar.
Next we started on those cookies. Lucas' favorite color is Yellow he calls it Winnie the Pooh.
Edward's favorite color is blue like guess who? Stitch. So Lucas calls blue Stitch. I don't mind but I still correct him now and then. As long he knows his colors he can call it what he wants for now. Hey he's 3!
So I took a knife full of each color and Lucas placed a cookie on top of it.
We found that 7 bite size cookies made a perfect size. Last we added the pretzel sticks for the antennas. See if you use the bite size they are perfect for little ones and the chips take the place of eyes. You can add more items to this but we were trying to stay budget friendly.
They were messy but yummy and the kids had a ball!!
Edward loved his and still brags that he ate all of his!!
This was my baby size one. Lucas and I ended up trading and we ate it all gone too!!!
Okay we made these to go with our cookies. Yea, Yea pigs in a blanket to you but we imagined caterpillars inside their cocoons. giggles.
While eating we looked up and saw we had a visitor. No none of our cocoons hatched yet it was just a moth or butterfly that was watching us. The kids thought it was awesome!!
The next day we did a cute craft out of egg cartons. Take a dozen egg carton and cut it in half. Buy pipe cleaners, googly eyes, glue and construction paper for legs.
I did these and then let the kids create.
This is the construction paper pattern for the legs.
You could paint these but my kids can't wait for paint that's too long. So we took to markers.
They had a blast.
Edward did not follow the pattern and just went crazy cutting his construction paper up.
Then we glued on our googly eyes. Which we had to wait till they dried so we had a caterpillar race. I read online to do this in sleeping bags. Well we don't have any and I wasn't gonna spend money on those for one day of play. So we used pillowcases. The boys had fun learning how it was hard to crawl like a caterpillar.
The finished caterpillar egg carton project.
Edward's caterpillar.
Lucas thought his was funny.
He loves caterpillars!!
The following day we made fuzzy caterpillars. Again pipe cleaners, googly eyes, and glue, popsicle sticks, and fuzz balls. I got the fuzz balls, pipe cleaners, and googly eyes in Target's $1 isle. The popsicle sticks were $1.99 at Target.
Lucas' caterpillar he loves playing with.
Edward's caterpillar he loved creating.So to sum up the week:
Home school Theme: Caterpillars
Week Number: Two
Books we read: The Very Hungry Caterpillar, The Story of Abraham, Don't Worry Bear, Houdini the Amazing Caterpillar, Clara Caterpillar, and Arabella Miller's Tiny Caterpillar
Crafts we Made: Caterpillars out of egg cartons, Caterpillars out of fuzz balls, coloring sheet
Snack we Ate: Caterpillar cookies, Cocoons
Chapel Bible Lesson: Abraham
Friday Free Day: Watched our caterpillar cocoons and played caterpillar race
Games: Caterpillar race in pillowcases
Highs: Making the crafts and snacks we ate. What a mess but it sure was fun! Watching the boys especially Lucas loving his real live caterpillars.
Lows: Wishing again we had more time. We all get into these themes and then its seems the week is over.