Off Visiting The Grandchildren

Nothing gives me more pleasure than spending time with my grandchildren. Last week I went off to visit my grandsons. This week my grandsons have come to visit and spend the week with grandma and grandpa. It has been very busy around here but I did stop to take a few photos. I hope you enjoy the photos.

My youngest grandson Roo. He does not mind riding in the car as long as he is going places. He just loves being outside.

You have got to admit he is so adorable. He sure does like shopping. Just don't put groceries in the seat with him. He loves tossing anything he can get his hands on. 

We visited the Kalahari Animal Park with all three grandsons. That is Little Bug trying to reach a feeding tube. Pooh Bear found a lower feeding tube just perfect for his reach. The feeding tubes are used for the animals that are likely to bite. 

Pooh Bear feeding a carrot to a very gentle camel. 

Little Bug feeding a giraffe. The boys liked the giraffes the best.  

Which animal is your favorite? Have you been to Kalahari?

Preschool Lesson: From Tadpoles To Frogs

As I promised here is another post about the tadpoles in our pond. I wanted to make this a learning lesson for my grandchildren. So please keep in mind while you may already know and understand the information in this post. I am attempting to make this a lesson for young preschoolers.
Our tadpoles began their journey as a jelly like egg laid in the pond by the mother frog. The floating mass of eggs are clumped together. The mass of eggs is called frog spawn. A large clump of eggs is safer than a small clump of eggs that may be eaten by other pond life.
The egg starts as a single cell. As the egg slowly develops it splits into two cells. The two cells split into four cells and so on. The mass of cells forms an embryo. Organs and gills begin to form. At 21 days the embryo leaves it jelly like shell and attaches it self to a weed in the pond. The embryo is now a tadpole.
The tadpole grows until it can break free into the water. This can take any where from 3 days to 3 weeks. This will depend on the type of frog the tadpole will become.
The tadpole will use camouflage to protect its self from danger. The tadpoles eat small green algae plants that are in the water. At about five weeks the tadpole starts to grow hind legs. This is where some of our tadpoles are at in their metamorphosis.
I have included a video of a few tadpoles I scooped up today. The first one focused on in the video does not have legs yet. You may be able to see leg buds. As the video moves along you will see tadpoles swimming with legs.

No tadpoles were hurt in the making of this video. The tadpoles were release immediately back into the pond. 

As our tadpoles grow we will post more of our learning experience. I found a coloring page online for my grandchildren to enjoy. If you would like the same coloring page here is the link to the coloring page.

Metamorphosis of a tadpole to frog.

I hope you enjoyed our lesson today. 

Greek Spaghetti

I am not a fan of Spaghetti with red sauce. As I have gotten older I just can not eat anything with tomatoes in it. When my husband makes spaghetti he always puts aside a serving or two of the spaghetti noodles undressed for me. I usually doctor the plain pasta with butter, garlic and shredded cheddar cheese. Today I decided to try something different. I had a lot of salad vegetables left over from our family picnic yesterday.

I dressed the spaghetti pasta with olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper. I mixed in chopped purple onions, sliced olives, diced green and yellow peppers. I then topped it with shredded cheddar cheese and some crumbled feta cheese.

When I made this dish I did not even know there was a dish named Greek Spaghetti. I started searching spaghetti recipes and found a recipe for Greek Spaghetti.  The recipe I found was a lot like what I made. But they added lots of other ingredients like tomatoes, meat and other vegetables. 

I really enjoyed having spaghetti for a change. What do you think? Does that look tasty? Do you like spaghetti or another pasta dish?

How To Start A Weed Free Raised Garden Bed

To start off you will need something to use as a retaining wall for your garden bed. I had some leftover wood from a wood pallet and some 4x4's from our deck project.
Next you will need a supply of cardboard or newspaper. Earlier this year I started saving pizza boxes, soda cartons and other boxes from purchases.
Now decide where and how big you want your raised bed. Then lay out your cardboard flat right over the grass. I overlapped the cardboard just a little. I have been told the grass will die under the cardboard or newspaper. The cardboard will break down into the soil as the summer goes on.

Next lay out your wood or other material to help retain the soil. Cinder blocks would work just as well in this instance. 

Now fill the inside with about twelve inches of soil, peat-moss and other soil amendments. I added 14 bags of organic soil and two large bags of peat-moss. 

At this point I had my husband put some stakes around the out side of the garden bed. This will stop the heavy soil from pushing the 4x4's outward. 

I then added my started vegetables. 

I am looking forward to keeping a record of how my vegetables do in my garden planner. This is the first time I am trying this new raised bed method. I have be thinking that I probably should have put the raised bed together in the fall so it could have sat over the winter. The cardboard would have been nearly decomposed by spring. No matter now I will keep you informed how this method works for me. What do you think? Do you think it will remain weed free for this summer at least? Have you planted a garden this year? Do you use a raised bed method? 

Best Wishes On Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day

My Son in a helicopter when he served in Iraq.

Our prayers are with all soldiers and their families. May God Bless all who have served and all who have given their lives for our freedom. 

Home Sweet Home

After being away for a few weeks I am happy to be home. That saying "Home Sweet Home" sure has a lot of meaning for me.
The first day back I had to go for our morning walk and had so much fun. I got to check out the fox hole. I did not even catch a glimpse of the mama and her cubs. I am looking forward to watching them as they grow.
I stopped by our two ponds and found we have some tadpoles that were not there before I left for my trip. I snapped a few photos to share.

That's a pretty nice sized school of tadpoles.

They are hanging out all over the pond in little schools. 

I caught a couple loners out eating some algae.

I am guessing the tadpoles in the schools are about 4 weeks old. I have been reading up on the subject.The tadpoles become social at about 4 weeks old and start hanging out in schools.  I am doing some more research so that I may be able to pass this knowledge on to my grandchildren. I know they will be asking lots of questions. I hope to post more about our study of the metamorphosis of our tadpoles into frogs.

Back to my walk. Sorry about getting side tracked I do tend to get excited when it comes to teaching my grandchildren. 

While walking through the yard I noticed this this Robin had been hopping along behind us. Just before I left on our trip there was an injured Robin hanging around our yard. I had been tossing it some bread crumbs every morning. I though by know it would have left as it seems to be healthy. My husband informed me that has been hanging out following him about the yard and he has continued to feed it. 

The pond on the left is where the tadpoles are. That pond is more like a little bog. It is shallow and has a lot of algae growth. That is also where all the neighborhood birds like to come and bathe. I noticed the black birds hang around the edges of the pond. I am suspect they are fishing for tadpoles. No worries though their are at least a thousand or so tadpoles in that pond. Every year we end up with lots of little frogs every where. After a while most of them wander off to the game reserve which is a stones throw from our home. 

Lastly I snapped this pond photo. I love the reflection in the water. My little morning walk was relaxing.

How about you? Do you have a routine you follow to relax? Hope you have a great weekend.