I made up some fish out of pipe cleaners, attached a magnet to the end of the string on the fishing pole (a stick from our backyard), and we had an instant fishing game!

Merlin wanted to play too! For the World’s Laziest Cat, that is really saying something.

… and he managed to catch one too! (By laying on top of it.) Silly, lazy cat!

I found some toothpicks with umbrellas in the kitchen and added them to the tables. Emily thought they looked just like tiny cafe tables!! The two of us had so much fun gathering things from around the house or in the yard to add to our tiny Fairy Cafe! We added some cardboard to the thread spool for a table top, and a silk flower worked perfectly as a tablecloth. We used some acorn caps for plates. The entire project was super-frugal, and so much fun!!

Emily had great fun taking orders from her imaginary customers! Some of those fairies were very particular about their food, my goodness! Picky, picky, picky, I tell you!

On the menu, cake crumbs and rain drops…. The thimble made a great pot for the decorative tree (a small branch).

…. and clover salad, of course!

This table enjoyed dining on bits of crackers.

As for the sewing room, I think decluttering can wait a little bit longer, don’t you?

Have fun!!

Suddenly, I had no shortage of helpers to make the trips up and down the stairs. This is the ultimate in lazy parenting, people.

We used the bottom of an egg carton to make the buttons and attached them to the wall with a little masking tape. Super quick and easy, and the girls are still having fun with it!

It made putting away the laundry lots more fun for me too! Here it is in action!!

Elevator Pretend Play from Valerie Frugal Family on Vimeo.

There were lots of interesting containers to collect specimens — a baby food jar, a tea tin, a mint tin, and a leftover mesh bag from a sack of lemons. All I did was add a magnifying glass, a pencil, and we reused Emily’s old garden goody bag to store it all in. I put together the journal by reusing some of Emily’s old spin art for the cover and stapling in a few pieces of scrap paper to make up the book. In mind was this kit from Imagine Childhood.

Basically, almost any sort of interesting container can be reused to make your own Nature Study Kit!

Next, it was time to collect interesting nature treasures! Both of the girls had so much fun with this!!

Clara took her collecting job very seriously.

Emily enjoyed sorting the different types of leaves, bark, stones, and seed pods we collected — right from our own backyard!

She especially liked this tiny bit of moss!

So many interesting rocks!

Clara loved collecting twigs and clover to bring to the table.

Next, we made drawings in our notebooks to record all the details….

Emily asked me if she could take her nature study kit with her to the garden this evening, and I think that’s a terrific idea!!

Have fun!!

Here is a list of the links mentioned in the clip:

Solar Powered Lunch

Fun Fossil Dig

Water Comet Toys

MEGA Bubble Wands

A BIG thank you to everyone on The 10! Show for welcoming me back again. It was a pleasure, as always!

Print out the template onto heavy cardstock paper. We used the print-out template found at Having Fun at Home, and it worked beautifully! The girls enjoyed decorating their jumping beans….

They used lots of color!

I really enjoyed the striped pattern on Emily’s jumping bean… so colorful!

We cut out the template, folded it up, inserted a marble, and taped it secure. Then we took the jumping beans outside, propped up one side of a long table with some of Mark’s old college textbooks (I always knew they were good for something — HA!!) … and had several races with them!!

Here they are in action — so much fun!! Who will win? Play the video to find out! Ready…. set……… GO!!!

I linked this post to:
Get Your Craft On @ Today’s Creative Blog