Chronicles of Summertime: Day 15

Day 15:
Today, we visited the living historical farm at one of our metro parks. This was so fun and the part was it was FREE! You can walk around and explore the park at your own leisure. I was going to try to describe it, but the website's description does a better job, so...

Time has been turned back to the 1880s at Slate Run Living Historical Farm. Visitors can experience first-hand what life was like on an Ohio farm more than 100 years ago.

As you stroll through the gardens, barns and farmhouse, you will see the farm costumed staff and volunteers going about their daily chores. What you won't see are gas-powered tractors or electric refrigerators.

You may see the farmer plowing the fields with the help of the draft horses. Inside the summer kitchen, the ladies may be canning and preserving crops from the heirloom garden.

The farm is home to all kinds of heirloom animal breeds including the Poland China hog, Merino sheep and Percheron draft horses. There are also flocks of ducks, chickens, turkeys and geese.

So, we walked around and looked at the animals, pet the animals, saw a new baby bull, and pumped water to water the garden. It was a great time. We could've stayed a lot longer, but Ladybug got hungry. I fed her in the car and then took Snugglepuppy to another area of the park to play on the playground.

New lambs born at the end of March/beginning of April.

Snugglepuppy calling for the sheep to come over.

Looking in at the ducklings.

Baby ducklings!

Snugglepuppy scaring off a duck.

Whoa! I never knew pigs could get so big!

Piglets :)

Baby turkeys.

Pumping water.

Trying to throw a corn cob/feather dart through the hoop.

Marble ramp toy. Snugglepuppy was totally fascinated.

After the park, we came home and ended up making a trip to Walmart and then having our pizza pizza party. That was about it for the day. Hope you all have a great weekend!

Storytime Sunday: More Farm

Ok, I know I have been a slacker this weekend. It is technically Monday when I am posting this. Please forgive me. Anyways, we have been studying pets and farm animals the last few weeks. I have been getting the idea that there were still a few things my kids were not understanding about the farm. For example, they know about specific animals and barns, but I'm not sure if they know about what a real farm looks like and the names for some of the baby animals. Here are some books I found in my personal library that I thought would be helpful for them.

This story is great because it explains in detail what the farm looks like and what all the animals do on the farm. It tells about the sounds the animals make and some things that grow in the fields. It has colors, counting, and rhyming and it goes through the whole day from morning to night. There are a lot of descriptive words and vocabulary.

Next is a book about a boy who lives on a farm in Mexico and takes care of the animals. I especially love this one because it is going to be an awesome transition into our study about countries and cultural diversity. It has some simple words in Spanish and tells 5 stories about different animals and each one has a riddle that Ramon makes up about the silly actions of the animals. I know the children will love this one!

A very simple book with large print and very few words, this tells the name for each adult and baby animal.

And last is a simple reader that introduces the sight words "a, big and little" and other words "chair, sheep, three and white." Kids will enjoy reading this all by themselves!

HAPPY READING!