The Carrot Seed & Play With Me

I'm behind on sharing what we've been doing with Before Five in a Row - so here is a two week update in one!

First, we read The Carrot Seed. I've no doubt that you all remember the carrot cake incident - but here are the pictures of the little ladies helping shred the carrot:

We sort of redeemed the experience by frosting and decorating the cakes:

Cath pointed me to this idea for play-dough shaped into a carrot and we did this:


We planted bean seeds ~ see what they did! And, sprouted carrot tops (this took two full weeks to even get this far!) I was very skeptical that this would work, but it did!

We made a life-size carrot and marked our heights on it:

And, had an all-orange lunch:

The next week, we did Play With Me - we actually spent two weeks on this book since it was rainy and cold the first week and most of the things we wanted to do were outside!

We studied the Genesis account of Creation - and made these pictures as we read along. For example, the girls started with one piece of black paper each and then we added the sky, water, land, etc... in the order it was created. One side was day time and one side was night:

We hung a bird feeder and filled it with bird seed in hopes of seeing some feathered friends ~ we haven't seen a single one yet, but will keep watching!

We talked about some of the girls feelings in the story - but our favorite thing was walking to our neighborhood "lake" and taking a picnic lunch to eat on the small dock. The little ladies pretended to fish and we found a milkweed to blow along the way! We saw a squirrel, bird and cat - they wanted to see a fawn, but weren't too discouraged that we did not. Emily found a natural broom and had fun sweeping all the walk home!

I had also thought of making animal shaped sugar cookies and decorating some to deliver to a friend who is lonely. We did not get this done - and I remembered Rachel's terror at the friends dogs, so I decided it was best not to attempt this right now.

Homemade Play Dough (making this brought back immediate childhood memories!)

1/2 c. salt
1 c. flour
2 T. cream of tartar
1 c. water
1 T. cooking oil
food coloring

Mix all ingredients and cook over med. heat for 3-5 minutes, stirring constantly until it forms a ball. Store in plastic bag or airtight container in the refrigerator.

Carrot Cake (from Betty Crocker cookbook)

1 1/2 c. sugar
1 c. vegetable oil
3 eggs
2 c. flour
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
3 c. shredded carrots (about 5 medium)
1 c. coarsely chopped nuts

Combine ingredients and pour into one 9x13, two round or two 8x8 square pans, prepared. Bake at 350 for 40-45 minutes (rectangle) or 30-35 minutes (round) or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool completely on a wire rack.