Ball painting and muscadine grapes

Today in the country we stopped by our old house or rather our old garden, where some three years ago I planted an abundance of edible landscaping as well as medicinal plants. We planted a few muscadine grapes, which grow really well in this area, and for all the time we lived there picked only a hand full of grapes. Today when we came by we found the vines filled with the deep purple grapes and the children eagerly dropped their already gathered buckeyes (which Keenan quickly picked up again and stuffed in his pockets) and proceeded to pick a bag full of these sweet tart grapes. I could hardly believe the abundance. I hope to save a few seeds and take them with me, and plant new vines when we once again settle in a home of our own.

At the homeschooling class we played with balls, paint and canvas. I have already done a post similar to this here, but thought I would share again as it was such a success with the group.

We started with a big piece of parachute material for the children to get the idea and feeling in their bodies as to how to move the balls around the canvas. We did it wildly and softly, and the children LOVED it, there was lots of laughter, a great way to begin the project I thought

Cardboard was already taped to the canvases, and the children themselves added paint. We used a wide variety of balls, golf balls, tennis balls and bouncy balls. The ones with texture on the outside created especially wonderful designs. The secret I found was to know when to stop, although each and every canvas turned out amazingly beautiful. The children loved it and worked really well together. These beautiful pieces will be offered for a donation at an up coming Heritage fair (the neighboring county from here) in support of the coop.

We always finish the day with a picnic in the park outside, and a great tradition of this coop, is that each time everyone bring clothes, books and really anything that they no longer need or fit and we all trade, rather you take what you need. Today there was loads of apples, boxes of clothes and shoes as well as books. It is so wonderful to see how everything wanders around between the children and adults a like, and to see things you no longer need be of use to someone else, frugal living at its best.

~Happy evening to you~