rummage sale for the birds

I can't tell you how much joy this little basket of bits and pieces brings to my heart. It is a harbinger of spring, the first sign that winter is in its last throes. In this diminutive basket near the art supplies, we are collecting items for the birds, who are busy making their nests in preparation for the boom of new life that will be happening in the next few months.

Yarn leftovers, embroidery floss, downy chicken feathers, a left-behind piece of the cloth mop, scraps of fabric, a bit from a torn sponge, a ball of hair after a thorough hair brush cleaning - all of these things would have been thrown away, but our trash is the bird's treasure. After this indoor basket is full, a child takes it outside and deposits the loot in a larger basket, where the birds are free to take what they please at their leisure.

We're hoping that we will see evidence of this gift to the birds in nearby nests. Our eyes are peeled for pieces of bright yarn.

the wonders of metamorphism, the cute way

Remember my eyewitness account of metamorphism last summer? Here's a more snuggly version from the wee wonderfuls pattern:

caterpillar

chrysalis - faux suede 6" x 6" blanket with bias binding

butterfly with detachable wings (velcro)

Yet another lovely pattern by Hillary. I made just a few modifications which make it, quite possibly, the coolest science softie ever! Hand sewing is so liberating - I mean - who could imagine hiking down to the hot springs at the bottom of a canyon, and while sitting down there, granite walls soaring upwards on either side of you ... being able to create something so lovely with your hands. That's the best of both worlds. It's about time that the inside hobby breaks out of it's dimly-lit mold and into fresh air. I must make a note to myself to put more hiking and hand sewing on the calendar.

xo,
Meg

apples

Apple pie. Apple cider. Apple juice. Baked apples, cinnamon and sugar. Applesauce. Warm, apple smell drifting around the kitchen and enveloping you like a mohair scarf. Apple picking. Apple crates. Apples coming out your ears.

Here are the apples of my eye, making apple juice and peeling, coring, and slicing apples to be dried in the generous autumn sun.

Yum.

recreational entomology and other news

First off in today's news, a tap dancing moth has been spotted through an (embarrassingly) dirty window. "The moth continued its little jig for several glorious minutes," stated a big, fat cat who was located on the other side of the window. To which a little cat responded, "I didn't know that you knew what 'glorious' meant. I'm flabbergasted."

Also in entomology, the Tobacco Hornworm, a notoriously gluttonous grub, has made an appearance in Creel, Mexico. While wooing young children and their teacher with its flashy, green garb and extreme obesity, the Tobacco Hornworm surreptitiously and single-handedly destroyed a potato plant.

And in crafting news ...

Superbuzzy is having a sale! 20-40 % off awesome Japanese prints, including canvas for your reading pillows!

Amanda of Soulemama has launched her new website, which features excerpts of her book, The Creative Family, which is coming out in March.

Karla, a good friend and fellow Montessori teacher, has published an excellent tutorial for a wallet-sized fold-up fabric shopping bag on Whip Up.

And if you hadn't already heard, My Half of the Brain is a blog that collects crafting tutorials from all over cyberspace and directs you to them. Brilliant! Be sure to add it to your reader.

Finally, in blogging news, yours truly has given her blog a much needed make-over.

"I was feeling frumpy," stated Miss Montessori By Hand. "And I was feeling frustrated that none of the medium-sized flickr photos fit me. I just wasn't wide enough."

After listening to Miss Hand's needs, yours truly fiddled with her HTML code, gave her a new banner, and added a google site search bar so that Miss Hand's visitors can easily find what they are looking for.

"I feel like a new blog!" beamed Miss Hand.

harvest time

Fruits of the land and their little hands

Last spring we planted corn, squash, potatoes, and beans on a little plot of land a short walk from the school. Yesterday the children harvested the early corn, called elote. Did you realize that what we know as yellow "corn on the cob" is simply the early harvest? All corn is yellow at this stage. If you leave it on the stalk until October, all corn hardens into colorful Indian corn, known here as maiz. I never knew, even though my family planted corn when I was a child. We must have harvested it all early, given the fact that we didn't make corn tortillas from scratch.

Here in Mexico the maiz is essential, as it doesn't spoil and can be stored through the winter. It is a major food source for the indigenous Tarahumara people, who live as subsistence farmers on a diet consisting mainly of corn tortillas and beans.

On my plate (literally and figuratively) this weekend is a recipe I've had since I was in Montessori school. We affectionately refer to it as "Meggie's Montessori Harvest Loaf Cake." I hope you love it as much as I do!

1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 3/4 cup flour
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp. ground cloves
3/4 cup cooked (or canned) pumpkin
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
3/4 cup chopped walnuts

Cream butter and add sugar gradually. Cream at high speed until light and fluffy. Blend in eggs. Beat well. Alternately add dry ingredients and pumpkin, beginning and ending with pumpkin. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts. Pour into a loaf pan that has been greased on the bottom. Bake 1 - 1:15 at 350F. Cool completely.

Happy harvest,
Meg

P.S. If you haven't added your comment yet to the previous post, head on over and do so! Check back tomorrow morning to see if you are a winner of one of my sewing patterns!

losing your head (and your 6 legs, for that matter)

This morning, my cat Amelie helped us to notice (what we guess) was a Mourning Cloak butterfly larva that had hung itself upside down from one of our window panes. Another was hanging nearby on the stuccoed adobe wall. Nifty, I thought. I'll take a pic and see if I can capture it at various stages as it encases itself in its chrysalis.

Several hours later, and thanks again to eagle-eyed Amelie, I watched from inside as the caterpillar thrashed about wildly while the section with its head and six small legs fell off! It then rapidly split its skin from the bottom up. This new skin was wet and red. It slowly dried and became hard. Incredible! Here's what I was able to catch with the camera once I got outside.


Here's the head.


And the new, wet skin. You can still see the red on the top, but the bottom has already begun to harden.


Almost done hardening.

After this, I had high hopes that I could witness and document this for caterpillar number two, hanging on the adobe wall. Here's my bug watching camp - a knitting project and the camera.



But that bugger wasn't going to appease my voyeurism before sundown. He'll probably be nice and pupa-fied tomorrow morning. And I did have a nice time knitting. Wait until I share this with my students on Monday!

birdsong

I grew up in a rural area and became accustomed to a chorus of birds coaxing me out of bed in the mornings. While never introduced to proper bird watching, I do enjoy my fair share of observation and listening. Here's a wonderful resource to acquaint yourself (or your children or students) with the chirps and their composers:

"Common Birds and their Songs" by Lang Elliott and Marie Read includes descriptions, full-page photos, and audio tracks for fifty common birds in North America. It's an incredible resource!

You can also find this book in the Michael Olaf's "Child of the World" catalog. I can't recommend it enough! It will certainly be put to use in my classroom this coming school year.

Thanks for reading :)

Meg

favorite things

First of all, I need to thank all of your who have purchased my sewing patterns. Thank you for your dear notes of encouragement, for supporting the hand-made movement, and for helping us save some money in preparation for starting a family. I really hope that you and your loved ones find joy in both making and using your creations.

Remember this tree pillow? Now it has a companion.

These past few days I've been enjoying some hand stitching. Hand appliqué and embroidery - a few of my favorite things (aside from raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens.) It's portable and relaxing. The needle pricks on the tips of the fingers add an element of surprise (okay, and pain ... but it's all worth it in the end.)

I'm loving the polka dot ties on the back:

And did you see that Hillary just put her hand sewing pattern cards up for sale? I already bought mine. Can't wait to make the snail and the butterfly (which goes through metamorphosis ... caterpillar to chrysalis to butterfly!) Oh, I can't wait to have my own children! In the meantime, these toys might find their way into my nieces' little hands!

By the way, don't forget to take your blankets outside tonight and tomorrow night to watch the meteor shower. What a way to spark your child's interest in astronomy! This year there’s no moonlight to interfere. The best time to watch is from 11 p.m. August 12 until dawn the next morning. If you have a dark sky, you may see a meteor once a minute on average. Cross your fingers for cloudless skies!

Happy stargazing/meteor marveling,
Meg

Leaf Shape Cards

Today we're heading off to Mexico City for mini-vacation! I thought I'd leave you with some photos of my current materials project:

Hand-embroidered felt pouch for my leaf shape cards, which I bought at Montessori for Everyone.
I'm not quite done. I still need to finish the blanket stitch on the back panel and attach a loop and button closure. (I found some great leaf buttons at Craft Connection.)

I'll be back on Tuesday night, so don't expect to hear much from me until then! I hope to be having lots of fun and to be thinking about Montessori not-so-much. Everyone needs a break once in a while! Happy Mothers Day to all.

Peace,
Meg

Humble Creatures

Were you wondering why all of my mini-teapot cozy photos were shot outside? It's not as if things are green, blooming, and beautiful here at high altitude in Creel, Mexico. I do have some nice volcanic rock backdrops, though. Funny as it might seem, in between the oh-so-cute-cozy photo shoot, I was looking for earthworms. Hee hee.

We've been preparing the beds and planting our humble organic garden (with the help of our friend Tony, who is shown below in the foreground. He's an expert in all things gardening, having studied the subject at the renowned apprentice program at UC Santa Cruz.) We are lucky to have him.


I've been itching to get started with worm composting, or vermicomposting, the more socially couth way of discussing your little slimy house guests. It all started when I read this book:

Oh me oh my. You will also be a worm enthusiast after reading this cover to cover. You will DEFINITELY want to have one in the classroom! And this would be easy to do anywhere bait shops abound! In this situation, you don't have to worry about hunting in your backyard. However, this option is a lot of fun if you have a backyard and a green thumb. For more info on vermicomposting and the necessary supplies, visit this site.

I am using a smallish styrofoam cooler as my worm bin. More snazzy worm bins can be purchased. The book offers a lot of suggestions and also shows you how to build your own.

We filled ours with a bit of soil, started filling it with the cute little wormies, and put down some banana and papaya peels for their first meal. I later topped it off with moist, black and white newspaper. This prevents it from smelling bad, and the worms can eat the newspaper, too.

A worm bin in the classroom would be a great asset. I'm going to bring mine into my primary class for the rest of the year. The worms will eat anything except meat. (They will actually eat meat, but we don't want it in the bin because the smell would be pungent.) I won't tell you all about it here; the book gives plenty of instructions on how often to feed the worms and how to harvest the extremely rich vermicompost. (In short, by making little piles on a tarp outside in the bright sun. The worms will continue burrowing down, and you will continue removing compost from the outer layers of the piles. Eventually, you will just have a pile of adorable :) worms.) The worms are then placed back in the bin with food and damp newspaper. And you will have very rich compost to add to your classroom/garden plants.

For the elementary classroom, check out this companion book for science activities. I haven't read it, but it looks great.

Yum. For the worms, I mean.

For those of you in the swap, I will send out an email tomorrow letting you know who your partner is. This weekend has been a little crazy in my household. We took our car-phobic cat on the three hour (one way) drive to get her spayed on Saturday. It was rough on all parties involved. Plus, I've been worried about her because she still seems to be lethargic and not feeling so well. We've been giving her a water/wet food mixture from a dropper. Hopefully she'll start to feel better tomorrow. Anyone else had experience spaying their cat? How long did it take for her to recover?

Until the next post,
Meg

Great Science Curriculum Resource

My material-making focus has veered from music to science. (But don't you worry - one of these days I will finish the tutorial for the world music curriculum CD pouches. I just feel the need to procrastinate a bit and give in to the magnetic pull of physics, biology and botany!)

In the meantime, I thought I'd share with you a nice resource I happened upon the other day. Lori, a trained Montessori teacher who is now a full-time mom, has a website where she sells some quality printable materials. I especially like her offerings in botany, biology and zoology. For reasonable prices she will either email (PDFs) or print and send to you a wide range of 3-part reading classification cards. If you order the vertebrate nomenclature series (parts of a mammal, reptile, amphibian, bird, and fish) with each 3-part card set also comes a definition for each part. This can easily be used to make AMI-style definition stages. Just print off two extra sets of pictures.

In addition to her online store, Lori has a great blog on Montessori topics. Check it out when you have a chance!

:) Meg

P.S. Have you signed up for our little swap yet? You don't need to have ethnic children's clothing sitting in your closet. Perhaps you could buy it, or buy some ethnic fabric and send a pattern!

Color Mixing Science Experiment

First, an important update - the cob wall is finished!!! (Well, almost ... we just have to nail on the shingles.) Perhaps now the children will stop asking me: "What happened to your hands?" "Did your cats scratch you?" "What is that cut?" The 3 year olds notice everything. And so much for the keeping my precious, presentation-giving hands nice and neat these past three weeks. They have been cut by pine needles and rocks and are so dry that no lotion can keep them from looking like a dry lake bed. However, it was all worth it. The wall is done, and no more horses can eat our little organic garden!

The first leaves have appeared on the young willow tree in our front yard. The colors were very crisp, even on my clunker of a camera.
And speaking of colors, why not post about a color experiment? This idea came to us by a wonderful woman and Mexican Montessori Matriarch, Olga Dantus.

Materials:
2 white trays, one smaller, one larger
a small glass pitcher
three glasses - here I used two tequila shot glasses and one normal glass.
3 half-ounce droppers with diluted food coloring in each - yellow, blue and red. On the outside of the dropper, indicate the color with coordinating electrical tape.
Print outs of the Color Experiment Word document available for download at the Yahoo Group (join by clicking the purple button to the right.)
colored pencils (children can use the metal inset pencils)
NOT SHOWN:
a small sponge
an underlay/mat to protect the table
SHOWN BUT NOT SUGGESTED FOR THE EXPERIMENT:
a fat, yet interested cat

Masking tape indicates the water level.

The droppers remain on the small tray on the shelf. Pick one of the three droppers and add twenty drops of coloring to the first glass. Return the dropper and pick a second color, adding 20 drops of to the second glass. Fill the small glass pitcher with water and fill these two glasses to the line.

Avoid the chubby, nosy cat. And no, the magnificent pink of these photos was not planned. It was brought to you by my "Clunker of a Camera and it's Magnificent Flash."
Fill in the first 2 glasses on the paper with the appropriate colors. When presenting this part, fill in with the same care we use for the metal insets.

Combine the colors by adding them both to the larger glass.
On the paper, fill in the larger glass with the appropriate color.

Send me some pics and a simple presentation write up if you have some good science experiment ideas up your sleeve.

Cob, cob, cob, cob .....

It's been a little while because I've had my mind (and hands ... and feet) enveloped in mud. Literally. My husband and I are at the critical stage of building a wall on one side of our property. We decided to build it with cob, an adobe-like mixture of clay, earth, sand, and straw. The material is mixed with bare feet on a tarp, adding water and straw until the perfect consistency is reached. Then we pick up a glob of the stuff and slap it on the wall, molding it as we go. The layers are worked together with a long stick ... the weaving of the straw between the layers brings the wall tensile strength much in the same way rebar (the skinny steel bars) does for a concrete building.

Once we start building, we can't let the wall dry or else we won't be able to "weave" together the layers. So, it has taken up most of our waking hours this past week. Fortunately, the weather has been warmer ... dancing in the mud is something to look forward to after work!

We did find that this is a child magnet. Here are some photos of our neighbors helping us out.

They got so excited about cob's possibilities that they started planning to build a club house. Building a cob structure would be incredible for elementary and secondary children. It involves soil testing, simple structural engineering concepts, and lots of group work and planning. And, it's totally doable. My husband and I have never taken a course. We read The Hand Sculpted House, available here, but you could probably find sufficient "how-to's" online. A garden wall is only one thing that you can construct with cob. How about an earthen stove for baking bread outdoors? Or a sculpted bench? Lots of ideas for the elementary child to mill over.

In the meantime, my craft output will be less. Bear with me as we complete this project ... the benefits of such hard work will be a garden that doesn't get eaten by neighboring horses, sheep, goats, and pigs! Also in the works is my own craft studio. I can't wait to share photos of the finished product. It will be great to have a little place reserved for creative endeavors. I can't tell you what a pain it has been to work on the kitchen table. More on this soon.