My name is Melissa and I am a homeschool mom of three beautiful blessings ages 12, 10, and 4; and blessed wife to my husband for 16 years. We use Charlotte Mason's educational philosophies of learning the natural, everyday hands-on life way. We especially enjoy learning and growing together beyond the classroom doors in God's amazing creation in nature.
For some reason my last, very important entry did not come through on many, if not all feed readers. So I’m putting this notice out there again that I have a new blog home.
I will no longer be posting at this site….visit me at www.inthesparrowsnest.com
If the above link does not work, try this: http://inthesparrowsnest.com
I have been putting this off for quite some time, mostly because I’ve been too busy to work on it! However I finally have my new website presentable and ready to use. I am still working on it and it will be undergoing changes and updates however I just have to make the leap out there and get switched over in order to motivate me to finish it.
Another reason it has been so long in coming is I’m so fearful of losing my dear readers somehow in the changeover! And it makes me tearful that I cannot take the comments with the posts that I have copied over. Please do come visit me and let me know you found me. If you are signed up to receive my posts through a reader or by email, you will need to do that again for my new site.
I’m asking HSB to please leave this blog here, I DO have future plans for it. 
So without further ado, announcing:
In the Sparrow’s Nest at http://inthesparrowsnest.com/
It was just a dusting, but beautiful nonetheless. We’ve already been outside having fun in it! The temperatures are in the 30′s so we know it won’t last long!
The following is a link to our Snow Studies from last year. We’ll be doing many of those things again, plus more starting in January using the Snow and Ice unit that Shining Dawn Books will be releasing very soon!
Recently we started keeping a monthly nature calendar. As an example, at the beginning of this month we took our sheet of paper and labeled the top "December Nature", and then throughout the month as we visit parks and take nature walks we are keeping a list on this page of the different things we find and observe in nature.
Our monthly lists are such a neat thing to look back on and remember our walks and what we found. Plus it will be neat to look ahead to the coming months and anticipate how nature will be changing by looking at our lists.
This last week we had one day of bright sunshine and good temperatures, so we headed out to our favorite park to begin our list. Here are some of the things we found.
These male and female Mallard Ducks were swimming in the wetlands.
We noticed several abandoned nests and wondered what species of bird lived in them back in the spring and summer.
We were shocked to find so many dandelions still growing in the cold weather, or are we shocked, those things are resillent!
We found lots and lots of seeds on tree and plants in general, settled in with hope of the future spring season.
We also found several places where fungus was growing, mostly in and around trees. This photo below is of fungus growing on a huge tree that had damage around the base.
Of course we took time to stop and throw rocks in one of the water pools!
There was splashes of color everywhere. It’s amazing that once all the leaves and brush goes away how much more color stands out. They are like splashes of bright color on a gray/brown canvas.
Speaking of color, each month the park that we were at, which happens to also be an arboretum, hosts one of their trees/plants as their "Plant of the Month". This one, the Deciduous Holly, we believe was chosen very timely, adorned in it’s formal winter red dress.
The sun was shining so brightly on the red berries that they looked like they were on fire.
These are just a few of the things we added to our December Nature calendar. What sorts of things will you add to yours?
We were so blessed yesterday to have had the priviledge to see a huge group of Sandhill Cranes migrating over our house. In the information we read about them it said that they congregate in huge numbers to migrate….I’d say so! Here is a photo of Sandhill Cranes that I got from another site. I wish I could have thought quick enough to get my camera, but they were just too fast flying over.
My son came blasting into the house yelling, at first making me think we were on the way to the hospital again:), but thank the Lord it was just an excited yell because he could hear them coming. So we all jumped up and ran out onto the sidewalk to see several large V formations of the beautiful birds flying overhead. The sound they were giving off was amazing! If you visit THIS website you can hear their call, just multiply it by about 50!
According to what I read, this is the time of year to see the Sandhill Cranes migrating. They are mostly located in the Northwestern areas of the United States and Canada during the summer months, and in California, Southern Florida, Texas and Mexico during the winter months. We would only see them here in Kentucky when they are migrating, so it was quite a treat!
If you visit the above linked website you can also read up on some other interesting information about Sandhill Cranes such as they choose a mate for life and migrate with their offspring!
We’ve checked out a couple of books from our library to learn more, including the following:
Luck by Jean Craighead George
I love everything that I’ve read of Ms. George’s, so I’m sure this is a lovely book.
Melissa