Who? Me?

I never fancied myself a Nature Girl.  More often than not, I consider myself Nature ignorant.  But a funny thing happened while I was studying Nature with my children ... I learned to learn about it. 

How do I know that?  While visiting a friend up North last month, I asked her if her front yard tree was a Maple tree. She didn't have any idea.  The next day at the mini-golf course I found what I thought was a Hemlock tree*.  Still feeling Nature-ignorant, I asked her if she thought it was a Hemlock, too.  Not only did she not know, but she asked ME how I know SO MUCH about trees!  Me! 
My answer was nature study.  
What I have learned is how to observe nature; how to notice it; how to look for it.  I'm not an expert.  That is not even one of my goals.  As long as I keep observing, noticing, looking, and learning, I will be a Nature Girl.  And with that, my kids will observe, notice, look at, learn about, and love their natural world, too!
I cannot finish this post without giving some credit, some big credit, to Barb at The Handbook of Nature Study blog for her wonderful Outdoor Hour Challenges (OHC) which helped me find the Nature path in the first place.  After trying, and hating, the nature drawing path, and after looking at the introduction to the mammoth Handbook of Nature Study itself, I might have given up on "teaching" nature studies to my kids.  The OHC showed me a gentler, less daunting way to teach and learn about the world around us. 

Now, we need to get off our blogs and look outside! 
*We read My Side of the Mountain in the winter and learned about all kinds of northern nature.  The Hemlock was one of them.


What I thought was a weed in our flower bed,
looks like a tree sapling.  We're excited to watch
it grow up!

Hemlock on the Mini-Green

A Giant Dandelion we found during our
Outdoor Hour Dandelion Study

A mysterious sac

 

The Great Potato Experiment

Some time ago, I saw a video about the familiar potato-growing experiment.  The family which made it proposed that organic potatoes are healthier and will grow better based on their experiments with organic and non-organic potatoes.  I was so intrigued that I had to try this with my kids.  We had tried this experiment in the past, but nothing happened - no roots, no leaves, no thing.  

Organic potato roots were very full!

First, I found out that our grocery store does not even sell organic potatoes.  We found them at the local natural food store.  I must say, the organic sweet potatoes are redder than the non-organic ones, but they are also smaller.  
Second, this experiment takes a LONG time; months even.  In fact, I was about to throw out the potatoes after two months when I noticed that one of them had some roots just starting to peek through.  
Third, though we hypothesized, based on the video we saw, that the organic potato would thrive over the non-organic one, the first one to sprout roots and later leaves was the Non-Organic one!  Really.  Talk about a hypothesis buster.  (I was going to say a myth buster, but I don't think our hypothesis was really a myth; more of a presumption.)    

 This is more or less what the two potatoes looked like after 3 months.  The one on the left, with barely a leaf bud but plenty of roots in the water, is the organic one. 

 Here it is a little closer.  See how the leaves are just starting to grow?

 This potato grew like crazy once it started to grow at all. 

Plenty of roots, too.  

What does this all mean?  Did the non-organic potato thrive because the pesticides made it more resilient?  Did the organic one fail to thrive because  I put it in a green container instead of a clear one?  I do not know, but it was fun to compare them. I feel bad that we had to throw them out in the end, especially because the organic one cost about twice as much as the other one.  

Signs of Spring

    There is something about knowing that it is officially Spring that refreshes my spirit.  Though March can be very temperamental in weather, I want us to get outside as much as possible before the Southern summer sneaks up on us.  So, with the Handbook of Nature Study's Spring notebook pages, clipboards, and colored pencils in hand, out to the neighborhood park we went. 

      I love that each of my children noticed different things today, even if one of them refused to get out of the car because Spring brings out the bees.  

     After we made our observations, I noticed something else about Spring: Pollen!  Ah-choo! 

     Tomorrow we'll check on our 10 day old container garden.  This is always a highlight of our Springs!