Winter Spring Summer Fall Play

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Winter Spring Summer Fall Play

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06/12/2026

What an amazing week for Family Camp Week 1 - themed Tools & Tinkering Free Haven Forest School. We survived the heat and rain and had a blast! We packed in lots of learning and playing!

This week we focused on:

1. Rope: how can we use a rope? We made pulleys and practiced knot trying!

2. Bow Saw: with the right safety rules in place Bow Saws are a great tool for kids to test their focus and strength! We made log dogs!

3. Lopers: We made twig boats and each kid used tape measures to mark off where to cut their sticks with lopers! And then we headed to the creek for some boat races!

4. Potato Peelers: using our peelers we created stakes for simple tarp tents! We worked as a team to put up the tents and problem solve the best method to get our tents up! Then we used our stakes to secure the tent!

We hiked, we played and we got to know each other. So many connections and memories made in 4 days! So grateful for the opportunity to lead Family Class this week! 🔨

05/23/2026

May Family Lab was all about sowing a seed! God is so great, he created seeds as a complete package! Complete with an embryo, first leaves, lunchbox for early food and a coat that protects the seed until a desirable environment is created!

Week 1 - Soil: For the first week we learned about Soil! Knowing what kind of soil is in your garden will help you amend it if necessary for what you intend to grow. It also helps you understand why certain plants do grow in your garden. Soil is made up of three inorganic materials: clay, sand and silt. We completed a lab where tested texture, Ph, and filtration. I did a soil jar test and concluded in our classroom we had sandy loam soil!

Week 2 - Seeds: I soaked pinto beans overnight and in class we peeled off the coats and the bean basically split naturally. We were able to locate the embryo, first leaves and lunchbox! Super cool! We then used the soaked seeds to create a take home seed in a bag to observe! Interesting fact that all flowering plant seeds are classified by how many first leaves are in the seeds. The term monocot and dicot come from the plant in seed form!

Week 3 - Roots: Once a seed germinates it grows roots! Roots are important for drinking in water and anchoring a plant! We talked about the main root systems of angiosperms which are fibrous and a taproot! Our fibrous roots is like a mop of hair that is shallow and soaks up surface level water fast! The taproot goes deep and is hard pull. We dug out dandelions and grass to observe the different roots and then had some fun dandelion play!

Week 4 - Vascular System: Now that we have a mature plant above the ground it will have built a vascular system to help it reach its goal of flowering! Like humans have veins plants have tube like structures that move water and glucose made during photosynthesis. The Xylem moves water from the roots up to the leaves. There that water is used to create glucose and the phloem then moves the glucose around and can go up and down and all around! We concluded this class with an end of year celebration and creek play!

That concludes Family Lab 2026! I’m so grateful for the opportunity to lead this class this year!

05/09/2026

I’m in Love with my new Gel Printing Plate! 🫆🐾

05/02/2026

In honor of the May Flower Full Moon, I wanted to share the beauty that I’ve been watching bloom in the garden! God is good. He brings forth such beauty by his hands!

04/27/2026

April Family Lab was all about helping our native Bees and Earth! Where would we be without Native Bees? Most often people think of honeybees but did you know there are over 4000 species of native bees in the US? Most are solitary making their homes in the ground, wood etc. They are specialist to the native plants and are more efficient at pollination. etc. Native bees work very hard creating nests, providing all the food necessary for the larva, laying their eggs and sealing up the chamber. To help our native bees we created bee hotels to support our beloved bees. And we got to role play and become bees looking for nectar and pollen to make bee bread. We also celebrated Earth Day a week early to get our mindset on what our goals are to help Mother Earth. Earth day is not just one day but everyday! We discussed how we can make a difference in our choices and daily habits! And our final week we sought to learn more about flower parts and how pollination actually works by identifying the different flower parts and then creating a bookmark! What a beautiful months of spring! It’s a beautiful thing to spend time learning and focusing on nature!

04/10/2026

March Family Lab! A little late but still wanted to share about the beautiful month we had! March was, as usual, a roller coaster, the third week where we celebrated the arrival of spring it was only 25 degrees! We are used to this right! 😂 Here’s what we learned about nature this month.

Week 1: We talked about watersheds and the importance of them. We discussed some hydrology facts about how water is captured here on earth. We explored one of the water tributaries at Free Haven. Our class ending with learning how to make a natural water filter.

Week 2: Was all about frogs! We learned what frogs have been doing all winter! Did you know that the frogs have the ability freeze? They pump their cells with glucose that allows their cells to remain protected. Scientists actually mimicking what frogs do to advance human organ transplant! Just a simple reminder that God is the ultimate scientist! We talked about how with warmer weather, frogs will start to thaw out and reproduce! We had some sensory frog life-cycle play and ended with some frog Olympics!

Week 3: We explored weathering and erosion and how nature is sculpted and changed over time! We explored this concept with a weathering lab involving chalk. And of course a sneaky leprechaun visited our class and left us gold coins to sort into alphabetical order!

Week 4 was about the return of our beloved birds! We explored the extreme detail and care that goes into building a nest. We read ‘Bird Builds a Nest’ and then became birds making a nest!

What a beautiful month learning! Spring is here and the birds all sing for joy!

01/31/2026

January Family Lab was a wild ride! Getting outdoors with the sunsetting early is a different game! We had to really embrace the beauty of the dark! Unfortunately, at the end, the extreme cold made gathering not an option. But the two classes we had were in my opinion beautiful and I myself learned a lot!

First week back we discussed the Subnivean Zone, a special cove for small active critters in the winter that is protected between the ground and a crusted snow roof that falls at the bottom of fallen snow! This space helps small animals survive! And of course once you know it you see it everywhere! We happened to be reading Brambley Head afterwards and caught the perfect depiction of the Subjivean zone, see in pictures!

Next we talked about the moon phases and constellations! Winter evenings is a great time to look up and observe the sky! Kids got to create the moon phases and using light to project /view constellations! One thing I learned is if you know which direction is north you can determine based of North and where the moon if it’s waxing or waning!

Winter sometimes feels like a waiting room, but I’m always trying to remember that its purpose in the cycles of season is still very important! God is always creating life out of darknes! We are almost there for Spring New Life!

01/09/2026

Winter 2026

1. Turkey Tail
2. Treebuds
3. Figwort.
4. Tree I want to identify
5. Winter Sunsets
6. Handmade Xmas Ornament
7. Handmade Star
8. My Explore Partner
9. Winterberries
10. Tree Homes
11. Trees That Look Like Lungs 🫁
12. So Many Baby Trees
13. Timberrrrrrer
14. Tater Walks
15. Herb of the Month - Jan - Valeria.
16. Winter Walks
17. Shoe prints
18. Paw Prints
19. Hidden Driveways
20. Forest School Gear

01/04/2026

Experiences based gifts wrapped so pretty on the tree! I’d much rather have gifts that give us something to look forward to and more special time together! At the end of the day our kids really want our time and attention! Merry Christmas!

12/09/2025

Citrus! Another favorite holiday craft of mine! Dried citrus has been used to represent many things but in my mind it is symbolic with gold and royalty! Our King is Jesus and so with each fruit that I dried I was in my mind creating a crown of gold! And there’s nothing better than the smell of citrus drying in the oven! Hallelujah to Jesus our King, Prince of Peace and Light of the world!

Address

Naperville, IL
60565

Website

http://www.WINTERSPRINGSUMMERFALLPLAY.com/

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