Veranda Montessori

Garden work party 2026 was yesterday and our outside spaces are looking amazing!

All thanks to our amazing families who did the heavy lifting!

Come see what Montessori education can look like in a cozy environment and what makes us special. Open House on Saturday March 14th, 10:30 AM - 1 PM.

Grow. Explore. Discover. Welcome to Veranda! We provide an authentic Montessori program in a loving environment, with ready outdoor access; allowing children to discover and grow their passions and strengths, coming into their full potential. We offer a home-like setting with a full range of Montessori materials, as well

Open house tomorrow! Saturday February 7th 10:30 AM - 1 PM. Stop by and see what makes us special and how we combine Montessori with cozy, exploration and learning, creativity and fun.

(and if you can't make it, same thing on March 14th)

Grow. Explore. Discover. Welcome to Veranda! We provide an authentic Montessori program in a loving environment, with ready outdoor access; allowing children to discover and grow their passions and strengths, coming into their full potential. We offer a home-like setting with a full range of Montessori materials, as well

Gift giving season, but this time for the school.

I'm so excited for this one. And love that we're small enough that I can open and setup with the children - this child graded and matched all the bells while I unwrapped boards and other things ❤️

Coming up next, we're inviting families to join us for an art show in December - here's a sneak peek 😉

This year we've been more intentional about setting aside / intercepting cool stuff for it before it goes home. So we're going bigger and have a good selection!

I'm really excited about this. Still a lot of work to do to make it happen, but it feels like all the pieces are in motion.

The all the art work goes home afterwards.

Of course, things the children felt strongly about or they have made many of have still been going home, and we've been very clear that anything we take we are keeping safe and will give back after the art show.

It's also allowed us to take a harder look around art waste and reuse and come up with some options for layered pieces and for reusing and making new things. Also trying to encourage children to revisit their art - is there anything else you would like to add to it?

Because for the child who is making 10 just filled in easel papers, the joy is in the making, and though sending all of them home as the dry (like we would usually do) does show parents that their child is really into that, we also know that 8 of those at least are just going in the trash. And, well, we can take those 8 and make other things from them.

There's still waste, and I'm always looking for ideas on how to reuse them, so if you've got any, leave them in the comments!

It's been a fun art journey this year😊

This year's autumnal dropper watercolors are looking particularly gorgeous. We need to hand those up at a window ASAP!

Having a peek at the mailboxes to see if there's anything to put aside for the art show and ran across this. I love it: a book the child read and enjoyed, to go home both for them to show off their skills and to practice and work on fluency, a paper geography craft thing that I was wondering if it might be too finicky for them when we were halfway through (it wasn't!), and the care put in the coloring in and color choice for that sugar skull design. Plus the cool rainbow spiderweb art piece.

The things, the color, the way they're laid out, and simply knowing the backstory behind each of them.

Just enjoing the close of a busy, and good day as the apple sauce the kids get going summers on and I get ready for a fast clean of the school as I wait for a parent teacher conference.

We're busy, sometimes chaotic and overwhelming. But more often than not happy and creative and joyful. It's good. It's a good year even when it challenges us and makes us stretch ourselves.

I love it when our families share their traditions and celebrations with us, it makes it meaningful and very real.

Happy Halloween!

Let's do a Practical Life shelfie, shall we? Happy at how this is looking after just switching or adding most of it today.

Left to right.
Top: hand transfer by sliding the rings through the sculpture, sponge squeezing, pouring into a jigger, pouring 2:1, spooning.
Row 2: small tongs with tiny pom poms, chopstick style tongs mini apple transfer, pancake flipping practice with a bean bag, wood polishing, metal polishing, open and close.
Row 3: big threading, medium threading, threading / weaving frame, burlap pulling, swing on burlap line with pre-threaded needle, sewing practice (might switch the order of these two), sewing on burlap the full thing with beads for decoration.
Row 4: table scrubbing, dry plant pins, plant watering, cotton swabs + leaf cleaning, indicator cones,, weaving through a frame with ribbons, similar intro weaving but smaller.

Dressing frames have their own stand, I'll put it out next week.

Sweet family tableau