Forest Week: 11/1-11/5

Forest Week turned out to be a loaded subject. Going into it I was thinking pretty much talking about different types of trees and animals in the forest but then it turned out to be so much more. Conversations about the seasons (mainly Fall/Autumn) and how forests grow (fires are necessary to maintain healthy forests, etc.) to forest food webs, there are so many ways a discussion about the forest can turn. I didn't get all I wanted to accomplish done, I had plans to head out to a few forest locations I know of but it ended up raining a couple times during the week so we didn't get out, we did have fun with the stuff we did do though!

I took our pumpkins from Halloween, cut out some chunks and carved in some leaves and textures for some pumpkin rind stamps, they were ignored quickly but they were fun for a few minutes! We made a fall tree painting...

Charlotte and I had made these coffee filters a few days before and I wasn't sure what to do with them, then I decided to cut them out into the shapes of leaves and glue them onto a branch from the backyard and make another tree (I have yet to glue the leaves on the branch yet). They ended up being a "two for" because the leftover filter looked pretty awesome with the holes cut out, we hung them in the windows.

We did end up getting out one day to go to Deep Creek Lock Park (our favorite park) to enjoy some forest and some playing. It was a win-win, even though it was sprinkling I made sure to bring a towel to clean off the equipment. I had brought a container to collect leaves and acorns and pinecones and other stuff but Charlotte wasn't interested and we ended up bringing home a little lonely pinecone, courtesy of Alexis.

Swinging on the swings

Lichen is actually a combination of two things in one! Fungi and Green Alga

She spotted a squirrel

Exploring the trails

We checked out a lot of great forest books, here were some of our favorites:

Grandfather Twilight

Night Tree

The Forest

Into the Forest

The Kissing Hand

Fox's Dream

Fire!: The Renewal of a Forest

A Tree in a Forest

Waiting for Winter

Hopefully sometime this next week I'll bust out the glue gun and get those coffee filter leaves glued onto the tree branch but it might be hard to find the time since we'll be soooo busy playing games for GAME WEEK!!!!!!