Real Life Homeschooling: January 2014~The Wonderful White World

I am so happy to say that the monthly Real Life Homeschooling link ups are back in action with the new year! The second Tuesday of each month my fellow co-hosts and I will be linking up ways that we incorporated "learning" as we experienced L-I-F-E with our children.

This month I wanted to share with you some of the fun we had during the cold snap from early last week. We investigated the wonderful white world that we live in and learned things about ice and snow.

 One of the first things we learned is that when the snow is very powdery it unfortunately does NOT make good snowmen. In fact it doesn't hardly stick together at all--not even for snowballs, much to my son's dismay. So we talked about what we had learned when we had studied snowflakes in a previous week and why it did this.

 Next we discovered some ice by the creek and we saw how even though there was ice at the top the creek was still flowing underneath. This made us remember what we read in our book Farmer Boy about the dangers of falling into a frozen river because of the current under the ice. We tested this theory out using sticks and proved it to be so.

I love the designs in clear ice like this. I had to beg the boys to let me photograph it before destroying it with rocks and boots! LOL!

We enjoyed tromping through the snow on our walk and the boys eagerly ran ahead to jump on frozen puddles. We discovered one puddle that had feathery ice crystals on it. I couldn't get a good enough photo of it to capture the unique beauty. We talked about why it was like that and Little Britches decided it was because the wind was blowing while it was freezing. Very logical deduction!

I loved the view of the farm when we got to the top of the railroad...

The big barn...all dusted with snow.

The drive way and family farmhouse washed clean...

I love snow because it makes the world white and covers up the dreary brown of our winters.

We wandered down to the pasture to check out the donkeys and cows. Peppermint was staying close to her adopted daughter Cinnamon.

On the way down to the pasture, we had to go across the creek crossing and discovered beauty...and a bit of science!

Here is where the creek goes across the concrete crossing and spills into the lower stream that flows to the Ohio River. It's usually very pretty right here to watch the water. But as I looked I spied something that I wanted a closer look at.

Do you see it yet?? I had to cross the creek to get a better shot.

Do you see them now? Ice bubbles! When the water was misting and flashing as it came off the concrete it was freezing and making these gorgeous ice bubble balls! They just sparkled in the sun! A real treasure find for the cold winter day! The boys thought they were cool. If I had been able to reach them I would have broken one off for them to see more closely.

Once we investigated, we went back up to the old farmhouse and I let the boys just play in the snow...

Little Britches decided the powdery snow was perfect for "mowing" with the old fashioned rotary mower. He loved blowing the "snow dust" around!

Baby Britches discovered that though the snow didn't stick together very well it was perfect for scooping and dumping so he had fun just playing with his vehicles.

And what did mama enjoy most?

Well I did LOVE finding the ice bubbles, but my most favorite thing was probably...

My big cup of homemade hot chocolate w/whipped cream and cinnamon!

We had a lovely time exploring our wonderful white world and finding the real life homeschooling hidden in it!

Now it's your turn! Did you find hidden education lessons in your daily life? Math at the grocery store? ABC's while driving? If you have blogged about a situation of real life homeschooling, we want to see it! Simply use the link up below! And be sure to visit some of the other blogs of my fellow co-hosts too!