Going on Safari

 

We hosted playgroup at our house last week and had such a fun time!  We put together a "back yard safari" for the kids and really lucked out weather wise, considering the season.  I made some little field journals out of construction paper, notebook paper and bug stickers and all the kids arrived decked out in their safari gear.  There was a pretty complete set of supplies ranging from critter habitats and butterfly nets to binoculars and safari hats, super cute!  I picked up a tube of larger-than-life plastic bugs and hid them around our yard before the kids arrived.  When the safari started, the kids got to hunt through the yard until they found a bug. Then they got to catch it, sketch it, and return it to the wild for the next explorer ;-)  I was really impressed with how on-task the kids were the whole time, they really took their bug hunting seriously!  As a bonus, we actually found a real beetle (a huge sucker!) and a couple of earth worms

This was our first time hosting an outdoor playgroup since the pirate ship has been up in the yard and it was a blast watching the huge pack of children pile into the ship, then shoot themselves (with the imaginary cannons) across the grass to a treasure island (our patio) where they drew out maps (with sidewalk chalk) and then ran back to their ship to seek out the treasure. Hilarious!  The only down side? It has become very obvious to hubby and myself that we have to do something about the mud in our back yard! The poor kids were little mud monsters by the time we headed back inside for lunch (though I don't think they really minded much.)  I'm thinking pea gravel around the play area is in our near future.  Ah the little joys of living on a creek ;-)