"This Is Not Fun" or Where I Believe Making Birdfeeders Will Be Fun But Find that Listening to the Story Is Better

We're ending a term here. I am experimenting with a six week term schedule. We will school year around (cause really who doesn't learn anything in the summer), six weeks on, one week off with two longer breaks in the spring and fall as well as a Christmas break.

Yesterday we finished up math with a test. Today we finished four books that have been lingering in the land of mostly known, but not quite.

We're almost finished with the Burgess Bird Book for Children which is really the point of this post. It is a neat book and we've enjoyed reading and listening to it for the past two terms. The main character, Peter Cottontail learns about all the birds in his vicinity over a year. Oftentimes he is in conversation with a bird kind, but occasionally it is a discussion about a bird with another bird as in the hawk. We've drawn birds and identified birds and talked about birds.

In the End

I wanted to do three bird activities--a bird feeder, a bird house and a bird bath--with Abigail and Simon. Life happens and so we are still waiting to do those things. Today though was the bird feeder day.

Given a scoop of lard and a scoop of peanut butter to warm and mix they began while I tied stings to the pine cones. Simon was suspicious of any activity where his hands entered peanut butter, but he started. When I poured some seed into the mixture, Abigail kept mixing and talking and Simon froze.

Simon keep mixing.
I can't, holding his sticky, seedy hands splayed
Simon, mix it. This is supposed to be fun.
With just the right amount of matter-of-fact mixed with the smallest trace of whine, and while studying his hands, I have peanut butter and lard on my hands. This is not fun.

Needless to say Abigail and I finished filling the cones while George licked Simon's hands clean enough to wash. She declared that while fun for a moment, this was not an activity that needs to be repeated.

Peanut Butter on Their Hands Every Day, Please.

By way of sharing information: We found the Burgess Bird Book for Children for free on this site in a variety of formats. We are missing the pictures on the Kindle, but I use the Peterson's Guide for our backyard identification anyway so we find the pictures in there. I also found an audio version here. It is also free. Oh how I love books in the public domain. Every so often we will have a less than ideal recording, but we enjoy listening together. And I am not so strapped to a chair.