Healing the Hurts: Free Play Bandage Printable

Our daughter isn’t even two and her caretaker instinct sure has kicked in.  She makes sure everyone has all their food at meal times before she starts, things are shared evenly, gives the best hugs and makes sure each cut and scrape is urgently tended to. I think every little one can have most of their minor wounds miraculously healed by an adhesive bandage (trying to avoid brand-names!), but she wants to make sure everyone else has one, too!  And her dolls, and stuffed animals, and sometimes the wall… And, boy can the cost of bandages adds up quick!  Especially when you pick up those cute character ones.  We want to teach her that bandages aren’t stickers, but encourage her caring heart as well.

Then last week I found a pack of 300 labels (I used Avery 1” x 2 5/8”) and decided to whip up a pretend-play alternative.  Feel free to print and play with this pattern any way you like!  It’s saving us a pretty penny while our little one is saving the world as it is in her mind!  I’m rounding here, but we went from each bandage costing 30 cents to only 2!
 

Click here to open printable sheet

All these bandages got her brother talking about doctors and nurses, what’s the difference and who’s better.  Naturally (being a nurse) I set him straight! =)  But then I was realistic and explained how they work together with a whole team of helpers to try to increase the health of others and themselves.  And now, he wants to be a doctor!  Who knows what might come of a sheet of play bandages!? 

Although not outdoors, one of our adventures this week included driving out to the science museum in Portland (OMSI).  I feel like a lot of their exhibits were over our little ones’ heads, but I still love the concepts their observing.  I remember not enjoying reading the placards at the museums growing up, but then when I later read about concepts in textbooks, I could visualize them because of what I had already seen.  So hopefully it will stick with them!  I’m only disappointed we didn’t even get to the human body exhibit!  I think they really would have picked up a lot as it’s something they’re interested in right now.  Just too much to see!  I guess we’ll have to go back! =)

Are you looking for more pretend medical play ideas?  Check out these free doctor's office exam forms, and this great freebie idea for play x-ray print outs!  Sure to be hours of fun!  Or even better, make your next doctor's office slightly less traumatic. 

Seven Ways to Find Playscapes Near You (And 10 Pre-Tested in Lane County!)



Wonders of Nature (A Little Golden Book)

by Jane Werner Watson, Eloise Wilkin

This is our life right now: Wonders of Nature.  (If you get a chance to pick up a copy of this book, Wonders of Nature, do!  So sweet and poetic!)  Every morning, the littles wake up and before I can finish picking up their breakfasts, they’re begging to get their shoes on (or not) and escape to the great outdoors.  This week we’ve been studying beetles and caterpillars, flattening mole hills, picking apples, and splashing in rivers.  I say that in multiple because we’ve been exploring fair number of parks since we’ve been here and an even higher proportion this past week while Josh was at Peterson University in Oakland.  Parks seem to distract kids from missing their dad the best, they meet friends, and sleep great that night!

Willamalane

It’s always hard finding where to go to play in a new town.  So far I’ve been very impressed with the parks in the Eugene area, so I wanted to share our local experiences with others in the area who might be curious, as well as general ways you can look for play areas in any town. 

Armitage

How to discover new play areas near you:

1.       Drive Bys:  You know, to be quite honest, we’ve found the majority of parks by mistake.  Nothing beats exploring on your own, getting a little lost, finding some hidden gems and figuring out a new area.  My first memorized route in this town of crazy roads and traffic was to the grocery store (priorities, right?) and it was from there that I spied at least three of the parks we’ve visited!  Look for the brown rectangle park signs and yellow diamond playground signs.  In fact, even the kiddos recognize and seem to be on constant look out for these ones.

More info about recreational signs here

2.       Google (or other search engine) maps: Type in “playground” on the map and watch those red dots pop up.  Or “park” if you’re not particular about it having a play structure and swings.  A little tricky knowing just what you’re getting into, but it will often link to the parks web page and you can choose what area you want.  If you don’t see many, try zooming in and the smaller ones will appear.  Sorry if this is too elementary, but I myself am fairly technologically challenged, so it took me a little while to figure this out!  Maybe I can save someone else with a similar condition a minute or two! =)

Amazon

3.       County Parks home page. Search for (your county) county parks.  The Lane County Parks page  has links to a variety of different parks as well as regulations and passes.  They also have a page listing all the parks in Lane County with information on the amenities provided, though the presence of playgrounds is not always mentioned.

4.       State Parks: Search for (your state) State Parks to find their web page.  Oregon’s is definitely geared more toward camping and outdoor adventures rather than playgrounds.  And of course it covers the whole state, so you have to narrow your search.  But if that’s what you’re looking for, this can also be a great tool. 

Dorris

5.       Kaboom:  Have you ever heard of Kaboom.org ?  You just type in your town and it pops up a map and list of play areas near you, both indoor and outdoor.  And you can add in the ones not yet listed!  Pretty convenient.  I’m going to have to play with this one some more.   

6.       School rules:  Did you know public school playgrounds are available to the public for play during non-school hours?  We visited these all the time growing up and got to discover many fun places we would have never seen otherwise!

Hendricks

7.       Word-of-mouth:  Do you know anyone in the area?  Especially if they have similar interests they are probably your best bet for directing you to the spots you’ll really enjoy.  Or, if you can find one park, ask others you come in contact with where else they like to go.  In my experience, people are usually more than willing to share their knowledge!

Mt. Pisgah

Just prepping this page I found so many more parks I want to check out!  I hope you can benefit from it, too!  Play is so necessary for everyone old and young alike and promotes physical and mental health.  Sometimes just knowing where to go can be half the battle.  Especially for homeschoolers or those with young children who may not have access to the play structures on a regular basis.  And you can use a lot of these searches as you travel, too!  Just remember to check local park regulations and fees; they’re usually posted on site.

Amazon

My kids are totally into playgrounds right now, so those are always at the top of their lists!  But for those locals (or newly locals) reading this, I wanted to share a couple of our favorite spots so far:

1.       Discovery Village in Skinner Butte Park: Awesome play structures and water play!  Pretty busy and open with tons to do.

Discovery Village

2.       Fairmount City Park: Smallish park tucked behind the university that also has water play.  Very peaceful secluded feel to this park.

Fairmount

3.       Amazon Park: Lots of fun structures that seemed to enthrall a wide range of ages.  Outdoor pool in the summer and miles of paths.

Amazon

4.       Willamalane Park: On our way to the grocery store! =)  Lots of play structures, skate park, and apparently there’s an indoor swim facility we have yet to discover.

Willamalane

5.       Hendricks Park: Although it does have a few swings, we appreciate this heavily wooded area best for its peaceful walking paths.

Hendricks

6.       Dorris Ranch: more info on this one in my last post, but this park has miles of paths, mostly through century-old hazelnut groves.  They also feature a living history village.  Although open to educational groups by reservation, we visited a community day last Friday and found it very interesting!

Dorris

7.       Petersen Barn: this was the first park we visited (found word-of-mouth) and loved the sandy playground and open space.  Turns out, our new church meets in the community center here!

Petersen Barn

8.       Dorena Lake: nice swim area and wooded picnic area on this lovely lake in the hills.  A little bit of a drive from Eugene.

9.       Lowell park and Dexter Lake Park: equipment to climb on and a great swimming area.  The day we went here it was almost 100 degrees!  The cool lake was so pleasant!  Again, about a half hour drive.

Dexter Lake

10.     Armitage Park: paved paths that wind around by the river, gravel bars and large fields with picnic areas.

Armitage paths passing under bridges

Where is your favorite place to go outside and play?  Do you have one great spot that you keep going back to, or do you like to discover new place each time you go out?  I hope you have a great week and happy exploring!

The Long, Long Hike: Scavenger Printables!

Have you ever been on a hike and realized it was taking WAY longer than you thought it would?  I mean, sometimes it doesn’t really matter, like when it’s just you and the dog and you don’t have anywhere to be.  I really love hikes like that, they’re so peaceful and you can just explore and be spontaneous!  But, when it’s just you and the dog and the preschooler and the toddler and getting on toward suppertime, it gets a bit more worrisome!  That was our experience yesterday as we set off to explore a new trail system called Dorris Ranch.

Dorris Ranch is not a ranch at all, but rather fourteen individual hazelnut groves, woodland plots and a few open meadows on over 250 acres.  The hazelnut (or filbert) groves date back to 1905 and apparently half of our nations hazelnut trees originated from the Dorris Ranch!  There are miles of winding trails through the groves, but we naturally decided to take the shortest loop (about a half mile) as we planned to visit a new playground as soon as we were done.   Thankfully our adventure boy is in this “be prepared for anything” stage and I’m so glad he is!  He insisted on bringing his backpack with water and trail mix and we tucked a park map in there, too. Though the colored pencils and bungee cord were not found to be as helpful, we were prepared.

The map was nice to have, though I may not have looked at often enough.  We totally missed our cut off trail and took a loop that ended up being well over two miles.  With the wee ones in sandals and it getting close to dinner time.  I was bracing myself for the meltdowns, but attempted to be proactive in motivating them and distracting them from their discomfort.  And you know what?  It worked!  And I feel like they learned stuff, or at the very least, practiced what they already knew.  I was so pleased I thought I’d share with you in the rare case that you might find yourself in a similar predicament one day.  But probably not.  Most people actually read the maps they pick up for the hike!  Haha! Oh, well, it was an adventure all right!

So first off, we took a lot of breaks.  But not as soon as I heard a complaint.  Well, toddlers don’t really do waiting very well, so she did get carried a fair portion.  But when our bigger hiker thought he could go no farther, we would pick the farthest spot we could see to choose as a resting place.  Then we would sit down, take a drink of water and a handful of trail mix and I got to explain how muscles get stronger by being used and how we need to feed them the protein from the nuts we were eating (and the meat later on).  We kept that new playground as a goal when they didn’t want to get moving again.

As we trudged along we made up a sort of scavenger hunt of a few things from the schoolbooks this morning: shapes and colors.  This was such a great motivator as it kept them engaged in their surroundings and seeking to get farther down the trail to discover the next surprise!  Here are our results for the shapes.  Some of them are a bit of a stretch, but given the circumstances, I thought we did quite well:

Circles, ovals, triangle, square, rectangle, octagon.  At one point our loop followed a paved bike path so we were able to find many geometric shapes.

And the colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, white, black, grey, brown.

Oh, and giving points made it extra exciting.  We weren’t really even counting up to anything, but they were points!  We also had the random teaching moments like how the hazlenuts we saw lying on the ground were the hazelnut tree’s seeds and how the whole tree grew from the little nut-seed.  We talked about how the noisy wind bending the trees’ boughs was like God: powerful and strong, but invisible.  We can see what He’s doing but not God Himself.  We even took time (too late) to look over the map together and begin to talk about how they work and how they help us.  Yup, I was pretty much just preaching to myself there.  And random excitement: we found a really tame parakeet.  Pretty sure those aren’t wild around here.  I tried to catch him, but he didn’t think that was a good idea.  Though he let me get close enough to touch him several times.  I didn’t even know what to do!  I’m sure he’s someone’s escaped pet! 

At last we saw the truck!  And it was all downhill from there (literally and figuratively!)  We made it, and with no meltdowns!  Thank You, God!  And for those of you curious, we found a lovely playground and stayed there until dusk and the little ones sure slept good that night!  I did get to thinking these scavenger hunts might be fun to do even when not necessary.  So I whipped up some check lists to use on our next hike to help keep the focus. Maybe I'll keep a pen to cross the words off or better yet: stickers!  If you'd be interested in them, you can just click the photo to enlarge it and print a couple to keep in your vehicle for your next journey!  Happy learning and adventuring!

Tiny Creatures of the Deep Woods

~Mollusks and Millipedes and More (Oh My!)~

How was your Labor Day weekend?  We just returned from camping a few hours ago and I’m so excited to hammer out this post now that the tiny tykes are tuckered out and tucked in!  Sorry, sometimes the alliterations just slip out!  They’re so fun, I just can’t help myself!  This long weekend was spent with some new-found (to me and the kids) family from the area at the peaceful Indian Creek.  I love the Pacific Northwest’s towering trees that are drenched in moss and wading through ferns!  I do believe we got to pitch our tent amongst one of the loveliest scenes on God’s gorgeous planet, and that’s saying something! Many hours were spent wading in the water, hiking to waterfalls and talking around the camp fire, but I really love how my children got to study new creatures they’d never seen before!  Oh, the wonder!

The most numerous was the millipede!  I have rarely seen these creatures in my life, but there was an abundance this weekend!  There literally must have been thousands along our first hike; so many that you nearly couldn’t take a step without stepping on one!  Josh told our little guy that they may be poisonous, so he tried to rid the world of as many as possible, “so they won’t hurt anyone!”  But then we thought about how they would make a lovely bird feast, so he didn’t feel like he had to carry that responsibility himself! 

Still, at least the first couple were fascinating to all of us, especially how they moved their legs in waves down their bodies.  We talked about how the name described the creature (mili means thousand, pede means foot).  One of the little girls gathered some in a jar and we learned that they secrete a horrible odor when they feel threatened!  I was curious to learn more and found a little about these interesting creatures from A to Z animals.  They are invertebrates with 80-400 legs (not a thousand) but they only start out with 6!  As they grow, they shed layers and gain legs.  They are omnivores and some are indeed poisonous, though the only non-vegetarian dish the largest ones (they can get up to 15 inches) would eat would be small insects. 

A few caterpillars caught the attention of curious eyes for a while as well.  We stopped our little protector from his stomping rampage to remind him how caterpillars grow up to be butterflies and we need not be concerned with that creature!  There is a ton of information out there about the caterpillar's life process so I’m not going to rehash it here, but if you’re looking for good recources, kids butterfly is a good place to start or the butterfly site. 

 

At night, the kids and I sat on the bank of the creek and I watched them discover bats for the first time!  And while we were watching, a great blue heron flew right over our heads as it followed the creek bed!  We also found some fascinating spiders the next morning!

But the creature that enthralled my children the most was the humble snail!  We discovered a few over the course of the weekend and these little ones would just crouch down and watch.  It was amazing to see children so small gaze intently and be so still for so long!  I love that they are learning the benefits of being still from time to time.  I guess I want to learn how to do that better, too.  To just stop and watch.  To take it all in and learn and grow in that still time.  Hm, didn’t I just write myself a reminder card to be still? 

Anyway, we grew up with plenty of snails and slugs in our lives, but I wanted to see if we could learn anything new about them, too.  I found some great  information at Snail World.  Did you know snails can live up to 25 years old, or that they can see and smell, but not hear?  They are nocturnal and so strong they can lift ten times their body weight.  Snail World also has a kids page where I learned they like to eat calcium for a strong shell and that they actually have microscopic teeth.  The page has a print out and lots more info for my homeschooling  friends out there.  Although we didn’t want to transport one in the car, we’re considering keeping a snail or two in a jar in the house for a bit and the above mentioned page also has some great ideas for snail pet care. 

So much of our weekend was spent looking at tiny things.  Then we stumble across the great majesty of the ancient trees and the depths to which the waterfalls plummet!  Does this remind anyone else of the multiple facets of God?  So often I get so focused on what I can see of Him here and what I can see Him doing now that I forget that He is so much more than we can imagine!  Dad always used to explain it by stabbing a pencil through a piece of paper and showing us how we can be like two dimensional paper so that all we see of God (parablized by the pencil) in our little world is a circle, when in reality, there is depth and understanding to Him that we can’t begin to imagine!  Wow!  That’s my Jesus in whom I can trust!  Creator of the largest and tiniest wonders…

 

Water Doodles

Good morning!  We had such a lovely weekend with my parents here and now Josh’s folks are coming down tomorrow!  This is one of the biggest reasons why we moved down from Alaska: more family time.  I love seeing my children loving on and being loved by their grandparents!  We’re having some fun adventures that I’m sure to share with you later, but in the busy week I wanted to offer you my water doodles (quick water color paintings).

My dearest friend in Fairbanks was always so good about putting verses to paper and sharing them.  I continue to have these handwritten notes around the house as reminders as I pass through the room.  Life gets crazy sometimes and you might glance at something like this when you wouldn’t sit down in the moment to read your Bible.  They can be a quick scrawl or a work of art, but it’s been proven that writing things out helps you to remember them, so I wanted to give it a try, too, then share with you!  Feel free to print them out and tack them up where you’ll see them through the day, or I’ve saved similar verse art to my phone and use them as my lock screen background so I’m reminded every time I turn it on. 

Now that I’ve talked about verses, I have to admit that I didn’t actually write any full verses into these pieces.  Think of them more like reminder cards, or write out the verse to the side (it will help you remember! =)  The first says “Be Still” at the bottom.  This is to reference Psalm 46:10.  The whole verse says, “Be still, and know that I am God, I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!”  There are (many) times that we get way too busy, so much so that we sort of become dazed and confused.  Refocus and prioritize.  The exalted God is first.  This verse comes at the end of the chapter that begins, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”  Don’t put Him on the back burner! Note that I am preaching to myself here! =)

The second is from an old song that you can find in an old recording on youtube.  And the lyrics go like this:

"Life is easy, when you're up on the mountain
And you've got peace of mind, like you've never known.
But things change, when you're down in the valley.
Don't lose faith, for you're never alone.

For the God on the mountain, is the God in the valley.
When things go wrong, He'll make them right.
And the God of the good times
is still God in the bad times.
The God of the day is still God in the night.

We talk of faith way up on the mountain.
Talk comes so easy when life's at its best.
Now down in the valleys, of trials and temptations
That's where your faith, is really put to the test."

Can you relate?  Is it easy to say you believe when life is fine and everyone around you is a believer?  What happens when it’s not?  God doesn’t change and He never leaves.  Malachi 3:6a says, “For I the LORD do not change”.  Pretty comforting, really.  And good to know that though the hard times will come, even if we cannot handle what we face, HE is the same, HE is with us to allow us to handle anything when we put our trust in Him. 

I hope you have a wonderful Labor Day weekend and that these simple reminders can help you rest and refocus during this time!  And maybe squeeze in an adventure or two!  What’s going on in your lives during this break?