The Carrot Seed {Before FI♥AR}

Last week we finished rowing The Carrot Seed, by Ruth Kraus. It is such a short and simple book but we had lots of fun with carrots, seeds, gardening and more! (See my new row of this book with Bo for more memory making fun with this book.)

Our companion books were Growing Vegetable Soup and Eating the Alphabet: Fruits & Vegetables from A to Z.

And the radio program we listened to added an element of fun to it. We listened to it after we planted our carrot seeds and sang it all summer.  Then we waited and waited and waited for our carrots to come up!

And I so enjoyed looking back at the carrots we grew last summer, and seeing how much Eliana has grown!

Growing Carrots:



Eliana and I planted 2 square feet, but we only harvested one square so we could let the other square grow a little more. 



After pulling them, we lined them up and counted them. Then took them inside to trim and wash. 



Art:

We made a "carrot impressionism."



I explained that we were just creating the impression or idea of a carrot.


Creamy Carrot Soup:

Another day we made Creamy Carrot Soup ~ a recipe from our learning adventure with the Tawny Scrawny Lion. Malachi especially loved this and remembered the soup! And I was careful to make sure we went easy on the salt this time. 

To make the Creamy Carrot Soup, we used:
  • a fresh onion from the garden
  • and lots of organic celery (from the store)
Sauteed that in butter, then added:
  • lots of carrots
  • and 4 cups of organic free range chicken broth (1 carton)
And let it all simmer until tender. Then we added:
  • 4 more cups chicken broth to cool it down
Then we blended it in the blender until creamy, poured it back in the pan and added seasonings ~ a little salt and Organic No-Salt Seasoning (herbs and spices).  We served the soup with fresh baked Honey Wheat Flax bread that I had Luke pick up from a local organic bakery (our first week back to school and I was not up for more baking). 

Then we frosted the carrot cake (that was in the freezer waiting for us to make the soup) and had that for dessert. 
Lap Journal and Activities:

Carrot Sizing, Vegetables Book and Will It Come Up? Book:


(Lapbooking activities from Homeschool Share.) 

Fruit or Vegetable? and The Growth of a Seed:

(The above printables are from the book Exploring Science Through Literature, Level A.)

Fruit or Vegetable? Collage:



I cut out various fruits and vegetables from a seed catalog and had Malachi make a collage for each. The important concept to learn is that fruit is a seed container, so if it has seeds inside it is a fruit. 

P.S. With the calender on the wall, you can see that I don't always blog in "real" time! ;-)

Lap Journal/Memory Book:


Kumon Activities that tied in this week:


Seed Growth:

To study seed growth, we planted a bean seed in a glass jar with a paper towel so that we could see the growth. 

(Seed growth in reverse)

It is too late to plant our bean plant outside, but today we harvested some green beans from our garden so they could see the end result. We accidentally saved some pretty blue seeds from our Blue Lake Green Beans. :-) {As we were picking green beans for a Nutrition activity, I picked a mature bean that had yellowed and tried to pitch it over the fence to the chickens. Thankfully, I missed the fence and Nathan picked it up and discovered the blue seeds. lol ~ I had never saved seed from beans before.}


And of course, there were lots of discussions on seeds and bearing fruit from a Biblical perspective. :-)

Delightful Links:

12 comments

  1. We use FIAR as well, just love your ideas. Thanks, Karen
    Sippy Cup Central Mom

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  2. you're amazing, thanks for the post, so inspirational for us, we're a first year homeschooling family

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  3. Love this Michelle. You are very inspiring, thanks :-)

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  4. I love it... how fun, fun, fun, and yummy too :D

    (about posting so fast... I do it a little everyday, starting on Yom Rishon =)

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  5. The Carrot Seed is a such a simple story and you have done so much with it. I love your ideas and will be trying these out with my children. Thanks for sharing all the details!

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  6. I love your blog!!!!
    You are so inspiring! I am home schooling for the first time this year...and I have to tell you...THANK YOU ....FOR ALL YOUR INSPIRATIONS! =)

    pettiskirtsandmudpies.blogspot.com

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  7. Wow! What a fun time filled with great learning!!

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  8. I love it all, but the memory books and the seed in the jar (how many times have I done that?!:)) are my favorites!!! And, your kids are adorable. You are inspiring me to spend some time planning this weekend. :)

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  9. Wow! You had me at "Carrot Seed" -- I LOVE that book and had forgotten it. You did so many creative things here... super fun and educational at the same time. The impressionist carrots are great.

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  10. I think its fabulous how you tied in the three books and had such a varied, fun filled week!

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  11. Hi - I am a in home daycare provider just beginning our BFIAR journey with my littles. Thank you so much for posting this. Can you explain a bit more about your journals. It looks like every activity they do goes into this journal. This would be really nice to give to parents perhaps once a quarter or so... They are only 2 years old so we won't be doing all of this but some we definitely will!

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    1. http://www.delightfullearning.net/2011/05/lap-journal-five-in-row.html?m=1 Hi Tina! My post at that link will explain more! That would be a wonderful gift!

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