We have so much fun learning and playing in our garden at Tracie’s Treasures. I want to share some of my favourite films from the last couple of months.
In this film Jack is looking in our small barrel pond he is investigating what lives in there. He finds YUK
Jack Exploring In The Half Barrel Pond
George and the girls walk around the garden to check for bugs, George sings ‘Barbie Girl’ all the way around.
George Singing Barbie GirlMr Black Bird Having A Bath
This funny clip George is singing again as usual. This time he is singing to a Snail about being gorgeous.
George Singing ‘Your Beautiful’ To A Snail
My favourite time of day, looking in the greenhouses to see whats growing.
Elsie, Grace and Georgia Looking In The Greenhouse
Hope you enjoyed the films, the children here are amazing.
Today we have been focusing on communication, what better place to use questioning then our garden!
Walking along the path Elsie noticed some Strawberries which we had grown in one of our pots.
I asked the children “what do you think they will taste like? Else’s answer was “delicious, can I have one?” As I gave her the strawberry “ I asked “ what does it feel like?” Jack said “ yum yum” and took it out of my hand and popped it in his mouth. Else’s response was “squidgy “.
“Jack is the strawberry blue?” Jack shook his head to say no Elsie shouted from over her shoulder to me “it’s red silly”
I asked the children if they could find a flower that was red too. Elsie went one way and Jack the other.
Else’s found hers first, I asked her if she knew what it was called and she said “ it’s a Poppies, we sow the seeds yesterday! I explained “we sowed them in Springtime and it takes a long time for them to flower” I asked her if she could remember the parts of a flower she said “Petals and leaves”
When Jack found a leaf with holes in he stopped and looked at it for some time then turned to me and said “o no, o no“ I said “looks like a bug has had his dinner Jack. What type of bug could it be? Elsie thinks it’s a spider, Jack a ladybird and Tracie thinks a bee, we will have to keep watching to see if we can find the culprit. Jack then pointed at a very tall sunflower, “b, b” and signed the words ‘big Flower’ I showed Jack that the Sunflower was taller than me!
We went for a wonder, I asked the children “ how many different colours of flowers can we find in our garden? Jack found one first “blue, blue” well done Jack “ you found a blue flower” can you say flower? “Blue blue” that’s such a fantastic flower Jack can you smell it? Jack put his nose right into the flower and the pollen went on the the tip of his nose. He started wiping it saying “yuck yuck”
Forget-me-not
Else’s found yellow, orange, blue, purple, brown, pink and green flowers. “Wow Elsie well done finding all the colours of the rainbow”
I picked out a beautiful flower and asked Elsie “ how many petals does the flower have?
Elsie counted to 11 in sequence then kept missing out some numbers then said “to many!” I explained I would have trouble counting them too as there where so many. I asked Elsie what colours she could see in the flower, she said “ yellow, purple and white” I asked her what do you think the middle colour will be when it’s fully open? Elsie thinks it’s going to be Green, we will have to look again tomorrow and see.
What a lovely garden activity we had lots of new words, descriptive words, colours, conversations and fun.
George went first to find a treasure in the garden today. He ran around a few times then finally stopped at this amazing flower! He said “its a snowball!” I explained that its an Onion flower. He said “yuk I don’t like onions” then ran off to play.
Elsie chose this amazing Peony, unfortunately it had a baby spider inside one of the petals so off went Elsie in a tizzy.
Jack found this amazing Poppy he smelt it and said ‘Wow!” He loved the Ladybird crawling up the stalk and ran inside for a magnifying glass. He came back and studied the ladybird. He asked me to help him pick up the ladybird and put it in a Jar. We gave the ladybird some leaves and sticks and made him a lovely home.
Jack then went off magnifying glass in hand to find some more ladybirds to put in the jar so they could be freinds.
Jack was still on a bug hunt so Elsie decided to join in. Both of the children looked for frogs they were disappointed not to see any but overjoyed with the tadpoles.
Pool dippingTadpoles
Chloe chose this white Rose as her favourite flower of the week. Chloe also loved the pink climbing Hydrangea, it was behind the rose covering the back wall.
White RoseClimbing HydrangeaWater Canna Sweetpea
Tracie got excited about her water Canna which is starting to flower for the first time. The sweet-peas are coming on amazingly and have an amazing sent.
Can we do one wild thing everyday for the month of June! A whole 30 days? We are involving Our Childminding Family to join us in the challenge! Why don’t you join us too? Have a go be Wild for June with us and the Wild Life Trust.
Day one: Chloe Camping and making a wild 3D picture with sticks and stones.
Day 2: While out on a walk Chloe found and rescued a dragon fly
Helping A Dragon Fly
Day 3: Tracie, Chelsea, Chloe and Ruby went for an amazing walk in Snowdonia and came across a Waterfall and went Swimming.
Day 4: Elsie And Jack was looking for wildlife outside of the front window.
They saw flowers, Butterfly’s, Poppies and Incy Wincy Spider.
Going up into the tree’s
Day 5: Chloe went Tree Hopping at Zip World, she was high up in the trees and saw Birds, Rabbits, Bees, Dragon Flys and squirrels
Day 6: We found A Wasps Nest!
The nest consists of around 8,000-10,000 hexagonal (six sided) cells arranged in 8-10 tiers of about 20cm in diameter. The building material is paper-like and made of “chewed” rotting wood mixed with the wasp’s saliva. Construction is begun by a queen wasp but completed by workers (sterile females)
Six Sided CellsAmazing TextureOutside CrustCells For Laying Eggs
Day 7: watching the swifts going in and out of the barn and listening to their song was amazing.
Day 8: Identifying wild plants around our garden and looking in the barrel pool.
Fox GloveThistle PoppyFern
Day 9: Elsie planted some wildflowers in her plant pot at home. She sent me a picture to add to our blog.
Day 10: we put some crushed up crisps on the bench at the park. We sat still for a while and a Robbin and Black Bird came to have a feed.
Starting A Fire Fire Getting GoingToasting Marshmallows Smores Cool Dude YummyPeacock StruttingLooking Like A StatueChloeHigh In The Trees The Net WalkTree HoppingRope LaddersGoing Higher Zip WireTeam WorkTaking Turns For All AgesHi Chelsea and ChloeScreaming Loud!Back Down To EarthArt AttackPlayingRuby Chilling After Long WalkRescuing A DragonflyTidying Up To LeaveRecycling Night Night RubyOur View Beddgelert Lovely PoolsLaburnum Arch Ruby BedgelertLittle Mermaid Cute BridgeWaterfalls Worked Up An Appetite
It was lovely having Emma come and help Tracie care for us, we miss her so much during term time. It was also lovely to catch up with leo and Martie who came and spent the day with us, they have grown up so much!
The weather has been so kind for us, We have spent lots of time in the garden playing, planting, hiding and relaxing.
Emma, Martie and Mable
Our Jack took advantage of the lovely summer day to play out in the front garden, he loved this hot poker flower, he pretended it was a microphone and kept us all entertained with funny rap songs.
Jack
The long flowers were an amazing yellow colour which went with his t-shirt.
Jack practiced his ball skills, we tried to have a game but the table was to small. Next time we go to the park we will take our rackets and balls as they have a tennis table there!
Jack Showing off his Ball SkillsLottieInflatables
Lottie had a lovely time playing at Sector8 in the bouncy little ones play area. The big kids Georgia, Leo, Jack and Chloe played for a whopping 2 hours in the ‘big kids’ area.
LottieMable
We went for numerous walks around Stanly park. We took picnics, balls and got to play in the playground as it was very quiet.
Georgia Martie
Georgia loved playing with the Ello bricks and shapes. She made a lovely flower garden. She also made lots of crafts, this one was a pre printed princess dress, hair, shoes and gloves. Georgia then had to draw the princess’s face and join the arms and legs. It was so good she wanted to display it on the wall and make another one to take home. Georgia was so clever writing her full name on the top of the picture all by herself.
Georgia’s GarsenPrincess
While walking around the park we kept an eye out for ‘Liverpool Kindness Rocks’ we were just about to give up when Tracie found one! She screamed and had to jump high to reach it.
Liverpool Kindness Rocks
We finished the week off starting our ‘30 Days Wild’ campaign by putting up bee and insects houses .we made sure the wild birds have enough clean water and seeds.
The children have been so busy working hard sowing seeds, potting on and planting their crops.
They have been growing a vast array of fruit, veg and salad crops and we are just beginning to reap the rewards.
Sown From Seed Strawberries Cauldron Of Strawberries
Last year we sowed strawberry seeds, they took a while to germinate but after a while we were so glad to see little seedlings appearing through the compost. This year they have flowered and we are so excited to eat them. We have been thinking what to have them with. Chloe wants them just the way they come, Phyllis wants afternoon tea, Tracie wants Jam and Mason wants them on pancakes! What a choice we are going to have!
Potting Up Tomatoes To Take HomeAlba
This week we have potted up our tomatoes ready to take home and plant in our own gardens, in pots on our patio’s. Alba came for a visit, she took one home for her new garden.
Loofa, Lemon and Summer Flowers Cucumbers
The greenhouse is flourishing at the moment we have Loofa (to make as Christmas presents later in the year, watch out for that blog!) Our Lemon tree which we have grown from a pip has grown to about 2 feet now! We are hoping for some flowers then fruit soon.
We have summer bedding plants and Pac Choi for our stir fry’s. On the right side of the Greenhouse we are growing our baby cucumbers, We can soon have cucumber sandwiches to go with our Strawberry afternoon tea!
Behind the greenhouse we have our front garden project plants growing. We have 3 different types of Lavender plants growing ready to make a fragrant hedge later in the year.
We had a disaster last year with our cabbages. The slugs, butterflies and caterpillars decided they were going to eat them before us! We are touch wood (as Tracie says) beating them this year by growing them in a huge copper pot (apparently slugs don’t like copper) with a mesh over the top, lets hope our efforts work!
LavenderRubarb
In the big veg trough we have Parsnips, Carrots, leeks, swede and Beetroot growing ready for winter vegetables. Hopefully we will produce enough to keep us in Scouse and soups all winter.
ParsnipSwedeChivesLeeksSpring OnionsSprout
We have to be creative where we grow our vegetables and fruit as we don’t have a-lot of space. Our projects help to make our environment work for us, so we are clever and pack in fruit and veg in between the ponds, flower beds, wildlife feeding stations and play space.
We have sprouts growing in between the giant poppies, sweet peas and peas growing up netting together and our mange tout growing on wigwams.
Our lettuce is growing in rows on our decking and we have herbs in the living wall with tomatoes growing up the trellis. The only place left to play is on the washing line, even there Ive been known to hang bird feeders and hanging baskets.
Our lovely garden is packed full of planting to stimulate our five senses, smell, taste, touch, seeing and of course eating.
Did you know Honeybees fly about 55,000 miles at 12mph just to make one jar of honey! Today in our garden we found not 1 but 5 amazing nectar gatherers!
Some bees have very long tongues so they can reach into tubular-shaped flowers like our Foxgloves, honeysuckle, and snapdragons. The children are growing all three of these plants so we are hoping the bees take advantage and have some of our nectar.
FoxgloveHoneysuckle Snapdragons
We like to encourage the bees to come into our garden because they are part of the biodiversity on which we all depend on to live and underpin healthy ecosystems, helping all of nature to thrive. Honeybees, wild bees, and bumblebees pollinate our crops which helps them to grow.
A Few Bees From The 270 Found In Great Britain
The Honeybee is the best-known bee in Great Britain but there is actually over 270 species of bee recorded here!
George Looking For Bees
George asked Tracie an amazing question today about the Bees ” Tracie where do the bees sleep?’ Tracie explained she didn’t know but we would find out. We decided to ask Google and she said “Female solitary bees sleep in their nests but male solitary bees sleep outside, they rest in places like flowers or long grass stalks. We also found out you can tell a bee is asleep because its antennae are still, its head, and its wings are tucked into its body.
Wide Awake BeeCute Asleep Bee
Grace asked ‘ do Bees close their eyes at bedtime?’ another amazing question! Bees actually do close their eyes and relax like humans do. George said ‘Human?” We are called humans, George because we are living beings.
Elsie asked if bees cuddle? We looked it up on the internet and the answer was that they love to hold each other’s legs while they sleep! How cute is that!
Two Cute Bees Cuddling
George reminded us that we saw a bumblebee who looked poorly last year and we helped him feel better. I asked the children if they could remember how we made him better ‘ and they said ‘gave him water on a spoon’. I told them they were so clever to remember and that we also added sugar to the water and it dissolved and it gave the bee energy to make him feel better to fly home.
Bee HivesTracie’s DadLittle BeeMedicine
I then showed them the picture of my dad on the Tracietreasures web site, he was in his bee-keeping uniform and I explained how he collects the bee’s honey from his hives and puts it into jars.
We all had snacktime of honey sandwiches nom nom.
What an amazing activity we had today, started out as a walk around the garden and ended up with information collecting using Google, internet, and books all about our Bees, what amazing questions the children asked me.
Today we walked around the garden to look at all the changes we made last year and to make notes on what we want to plan for this year.
Spring In The Garden
The winding footpath we made last year is ideal for walking and running about avoiding the messy mud. The children love how they can run around and peep through the planting bug hunting, plant spotting and watching everything grow. They love the bug pile and saw some worms and ants.
Cold FrameOur Seeds Are Now Young PlantsGeorgia PlantingPetunia
We have sown all our bedding plants this year to save money, we also used peat free compost to help save our planet. The seeds have now grown into healthy young plants so we potted them on, ( put into bigger pots) and put them into the cold frame to wait for the last frost, we will then put them in our living wall.
This years project is to make the decking area into a nicer living ‘Outdoor Classroom’ We have chosen
Petunia, Lobelia and Fuchsia’s to have trailing, ground cover in the vertical wall garden. We will add the Herbs (growing in our greenhouse) for tasting and smelling into the wall as soon as they have matured.
We have Roses, Honeysuckle, Jasmine and Passiflora for climbing up the trelliss and giving off a floral fragrance. Our aim is to make the ‘Outdoor Classroom stimulate all our five senses. To make the decking more accessible for the babies we are going to add Astro turf so it’s safer for them to crawl and play on.
We were so excited to see our frogs while out and about, they were keeping an eye on their spawn, this will soon turn into tadpoles and frogs. Tracie taught us how to carefully remove some of the water weeds and she added some bunches of watercress to freshen up the pond to make the water less Murky so we can see the pond life without disturbing them.
Clear Water Small PondApple Tree PondMr Croak Mrs CroakSpawn
Our Big Plans For This Year 2023:
We have decided in our living classroom we are going to:
Lay artificial grass to make the decking completely baby friendly.
Make a toy box storage area for outdoor equipment
Pot up the Herbs and make labels.
Make a water feature for relaxing sound and to have water play
In the Greenhouse we are going to grow:
Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Loofa , Chilli and start off our Cabbage, Cauliflower, and Broccoli
Sow winter flowering plants to give out Garden all year color and edibles.
In the front garden:
We want to encourage more wildlife in, so we are thinking about making a new pond, putting in more hedging, and adding some hidden bird feeders.
So we have BIG plans, so keep watching our blogs to see how we go….
Tracie's Treasures 