Category Archives: Nature

Origami Boat Race

Posted on May 16, 2013 by suzlipman| 3 Comments

My family has long been fans of making and sailing paper boats, an idea we got from our beloved book, H.A. Rey’s Curious George Rides a Bike. In the book, George secures a paper route, which leads him to make and sail a whole flotilla of folded-newspaper boats. Over the years, we’ve taken our origami boats down to a local creek, where they indeed sailed along once released, on the gently flowing spring stream. We were thrilled to learn that our local Mill Valley Public Library was teaching kids how to make their own origami boats (which they cleverly dipped in wax), before holding a boat race in the local creek.

What better way to celebrate Children’s Book Week than by making a version of Curious George’s paper boat and joining local children in releasing the boats into a creek for a race?

Follow these directions to make your own paper boat.

You might also like:

How To: Make a Paper Boat
Celebrating 100 Years of the Mill Valley Libary
Rich in Kindness, Poor in Money: All-of-a-Kind Family Children’s Book

Photos by Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Community, Crafts, Nature, Reading, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Children's Book Week, Children's Books, Craft Tutuorial, Curious Goerge Rides a Bike, Kids Activities, Kids Crafts, Mill Valley, Mill Valley Library, Mill Valley Public Library, Newspaper Boat, Old Mill Creek, Origami Boat, Paper Boat, Paper Boat Tutuorial, Tutorial

Have a Summer Nature Camp at Home

Posted on May 14, 2013 by suzlipman| Leave a comment

For many summers, my family divided the season into summer camps, vacation travel, and down-time at home, during what we called Camp MommyAnna. It seemed important to enjoy some of summer’s long days with adventures in our local nature and area and no set schedule. So I’m very excited to participate in The At-Home Summer Nature Camp eCurriculum, which offers tons of ideas to help you create your own at-home summer camp experience.

The At-Home Summer Nature Camp eCurriculum, from A Natural Nester, contains creative and easy-to-follow ways to keep kids engaged throughout the summer and to make the most of family time together.

The Curriculum includes 8 weeks of kid-friendly lessons, outdoor activities, indoor projects, crafts, recipes, field trip ideas, children’s book suggestions, and more in a full-color PDF you can read on your computer screen or tablet, or print out. The program is designed to be flexible and fit with your family’s schedule and surroundings, so you can incorporate the ideas any time it works for you.

Fun weekly themes to help kids discover and enjoy the natural world include:

An Edible Garden ~ The Night Sky ~ At the Beach

A Spot in the Shade ~ Ponds & Frogs

Rain, Rain ~ Wildflowers & Bees ~ Sun Fun

While designed primarily for children ages 5-11, the ideas are fun and adaptable for all ages.

These are the talented and inspirational camp counselors:

Sarah of Imagine Childhood ~ Kara of Simple Kids

Suz of Slow Family Online ~ Ashley of Small Measure

Valarie of Jump Into a Book ~ Heather of Shivaya Naturals
Cerys of Nature and Play ~ Linda of Natural Suburbia

Leah of Skill It ~ Amy of Mama Scout

Debi of Go Explore Nature ~ Shawn of Awesomely Awake

Liz of A Natural Nester ~ Kat of Creative Playhouse

Gina of Connecting Family & Seoul

Erin of Exhale. Return to Center and More!

The eCurriculum will be available May 20, but you can pre-order a copy now.

I can’t wait for summer!

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Posted in Crafts, Field Trip, Nature, Porch Swing, Seasons, The Great Outdoors

Tagged At-Home Summer Camp, At-Home Summer Camp e-Curriculum, Children, Crafts, Natural Nester, Nature, Summer, Summer Activities

Small Wonders: Early Childhood Activities for a Greener Earth

Posted on May 9, 2013 by suzlipman| Leave a comment

I’m so pleased that Patty Born Selly, educational expert and consultant at Small Wonders, parent, Small Wonders blogger, and long-time advocate for early childhood nature play, has written a beautiful, inspiring and very thorough book, Early Childhood Activities for a Greener Earth.

After making the case for nature fun and offering tips for overcoming common obstacles to getting kids outside for exploration and play (“the kids are too wild”, “this is a logistical nightmare”, “we don’t have a nature area”), Selly dives into instructions for countless fun activities that inspire children’s exploration and care of nature and help them learn about weather, air, water, food, health and reuse. Each activity lists a recommended minimum age and offers detailed descriptions, as well as tips for further exploration. Many are very simple to do, such as a Sound Walk, a Color Search, a Seed Sort, or a Puddle Hunt, while offering windows to deep exploration and fun.

A few other wonderful projects include a Water Cycle Garden, in which kids create a greenhouse to observe the movement of water through plants and soil. Wind Ribbons, Kites, Rocket Balloons, and Paper Pinwheels are among the activities that help children explore air. Sunshine Sculptures, Shadow Tracing, and Raindrop Rainbows help children explore sun and rain. I love the Scent Chase, in which children experience their senses of smell with scent jars. I also love the Soap Making activity, which utilizes the melt-and-pour method and is part of a group of activities designed to help children think about healthy choices in cleaning and personal products.

Each activity includes the national science education standards that that activity meets. Each chapter includes information about the theme (such as “Weather, Climate and Energy”) suggestions for teaching and discussion of the impact of (weather) on people and of people on (weather), so that readers and the children in their lives can get a very clear understanding of the Earth’s ecosystem and their place within it. This is a very thorough, inspiring and fun book that will help parents, teachers, youth leaders and others spark children’s curiosity about and knowledge of the natural world.

Redleaf Press is offering a 30% discount on Early Childhood Activities for a Greener Earth from now through June 30, 2013. To take advantage of this deal, follow this link and enter the coupon code GREENEARTH.

12 Fun Family Activities for Screen Free Week

Posted on April 29, 2013 by suzlipman| 2 Comments

When I speak to families about slowing down and enjoying family time, one of the things that comes up over and over is screen time. Screens dominate many of our lives, often to a greater degree than we wish. While many of us parents can attest to the addictive nature of technology, we struggle with ways to reduce it in our children’s lives.

It is perhaps a bonus, then, that the wonderful Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood has proclaimed April 29 – May 5 to be Screen-Free Week. Sometimes this kind of added incentive is all we need to inspire us to action. More than once, parents have told me that their children’s favorite memories include episodes of family game nights by fire- or candlelight during power outages. You can create your own “power outage” by participating in Screen-Free Week. And, even if you don’t go completely screen-free, you might want to pledge an hour or so a day or night to have some good screen-free fun. Who knows? That fun might just become a habit or your own favorite family memory.

Here are 12 ways to celebrate Screen Free Week:

Make a Paper Boat and sail it in a creek, pond or bathtub.

Make a Bird Feeder. Our local birds have gone nuts for ours and we plan to make more.

Make easy Wreaths, Crowns and Baskets to celebrate May Day.

Enjoy Loom and Finger Weaving. You can do this anywhere!

Keep a Moon Diary as a way of observing the night sky.

Slow your pace and have a Cloud Race.

Get a jump on summer by making S’Mores. Camp under the stars if it’s warm enough.

Start a Backyard Garden.

Bake your own Soft Pretzels. These are really easy and fun.

Play a different fun board game every night. We like Boggle, Sorry, Taboo, Pictionary, Scrabble, Mancala, Masterpiece, Monopoly and Hi-Ho Cherry O.

Discover The Joy of Quiet.

And, if you’re really missing your screen? Make your own Shoebox TV!

You’ll need:

Shoebox or a square-shaped box and lid
Cardboard tubes, from paper towels, foil or plastic wrap, or wooden dowels
4-10 pieces of printer paper (8 ½ x 11”)
Drawing materials
Scissors, craft knife and tape

Cut a large opening for the TV screen into the bottom of the box, leaving an even border of 1” or more all around.

Holding the box horizontally, cut two holes on the top, each about 2” the side and 2” back from the cut-out section. Your dowels or cardboard tubes should fit into the holes.

Cut two bottom holes that line up with the top ones.

Cut the cardboard tubes, if necessary, so that about ½ “ sticks out on the bottom and 1-2” on top.

Decide on a story you want to tell that primarily uses pictures.

Place the paper horizontally (cutting, if necessary, to fit the tube length) and draw one picture on each page, adding words, if desired. Leave at least 1” on each paper edge and at least 2” on the left edge of the first picture and the right edge of the last picture.

Lay the pictures out, left to right, in the order they will appear. Turn them over and, keeping the order, run a piece of tape down each back seam where two pictures come together.

Tape each end of the paper story scroll around a tube or dowel and roll on the back sides of the scroll, so that the paper image is at the front of the tubes and the paper is tight and sized to the box.

Place the tubes into the holes and place the lid on the back. Decorate the front of the TV, if desired.

Gently turn the tubes to make the pictures move.

Slow Tip: You can also use images from magazines or comic-books to create your story.

You can make multiple story scrolls and change them through the back of the box. In doing so, you’ll join nearly every ancient civilization in telling stories using scrolls, starting with the Egyptians, who created them on papyrus.

The Shoebox TV craft is adapted from Fed Up with Frenzy: Slow Parenting in a Fast-Moving World, which contains 300+ more ways to enjoy screen-free family fun.

Related posts from Slow Family Online:

Eight Fun Things to Do While It’s Still Summer

Six Fun Family Activities to Enjoy This Weekend

Hooray for Low-Tech Toys

Graphic: Campaign for Commercial-Free Childhood, Photos: Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Butter and Egg, Crafts, Deck Garden, Home Ec., Nature, Slow News, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Campaign for a Commercial Free Childhood, Childhood, Crafts, Family, Games, Nature Activities, Parenting, Play, Screen Free Week

Slow and Frugal: A Teen’s 10 Tips for Recycling and Reuse

Posted on April 20, 2013 by suzlipman| 1 Comment

Many of us are trying to do our part to help the planet. In our family we’ve seen that thoughtful consumption, use and reuse can also help us lead slower, less expensive, more purposeful, and more family-centered lives.

The biggest influence on my relatively green habits has been my daughter, Anna. From a young age, she showed great concern about our environment and the world she would inhabit.

Plastic waste in the oceans and in our landfills upset her so much that she embarked on a lifestyle of extremely limited consumption of plastic, oil, paper, water and other non-local or non-sustainable goods, which she has followed for about the last eight of her 17 years. She bikes to school and errands.

She buys little and often reuses or upcycles clothing and other items, by embellishing them or piecing them together to create new items. She uses reusable bags, water and food containers, and water-bottle holsters, like these:

Dovetailing with Anna’s desire to use less is a desire to spend less. She sees these two practices as intertwined. Saving resources results in financial savings, and vice versa. Both also result in time savings, and the ability to spend precious time engaged in fun hobbies and with friends, rather than shopping and consuming.

Through Anna I’ve learned that, as conscious as many of us try to be, there is much work to be done, if we really want to change our habits and be thoughtful consumers and good stewards of the Earth. She recently sat down with me to offer her top ten suggestions for reuse, using less, and ultimately saving money, while conserving natural resources.

1. Bring your own shopping bag, instead of using plastic

“Only buy as much as you can carry.”

2. Bring your own utensils

“Camping sets are very inexpensive at army surplus stores.”

3. Turn off faucets and lights when they’re not in use

4. Don’t spend money just because you can

“You will end up wasting money. Focus on what you really need. Put yourself on a budget. Sometimes you have to decide whether you want one large thing or multiple smaller things.”

5. Try to go to local stores and buy local goods

“This eliminates imports and the transportation they require.”

6. Bike or walk instead of driving

7. Get out in nature

“This will immediately make you want to recycle and help our environment because you’ll appreciate where you are.”

8. Use your local library

9. Buy second-hand clothes and upcycle them

and the most important thing you can do:

10. Stop buying plastic bottles

Americans purchase 29 billion plastic bottles of water each year. This takes 17 million barrels of crude oil to make, enough fuel to keep one million vehicles on the road for a year. The energy used to pump, process, transport and refrigerate bottled water takes an additional 50 million barrels of oil each year.

The creation and transportation of plastic causes much of the world’s pollution. Bottles in the landfill take centuries to decompose and many end up on our beautiful shores and in our oceans. It’s easy to see why limiting plastic consumption figured in three of Anna’s ten recommendations.

It’s been humbling and refreshing to be enlightened by my own daughter and to watch her grow into a thoughtful and resourceful young person. I’m delighted to think that there are many more like Anna who are conscientious consumers and educators. Her tips can easily be put into practice by anyone who wants to make small changes that will have large ripple effects on their lives and the life of the planet.

Photos by Susan Sachs Lipman and Poor Planet

This post originally appeared in Frugal Mama.

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Posted in Nature, Sustainability, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Ecology, Frugal Living, Frugal Teens, Green Living, How Much Oil Used to Produce Plastic, Plastic Bottles, Plastic Bottles in Landfill, Plastic Water Bottles, Recycling, Recycling Tips, Saving Money, Sustainability, Teens, Teens and Budgeting, Teens and Money, Teens and Recycling, Why Plastic is Bad

Lyrid Meteor Shower will Peak Early April 22

Posted on April 18, 2013 by suzlipman| Leave a comment

The Lyrid meteor shower is due for its annual appearance, and is expected to peak late Sunday night, April 21, and early Monday morning, April 22, over North America. Even though the near-full moon may render much of the annual show invisible to us, Space.com tells us that away from city lights, 20 meteors per hour could be visible.

The Lyrids (pronounced Lie-rids) have been observed for more than 2,500 years — during 687 B.C., Chinese records noted that “stars fell like rain”. Aside from some similar key years, notably last year, when my family scanned the skies and then joined many other enthusiasts for NASA’s Up All Night NASA Chat, and 1982, when 90 and more shooting stars were seen for a period of hours, the Lyrids have been a minor meteor shower.

Can’t watch it at the exact time? Don’t worry — astronomers tell us that meteor showers can last for hours before and after the peak time.

What is a meteor shower?

Meteors occur when the Earth passes through streams of dust and debris from ancient comets which have entered the Earth’s atmosphere. (When the comet has flown close to the sun, its dirty ice evaporated and that, in turn, caused the comet dust to spew into space.) The Lyrid meteor shower hails from the comet C/1861 G1 Thatcher, which orbits the Sun only once every 415 years, even though we see the Lyrids that result from it annually. The orbit of this comet appears to lie in the constellation Lyra, the source of the name Lyrids.

How to watch the Lyrid Meteor Shower

Meteors are best viewed with the naked eye. Sky watchers should grab a chair (ideally one with some neck support), and a blanket if it’s cold, and head outside where you can see the largest patch of night sky possible (with as little city light as possible), and look up.

Because meteor showers last for days before and after the projected peak, try to scan the skies during the surrounding days, if you can.

This American Meteor Society page is a great site for exploring more about the Lyrids and where and when to see them in your local night sky. Their Meteor Shower Caldendar lets you get ready for future meteor shows, like the popular Perseids, which will hit this year on August 11-12.

Photo: Composite of 2009 Lyrids over Huntsville, Ala. (NASA/MSFC/Danielle Moser)

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Posted in Nature, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Astronomy, Lyrid Meteor Shower, Lyrids, Meteors, Nature, Nature Activities, Night Sky, Science, Shooting Stars, Stargazing

Kids’ Outdoor Adventure Book Makes You Want to Go Out and Play

Posted on April 8, 2013 by suzlipman| 1 Comment

“Nature is a destination,” write Stacy Tornio and Ken Keffer, the authors of The Kids Outdoor Adventure Book: 448 Things to Do in Nature Before You Grow Up. “But you don’t have to travel anywhere to find it. Just open the door and step outside.” That idea of fun and adventure in “nearby nature” infuses their entire delightful new book. This is an especially important concept at a time when kids are spending much more time with electronics than they are in the natural world. The Kids Outdoor Adventure Book offers a perfect counter-balance to indoor time, with activities that are easy for even the busiest families to enjoy.

The book is wonderfully, and helpfully, arranged by seasons (each of which is declared “the best season”.) Each season features an array of fun outdoor activities, so that a reader might be inspired to tap a maple tree or find a turtle in spring, catch a firefly or find fossils in summer, go owling or conquer a corn maze in fall, or go ice fishing or whittle a branch in winter. In addition to all the activities, which are presented in a fun check-list fashion and have guidelines as to the “adventure scale” of each one, there are plenty of larger-scale projects, outdoor games, destinations, and foods to make, so that families and others can be kept very busy doing the book’s activities over many years.

The Kids Outdoor Adventure Book is very rich. It features a range of activities, from those that are simple to do, but might have escaped notice, such as “Roll down a hill like a log” (something my daughter loved to do) to more exotic ideas like “Go spelunking” in a cave. Rachel Riordan’s extremely cute illustrations complement the breadth of ideas in this jam-packed, fun-filled book. Tornio and Keffer, who are judges in the 3rd annual ClifKID Backyard Game of the Year Contest, have captured the joy of being alive and the rhythm of the seasons and the natural world. Readers of this book will surely be inspired to open the door to their own outdoor adventures.

Want to get your own autographed copy of the Kids’ Outdoor Adventure Book? Enter to win the CLIFKid ZBar and book giveaway.

Welcome Spring!

Posted on March 19, 2013 by suzlipman| 1 Comment

Spring is almost upon us. In the Northern Hemisphere, the Vernal Equinox will officially occur Wednesday, March 20, at 11:02 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). This corresponds to 7:02 am, Eastern Daylight Time, and 4:02 am on the West Coast.

During the twice-yearly Equinox, the tilt of the Earth’s axis is inclined neither away from nor towards the Sun, and the Sun is vertically above a point on the Equator. (The name “equinox” comes from the Latin for the words “equal” and “night — on these days night and day are approximately the same length.)

Spring conjures growth and new life, play, beauty, flowers, and the return of the sun and longer days. There are many simple ways to honor spring, from dancing a maypole dance to dyeing eggs.

Celebrations of spring happen all season, of course, as buds bloom on trees and the tulips, daffodils and other bulbs planted in the dead of winter show their cheery, colorful heads.

In my neck of the woods, wildflowers and spring bulbs have recently popped their heads up to welcome this expansive and lovely season. Here’s hoping for a pretty, play-filled spring where you are.

As I often do, at times of seasonal change, I turned to the haiku poets to help give gentle expression to the turning of the year.

Now wild geese return …
What draws them
Crying, crying
All the long dark night?

-Roka

From my tiny roof
Smooth … Soft …
Still-White Snow
Melts in Melody

-Issa

Good morning, sparrow …
Writing on my
clean veranda
with your dewy feet

-Shiki

Opening thin arms …
A pink peony
Big as this!
Said my bitty girl

-Issa

Photos by Susan Sachs Lipman

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Posted in Deck Garden, Holidays, Nature, Porch Swing, Seasons, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Equinox, Haiku, Nature Photography, Photography, Spring, Spring Equinox, Vernal Equinox, Wildflower Photography, Wildflowers

What Our Kids Can Teach Us About Recycling

Posted on March 12, 2013 by suzlipman| 2 Comments

The biggest influence on my relatively green habits has been my daughter, Anna. From a young age, she showed great concern about our environment and the world she would inhabit. Plastic waste in the oceans and in our landfills upset her so much that she embarked on a lifestyle of extremely limited consumption of plastic, oil, paper and other non-local or non-sustainable goods, which she has followed for about the last 8 of her 17 years. She bikes to school and errands. She buys little and often reuses or upcycles clothing and other items. She uses reusable bags, water and food containers, and water-bottle holsters, like these:

Through Anna I’ve learned that, as conscious as many of us try to be, there is much work to be done, if we really want to be good stewards of the Earth. We can try to use less plastic in general. When we do use plastic, we can recycle it. 70% of plastic water bottles are not recycled. In California alone, more than 2.8 billion plastic bottles end up in landfills.

According to National Geographic, Americans purchase 29 billion plastic bottles of water each year, far outpacing other countries. This takes 17 million barrels of crude oil to make.

That is enough fuel to keep 1 million vehicles on the road for a year.

Oil is precious .. and limited. The energy used to pump, process, transport and refrigerate bottled water takes an additional 50 million barrels of oil each year. The creation and transportation of plastic causes much of the world’s pollution. Bottles in the landfill take centuries to decompose and many end up on our beautiful shores and in our oceans.

With this in mind, I was happy to learn about Arrowhead Water’s ReBorn bottle, which is made with 50% recycled plastic. Most plastic bottles are produced new and are not made with recycled plastic. ReBorn bottles use 50% recycled plastic, only because there isn’t enough quality recyclable plastic for them to use 100%.

This video conveys the beauty of recycling and sustainability.

Will you pledge with me to use less plastic overall, and to recycle when you do? If so, click “Like” underneath the video, and share this information with someone else.

This post was sponsored by Arrowhead. The views expressed are my own.

Images: Susan Sachs Lipman, Arrowhead, Poor Planet

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Posted in Community, Nature, Sustainability, The Great Outdoors

Tagged Arrowhead Water, Ecology, Green Living, How Much Oil Used to Produce Plastic, Plastic Bottles, Plastic Bottles in Landfill, Plastic Water Bottles, Reborn Bottle, Recycling, Sustainability, Why Plastic is Bad

Join the Great Backyard Bird Count

Posted on February 13, 2013 by suzlipman| Leave a comment

I am very excited about the Audubon Society and Cornell Lab of Ornithology‘s upcoming Great Backyard Bird Count. It takes place Friday-Monday, February 15-18, all over North America. It’s a great family activity. Anyone can participate, even if you only have 15 minutes and are completely new to birding.

Here’s how it works: You can pick a spot to go watch birds (a backyard, a park, a trail, a marsh, or anywhere you think birds might be) or you can join an organized event. You can download a very thorough check list of birds that are likely to be seen in your area. You record the birds that you see and then go home and either send in your checklist or enter the names and numbers in online.

There are lots more tips about counting and recording birds, tricky identifications, binoculars, and much more on BirdSource’s Great Backyard Bird Count page. The site also features recordings of bird sounds and more activities for kids.

The All About Birds site has beautiful photos and information that can help you identify birds. These are the top birds that were reported during the count last year.

So, why count birds in the first place, and why now? The Cornell Ornithology Lab, the Audubon Society and others use the information from the annual February count to track the health of various bird species over time and, in some cases, take steps to protect them. Mid-February has proven a good time to count, as it occurs just before the major Spring migrations. If you find you like counting, you can actually help year-round on various projects.

Last year more than 17,400,00 individual birds were reported by more than 104,000 people. This year you could be part of the Great Backyard Bird Count.

Read about and see pictures of the 2010 Great Backyard Bird Count.

Make a valentine feeder for the birds.

Get ideas for other great citizen science projects like Project Feeder Watch.

Photos: Painted Bunting and Green Honeycreeper by Doug Janson, Flame Colored Tanager by Jerry Oldenettel, Blue Jay: Creative Commons, Northern Spotted Owl by Susan Sachs Lipman