My Grandma and Grandpa Ellison came to visit the last couple weeks of December, and one of the weeks I had to do school.  My Mom and I sat down and thought about the things that Grandma and Grandpa are knowledgeable about that I was interested in.  Then we came up with some ideas of subjects they could teach me, and luckily they agreed to share their knowledge.  So my Mom got the week off while I had the best substitute teachers ever.

My Grandpa Ellison walks five miles almost every day at a nature reserve.  He uses his time on the walks to birdwatch and photograph animals in their natural habitats.   My Grandpa is also very good at designing and engineering things.

My Grandma Ellison is an excellent artist and knitter.  She has been teaching watercolor for longer than I've been alive.  And she has knitted me amazing clothing.

So, on the docket for their week of teaching was:
Watch and learn about birds.
Build a bird feeder from natural/found objects.
Knit.
Watercolor birds in a field journal.
Illustrate the life-cycle of yarn.

I had a great time learning the knowledge my grandparents shared with me.

We saw so many birds that my Grandpa didn't even know and/or had never seen in the wild before . . . like the Cardinal, which is the prettiest bright-red bird.  The birds you see on the north-west coast of America are different from the birds you see on the south-east coast.

We went birdwatching in our backyard and along the Savannah River.  After birdwatching, I came home and Grandma taught me how to draw and watercolor the birds we saw.  Then I had to read my bird books from the library to learn interesting facts about each bird.  Here are the pictures and notes from my field journal:

One of our final projects was making a bird feeder for our backyard to attract the birds from the woods behind our house.  We took a plastic mesh basket and weaved pine needles through the holes on the bottom.  Then we tied bark, pinecones, and shells to the sides with twine.

Since hanging it, we have seen so many birds in our backyard!  Our favorite is the female Cardinal that my Grandma and I nicknamed, Cranberry.

Here is a picture of me and my Grandpa making the feeder:

I haven't finished my knitting project (I'll post that later), but I did finish my life-cycle diagram of yarn.  What do you think, did I capture yarn from beginning to end?

Oh my goodness . . . my Mom and I cannot figure out why this picture is sideways.  It's not on the original file on our computer, and Blogger will not let us fix it.  So - sorry.  How are your sideway reading skills?

To sum it up, here are the phases:  the sun, water, soil, and grass seeds combine to create grass to nourish a sheep; the sheep eat the grass and grow a wooly coat which is then sheared; the wool is washed and combed and then sold; the wool is spun into yarn and dyed (My Grandma and I were going to dye wool with kool-aid and we didn't get to it.  I'm saving the yarn for next time she visits.); then a person buys they yarn and knits it into something; then the yarn decomposes and is recycled any number of ways - in this case, somebody reused the yarn and knitted it into a cape.

Now that my grandparents are gone, I have to do hard work again . . . like posting this.

Signing Off,
Evalynn and Mom