Unplugged - Trees

What a great theme! There were a million ways I could go with this one, being a field biologist. But, figuring that E would eventually get plenty of science lessons, I went with another of my passions...genealogy. After brainstorming with my sis, I introduced E to a simple version of our family tree.

First I went though the vacation photos from this summer. Luckily we took trips with both sides of the family, and had plenty of pics on hand. Otherwise, this step could have taken a LONG time. I opened a PowerPoint document and pasted a small version of each photo onto the page, then printed it out. I looked for shots of two or more family members to make the job a little less daunting. I ended up with 18 pictures...then I cut out 18 apples from red construction paper and found 18 paper clips.

When E woke up from her nap, I told her it was "Project Time!" She was so excited to get started, until Baby m woke up. She started to cry and said, "Now we can't do a project." I assured her we could still do it, and handed her a glue stick. No problem. She took each picture, one at a time, and stuck it to an apple while I talked to her about family. She named each person, and even talked about what they were doing in the pictures. She started slowing down about halfway through, so I attached some of the paper clips to the apples and we went over to the "Family Tree" (a fake Ficus in the living room) to hang them. While Baby m crawled around pawing at our toes, E and I decorated the tree with people. Then back to gluing so she could hang "MORE!"
I knew the project was a hit when she dragged Grandma over to see it later that night, and asked me to pull off all the apples so she could hang them again. By the time she went to bed, 15 of the 18 apples were all jammed together, hanging on one branch. I guess that's where we belong, together after all.