Apples on the tree Family Day Care in Burpengary, Queensland | Primary School

Apples on the tree Family Day Care

Locality: Burpengary, Queensland

Address: Burpengary 4505 Burpengary, QLD, Australia

Website:

Likes: 328

Add/Update information

Reviews

Tags

• Primary School

24.01.2022 We were lucky enough to be given a beautiful homegrown pumpkin from Master 3's garden last week and we were keen to use it in a cooking experience! Today, we steamed the pumpkin until it was nice and soft, ready to add to some other ingredients, to make pumpkin sausage rolls! The kids took turns to use the tongs, adding pieces of steamed pumpkin to the thermomix bowl. From here, we added meat, sauces, breadcrumbs, dried herbs and a little salt and pepper! Miss 2 cracked the e...ggs to complete our sausage roll mix and we used the thermomix to combine all the ingredients. Once our pastry had defrosted, I shaped the sausage roll mixture and Master 3 cracked another egg, making an egg wash. We sprinkled sesame seeds on the top, before popping our sausage rolls into the oven. All of the children watched through the oven door, waiting ever so patiently for our sausage rolls to bake! They were a little too hot still to enjoy before rest time, but we are all looking forward to a taste test this afternoon! When children are involved in everyday cooking experiences, they gain a greater understanding of where 'real food' comes from and learn plenty of skills along the way. We value cooking, using our own homegrown ingredients, helping the children to be part of many different processes and gain a deeper understanding of nutrition, while building on life skills.

21.01.2022 Today we did an experiment with honey to learn more about the inside happenings of our beehive. We started by lining the bottom of a ceramic bowl with one type of honey and adding a small amount of water. From here, we swirled the water and honey together, which quickly revealed a 'honeycomb' shape in the honey! This honeycomb shape is the genetic imprint of the honey- mindblown right? REAL honey has this result, however, mixed or fake honey will not make this distinguishable... shape. We repeated the experiment 3 times, using 3 different types of honey (2 I got direct from farmers). I was expecting that my cheaper supermarket honey may not produce the honeycomb shape, but we were pleasantly surprised! Turns out it is 100% honey as stated on the bottle! We used the iPad to watch a short clip on the activity inside a hive, observing thousands of busy bees building their honey stores. We recognised the honeycomb shape, comparing it to the experiment that we just did! Isn't science amazing??

20.01.2022 Today we were extremely excited to open our very first letter from "Ash and Indigo."This is a subscription, that sends a letter monthly to our little group, which inspires children and families to build connections with nature, through story telling. We read all about Ash and Indigo's home in the mountains, learning lots about the animals and plants that live amongst their community- we even received seeds from a Mountain Ash tree and an Indigofera Australis plant! Ash and Indigo sent us photos of 3 interesting things they found on their recent forest walk, which has inspired us to follow in their footprints. Over the next few months, we will find ways to extend on our learning from our new friends and discover some more about our own community and what lives here- I can hardly wait!

19.01.2022 Last week, we made some vibrant pink paint using fresh beetroot, so I thought today we could make some more nature paint using plants and herbs from our own garden! Our passionfruit marigold is looking sensational at the moment, so we decided to pick some of the bright yellow flowers for our new paint experiment! We used the pestle and mortar to grind the flower petals, gently adding small splashes of water- PRESTO, we made paint! The amazing thing about this paint was...it l...ooked yellow before we used it, but when the paint dried on the white paper, it was green! "Do you think those blue flowers would work too?" questioned Master 3. There was only one way to find out- so we gathered a few samples of a variety of plants in the garden, ready to make more coloured paint! The children collected small vessels from the mud kitchen and found large rocks, to start grinding the cuttings. Unfortunately, we were unable to create any other coloured paint, but we will continue to experiment! I found some ochre in my art cupboard, which was another wonderful way to make our own paint. I explained to the children that the Aboriginal people would grind up the ochre, making their own paint to create cave paintings and body art.

18.01.2022 A couple of weeks ago, Miss 3 and Master 3 planned and executed their own wedding! Although the wedding arrangements were quite simple, we thought that making our own wedding cakes would be a fun and engaging activity to add to the festivities! Earlier in the week, I ordered a beautiful selection of edible flowers from our favourite herb farm Basilea Living Herbs! The children were presented with white chocolate mud cupcakes, vanilla bean buttercream in piping bags and of course our beautiful edible flowers! Miss 3, Master 3 and Master 2 used their creative abilities to decorate the cakes, ready to take home this afternoon....there may have been a taste test along the way too!

17.01.2022 Recently I joined a Sustainability Course online and I have been completing some very interesting modules, that I plan on adding to our program. Somehow I have accumulated a mountain of homegrown and store bought tomatoes and instead of feeding them to the chickens (which they would love also!), I decided to get some help from the kids and make a batch of Tomato Chutney! Master 3 helped me to collect all our ingredients and we followed a recipe that I found online! We chopped, measured and poured everything into the thermie- and crossed our fingers!! Everyone has a jar to take home!

14.01.2022 Taking care of our planet is more important than ever and if we are ever going to protect and preserve it, its crucial that we get our youngest generation on board and teach them how to appreciate and care for nature, from the ground up! From the moment you all first set foot in our home, it is obvious that we LOVE sustainable practices and we are forever looking for new and inventive ways to reuse and recycle. This week we have been bringing in a range of 'pots' from home t...o make our own flower garden, ready for the bees and butterflies to enjoy in the spring. The children have enjoyed getting their hands dirty while planting the seeds and it will be very exciting to see them starting to sprout in the coming weeks. From old shoes to formula tins, we now have a fabulous arrangement of sustainable garden pots! The children have learnt how to plant seeds and continue to care for them- giving ownership and responsibility! See more

09.01.2022 Today we went back to Kumbartcho to further discover the amazing sights! We were lucky enough to have our own personal tour guide in the nursery, who showed us a range of Bush Tucker plants and other interesting varieties of trees. We finally decided on a Lomandra plant each, which we will plant in our Bush Tucker garden tomorrow! Next, we set off to the "Frog Hollow". Inside this captivating space, we were able to hear a frog making a croaking sound, however, it was so c...amouflaged that we couldn't even see it! The frogs have a variety of different sized ponds to live in and we kept our eyes peeled hoping to spot one! I have a feeling that a frog pond should be on our next to-do-list!! Kumbartcho is the most beautiful place for an adventure and it is filled with so much wildlife and gorgeous scenery. At one stage, we found a great spot near the lake to have a little relax and meditation, listening carefully to all the sounds in the bush. We could easily identify 3 different birds, but Im sure if we spent more time, we would have heard a lot more too! We stopped off at the Fairy Garden to poke around a little more! This time, we brought along a precious fairy to donate to the space and I am sure it will bring a little smile to other children, just as the special garden does to all of us! Master 3 chose a sacred place for the fairy and we will visit her again next time!

09.01.2022 With all this craziness lately, I must admit, while cleaning out my fridge on the weekend, I did take a second look at my tomatoes and wonder if the chickens really were the best recipients? After a few seconds, I decided that we could take these older tomatoes and use them as a learning opportunity. I have seen plenty of Youtube videos on growing veggies from the veggie itself.....how hard could it be? Luckily for me, I have 4 very enthusiastic gardening assistants who wer...e very keen to lend a hand! We cut the tomatoes into slices, filled our greenhouse pot with soil and carefully added all out 'bits of tomato' to the pot. With a sprinkling of soil, a light watery mist and a whisper of luck, our tomato seeds were put into the greenhouse, ready to germinate! Who knows, we may have a fruitful tomato business in the coming months! Master 2 put our tomato 'scraps' into the compost bin- so much goodness, from a few humble tomatoes! See more

05.01.2022 We created our Bush Tucker garden a couple of years ago and we have been lucky enough to use some of the beautiful produce in our cooking over this time. A few months ago, we added a gorgeous Rosella plant, in the hopes that we would have an abundance of yummy flowers to eat as soon as possible! Although our little plant is still establishing, our next door neighbours have one that is FLOURISHING! We were given a bag of fresh, homegrown Rosella's to use and today was the day ...we began the process! After freezing the fruit and letting it defrost again, the flowers were nice and soft and very easy to peel. Without this vital step, it can be a little spiky on your fingers! Master 2, Miss 3 and Master 4 helped me to peel a large bowl of Rosella flowers, separating the seedpods from the petals. The colour of the Rosellas is simply amazing...and turns out it stains fingers too!! After counting 40 seed pods, we added these to the thermomix, covered them in water and we began to cook it down. By cooking the seed pods, we released the pectin, which helps the jam to set. We continued to follow the recipe and after quite some time, we have been rewarded with some homemade Rosella Jam to take home this afternoon! Enjoy! See more

05.01.2022 Our chook Shirley, happened to hatch a few ducklings last week! Unfortunately, we only had one survivor and little "Luna" quickly imprinted onto our daughter. As the school holidays were quickly coming to an end, we were very worried that Luna was going to be too lonely without a friend. On Sunday, we went out to City Chicks and purchased a gorgeous Silver-laced Dorking Pullet, Hazel, and we are happy to see the girls have become very close friends

05.01.2022 With the warm weather upon us, I decided to offer an experience that would cool us down! Our flowers are in full bloom too, so it made perfect sense to incorporate them as well ! With some preparation and planning, our "Flower Ice Cubes" were born! The kids were so intrigued at the prospect of playing with them, everyone joined in! The longer we played with the ice-cubes, the smaller they became, "Its melting away!" explained Master 4. Basilea Living Herbs donated the beautiful coriander that we used to create our 'flower ice-cubes'. Basilea Farm is located in Burpengary and is open to the public once a month. Head on over to their Facebook page for more details.

03.01.2022 I have been talking to Sarah from Basilea Living Herbs, as I wanted to get some advice about using the edible flowers in our garden, to teach the children new skills and knowledge. Today, we set up an experience using Alyssum and Dianthus flowers, along with some Native Mulberries from our Bush Tucker garden. The children were armed with organic honey, butter knives, rye bread and a collection of edible goodies from our very own garden! They thinly (and a little thickly!) spr...ead the honey on the bread, before choosing an array of pretty flowers to decorate with. I reminded the kids that not all flowers were to be eaten in the garden (and to check with an adult first), but we looked at the ones we could enjoy! The 'Flower Fairy Bread' looked very beautiful and it was great to see every one trying the flowers too! "Tasty!" said Master 4, "Oh yummy" added Miss 3! I know Master 1 and Miss 1 also loved it, as they didn't leave many scraps behind! lol For more information about Basilea, head over to their Facebook page to see the wonderful range of delicious herbs and edible flowers. Once a month, the farm opens to the public too! https://www.facebook.com/basilealivingherbs/