Children and Nature Awareness Month - What Fun!

One of the blogs I've recently discovered is 5 Orange Potatoes.  Lisa writes wonderful posts showing how she spends time with her children doing art projects, exploring nature, living a life that pays attention to what's important.  April has been declared Children and Nature Awareness month and she's suggested a challenge where readers send in photos of how they are spending time with their kids outdoors, preferably learning something in the process: http://www.5orangepotatoes.com/blog/2010/04/04/children-and-nature-awareness-month-challenge/
So here's what my little  5 year old grandson and I have done so far this week:
Monday we had the whole day together because he still was on spring break.  We took a short drive to Norrie Point Nature Center on the Hudson River, where we first went in to see what animals, trail maps, and resources they might have.  We saw tanks of fresh water and salt water fish, different species that live in the river (which is still an estuary here).  And we saw mud puppies!  They were very cool.  While not uncommon, we hardly ever get to see them because they blend in to the water and mud so well and they are very quick.  Then we got trail maps and went exploring for a bit.

Tuesday we had less time, so we made a map of his yard and started cataloguing all the plants and animals we could find there.  We found we have a lot of research to do!  And some waiting for more identifying characteristics to appear.
Today's adventure was a quick trip back down to the river where the main lesson might have been why we don't want to throw rocks at geese.
But this is just the best month to be encouraging discovery - there are new plants shooting up every day, more and more insects hatching out, which will mean more fish and birds coming around for the feast.
I hope you're enjoying spring delights wherever you are.