Rocks, Paint, Water and Light

Thursday we woke up and there was a chill in the house from the past couple rainy days, so we put on our long sleeves and warm pants and had breakfast.  I didn't have anything planned for the day and wasn't even sure if playing outside in the yard would be an option because of the mud.  But when I opened the front door it was HOT!  A welcomed gust of warm air came into the house and we quickly opened up some windows and doors and let the temperature inside the house equalize a bit.  The boys got complete outfit changes and we were off into the front yard to paint rocks.  Surprisingly, the sun had dried everything up and mud wasn't an issue, however there were still a couple small puddles to splash and play in with the mowers.  After nap we did another creative, hands-on activity using the light panel.  I took a big storage container and filled with water, then dropped a handful of water beads into it along with a few other colorful floating toys.  The water beads start out really tiny and hard, a little smaller than pieces of dried rice but round, and then expand over a few hours as they absorb the water and turn into soft transparent balls (about an inch thick).  We also found one of those toy snakes that expands in the water and the boys (including Wesley, who probably thought it was real) had fun pushing it around inside the container.  I put the big container on top of the light panel and we watched all the items light up against the bright background as we played!