Sprout Scouts Playcamp: Stellar Sunflowers

We've talked about the whimsy of tiny little wonders in the garden, but what about the glory of garden giants? We kind of have a thing for sunflowers this year! It began with this incredible sunflower patch at our local botanical garden center and continued with some sunflower seeds planted in our own garden. Of the seeds we planted, three sprouts emerged, standing in ascending size order. One of those natural garden lessons occurred this past week when a certain young gardener, S, got a little carried away with some garden tools and accidentally caused the demise of the tallest of our growing sunflowers. The remaining two are catching up to their tallest friend's legacy, now with newfound exposure to sunlight that undoubtedly their eager counterpart was stealing for himself! Even the sad parts of gardening pass onward to reveal hidden blessings. Patience, acceptance of mistakes and hope are all lessons safely learned in a play garden!





As our Sprout Scouts Playcamp continues our exploration of Art & Artists in the Garden, sunflowers took center stage this week in a study in still life and collage based on the work of Vincent Van Gogh.

Our "Morning Work" table was set with a print of Van Gogh's interpretation of sunflowers, our own arrangement of silk sunflowers and a variety of colored card stock, yellow tissue paper, oil pastels in shades of green and white glue for each of the boys to create their own work of art inspired by these stellar blooms! Our family gallery proudly displays all of the works of art we have completed and observed and both boys love to see it hanging as much as they love the process of contributing to it!



We checked out Eve Bunting's Sunflower House from our botanical gardens' library a few weeks ago and that (along with plenty of visits to their sunflower patch) inspired our "sunflower playhouse."
Last night after the boys were in bed, I got out our fort building kit, some tablecloths, play silks, blankets, clothes pins and plenty of silk sunflowers, I set up an indoor sunflower house for the boys to play, read and snuggle up in. This time of year, Shabbos is very long and with our current heatwave, much of that time is spent inside. I thought this would be the perfect way to add a little fun and whimsy to our family time together this weekend and the boys were thrilled this morning!

Y quickly got busy planting flowers in our DIY Garden Planting Set and then headed to the kitchen set to whip up some pretend soup to serve in the house. S decided we needed more decorations and gathered some pipecleaners and more flowers to hang and display. He also spent some time gathering baby dolls and blankets to put to sleep in the sunflower house and then added a spider finger puppet to the scene! I think we will all have fun playing in here this Shabbos. Waiting for our own sunflowers to grow and grow and hopefully bloom is hard--but this wonderful and whimsical replica of a sunflower house will tide us over as we wait...

Happy Playing!