Homeschool Day at the Florida Museum

Today was homeschool day at the Florida Natural History Museum in Gainesville. We got there nice and early, about 20 min ahead of the 10 oclock entry time. The line was not that large at that time. Yet, it still took almost an hour to get a ticket purchased. I was not super happy about that. I would think they could have done better than that. The exhibit itself was interesting, but in my opinion not worth 6 dollars a person. Then the various activity stations were mostly for very young children. We did get to look at shark skin under a microscope, at one station, and the kids did a fishing test that taught them using nets for fish gets you way more than you wanted, or expected. The rest of the museum, except the Butterfly Rainforest is free, but our time was limited, and we had already seen it. We were able to identify two types of shark teeth, that we had collected while fossil digging.  A Tiger Shark and Lemon Shark.  All in all I was disappointed. Not sure I would go for another Homeschool Day.

Fossil Digging Field Trip #2 and What We Do With Them

Today we went digging for fossils, for the second time. Last time was in November, and the water was cold then, but let me tell you that was nothing compared to today. It was 40 degrees when we left the house this morning, and that water was bone chilling cold. However, it is a fairly shallow creek and we found a nice sunny spot, where the water was at least bearable.  Plus it has been such a wet winter, I was hoping it would have stirred up lots of good stuff.  Boy did it, and we only kept some of it.  I always find tons of shells, but since they are all the same I only took a couple.  Last time I only found one shark tooth, that was not very big at all.  I found some nice size ones this time, but my son and our friend found two huge shark teeth.  I mean huge.  Also of interest was manta ray jaw bones, some white rocks with blue spots I found some of those last time too, petrified wood, and a rock that actually had a shark tooth fossil embedded in it with other fossils too. 

So, now what do we do with these?  I use them for various crafts, three of which you can see below.  My kids have not attempted the resin craft yet, but they will be doing it in April.  Resin does have some safety issues that you have to follow, so I know some people use Modge Podge.  I have never tried the Modge Podge method.  I myself, am fairly new to resin, but I love it.  You can go to my other blog, http://www.melissasjewelryandgems.blogspot.com to see all my resin, art, and crochet craftiness. 

The kids can also read about fossils, why are there so many fossils in Florida, and the laws on collecting fossils.  There are very strict laws on fossil digging, not really the digging, but the keeping of the fossils.  Also what makes Petrified Wood.    This is a fun way to learn some cool Science, and enjoy nature.  We will definitely probably go back again.  The little area where we dig is so beautiful and peaceful.  The blue piece below is actually resin with blue food coloring and a shark tooth in it.  It is really cool.  It will be in my Etsy store soon, as my son found a bigger one today and will be making a piece of his own with resin.  The clear piece has a shell, that stone I told you about, and part of a shark tooth I think.  The top piece I used one of the shells I found, put a little hot glue in there and a coral flower then poured the resin in.  It will be a pendant eventually.  All of these were made from our first time digging.