The Story of a Tree (and why it loses its leaves in the winter).

Last week as Molly and I were playing in the yard, she looked up at our trees and said, “Mommy, I wish that the trees still had leaves on them, they are so pretty with their leaves!” I explained to her that trees lose their leaves in autumn so that when winter comes they not only have a nice blanket from the fallen leaves to keep them warm, but also the snow would collect on their leaves and break their branches and hurt the tree. She nodded and agreed, but I figured it certainly wouldn’t hurt to do some paper cutting to illustrate the concept.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, Fridays I’ll be talking about what we’ve been doing in our homeschooling adventures that week. Aptly named Home Free. 🙂

Introducing: The Story of a Tree.

Our story starts with soil and a seed.

In comes clouds and rain, providing the seed with much needed water and draining the soil of its nutrients.

Soon to follow is the sun which tells all the plants it’s time to grow! The seed sprouts.

It grows strong and tall and sprouts many leaves.

If trees didn’t lose their leaves, snow would gather on them and break their branches. {Ha! I didn’t expect them to have so much fun breaking their trees!!} So instead, the leaves change colors in autumn before the snow comes.

They gently fall to the ground, creating a nice warm bed to insulate the roots for the snow fall.

When the snow comes it passes safely past the tree’s branches and onto the ground.

{The kids came up with this part} Many days and nights pass and the winter is over, the sun and rains come again and leaves return to the strong tree once again. The end.

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Then the kids made their own pictures:

Thomas created a spring picture.

Molly’s “Me, Walking on the Sidewalk” – 365, 364 (My 364 of my 365! Eek!! Only one more left!!)

Marcus even got in on the fun today.

Then, I hung up their beautiful artwork on my refrigerator. Hooray for the weekend! We are home free. 🙂