Tap My Trees

Back at the beginning of fall I talked about me and the girls marking maple trees. Our hole jungle adventure was for this review.  We discovered a company called Tap My Trees if you have maple trees on your property you are going to want to check them out. Tap My Trees is a company that offers maple sugaring supplies. They have books on how to get started. They have kits with everything you need to tap your first maple tree. They even offer pictures and directions on how to identify different types of maple trees. This is our winter science project so you will see a few post on it between now and the time the sap stops flowing.  Maple Sugaring is a science experiment that taste yummy.

The basic idea of sugaring is turning sap into a yummy syrup you can eat.  You must do this during a specific time of year. The night time temperatures must be below 32 degrees and the day time temperatures must be above 32 degrees. Sap generally flows for around 4-6 weeks. You drill a hole in a Maple tree (you can tap several varieties of trees) In this hole you insert a spile and hang a bucket from it to collect the sap. The sap will run out of the tree into the bucket once you collect a large amount of sap it must be boiled down. Sap has a lot of water in it and you must remove this extra water from the sugary part of the sap.

For this review we received a tap my trees starter kit with aluminum buckets it sells for about $109.95 you can go directly to it by clicking this link http://www.tapmytrees.com/products/starter-kit-aluminum-buckets. This kit it includes the Following:

3 Aluminum 2 gallon buckets to collect the sap as it drips from the spile.
3 metal lids to prevent leaves and bugs from falling into your sap once it has left the tree.
3 spiles or taps that you put into the tree so that the sap may exit the tree into your bucket.
3 hooks so that you can hang the bucket from the spile.
1 drill bit that is 7/16 so that you can drill the perfect size hole for your spile
Cheesecloth: for filtering any solids you use this when you transfer your sap to the storage container.
1 Maple Sugaring at Home book: this little gem tells you everything you need to know including identifying maple trees and how to boil down the sap to turn it into maple sugar.

It has almost everything you need to get started. It has enough buckets and spiles to tap three trees. In addition to the kit you will need a cordless drill and some clean empty food safe jugs to put the sap in when your buckets need to be emptied. You will also need a large pan to boil your sap down in. You will want to boil the sap down out side. Boiling the sap produces a large amount of moisture and it can peel the wall paper off your walls. So its best to do it out side.

The weather is not quite right for tapping trees yet but I want everyone to say tuned because me and the girls will be documenting our sugaring experiment as soon as the weather is right to begin tapping our trees.

I am very pleased with the kit from Tap My Trees. The buckets are nice and heavy, and they came with lids to help keep leaves etc out. I also love that it includes the correct size drill bit for the spiles. I never can find the bit I need and I spend 20 minute digging in my giant bucket of bits looking for the right one. The Maple Sugaring at Home book is great! It helped us to identify the correct trees easily. It also has great directions for tapping the trees and it leaves nothing to be confused about. It is really a great book to have around if you are going to try maple sugaring. Just about everything in the kits is reusable for years and years as long you take care of it. The only thing you might need to replace is  the cheese cloth and after a while the drill bit as those do get dull after a while. Both things are affordable and easily replaced when needed.

The only thing I think is missing from the kit is bottles, to bottle you syrup after you have boiled it. We are planning on processing it in mason jars.

Now we wait for sugar snow. For us that's typically mid January to late February. Stay Tuned to Updates!

Get Social and Check out Tap My Trees at:
Facebook
Twitter
Pintrest

Big Happenings

Some exciting events are about to happen at our house. I have been blessed with two amazing opportunities. In December I will be Joining the 2015 School House Review Crew. Which means I will be blogging more about our weekly activities but I will also be putting out more reviews on some really cool educational products. I am so excited to see what the Crew has to offer this year. This is a Huge Blessing for our Family.
The second big event Drum Role please........... I start my first official collage class I finished my registration earlier this month and my class is set to start in January. I'm only enrolled in one class, its more for personal enrichment than anything else but I am excited and blessed to have the opportunity to take the class. Aroma Therapy is something I have used for years and I have always wanted to take it to the next level.  The girls are enjoying the fact that mommy will have school work to do. I am excited to see where the new year will take us, I hope you be here to enjoy the journey with me. I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving.

LeapFrog Tag Human Body Discovery Pack #LeapFrogTag #spon

                                                      

Thank you to LeapFrog for sponsoring this review.  For more information about the LeapFrog Tag Human Body Discovery Pack, please click hear to visit their website #LeapFrogTag #spon
.

This week I was given the opportunity to Review a product by LeapFrog. The Tag Human Body Discovery Pack. Before I get to that part of the review I want to explaining what the Tag Reading system in-case you haven't discovered this great learning tool. Tag is a reading system that brings stories to life with sound effects, the voices of there favorite characters, and exciting activities. The Tag system has a library of 60+ books, maps and more. The Tag system is designed to help guide your child on a reading adventure.

The Tag Human body Discover Pack Its a 5 piece set that brings learning fun about the human body and nutrition facts. You use the tag reader to bring the human body chart to life. It teaches all the amazing things that make up the human body and how different parts of the body work together. Its got a two sided interactive chart and game board. It reinforces learning through 300+ responses and over 40 activities. With an interactive growth chart and interactive glow in the dark stickers the possibilities are endless. The Tag Human Body Discovery Pack sells for $19.99 and you can click hear to find it on the Leapfrog site. Don't forget that the tag reader is required to use the Human Body Discovery Pack.

I gave the Hot Rod Princess a quick demonstration of how the tag system worked. She picked it up very quick and was excited to start exploring. I had to pry her away from it to get her to come eat dinner. Its always great to see your kids get excited to learn something new. I was amazed at how much information she has picked up from the Tag Human Body Discovery Pack. She really loved the skeletal system, she has walked around for two days no feeling the bones in our hands, feet, arms and legs even naming a few. She surprised her POP when she informed him that the bones in his fingers were called phalanges and that muscles made her hand open and close. She has spent a lot of time with it each morning and is now asking for more Tag books. Snoopy gets a kick out of hearing it talk and loves to sit next to the Hot Rod Princess while she is working. She loves the wash your hands song its quite catchy and we have begun singing and danging to it when we wash our hands. The tooth brushing song is the Hot Rod Princesses favorite song she likes to play it while she is brushing her teeth at night. I have to admit its a fun song.

The Tag Human body Discovery Pack is helping me to teach the girls about the Human body and good nutrition. I have to admit I love interactive learning products and so do the girls. The two sided interactive chart is cool. You can touch everything on it to learn something new. We had a great time exploring the human body and I even re learned a few things I had forgotten.  We set up the interactive growth chart and the girls took turns marking there height on it. Since they both celebrated there birthdays this week we got try out the Birthday stickers. The stickers are interactive so when you touch the birthday sticker the Tag reader say's This marks your height on your birthday and cheers the girls got a kick out of it. The Hot Rod Princess now wants to loose her first tooth just so she can put the interactive tooth sticker on the growth chart. The Human Body Discovery Pack comes with some other interactive stickers that the girls have really enjoyed. We love that it talks to you so its great for a little independent learning time.  I like the games because they help to reinforce what they have learned. But the girls like them because they are fun. Me and The Hot Rod Princess have a lot of fun with the Making healthy choices game. We even make games of our own using the Interactive stickers to see who can get the most bones and muscles right.

Leapfrog's Got a video available so you can see the Tag Human Body Discovery Pack in Action check it out its very cool.
Tag Human Body:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2e9ROt7OplE



To shop for the Tag Human Body Discovery Pack Click Hear

Find LeapFrog on facebook Click Hear
Find LeapFrog on Twitter Click Hear






I was selected for this opportunity as a compensated member of Clever Girls Collective and received free product from LeapFrog to review. The content and opinions expressed here are all my own. #LeapFrogTag #spon

Crayola Dry-Erase Activity Center

My First Review of the week is the Crayola Dry-Erase Activity Center ages 4+ years. It retails for $15.00 at walmart.Ours is the Blue one called Zany Play we chose it over the yellow one just because I like Blue. Hear are a couple photos one of it in action with my two year old and the other is just an over all photo that I did because what good momma doesn't try out the toy first and i wanted to draw something on it too.

 


 It includes:
1dry erase board
4 crayola Dry erase markers
8 zany activities
16 clings
1 eraser
1 clear cover sheet.

The dry erase board its self has a hard clear plastic top that you write on. It has an opening on one side that lets you slip different activity sheets under it so that they can be reused. You slip the activity sheet in the clear cover sheet and slid it in the activity center. The quality of the board seems fairly tough but i wouldn't recommend stomping on it or throwing it as the clear write on part would scratch. It has a place at the top to hold four dry erase markers and the little eraser that comes with it.

The Activity sheets are fun games and simple enough for my 4 year old to do. You can also go to the crayola website and they offer two sections with more printable activity sheets for free so that's a big plus in my book since my little ones get board doing the same ones over and over. You could also use any 8.5x 11 page that you can find. I love this because I can use most any pre-k work book pages over and over again so its saving me lots of money. I included the links to the crayola site and there printable pages.

http://www.crayola.com/free-coloring-pages/dry-erase-activity-center/

http://www.crayola.com/free-coloring-pages/zany-dry-erase-coloring-pages/

Now for the Crayola dry-erase Markers they are the only part of the product I am slightly disappointed in. They color nice and are bright but like the Crayola dry-erase crayons they are difficult to erase from the board. We prefer the expo brand dry-erase markers as they erase easier for my four and two year old. Also be aware that my daughter got the markers on her skirt and we can NOT get it to come out. So be aware of that potential problem.

the Eraser is a tad small for my two year old but it erases well and has a great storage spot at the top so it doesn't get lost in the bottom of our school and art tub.

Over all I would definitely recommend the Crayola Dry-Erase Activity center to other moms looking for a great reusable on the go toy for there pre-k or toddlers even my older nieces love it. this one Gets a Thumbs Up in our book.

I hope you enjoyed my review if you have any questions please feel free to ask.!