Plant of the Week #2-POISON IVY

Poison Ivy

Learn how to quickly identify and teach your kids about Poison Ivy with pictures!

Last year we had a run in with Poison Ivy at our house and I discovered that all I thought I knew about what it looked like, was completely wrong.  My husband and two girls ended up with it all over their bodies so I spent a lot of time online trying to figure out exactly what it looked like.  Surprise! I found that we had some in our yard and while gardening today, I found a bunch more!  I figured now would be a good time to teach my kids more about this plant. My husband says I'm obsessed with it now, but I'm ok with that. (This coming from the man that wasn't so sure about my identifying skills and ended up suffering for weeks because of his lack of faith) 

Hopefully this will save someone else from some suffering.  I ended up...

Plant of the Week #1-The DOGWOOD tree

Plant of the Week #1
DOGWOOD TREE

Pink Flowering Dogwood

I love teaching my kids about the plants all around us!  Being able to have them point out plants from the car as we drive by, or from walks we take, by name makes me so proud.  What can I say, I think it's awesome!  I'm going to try and feature some of my favorite plants once a week along with some quick facts about the plant to teach your kids.  I tend to go a little crazy with taking pictures of plants as well, but I hope you will get an idea of how gorgeous they are from some of the pictures.  Enjoy!

Pink Flowering-DOGWOOD

Chances are, you've seen hundreds of Dogwood trees throughout your life.  They are a very popular tree in landscaping and are even the state tree of three states (Missouri, South Carolina and Virginia), as well as being the state flower of Virginia.  The flowering variety of Dogwood blooms in the Spring.  

It is said that Native Americans...