Nature's Gifts

Air is all around us. It is a mixture of gases that every living thing needs to live. Air helps us breathe, moves clouds in the sky, and plays a vital role in changing the weather. Air movement initiates water evaporation, cloud formation, and rainfall. Air carries pollen and seeds, helping plants pollinate and spread. Air is made up of 78% nitrogen and 21% oxygen; 0.03% of the air is carbon dioxide, which is essential because plants use it to make food and release oxygen during photosynthesis. Other gases, such as neon, helium, methane, ozone, and water vapor, are also present in small amounts in air. Air takes up space, has weight, and pressure. When air gets warm, it expands and takes up more space, pushing air around the world, creating and changing weather, and balancing the temperature. Watch the Earth’s Energy Balance as Air helps control the Earth’s temperature by trapping heat and distributing it evenly across the planet, thereby balancing the weather, temperature, and environment.

Breathe in. Breathe out. Be thankful for air!

Now watch the Evolution of Life on Earth and create a timeline of which forms of life came first. Draw the microorganisms, the fish, the land plants, the insects, amphibians, reptiles, dinosaurs, mammals, birds, flowers, primates, apes, and then humans!!!!!

For there is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of birds, in the ebb and flow of the tides; in the folded bud ready for the spring. There is something infinitely healing in these repeated refrains of Nature. Rachel Carson, Lost Woods

The rise of the sun each morning is a wake-up call that we are alive. The noon sun shining overhead shines down on us charging all living things with energy. The sun moving across the sky invites us to chase the setting sun, calling colors onto the clouds, painting beautiful sunsets.

The dusk sky turns a dark canvas that slowly but surely entices twinkly stars and shining planets connecting us with the past, the present, and the future. Tis a glorious world we live if we can just take a moment to appreciate its gifts.