Idea of the day: Chalk

"Mommy I made an H, I !"

The funny thing is, she didn't even know that actually spells something.

You can make hopscotch, draw shapes, practice colors, and spend outdoors time all at once!

Activity: Game Time

My kids have been very into playing games lately. They saw the game UNO on the counter and got all excited about the colors on the package. My daughter would not stop asking to play the color game. Now, UNO says it is for ages 7 and up, but who says we can try at almost 4?

So, I decided to make our own version. We used 4 cards person instead of 7. To begin with we just tried to match colors, not numbers. We ignored the skip, reverse, and draw extra cards. We matched the colors on the pile and practiced our colors.

My daughter, almost 4, enjoyed it so much! After a while she wanted to try to match the numbers and "extra" cards. She did really good. My son, 2.5, did not want to sit still. He was not okay with waiting his turn. He wanted to make his own game with the cards and not sit and play. This is okay! They are at different stages. They are both going to want to have different activity levels.

I'm hoping to see what other games we have that we can adapt to toddler/preschool age level and play anyway!

Idea of the Day: Step in and out game

What's with this empty laundry basket?
Sometime in the early toddler years our dear helper from Geary County schools introduced us to the step in, step out game. Just hold onto the sides for them! Simple, but builds coordination. It can be a kind of reward for when you are done folding the laundry maybe? I played it with my second born the other day, but of course I had my hands full when he was actually playing.

Idea of the Day: Fruit vs Vegetable

This one was made possible by kitchen play food. You could also just talk about it as you load your cart in the grocery store!

I took out two dishes and asked her for each piece of play food, "Do you think this is a vegetable, or a fruit?"

Warning, you may need to preview what play food you have, in case it is hard to identify it due to manufacturing idiosyncrasies, or because you can't remember what the conclusion about tomatoes was.... 

Colander pipe cleaner

If you still have out that colander I mentioned from yesterday, a super easy to set up activity is to poke pipe cleaners through the holes.

There's always so many uses for pipe cleaners it doesn't hurt to have a few on hand!

Pom pom task

Something both of my kids love is moving pom poms into and out of mason jars, into and out of this colander with tongs, and into and out of over various containers and boxes.

I did have to look around a bit to find pom poms - apparently not every store stocks them at all times. These were from Hobby Lobby, but you can also get them from Amazon below.

Resource of the Day: Moon Phases Link

So I might introduce the moon phases soon. My daughter has asked about the moon a lot, and finds it in the sky all of the time. She also really loves this adorable book our friend sent us (after we had an invasion of mice at our house due to construction all around kicking them out of their habitat supposedly, we'll go with that and not my housekeeping skills with a newborn and 2 year old) about a mouse and the moon, though it is not scientific - The Mouse Who Ate the Moon:




Meanwhile, I found out how little I actually know about the moon, and a great resource to teach from, here! http://www.kidzone.ws/planets/moon-full.htm

So, do you know what a Harvest Moon is? The link above will give you the answer!

Activity: Cleaning

Today I needed to do a bunch of cleaning. Most cleaning I do I try to do it during nap time so I don't have to have helpers. Today, I just needed to get some stuff done.

So, my helpers assisted me in between their playing.

We started with dusting. They helped me dust the banister and one vacuumed with their toy while I vacuumed the upstairs. Did I have to work slower? Yes. Did I have to explain more than once how to do each task? Yes. Did I have to ask multiple questions about why we needed to clean each task? Yes.

It worked. We got the jobs done. The kids learned new things about taking care of a house. They were able to work on gross motor skills and small motor skills. They learned things in all sorts of ways. And that's what matters!

Let them help! Answer their questions. Let them learn. 

Activity: Story Time

There have been a few nights that bedtime has been missed and my husband and I have been rushing to get our kids to bed before it gets too late. Nights like this we usually skip bedtime stories, but I really don't like skipping this part of our routine. I know how important reading to our kids is and I really want them to love reading.

So, I have come up with a creative way to still have a story before bed.

I have been asking my kids to tell me how many minute they want me to tell a "story from my mouth" as my daughter calls it. Basically they tell me to make up a story for so many minutes. I set a timer and make up a story. While I tell the story I ask questions like "Did the princess go to the store or to the woods?" I then continue the story with their input.

Tonight, I introduced the "tag you're it" function to involve my husband. I started the story then said "tag you're it" and he had to continue.

Overall, this can get silly, but it is fun and creative. Everyone ends up laughing and enjoying themselves.

I am thinking about investing in Story Cubes to use with this same idea. I have never used them before, so I don't know if they will work or not, but with a birthday coming up it may be a purchase.

Activity: United States Puzzle

Tonight, while I was making dinner, my kids convinced my husband to do their new United States puzzle with them.

They worked together to put the pieces in the puzzle. They practiced colors and directions. My husband even worked on North, South, East, and West with them as he described which piece went where. While they put it together, they talked about where we have traveled, where we have lived, where grandparents and family lives, and where we want to go someday. After it was all together (which I don't have a picture of...oops), they talked about where states like Alaska and Hawaii really are in relation to the continental United States.

The kids loved helping daddy and they loved trying to figure out what state fulfilled his description. It was a great use of the time while they waited for dinner and everyone enjoyed the time together.

The puzzle (Linked Puzzle*) has information in the form of pictures for each state. There are bright colors to help differentiate from each state. The only things I feel this puzzle is missing is the Great Lakes and outlines of our neighboring countries. For the most part though, this puzzle will be great for us to work on United States geography. 

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Cooking with Kids: Colored Popcorn

Tonight we had movie night and my kids were begging for popcorn with their movie. We agreed. So, we broke out the popcorn popper again. Only this time we had some colored popcorn. We were gifted some dark colored kernels. Before popping said kernels, we talked about making a hypothesis. I explained that a hypothesis is an educated guess as to what will happen when you do something. The kids didn't quite understand the definition, so we talked a little more and explained it as best we could.

We then talked about if the popcorn would pop a different color or if it would still be white like any other popcorn. I asked each kid and my husband what their hypothesis, or guess, was. We had a 2-way tie. 2-2 for colored and white.

When we started popping the kids were very excited to find out that the popcorn was white after it popped. 

Overall, this was a fun little science lesson. We have never talked about a hypothesis before, so it was fun for them to experience this idea. It was fun to see the competition build as they waited for the popcorn to pop.

This just goes to show yet again, you can teach your children in  your everyday life activities.

Little Helpers: Shredding Paper

I ordered new checks after our move, but I ended up receiving checks with the wrong information. I needed to shred the bad checks, but that also meant ripping them apart to shred. I let the kids each rip the checks off the pad and I shredded them.

I didn't realize it at first, but this was a good learning experience for the. They needed to figure out how to hold the pad to rip the checks. They had to figure out what angles to hold the check while ripping it so it would actually come off and not rip in half.

They did great. They had fun. I didn't have to rip and shred for hours! :D

Activity: Cutting Paper

My kids are very much into cutting with scissors. I am trying find activities for them to do that allows them to safely learn how to use the scissors. For this particular activity, I cut paper into strips then let them cut the strips into squares.

 

My daughter has done this previously, so she did most of it on her own. My son hadn't done much cutting yet so I needed to help every step of the way for him. This is just fine. They are at different ages and stages. Also, I'd like to note, my daughter is left handed and my son is right handed. This difference isn't much, but scissors work different for different hands so we bought these special spring loaded scissors that are both left and right handed. They are great to use for beginners. 

After they cut a bunch of squares, in effort to not just waste the paper or have it all over my house as confetti, I let them glue the chunks to a piece of paper for Daddy when he got home. They glued the paper pieces to the big paper then colored a picture. This was a great activity for them to work on practical fine motor skills. 

Activity: Play Dough

My kids love play dough. I haven't enjoyed it in the past, but I'm not sure why. I always thought it was messy, but now I'm realizing that isn't necessarily true. We really enjoyed playing with the play dough today. We opened a new package of cutters and different scissors and roller from the dollar store.

As the kids were playing I was making letters and asking them what letter they were and what sounds made. My kids are just now starting to recognize letters and they are beginning to connect the sounds to the letters. This was a fun way to work on letter recognition. It only lasted a few minutes, but my daughter did well and she started to match letters on her place mat (Linked Place Mat*) which is also a good way to practice. 

Play dough isn't that bad for the mess factor. My kids loved it. I definitely think we will be doing more play dough!

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Cooking with Kids: Measuring Cups

My kids love to be in the kitchen while I'm cooking. This annoys me so much sometimes, but I am learning to enjoy it. Tonight my son decided to clean out my basket with all of my measuring cups and spoons. He proceeded to line them and stack them. He was talking about the colors and shapes. Not long after my daughter joined him. I was not excited to have my clean cups and spoons on the floor nor was excited about the mess, but they were learning. So, I continued to make dinner and let them do their thing.

Activity: Things You Can Up Cycle to Color

My daughter wears pull-ups during nap and bedtime. The last box I bought had a picture on the inside of the box to color as a promo. My children asked if they could color it and I agreed, but like most things, they each wanted their own to color on. Luckily, I had ordered a box of pull-ups and a box of diapers at the same time. So I let my daughter color on  the pull-up box and my son colored on the diaper box.

The whole activity didn't last long for my kids. This was the first time my kids had used real markers, not Crayola Wonder Markers. My son decided to color on himself and on the wall. Minor details, right? We let them color long enough to get some energy out, but it didn't last forever.

This is just one example of something that you probably have around the house that can be fun for the kids to color on to change up the scenery. 

Wrapped string

This was a last minute idea with string, beads, and some glue. Wrapping string while I held the popsicle sticks is good for her motor skills! This was Easter season but you could make it work for lots of different themes.

Cooking with Kids: Cookie Edition

Baking cookies with my grandma is one of the biggest memories I have as a child. Christmas, almost a year ago, my mom and grandma came for a visit to help us settle into our new home. One goal of mine was to unpack from our move, the other was to bake cookies with my grandma and my kids.

Baking can teach so many things; math and counting skills, hand-eye coordination, fine and gross motor skills just to name a few. 

Most of the time my kids just want to feel involved. They are typically happy watching. We let them cut out the cookies and then place them on the cookie sheet. After the cookies were baked we let them cool and then frosted them. 

After cutting, baking, and cooling the cookies we decorated. This was the part the kids enjoyed the most. More toppings may have made it into their mouths than on the cookies, but that s okay. It was a moment all about memories. They did some learning along the way which was great too.

It's okay to have your kids help you in the kitchen. It does get messy, but it is worth every minute. I will openly admit I don't have them help me enough, but I want to work harder on it.

Activity: Painting

I know, I said before that I don't like messes. And that is still true. But today we painted.

Okay, let me explain. I love letting my kids explore. I love letting them learn and try new things. I love seeing the joy on their faces while doing new and exciting things. But the clean up from these activities will be the end of me one day.

Back to the mess:

What we used:
-Vinyl Tablecloth
-Paint Brushes
-Crayola Washable Paints (Linked*)
-Easel Pad Paper
-Coffee Filter
-Coffee Stir Straw
-Smocks

My children were begging me to paint, so I decided, why not. What was the worst that could happen? Being that today is my husband's last day of work for the week, I could spend tomorrow scrubbing the kitchen if I needed. So, we got out all of the supplies and got to work.

I put down the vinyl tablecloth to protect the table. Our tablecloth is old and torn, but works great for projects like this. My grandma once told me to never throw a vinyl shower curtain or a vinyl table cloth away, because they always work great for art projects. Then when they are destroyed from art projects or painting furniture you can throw them out! Great words from the wise! We put the cloth down then put smocks on. I gave them paper, some paint on a paper plate, and a brush and I let them go at it.

After a few minutes they seemed to be slightly uninterested, but not enough so to stop. I brainstormed for a minute and thought we should do some simple imaginative play with the painting. I dug through the cabinets and found coffee filters and coffee stir straws. I handed them to the kids and let them try to paint.

It all seemed to work out just fine. No crazy messes. Hands ended up in the paint at one point, but I expected that. They loved talking about each color and mixing colors to make new ones. They enjoyed looking at their hand prints when they were using their fingers.

Next time I may try to have some late letters written out for them to try to trace with the paint or even some shapes. Today, it was more hand-eye coordination and just fun free play. Maybe I will be willing to do this again soon since the mess wasn't so bad.

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Activity: Dot Markers

Messy activities are not my forte. I do not enjoy messes. I never have. I prefer to keep things clean and organizes. My children love making messes and creating chaos. Que Dot markers.

We have these Dot markers (Linked Dot Markers*). I also printed off some free dot marker letter pages from Supply Me for the kids to practice with.

The kids enjoyed the letter pages, but they were done in a matter of minutes. The asked for more pages to color so I pulled out our large pad of paper (Linked Easel Pad*). The kids continued to color and draw all sorts of things. My daughter actually ended up making a map, with a little help from me. It was fun to see her work through and understand the questions that I was asking to help her get there. She was so proud of her work!

My son colored for a few minutes and would need to take a break before coming back. Here is some of his progress. 

The kids had so much fun with these markers. In all they spent close to an hour working on the pictures. I do recommend making sure to have clothing that can get marked on or using smocks (Linked Smock*). I use an old table cloth to protect the table. The Dot Markers that we have, say they are washable, but they do not wash off hands very well at all. 

This photo was taken after trying to use a baby wipe and washing with soap and water two times. So use your best judgement when coloring with these, unless you want red fingers for family photos or something like that! 😂

Honestly though, this version of markers is fun and different. It allows me to not have to get the pain out all the time, but it is still unique for the kids. 

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