House Fun!

Well I was thinking of playing with color today but that kind of failed miserably so we moved onto bigger and better things! We made another contact paper craft; I cut out shapes of a house, trees, sun and had Owen help put them onto the contact paper. He loves to help "pat, pat, PAT!" (if that makes no sense to you, he helps "pat" the papers down.) I had put double sided tape onto the windows and doors to get them to stick. We had a lot of fun putting the cotton snow down.

I wanted to put this up on the wall next to the house from yesterday, but knew from our experience with the red collage that Owen was going to touch it and get his fingers stuck to the page and get dog hair on it and pull off the shapes and just make a big mess. soooo... I put saran wrap on it. Weird, I know. And probably there was a better solution but that was the one I tried. So here is our saran-wrapped finished product:

Since he enjoyed muffin tin monday so much I decided to make a house-themed lunch, which I thought was pretty cute.

But Owen pretty much made a mess of it and asked for cheese crackers. Isn't that just how it goes??

We also tried putting straws into a Parmesan cheese container because, well, all the other bloggers are doing it but that was only fun for about two seconds.

Things that were more fun:
--throwing the Parmesan container
--running with the Parmesan container
--chasing the dog with the Parmesan container
--getting tiny boy fingers stuck in the holes of the Parmesan container (several times, lol).
--leaving straws all over the house
Anyway, hope you are having fun getting ready for Thanksgiving tomorrow! If I am lucky maybe we will do another fun craft. OH, and I should definitely post my MIL's sangria cranberries recipe. YUM.

turkey turkey!

So I decided that I had to do a hand turkey craft with Owen after seeing a blogger (ack, I don't remember who) saying they do them every year to see the hand grow. I really loved this turkey craft and decided to do it. I was shocked by how tiny Owen's hand is!!! I had planned on decorating the fingers with pompoms because we don't have feathers but the pompoms were way too big! So I cut the hair off of the pompoms and had Owen help me glue them down.

Well thats about as far as we got as a group project, he was not interested in helping, so I just got out my gluegun instead and finished it off myself. And then I made another one for Owen to play with because he sure ain't touching mine! Ha. who said crafts were for the kids?

Some other things we did today:
--these fun house activities I posted about yesterday

--we took a walk outside and down the street pointing at the other houses, trees and snow on the street. We also looked in the windows of our house. Owen definitely has house, tree and door down; window--not so much.

--since crayons really aren't that fun for Owen to color with (he's just not that good at them) I got out a pastel set and had him color a picture I drew of a house and trees. It was fun, but a warning is that pastels are pretty messy and they break when dropped. Sure are fun, though!

We hung the picture on the wall. Since I didn't have anything to "fix" the color with to prevent tiny hands from smudging it all over I took two page protectors (like from a binder) and put the picture in them. Instant frame!

One box, many uses

This week's theme is "out the window" because I suspect there are a few things out there that Owen doesn't know the name of (have we ever talked about trees?  Does he know the name of a house?).   I made three fun projects out of a moving box and am pretty excited about them.

The first was this peekaboo house.  I got the idea from this post at I Can Teach My Child.  It was fun and easy to make (although if you make it, make sure to put the pictures down before you put on the windows... so hard the other way!)

Inside the windows are pictures of his grandparents and his parents.  Owen loves looking at it and naming them.  And opening all the "doors."  Next up: learning that a window is not a door ;) "door, door, door, door"

Then I decided it would be fun to have a flannel board.  There are tons of tutorials out there so I'm not going to go into depth with this, but I basically duct-taped two pieces of cardboard together, repurposed a receiving blanket by hot-gluing it onto the cardboard, and duct taped the ends onto the back.  Easy peasy flannel board.  At the time, I didn't have any felt so I cut out shapes to make a house, trees, etc and reinforced them with packing tape.  To make them stick, I tore off the velcro tabs on Owen's disposable diapers and taped them onto the back.  Oh, and the cotton is snow!  I plan on propping this up by the window and comparing what is on the  board to what is outside.

So then I saw that I had the rest of this box and was wondering what to do with it.  Well I turned it into a house.  Fun!  I did not spend much time on it because I know it will be destroyed within the next day or two, but I made a roof and cut doors and windows.

From the inside of the house, I drew pictures of what you can see out the window; one of the pictures resembles what our picture window looks like. 

 From the outside, you can open the tabs and see inside the house.. I used some pictures of Dora and Diego that my husband prints out every once in a while.  I just missed taking a picture of Owen trying to shove his head through the door, it was so cute, hopefully he will do it again!

And there you have it, three easy things to do with one cardboard box!

Tot Book!

I read about Tot Books earlier this week on Carissa's blog 1+1+1=1 and I thought it was such a great idea so I decided to give it a try!  Tot Books are like a smaller, less complicated version of a lap book, which is basically a tool for older kids to review and reinforce learning in a fun and interesting way (they usually help make the books as well.)  You can read about it more here and here. 

So I decided I wanted to make a little book focusing on the things we were talking about this week.  Here is what I came up with:

Ok. So first of all, yes, I know I need to learn to take better pictures.  Lets add that to my to-do list, shall we?  So I cut a file folder in half and then made two folds so that it would have two sides that folded inwards.  This is what the book looks like open.  It is good to make the different elements fun and interesting to look at.  I got some ideas here

The section on the right is a circle folded into fourths.  I drew objects that are circles in each segment, which totals 6 segments as you are opening it.  I also covered all of the elements of this tot book in packing tape, because Owen loves to destroy things.  That makes it difficult for this circle to stay shut, which I find frustrating.

 The middle section is a book of things that are red.  Each of the blue and green pages has a different red item on it.  This is Owen's favorite part of the book.  He loves to turn the pages.

 Finally, I made triangle number flashcards.  This is the most uninteresting part but I am sure he will grow into it ;)  Daddy has taught him to count but I don't think he really knows what the numbers mean

And there you have it, a tot book!  Owen loves it, which was the goal but I still need to figure out how to make it completely toddler proof.  Is that even possible??

redredredredred

In general, Owen and I are repeating the activities we do during the week so I try not to post about those.  I wrote about some red activites we have done here.  These are a few other red activities we are doing.

Red Collage!  It takes less than 15 minutes to flip through your old magazines, tear out red pictures or pages and cut (or tear) them into shapes.  I found some contact paper (we bought it for the purpose of being a drawer liner) and cut a big rectangle out of it.  I helped Owen put the red items onto the sticky part of the contact paper to create a red collage.

We hung it up in his toy closet, where we will hang other color creations in the future. ok, I should have been more thoughtul... The placement of this picture made Owen very angry since he couldn't reach it.  I moved it to a lower position that he can see at eye level and he is loving looking at it now.

I also spent about five minutes drawing pictures of red items and made a small book.  I added a wagon, t-shirt, apple, car, elmo and a truck.  I did not write any words, mostly because I am lazy...  I read it to him in the style of the book "Brown Bear" (Red wagon, red wagon, what do you see?  I see a red shirt looking at me, etc.)  I was surprised that he really enjoyed the book because it seemed boring to me. 

We also did some cooking (Owen stirring up ingredients + food coloring), played with red (and not red) cars, read some red books, and.. thats about it.  Sometime this weekend I might freeze some red ice cubes and let him play with them in the tub or in the kitchen with bowls of water.  He did some water play yesterday for almost an hour, which is pretty incredible amount of time to keep a toddler interested.  Yes, everything got wet, but the cleanup was remarkably easier than anything else we do.

Circles and Triangles (yes, again!)

Today we have done some of the activities from Tuesday, along with a few new ones that I really enjoyed. My favorite activity was rolling this shapes dice.

I got the idea here at Toddler Toddler .  I wrapped a kleenex box in paper towels like I was wrapping a present (again, I am seeing a serious materials shortage at my house...  we need paper!  And real tape!).  Since I figured it wouldn't last long, I quickly drew shapes onto the box, although once I get real paper I will probably cut the shapes out.  This all took less than five minutes and voila! Shapes dice.  We rolled the dice and then called out the shape that was on it--I only put circles and triangles on it to keep it simple.  It was really fun.  Obviously it is already falling apart due to Owen feeling like he has to claw the box to throw it, but it was a very fun activity and I know we will do it again soon!

I also downloaded this simple shapes book a few days ago called Shape Monster from Hubbard's Cupboard

I think it is designed to be for kids to put together but we don't have many shape books so I figured it would be perfect for us.  I colored the shapes and put it together and we read it a few times.  Owen seemed to like it and was especially interested in the circle and triangle pages.

The other "new" activity today was playing with the shapes sorter game.

Oh, I hate the shapes sorter, it has been the bane of my existance.. Owen doesn't understand it and all he ever wants to do is dump the pieces out all over the place so I step on them and hurt my feet... But today I tried something new, and got out just the circles and triangles thinking that maybe the more complicated shapes overwhelmed him (Whats with the star and plus sign? Whats wrong with a rectangle or oval or something?).  He got the circle right away and needed a little help with the triangle but I was very surprised that he even did that well since he hasn't been able to do it before.   I'm going to try my best not to hate this toy and to play with it some more in the future.

Finally, I know that I posted this the other day but I thought I would post the sensory bean tub again,  It is one of Owen's favorite things to do, plus we added a little singing to the activity today.  We had lots of scooping implements as well as the triangle and circle shapes, and I let him play by himself with it for awhile (which, in general, means disaster).

When I came back I remembered that we have been singing a song from storytime lately to the tune of "where is thumbkin" so I made up a very easy song for the shapes.  "where's the circle? wheres the circle? Here is is, Here it is, this is a circle, this is a circle, here it is, here it is."  yeah, I know, am a genius songwriter.  But he loved the song and I think it helped reinforce the shapes (which he mostly understands now).  We also sang about other things like "where's the bowl, spoon, etc."  I'm pretty sure I am going to incorporate this song into other activities because it worked pretty well for us.

Also, this afternoon, if we have time or inclination, I will bring out the playdough and use the shapes sorter shapes to press into the dough.  But maybe we will save that or another day, who knows?

Anyway, thats what we are up to, hope you got some ideas that you can use and please share with me anything you have been doing that you think we would enjoy!

Intro to Red Overkill

I thought it would be fun to do a lot of red things today. Not just bringing out red stuff and talking about it but also just seeing a lot of red during the day.

First we made some red playdough. Owen was very interested in the food coloring.


After it was all mixed up, he was mad that we were done cooking so we went back to the old standby, oats, flour and water. Yum!


I then set him up in the den to play with the red playdough and commenced with washing dishes. I went in a few minutes later to check on him and he was playing with dog vomit. seriously. If I ever find out what makes dog vomit more interesting than playdough I will let you know.

He was then making vrooming noises all over the house so we played cars for a bit (lots of red firetrucks!) and then we worked on putting red chips from the game Sequence into his piggy bank. I've tried this activity with homemade jars but he finds the piggy bank more interesting. He does struggle sometimes to get the chips in though.


We read one of his favorites, Elmo's First Book of Colors, and a couple of times through I picked up objects near us to compare the colors, for example, this truck is red like Elmo, or this block is yellow like big bird.

A few days ago I put together a bunch of red items and then covered this box in red paper. I am just going to leave it out for him to find and explore this afternoon. Don't make fun of my duct tape job, I am super embarrassed about it, why don't we ever have tape like normal people??


The final piece to our red puzzle today is red lunch ;) Owen will have spaghettio's (not that he will eat them, I'm sure, but I'm going to let him practice with his spoon as well). Red cottage cheese, grapes, and jello! The jello is homemade; I didn't have any "normal" jello on hand, and recipes I found called for juice to flavor it but we don't have juice. I was thinking of using sugar and extracts but I just didn't feel good about making him sweets since he doesn't eat them very often at all, maybe a tidbit from mom and dad's dessert like once in a blue moon, so I reverted back to the babyfood days and blended up some apples and bananas, stirred in gelatin, cold water and food coloring and voila! Jello! Lunch looks a little gross, to be honest! Sure he won't mind, though.



oh! we are also going to fingerpaint with red this afternoon!

First Look at Shapes

Nana and PopPop brought Owen's Christmas presents with them when they visited over the weekend. They were supposed to stay hidden until Christmas, but I had to play with this shapes puzzle because it seemed like such a great thing for us to work on at this stage.


We had lots of fun, but after a while I started focusing on just the circle and triangle to make it simpler. Here are some of the other things we did:

I spruced up our bean bin by dyeing rice red and blue, and also dyeing some pasta green. So many pretty colors! (Dyeing rice and pasta is easy-- put it in a plastic bag along with some rubbing alcohol and a few drops of food coloring and then squish it around to mix it. Lay it out on a paper towel to dry.) I added in wooden shapes that I got at the Target Dollar Spot yesterday (wooden lacing beads) and while scooping and pouring and making a huge mess we also played with the shapes. my newest help was laying out a leftover tablecloth underneath us for easier and quicker cleanup.


Later in the day I tried to get Owen to help me sort triangles and circles onto a paper where I had drawn a big circle and a big triangle, but he wasn't interested.


So I got out the markers to color the picture instead, but he wasn't interested in that either.


Finally I got out the muffin tin lunch and that seemed just about right. He's still got some sort of a cold so I think the rest of the day will be spent reading, snuggling and relaxing.


What do you like to do to have fun with shapes?

world's best puzzle!

Nana and PopPop came to visit this weekend and brought this Melissa and Doug Puzzle.


I almost think I love it more than Owen does; it is absolutely perfect! First, it has several of his beloved animals (giraffe, lion) but also a few he does not know yet. The pictures are very cute and interesting, the puzzle is sturdy, but the best feature of all, in my opinion, is that the pieces are very thick! They are taller than the puzzle itself, which makes it easy to take them out but also fun to play with. I've been finding the pieces all over the house the past two days, it is such a hit! Definitely have to invest in more Melissa and Doug puzzles in the future.


...oh and the disclaimer is that this is, in fact, the only puzzle we have so I have no idea if it is the best ever ;) But I still love it!

We also did a little shopping and I was finally able to pick up some stacking cups (better late then never, right?) And I have been so pleased at how much fun Owen has with them. They are definitely easier for him than the nesting blocks he has so I think I will be on the lookout for fun things we can do with them together. Hope you had a fun weekend, we were very busy with the grandparents!

outdoor exploration

we have had an absolutely gorgeous fall day so we decided to take full advantage and go out exploring. First stop, the sandbox! Throwing sand is always fun;


Owen has gotten a lot better at scooping with the shovel as well.


Next I followed the little guy around as he explored the backyard, finally settling on a pile of leaves where the rest of our time would be spent. He threw them, snuggled them, crawled in them, tasted them... great fun.




finally "we" (I) gathered up some outdoor materials to play with inside.


I got out the playdough and added in the outside stuff. I had grand visions of him rolling the pinecones in dough and pressing the leaves in it and things like that, but that just didn't happen ;) It probably would have been enough to just explore the outside stuff on its own without the playdough. Or perhaps it would have been better if I was helping more, but I let him do his own thing while I worked on his daddy's birthday cake.


The playdough, however is awesome, and here is my recipe:
1-cup flour
1/2-cup salt
2-teaspoons cream of tarter
1-cup water
1-Tablespoon cooking oil
food coloring (optional)

Put everything in a pot and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. You're looking for the dough to start separating from the sides of the pan (the time this takes depends on how big your batch is). The smoothest results come from stopping when it still seems like it’ll be a little too sticky. Remove and let cool for a bit on wax paper. Add color and knead to distribute color. Add a scent (e.g., mint, wintergreen, clove, strawberry, etc.) to keep it smelling fresh.

in which we make noise, eat finger paint, stack and explore color (or not)

at the library, Owen really seemed to enjoy playing with shakers while dancing around to music so I decided to implement this at home. We've danced, and we've shaked, but never at the same time. I rounded up some noisemakers-- a set of keys, bells, a homemade shaker bottle (beads, rice and found items in a waterbottle), round bead containers, a package of beads and a vitamin container with magnets inside.


I was searching for the Ting Tings, which I think is the essential toddler dance music (and should be marketed as such) but settled for Mates of State instead. It was a blast, well for about four songs, and then he suddenly found coloring more appealing, but that is exactly why I set up the color table so I was cool with that.


Fingerpainting with pudding was another activity of the day. I had mixed up and colored instant pudding last week so we used the leftovers. If I were making it fresh today I would have had Owen help stir in the food coloring. I laid out tinfoil (interesting to play with and easy cleanup) and set out some utensils and objects and let him do his thing with the pudding. He had lots of fun smearing and eventually eating, the pudding. And spoon practice!


I thought this stacking rings-type activity was going to be a hit, but it wasn't. As soon as Owen saw the paper towel holder, he started making car noises and was driving it around the room. lol. Well I had cut up some toilet paper rolls, and gathered up other round objects with holes in them like stacking rings, bracelets, duct tape, etc for him to place on and take off of the paper towel holder. I will definitely try this again because I still think its a great activity.


the final thing we did was introduce the color green, which I don't think he's really ready to embrace but we will keep looking at colors. Today I put a bunch of green things in a green bag and had him play with them and take them out while I named the items...Usually this sort of discovery is really fun but the bag must have been full of lame stuff because he was so over it in a few seconds... Maybe if I had said "these are my cherished treasures please do not touch them" he would have spent a lot of time on it, who knows. Anyway, I have some piles of red and blue objects put together in the closet, I am sure we will try this again soon.