Gel Drawing Board

I made this gel drawing board for E(2) before our last vacation.  I thought it would be the perfect activity for our plane trip.  Luckily, I realized before we left on our trip that this was a terrible idea since our plane was small and unpressurized, and therefore the gel bag would explode!  Phew....glad we didn't have to learn that the hard way :)

Anyway, the gel drawing board is lots of fun and super simple to make.  It's actually the only thing that I've ever made that Elliott has really, really liked!  His brother also had fun drawing with it.  The girls like it, too, but not nearly as much as the adults in our family!

To make the gel drawing board, I filled a gallon sized ziploc bag with hair gel, food coloring, and glitter.  I cut a foam core board the same size as the ziploc bag.  I taped the bag to the foam core board using zebra print duct tape.





I put a piece of clear contact on the back, so that it would work as a dry erase board.





This is a great activity for the car, and I'm planning to make some smaller ones in different colors for the girls to use in the car.  Fun stuff!

Our Peace Basket

The girls (especially O) love our peace basket.  It sits on the floor behind a chair (O chose the location), and they enjoy going back there for some peaceful moments.

When I put together the peace basket, my goal was to include items that would reach a variety of their senses.  So, we have a whelk shell for the girls to hold up to their ears to hear the ocean (they have to be very still and quiet to hear the sounds of the "waves"), a finger labyrinth to trace, a cinnamon stick to smell, a book to read (When I Make Silence by Jennifer Howard), and our Starry Night Bottle to shake and then watch the "stars" settle to the bottom.



I decided to remake our Starry Night Jar after E(2) was shaking it and slammed it into her face (she was ok).  I decided that a plastic bottle may hit with a little less force when shaking than a glass jar!  Also, I LOVE the round Christmas Coke bottles.  (I also love Coke...it's an addiction that I'm trying to break...I haven't had one in more than a week!) So, before Christmas, I bought many round Coke bottles to use for various Discovery bottles.  The round bottle works perfectly for our Starry Night bottle.  I just poured the contents from the jar into the bottle and added extra water to fill it up.

I know that most people glue the tops of their discovery bottles so that the kids don't open them with disastrous consequences, but I've never done this.  So far (going on 4 years), the girls have never opened a bottle.  I like to have the option of pouring out the contents and using the bottles for something else, which is why I don't glue them.

Color Sorting Bags

While cleaning out the chaos that is our activity drawers, I found these color bags that I made for O(5) many years ago. (see O's color hunt game here)  E(2) was THRILLED to see them!  She dumped all of the objects out and started sorting!


We haven't used these bags in more than 6 months (at least), and I'm feeling guilty that I haven't had them out for E (because she loved this activity).


I have a feeling that this is going to be one of E's favorite "works" for a while :)

"P" Week

E(2) had "P" week in October, and I wrote the post, but never put it up on the blog!

She made pumpkin pie with O and my mom.




We ate purple cabbage.




We carved a pumpkin.




We made pipe cleaner spiders.




We did lots of puzzles.








She pulled her puppy around the house.




She dressed up like a pink poodle.




And wore her hair in pigtails.




The girls loved their first experience with pop rocks! This was probably the highlight of our "P" weeks!




We went for a windy ride on the pontoon boat.




The girls painted wooden pocketbooks.








E matched pumpkin life cycle cards (from Montessori for Everyone).




She really enjoyed talking about the life cycle of the pumpkin.



We dressed like pirates.



She painted this tray and made prints of it. 


We had a picnic in the woods, rode the plasma car, and played the piano. Fun stuff!

Blue/Yellow Color Mixing Discovery Bottle

I was so excited to see this color mixing discovery bottle since color mixing is an activity that we spend a lot of time on.



To make this discovery bottle, I filled the bottom one third of the bottle with water colored with blue food coloring. Then I heated cooking oil and mixed in yellow powdered tempera paint. I stirred and stirred to try to get the paint to dissolve. It eventually dissolved enough, and I spooned it into the bottle. (I did this slowly because I was try to avoid putting any undissolved powder into the bottle). I'm not completely happy with the bottle because the yellow oil clings to the sides and makes the blue a little cloudy, but I've worked on it for several days, and I think this is as good as it's going to get.




The liquid turns a nice shade of green after shaking it vigorously. Then it immediately starts to separate into yellow and blue again.



I have to admit that I am much more impressed with this than the girls are, but they have had fun with it, too.  I'm looking forward to making more coloring mixing discovery bottles for E(2)'s science shelf!  (I'm hoping to find blue lamp oil because I think this would work much better with blue lamp oil and yellow water).