Going Fishing

While looking in our guest room closet for a wedding present (sorry EB but I didn't find the present), I found this cool fishing game that I bought 2nd hand about a year ago. O was THRILLED when she saw it, and she did her little excited expression/sound that we love so much. She had fun catching the fish, and then I put them back for her. She got a little frustrated at times because the fish fell off, and I had to remind her to move slowly so she wouldn't lose the fish.

Feeding the Frog

Here's my thrift store frog! O fed him a basketful of bugs (from the dollar section at Target). She loved this work and repeated it 3 times immediately. When she a little older, I'll let her feed the frog using tongs or tweezers. I think this may be a daily work!

Crushing Cheerios

O used the mortar and pestle to crush Cheerios. Today was the 1st time, we've used it and she did a good job. She needed some help to crush the Cheerios, but she enjoyed trying to crush them:) I then poured them into her organic applesauce (the mortar and pestle is made of stone, and its too heavy for O to lift). She enjoyed mixing the Cheerios into her applesauce. She loves to mix and says "mix" all the time :)

Our Busy Day

This is what we did today. It was a busy day despite the fact that this mama is sick! Bleh! I hate being sick. O keeps looking at me saying "sick" then she tells me to drink "tea" because she knows that hot tea makes me feel better. She is just getting over the same illness, and she's been quite a grouch lately :( I can't wait until we are both better. We are so rarely sick that we don't quite know how to handle it!
She loves this work and is always so focused while doing it.
Stringing beads
Putting rubber bands on the doorknob. This is a favorite activity which requires lots of concentration. I LOVE to see her totally focused on the task at hand. O's hair is in her 1st ponytail! After putting the rubber bands on the door knob, she took them off and put them on her wrist. She was proud of her bracelets. It also tooks lots of time and concentration to get the rubber bands on her wrist.

Bear Puzzle

O has had a good time playing with her bear puzzle lately. Its been in the toy closet for a while because she used to spend more time chewing on it rather than playing with it :) We talked about emotions and colors while doing this activity.

Brown Bear I Spy Bottle

I made an I Spy bottle for O to go along with the book Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? I got the idea from here. Thanks Shannon for the link to that site. Its full of great ideas! I used lentils instead of rice since O already has a rice I Spy bottle. For this activity we read the book and after we read each page we look for the animal on that page. I kept saying "Green frog, green frog. Where are you?" O wasn't too interested at first (she just wanted to shake and open the bottle), but she became more interested as a I called to the animals asking where they were.

More Matching

Are you tired of reading matching posts yet? This is the last one for a while, I promise! I bought this set of Go Fish cards for O to match since its animal mamas and babies. O LOVES to label everything as mama and baby. She even calls our big tomato plant mama and the little one baby. She really loves these cards and was totally focused (despite the upside down sunglasses) on the activity. She looked closely at each card before matching it. After she finished she said "mama, baby, milk" and put the 2 cards together face to face so the baby could nurse. Then she swung them back and forth and said "rock, rock." She such a nurturer!

I Spy Matching Game

I bought this I Spy Preschool Game for my 3 year old niece for Christmas, and she really enjoyed it for about a week. By then she had it memorized, and it no longer offered a challenge. Since O loves to match, I thought I'd try it with her. I suspected that she was too young to do the game since its for ages 3 to 6 years, but I decided that it wouldn't hurt to try. I put out 3 cards and handed her a matching card one at a time. The first time we did it she got all of them right, and I was very surprised. Today we did the game again, and she barely looked at the cards and she didn't match any of them correctly. She obviously wasn't into it. Then she decided that Niney (Tiny) wanted to match. She held Niney's hand and had her match the cards. Niney matched them all correctly! It was so funny. O LOVES Niney, and she goes with us everywhere!

Feeding O's Matching Obsession

Since O loves to match, I'm always looking for matching cards. This weekend I found Brainy Baby Wild Animal cards at Fred's for $1.50. I bought 2 sets so she could match them, and she's really enjoyed it. The cards are super sturdy, and I hope they'll last a while. I'm also going to try to find some small animal figurines for her to match to the cards.
I also bought these puzzle cards by School Zone. There are 3 cards that the child puts together to make a picture. I put the 1st 2 together and handed O the 3rd card for her to match. (she was sitting directly across from me, but moved to the side while we were working)

Playing the Harmonica

O loves to play the harmonica!

Hard/Soft Sorting

O learned the attributes hard and soft today. I had 6 items in a bowl- 3 hard items and 3 soft items. We talked about the different concepts as we touched the items and sorted them into 2 containers. O was really thinking during this lesson, and she really enjoyed it. She kept wanting to do it again, so we ended up sorting the objects 3 times in a row.

Our Version of Dressing Frames

I bought this Zoolio activity set before our cruise in December. I thought it would a good, quiet activity to take to dinner. O wasn't very interested, but my 3 year old niece loved it. After we got back, I put it away in the closet until this week. O has enjoyed trying out the different activities. It includes 6 removable pages that have a different activity on each- velcro, zipper, snaps, buttons, weaving, and a pocket kangaroo. O also likes carrying it around like a purse. Actually, this is her FAVORITE thing to do. She puts it on her arm, turns to walk away and says "bye" like she has somewhere very important to go! This toy well-made and attractive, and the best part of all is that I bought it 2nd hand for about 3 dollars! I LOVE 2nd hand shops!

Stringing Beads

We've been working on stringing beads lately using O's snake bead stringer that was a baby shower gift. Its made by Ryan's Room, and we really love it. The beads are wooden and nicely made. O has a little trouble stringing the big beads, but she's learning. Somehow my Kleen Kanteen jumped into this picture. I LOVE that thing!

Oh, The Things You Can Do...

with an egg carton! I cut holes out of the bottom of the carton. First, O put clothes pins in the egg carton. When I showed her how to do this, I put the clothes pins upside down. She quickly corrected me!
Open the carton and drop the clothes pins through to the floor. This is very exciting!
Push wooden acorns into the holes. This was a little challenging, and O REALLY enjoyed it.
Then she put bears in the holes or "caves." This was soooooo much fun!
Then shake, shake, shake to get them out again!

Finally! The Felt Snake.

Montessori Mama posted this great idea about a month ago, and we decided to give it a try last night. My mom brought all of the materials and got things ready while I was at work, and we introduced it to O when I got home. My mom and I were much more excited about it than O was unfortunately. It was a difficult task for her, and she didn't stay with it long. I'm going to try it one more time before I put it away for later.

Sink or Float

O and I played with water on the screened porch today, and we tested different objects to see if they floated or sunk. O understood the concept of floating, but I'm not sure if she knew exactly what sinking meant. I didn't have enough water in the container, so the objects that sunk still broke the surface of the water. Oh, well. We had fun and that was our main objective. Shortly after I took this picture, O decided that she couldn't "each" well enough, so I put the container on the floor. Shortly after that she stripped and was taking an impromptu bath in the container. She had the greatest time and kept herself entertained for about 15 to 20 minutes. I took advantage of this time to read a few magazines :)

Fun with Play Silks

We haven't played with O's playsilks in a while, so I brought them back out today. I put them all in an old baby wipes container. She loved pulling them out one by one. She also had fun wearing the silks as capes and putting them on my head.

Crocodile Rocker

We gave O a Crocodile Rocker game from Hearthsong for Easter. To play the game you roll the dice and then choose a piece that matches the color on the dice. Then you balance the piece on the crocodile. O is a little young to understand exactly how to play the game. We take turns putting the pieces on the crocodile. We talk about the colors and build tall towers with the pieces. O likes to turn the crocodile right side up to make a little "ouse" for the pieces (she into "ouses" these days). She also puts the crocodile on her head and calls him a "at."

Egg Carton Fun

Egg cartons are great for sorting. Today O got her egg carton off her shelf and put shells in it. She was very engrossed in this work. I prompted her to take the shells out and put them back in the basket after she was finished. She counted as she put them back...2, 3, 4, 6, 9. For some reason she refuses to say 1 :) See Montessori Mama's blog for more fun things to do with egg cartons.

Jan Brett Matching Cards

Thanks to Mom over at What Do We Do All Day? for this idea! I printed these animal matching cards from Jan Brett's website last night and laminated them this morning for O. She was feeling a little fussy and overtired when I first showed them to her, but she cheered up when she saw the picture of the "orse." She rode a horse at an Easter party last Saturday, so she's into horses these days. We had fun matching the cards, and we are looking forward to matching them again soon. I think O will also like matching 3d animals to the cards. Since she enjoys matching so much I have plans for a few more homemade matching games- mommy/baby matching using pictures of animals and mommies and babies that we know and a family and friends matching game (thanks for the idea Auntie EB). The family and friends matching game will be great because it will help O remember family and friends that we don't see very often. I think that I'll use 2 different pictures of each person instead of an exact match to make it more challenging and fun for her.