Bubble Wrap Fun

Our Let's Explore goodies came with LOTS of bubble wrap, which was thrilling for O and M! O immediately spread a long piece out in our hall, and we took turns hopping down it. Then when M came to visit, she made a "maze" in the den, and we all had fun hopping and popping! We also plan on doing more bubble wrap paintings, and maybe bubble wrap pillows (recently seen in Family Fun). I hope Amy will be glad to see that her shipping materials are being put to good use!

Toothpicks and Styrofoam

Thanks to Montessori Mama for this fun activity! I handed O a sheet of styrofoam and a container of toothpicks and showed her how to stick a toothpick in the styrofoam. She thought it was great, but we quickly ran out of toothpicks. Luckily, our guests arrived at the same time that she ran out :) I'll have to find more toothpicks before I let her try this again!

Painting with Water

O and I took a few paintbrushes with us this morning when we went to the beach and painted the retaining wall (this has been on my to do list for MONTHS, but I always forget the brushes!). She had so much fun, and so did I :) We also made handprints, footprints, and lily pad prints.

Homemade Water Color Paint

O and I made homemade watercolors which were inspired by this post at Dim Sum, Bagels, and Crawfish.

To make the watercolors you need 3 Tbs cornstarch, 1.5 tsp corn syrup, 3 Tbs baking soda, 3 Tbs white vinegar, food coloring, and small containers. When you mix the 1st 4 ingredients, you'll see (and hear) lots of fizzy fun! This was O's favorite part of the activity. She was VERY impressed with the fizzing! We then poured the mixture into several small containers and added food coloring. This was yet another lesson in color mixing since we made orange and purple. She wanted to mix yellow and blue to make green, but since we already had green (and we didn't have enough mix to make 2 greens) we didn't make another.
O enjoyed painting with the watercolors, but after 4 paintings she said "O tired. Going to lay on the couch. Need blankie." I got her down from the kitchen helper, and she acted worn out and tired and laid on the couch with a blankie over her for about 2 seconds :) Here are her watercolor masterpieces. I'm planning on incorporating them into her color book somehow, but I haven't really figured out how yet. I'm hoping to finish her color book before she goes to college, but I don't know if I'll make it :)

Teddy Bear Bread

Yesterday I was thinking that I would try to make cinnamon bread with our leftover dough from pizza night, so when I saw Megret's post about Teddy Bear Bread I knew that would be the perfect way to do it! O was thrilled to make 3 little bears of bread...mama, dada, and O, of course! She had fun rolling the dough and decorating the bears with raisins.
We brushed them with olive oil and sprinkled them with cinnamon and sugar. O and I thought they were delicious. Elliott thought they needed more sugar :) I think this might become a tradition along with our weekly homemade pizza night. Next time we might make garlic bread bears instead of cinnamon bears :)

Feet Painting

O was in a painting mood after we finished the bubble wrap painting, so she made a painting for her dada for his birthday. She loved mixing the color on her hands and then smearing it onto the canvas. She was very excited that we were going to be making footprints instead of handprints. Although she did make a few handprints while she was covering the canvas with paint.
Here's her 2nd masterpiece of the day! Her footprints did not show up as clearly as her handprints have, and I'm not sure why. We used a different kind of paint so that may be it, or we might have just tried to make the footprints too soon (before the paint was tacky).

Bubble Wrap Painting

This activity has been on my to do list for a LONG time (at least 3 months!), and I don't know why its taken so long to get to it! You need bubble wrap, paint, and paper. I taped the bubble wrap onto a table, and O painted it. She was a little tentative at first, and she asked for paper. I assured her that it was ok to paint the bubble wrap, so she jumped right in :)

She tried to make handprints and seemed a little dismayed when it didn't work. She looked at me sadly and said "not work!"
I put the paper on top of the bubble wrap, and she loved pressing it (especially since she was making handprints on the back of the paper!).
Tada! Her finished masterpiece!

I've seen this activity on many blogs and in several books and magazines, so I'm not going to link to one particular place. Just wanted to let you know that it wasn't my idea (even though you probably already knew that!).

Paper Bag Water Painting

For this activity you need an unfolded paper bag and water :)

O was thrilled to make footprints...
and handprints on the paper! She LOVES making handprints!We also sprinkled water on the paper with our fingers, and O made fingerprint dots. After we were finished, I hung the paper to dry and then wrapped it up to use again another day.

Washing Shoes

The idea for this activity came from the Montessori n Such catalog (I LOVE that catalog!). You need a container, wash cloths (the small one is for washing and the larger one is for drying), a couple of brushes, a sponge, and shoes.
O had a great time, and I was excited that we accomplished a few tasks that have long been on my lists. In addition to 3 pairs of shoes, we also washed O's outside baby buggy and a rubber placemat that's been in the garage for several months.

Making Chalk Paint

Since our last experience with our homemade chalk didn't work so well, we decided to try it again using a different (and simpler) method :) 1st we crushed O's wet chalk using the mortar and pestle. Then we added a bit of water and stirred.
Viola! Chalk paint!
This paint worked much better on O's chalkboard, and we had lots of fun! (aside from the fact that I was attacked by fire ants in the middle of the process! I'm just glad that they got me and not O!)

Homemade Puzzles

This idea came from One Little, Two Little , and I've been planning on making these puzzles for a while. I saved a Cheerios box and Goldfish box, and I finally found the time to cut them into puzzles. I'm not holding out too much hope that O is going to love (but I hope she'll at least like them) these puzzles because she really shows very little interest in puzzles (except for the Montessori puzzles that are quite difficult and somewhat frustrating for her!).

Toddler Brain Quest

I hesitated to buy this set of cards for O, but I'm a sucker for free shipping at Amazon, and I needed to add something to my order to qualify for it :) Once they arrived, they sat on the shelf for about a month before I opened the package. I don't know why I waited so long. I think I was afraid of being disappointed. I hate buyer's remorse! So...my mom saw the box, opened it, and read the cards to O. O LOVED it! She LOVES Max the monkey, and she thinks its great that he is pointing (she says "Max is mointing!"). The cards basically consist of pictures on each page with questions about what you see. There are also inference questions. There are lots of things that I've never thought to ask (or teach) O, and I am REALLY glad that I bought these cards :)

A New Spin on the Toddler Activity Bags

Ok, I have to admit that I CAN'T STAND ziploc bags. They just seem very wasteful and flimsy to me. However, I couldn't think of anything else to use when I made O's toddler activity bags. Then, about a month ago, I saw these pencil pouches. I knew they would be perfect for most (but not all) of the bags. They are much more durable, and they look so much better than the ziploc bags. I am VERY happy with them. These bags will also provide O with lots of opportunities to practice her zipping and unzipping skills. Also, since they have metal grommets, I can hang them from hooks or group them together with book rings when we travel.

Mini Animal Match

I bought these decorations for O's crocs a couple of months ago from a dollar store (Family Dollar, I think). I wasn't sure if they would work for her crocs (they didn't), but I knew they'd make a cute matching activity. I know she'll love this work since she loves "niney" things. Don't try an activity like this if your child still puts things in his or her mouth! O occasionally puts things in her mouth, but usually only after she makes SURE that I'm looking. She likes my reaction (or perhaps my overreaction). Regardless, she'll not be unsupervised while doing this work.

Frog and Lily Pad Game

The idea for this game came from a commenter on the magnetic fishing game. I bought a packet of plastic frogs from the Dollar Tree and stuck tacks in their backs to make them magnetic. Then I borrowed the lily pad that O got from the lake today to use as a pattern, and I cut lily pads from craft foam. The blue playsilk makes the perfect pond, and we'll use the fishing pole from the fishing game. When we play this game, we'll work on one-to-one correspondence by trying to put a frog on each lily pad. We'll also talk about sizes since the lily pads are 3 different sizes, and we'll talk about colors since the frogs are several different colors. I think O will like this game because she LOVES lily pads. She has to get a lily pad to hold every time we go for a kayak or pedal boat ride, and she gets excited when lily pads wash up on the beach :)

Cake in a Mug

Thanks to Laura for posting about making cake in a mug! We tried this on Sunday night for a special treat, and it was delicious. O was talking about her "pecial treat" all day. I couldn't believe how easy these were to make! Here's the recipe:

You need: a mug, 4 tbs of sugar, 4 tbs of flour (I used 3 tbs of white flour and 1 tbs of whole wheat flour. Next time I'll do 2 of each.), 2 tbs of cocoa, 3 tbs of milk, 3 tbs of oil, and an egg. Combine the dry ingredients, add the wet ingredients, and mix WELL. We didn't mix our quite well enough, and we had egg and flour streaks in our cake :) Put your mug of cake mix in the microwave, and cook it for 3 minutes. Pour it into a bowl and enjoy!

While O and I mixed up the cake, Elliott was making whipped cream to go on top. He shook and shook a jar of cream with 2 marbles, but it was still watery by the time the cake was ready. We poured it into the mini blender (that we used to make baby food when O was tiny), and it was ready in a flash :)

O had fun mixing all of the ingredients together.

Delicious, but VERY rich! Thanks, Laura for sharing this fun and yummy idea :)

Learning to Balance

I've been planning on making O a balancing board out of leftover boards from her swingset for a while, but I just haven't gotten around to it. Today when we were going in from playing in her sandbox, she decided to balance on the bricks. What a great idea, O! I'm sure this will now be a daily activity!

Paper Plate Food

O and I had fun making paper plate food today. For this activity you need pictures of food cut from a magazine, glue, and paper plates. O and I looked through old magazines and chose the pictures of food about a week ago, and this afternoon I cut the pictures out. O worked on cutting bits of the magazine, but she's really too little to handle scissors effectively on paper (we need to practice cutting playdoh again). She enjoyed putting the glue on the backs of the pictures using a glue stick. I had to hold the pictures still for her. She also liked patting the pictures onto the plate. After the 1st 2 plates, she was a little tired of the activity and kept leaving saying "mama do it by self." She came back and helped with the 3rd plate, but I did the 4th one by myself :)
She was proud of the finished products! She set her table (by her play kitchen) and fixed supper for dada as soon as he got home!

Making a Baby Doll Cradle

O and I made a cradle for her "niney" babies using an oatmeal box. It was simple, but it took a few days since it had to dry between each step. First, I cut the oatmeal box. Then O and I painted it with mod podge glue. She LOVED doing this!

While she was painting the box with mod podge glue, I cut out strips of construction paper (O chose the colors) that we laid them on top of the mod podge.
We let the cradle dry for a day before painting it with another layer of mod podge glue. Again, this was SO MUCH fun for O. She stayed busy picking the glue off of her hands for quite a while after we finished this project :)
Here's the finished cradle. Its the perfect size for her "nineys," and she loves to rock them in it. The cradle actually turned out to look a bit like a roll of lifesavers, but O doesn't mind. I thought about embellishing it with stickers and lace, but decided to just leave it as is.

Homemade Tortillas

O and I made homemade tortillas for lunch yesterday, and they were delicious! The recipe came from her Highlights High Five magazine (we LOVE this magazine!), and I adapted it a little. You need flour, salt, vegetable oil, vegetable oil spray, shredded cheese, and water.

1) Mix together 3 cups of flour (we used 2 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour) and 1 teaspoon of salt

2) add 1 cup of water and 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil (we used olive oil, and I added a little more water since we used whole wheat flour)

3) stir until mixture forms a ball

4) make 12 balls of dough

5) flatten the dough with your hands or a rolling pin

6) spray a pan with the vegetable oil spray (we didn't have any spray, so we just used olive oil), and cook each tortilla over medium heat for 2 minutes (we cooked ours a little longer because I like them when they are a bit crispy). Turn it over, add cheese, and cook until the cheese melts.



I was excited by how easy and fun this was! O had a great time tasting the dough. She kept asking "O taste?" Pouring the flour in the bowl
Mashing the dough with her hands
Rolling the dough with her rolling pin
Eating her cheese quesadilla. They were a little greasy since we used olive oil instead of cooking spray. Next time, I'll use a bit more whole wheat flour. O had lunch a delicious lunch of cheese quesadillas, blueberries, and tomatoes while standing in her kitchen helper while I cooked all of the tortillas :)