Cheerios & Pipe Cleaner Bird Feeders

O, M, Guh-guh, and I made cheerios and pipe cleaner bird feeders this morning. To make the bird feeders you need pipe cleaners and cheerios :) Thread the cheerios onto the pipe cleaners and you're done! Simple and fun! It's also a great activity for strengthening fine motor control. O and I made these feeders last year, too, but she was much more involved this year. She was excited to make her feeder in the shape of an O (of course!).


Guh-guh climbed up in the tree to hang our creations with the other bird feeders.

Another Science Experiment

Guh-guh and the girls watched Sid the Science Kid this morning (O and I are at Guh-guh and Grandpa's house for the week while Elliott is out of town). After the show, they decided to do a science experiment.
They used carrots in their experiment, and M had the fun idea to make letters using the carrots. The girls took turns making letters while the other one identified the letters. Both girls are really into identifying letters, sounds, and reading words lately.



For their experiment, they discussed the sizes of the carrots and chose the 3 fattest carrots. Guh-guh cut the ends off of the carrots, and showed the girls how to hollow out the carrots to make miniature carrot baskets. Somehow Guh-guh threaded dental floss through the carrots (O insisted on flossing her teeth. She loves dental floss!). They hung the carrots in the window and filled the carrot baskets with water. Leaves should begin to sprout and curl up around the basket (hopefully within a week).




Update: The carrot experiment was a flop :( Guh-guh thinks that our carrots weren't fresh enough, and she's determined to try this experiment again. I'll let you know how it goes!

A Simple Science Experiment

O's Grandpa sent her this yellow daffodil, so O and Guh-guh decided to try a simple science experiment. They put red food coloring in the water to see if the flower will turn red as it drinks the water.



It didn't actually turn out that well because the flower only turned slightly red around the edges. However, it was fun, and that's the most important thing!

Leapfrog Letter Factory

 

I REALLY don't like for my kiddo to watch tv, but I'm loosening up a little, and we let her watch carefully selected dvds (and Noggin at Guh-guh & Grandpa's house). Guh-guh let us borrow the Letter Factory, since O is really into reading these days. O LOVES it! She'd watch it over and over if we let her. She's learning a lot, too, which makes me feel less guilty about letting her watch tv.
O recieved The Treasury of 100 Storybook Classics and Treasury of 20 Storybook Classics for Christmas. (I found both sets for 47 dollars and couldn't resist the deal since we were planning on starting a weekly family movie night after Christmas). O and I love the dvds, but Elliott thinks they are a little boring :)
We've also been watching Signing Time videos on youtube, and I am amazed by how much BOTH of us have learned. So, I guess tv isn't all bad afterall :) I never thought I'd say this, but I may put a few dvds on her birthday wish list (Signing Time and The Little Travelers).

Chocolate Playdough

I 1st saw a recipe for chocolate playdough on The Crafty Crow (I think) around Christmastime, and I knew it was something we'd have to try! I was glad for the reminder and the recipe on My Montessori Journey recently. I was also VERY glad that Guh-guh was excited to make the playdough with O. They had a great time, and since chocolate is one of O's (and Guh-guh's!) favorite things, this was the perfect activity for her (them)!

Mixing up the playdough





Spreading out the dough to make chocolate cookies. Yummy! Although O told me later that she tasted the playdough, and it REALLY wasn't yummy :)
 

Here's the recipe:
Chocolate Playdoh Recipe

Mix together:

1 1/4 cup flour

1/2 cup cocoa

1/2 cup salt

2 tsp. cream of tartar

Make sure you combine these ingredients until they are thoroughly mixed together. Then add 1 1/2 T. cooking oil and 1 cup boiling water. Mix and knead until you have a nice smooth ball of dough.

My mom really preferred this method of making playdough over the cooking method. She said it's much easier! Thanks, Laura!

A Block House :)

 

O has had lots of fun playing with Guh-guh over these last few weeks! They built this fantastic block house of which O was VERY proud! She even put in a bookshelf and spent lots of time in her house reading to her babies. She's a good little mama :) She's also been spending a lot of time as Angelina Ballerina. My girl LOVES to dance, and she pretends that she takes dancing lessons. She was talking to me yesterday about what her teacher taught her at "dancing class." She has a very vivid imagination, and I would have believed her if I hadn't known that she doesn't take lessons! I can't wait until she can start dancing lessons in the fall. I hope she'll love it as much as we think she will!

Pudding in a Bag

O and Guh-guh made pudding in a bag, and it was yummy. The idea for this activity came from Thrifty Craft Mama's blog. O enjoyed pouring in the milk and pudding mix into the bag, and she especially enjoyed squishing the ingredients together! (They poured the box of pudding mix and slightly less than 2 cups of milk into the bag, and then it was time to squish!) O has never had pudding before, and she was not very impressed with it. I, however, thought it was delicious!

Laminated Park Maps

O's grandmother laminated our park maps from our trip to Disneyworld, and the girls love playing with them. Thanks, Grandmother! Because the maps are laminated, the girls can draw on them with dry erase markers. Also, we don't have to worry about them tearing.



O is studying her map.


M was excited to find Soarin' which was her favorite ride. Guh-guh showed her how to find the number and name of the ride on the side of the map and then find the number and picture of the ride on the map.

I Spy Doll Quilt

The doll quilt my mom and I made to match O's I Spy quilt is perfect for playing on the go games of I Spy! We've rarely played I Spy with the quilt on her bed...probably because it's so big and it's in her room (obviously), and we do most of our playing upstairs in the den. The doll quilt is a different story :) She takes it everywhere, and she was excited when I showed her how we could play I Spy with it. Hmmm, maybe this will be another game for game night :)

Matching Colors using Clothes Pins

The idea for this activity came from Teaching Tiny Tots. This is a fun and easy activity to put together. Get 2 each of several different sheets of paint chips from your local paint store. Cut the paint chips on one sheet and glue one each to a clothes pin. You're done! O enjoyed matching the colors, and she really had to pay attention since the colors are so similar. I also like that this is a fine motor exercise. O had a little difficulty managing the clothes pins, so I held the cards up for her while she clipped the paint chips to them. I think this will be another popular work on O's shelf!

Cinnamon Sticks & Sandpaper

This is another activity from Starting Sensory Integration Therapy by Bonnie Arnwine. For this activity you need a cinnamon stick and sandpaper :) Let your child draw on the sandpaper with the cinnamon stick and smell the sweet scent. I was surprised that the cinnamon stick did not actually leave a mark on the sandpaper, and O lost interest rather quickly. However, we did enjoy smelling the cinnamon.

Squishy Bag Fun!

The idea for this activity came from the book Starting Sensory Integration Therapy by Bonnie Arnwine. This book has lots of fun activities, and I'll be sharing some of my favorites over the next few weeks. To make the bag O and I squeezed a bottle of hair gel into a ziploc bag. O shook glitter into the bag, and I added letter beads and color beads (thanks, Guh-guh!). I included the letters of O's name, and 3 each of several different colors. We sealed the bag, and put it into a second bag. We then taped the bags closed with duct tape. O enjoyed cutting the tape :) O loves to mash and squish the bag. Eventually, we'll squeeze and squish our way into spelling her name and sorting the colors. She loves to find the letters of her name, so I think this will be a lot of fun for her (and me, too!).

Family Game Night

Family game night has turned into family game morning, game afternoon, etc. O received lots of fun games for Christmas, and we have been playing them nonstop! Zingo and Keep it Steady are our favorites, but we've also enjoyed Count & Cook by Cranium Bloom, Seek and Find by Cranium, and the Tea Party Game by Eeboo.

To play the Seek and Find game you have to assemble the puzzle first. You then draw cards which give you an item or items to find. Once you find the items, you circle them with a dry erase marker. This game is actually somewhat difficult, and there are a couple of items that we still haven't found!



The illustrations for the Tea Party game are really pretty :) To play this game you spin the spinner to obtain tea party items. The first person to gather all of the party items wins the game. It's fun and simple!




Just so you know...I linked to the games at Amazon, so you could see them if you are interested. However, the prices for the Cranium games are VERY inflated. I paid 3.98 for the Seek and Find game and about 7.00 for the Count and Cook game. Both games were on sale at Target. They are both a lot of fun, but not worth the prices on Amazon :)