Hard at Work

O has been spending A LOT of time at her art shelf lately. She loves Pottery Barn Kids catalogs because there is a doll in there that looks like her baby doll, Emma. She enjoys cutting the magazines and gluing the pictures on top of each other. She glued about 10 pictures one on top of the other and was SO proud of her creation. She immediately hung it up on the refrigerator!

Toothpicks & Styrofoam

To make this activity I drew dots in shapes on a piece of styrofoam and gave O a container of toothpicks to match to the correct color dots. She was very engaged at first and seemed to enjoy herself, but she lost interest after completing 1 or 2 shapes. I should have cut the styrofoam and just put one shape on each piece. She enjoyed making her own designs with the toothpicks under the shapes I had drawn.

Embroidered Christmas Dolls

I have set an unrealistic goal for myself...to have all of my handmade Christmas gifts made before Little Kicker arrives in August. Here are the 1st of many handmade gifts. I used a free pattern from Wee Wonderfuls to make the dolls. The doll on the left is for Little Kicker, and the doll on the right is for my friend's baby girl. I can't decide if I like the doll better in different colors or all in red. What do you think? Also, I wish I'd shaped the red doll a little better, but it was my first one and I was being super cautious because I didn't want to ruin it :) Little Kicker's Christmas doll will match O's Christmas stocking. I ordered this pattern for Little Kicker's stocking, and I'll make O a Christmas doll using the same pattern.

A Listening & Matching Game- Rhyming Words

 
O and I had fun playing this rhyming game this week (I bought this game at Wal-Mart last summer). She is really into rhyming lately, and she is constantly coming up with real and nonsense rhyming words for different things she says, so this game was perfect for her. To play the game, you listen to a cd of different words, and you cover up the picture of the rhyming word on your card. O needed help, of course, but it was a great way to practice our rhyming skills while having lots of fun!

Cleaning Her Kitchen

O has recently shown an interest in dusting. Now she just needs to start dusting the whole house! Then I'll be happy (since I detest dusting) :)

Loving the Sand Tray

Sorting by Color

The object of this activity is to sort the insects & animals by color into the four separate compartments. I was trying to get O interested in sorting with tongs with this activity, but it didn't really work. She tried the tongs at first, but then she said she'd rather do it by hand. The tray is from Dollar General and the animals were an after Halloween deal that I found at either Target or Wal-mart.

Animal Families

I also downloaded these animal families cards from Montessori for Everyone. To introduce this activity to O, I put one card from each animal family out and had her sort the rest of the cards to the correct animal family. There are stickers on the backs of the cards for self checking. This was a really easy activity for her, and I wish I'd introduced it to her sooner.

What Doesn't Belong?

I downloaded these cards from Montessori for Everyone and introduced them to O this morning. She marks the picture (with a wipe-off marker...the pictures are laminated) that does not belong. She zoomed through this activity and seemed to really enjoy it. I included a little piece of felt in the bowl for erasing the marks on the pictures.

A Few of Her Favorite Things...

are blocks, rocks, shells, and playsilks. The simplest (and most natural) toys always seem to be the best :)

Magnolia Leaves Crown

When I called to check on O while I was at work on Friday, my mom told me that O was really enjoying playing with Magnolia leaves. I suggested making a Magnolia leaf crown, and they did! O calls it her "marrying hat" because she loves to pretend to get married. (She also gives birth to multiple babies each day!)



To make the crown my mom cut a piece of cardboard to fit around O's head and stapled it into a circle. She then stapled Magnolia leaves all around the cardboard circle. It doesn't get any easier than that!

Overheard...

O and my 5 year old niece were coloring in a big coloring book on the floor. M was coloring a picture, and O was coloring on the back, blank side of a coloring sheet. I overheard M tell O proudly "I'm coloring in the lines, and you are just doing scribble scrabble." Just as I was about to assure O that her "scribble scrabble" was beautiful, she confidently said "Scribble scrabble is good for my brain!" Good girl!

Floam Fun

It's been a while since O has played with floam, and she really enjoyed herself! She asked to play with playdough, but when she saw the blue floam, she quickly changed her mind. Floam is a nice texture variation to playdough, but I still prefer homemade playdough :)

Learning about Car Engines

Elliott is determined that O is going to like and know all about cars and their engines. Luckily, she LOVES to help him check and change various car engine parts. She identified several parts to me, but I had no idea what she was talking about :)

 

Fun in the Garden

We were so happy that O and Guh-guh prepared and planted our earthboxes for us one day when Elliott and I were at work. We decided to primarily garden using earthboxes this summer instead of planting a large traditional garden. Last year our grape tomato plants grew to over 6 feet tall and produced grape tomatoes until October. We are hoping for similar results this summer!



They also planted flowers in O's window box on her deck playhouse.



O loves to help Guh-guh & Grandpa in the garden at their house, too. She helps spray the bugs off the lettuce, water the lettuce, and pick it for our daily salads :)