Our Favorite Toys

A reader recently asked me to write a post about our favorite toys, so here it is! I love to research and find really wonderful toys for O (and Ema!). I admit that I'm a toy snob, and I prefer for O's toys to be well-made, open ended toys that inspire creative play. I try to buy toys that she'll play with for years instead of growing out of in less than a year. I try to avoid plastic toys and toys with characters...however, I DO make exceptions :) Here are the toys that are most often (daily or almost daily) played with at our house:

Playsilks!!! Playsilks are definitely the most played with "toy" in our house. O uses them in almost every aspect of her play...they make great capes, skirts, hats, scarves, baby doll blankets, baby doll diapers, picnic blankets, bags, shirts, etc. The possibilities are endless! We bought our silks from Dharma Trading Company and dyed them using Kool-Aid. However, they are on sale for another day or 2 at Let's Explore, so you might want to check them out :)

Unit Blocks- O has this set and this set of Unit Blocks. These blocks are very well made and will last forever. O plays with them all the time, and I'm sure she'll play with them for years to come.

Baby dolls- O is a little mama, and she loves her babies. Baby Emma is one of her favorite baby dolls.

Dress-up Clothes- O LOVES to dress-up! She has fairy costumes, princess dresses, ballerina dresses, dr. scrubs, construction worker outfit, etc. The scrubs and construction worker outfit are her newest costumes and therefore the most used right now, but she wears all of her costumes fairly frequently. For Christmas last year we gave her a suitcase full of costumes and accessories :)

Play kitchen and play food- O loves to cook in her play kitchen. She spends a lot of time mixing up crazy concoctions with her wooden and felt food.

Art supplies- O creates various forms of artwork everyday at her art shelf. She has markers, crayons, paint, scissors, tape, glue, and lots of various collage materials availabe to her at any time at her art shelf. She creates some interesting artwork!

Spinny Speller- We all love the spinny speller! We take turns making real and nonsense words to sound out and read. (I'm planning on writing a review of the spinny speller soon).

Playdough & Silly Putty- We love homemade playdough and therapy putty. O LOVES the homemade silly putty, but I prefer the therapy putty because it's not quite as sticky as the homemade putty.



O also has several great toys, games, and puzzles that she plays with occasionally (weekly or monthly). Here are our favorites...

Beleduc Your Body Girl Puzzle. O loves this puzzle, and she has learned so much from it.

Bilibo- The bilibo is so much fun and is so versitle. O was calling it her "turtle shell" a few days ago :) It also makes a fun cradle, a nice chair, an oversized hat, etc.

Latches Board- This Melissa and Doug latches board is lots of fun, and it's great for developing fine motor skills.

Buddha Board- O enjoys painting with water on her Buddha Board. This is also a fun way to practice writing skills. A mini Buddha Board would be great to have in the car...this may be going on O's Christmas wish list :)

Twig blocks- O loves to create different designs and structures with these amazing blocks!

Zingo- We love to play Zingo! Zingo is a great game for Family Game Night.

Rainbow Tunnel Stacker- O received the rainbow tunnel stacker when she was 15 months old, and she played with it almost every day for probably a year. She still plays with it frequently. It's a wonderful toy that can be played with in so many ways...a tunnel for mini cars, bracelets, anklets, rockers for baby dolls, sculptures, etc.

Halloween Spooning Work

The idea for this fun Montessori spooning work came from Itty Bitty Love. Sifting the spiders from the rice is fun and takes a lot of concentration (so you don't spill the rice!). I haven't introduced this work to O yet, but my 5 year old niece really enjoyed it!

A Fun Language Experience Activity

I've wanted to start writing letters (with O dictating) to our family and friends for a while, but I've never gotten past the thinking stages...until yesterday. I realized that email was much more doable :) I created an email account for O, and she dictated letters to her daddy and grandaddy (we'll write "real" letters,too...eventually). I prompted her with questions and helped her decide how to say things, but it was basically her own words (and occasionally things didn't make sense to me, but that was ok...it just makes it more fun and unique). O has enjoyed receiving letters back, and I'm sure this will be a fun weekly (if not daily!) activity.

As an added bonus to this activity, I plan to print the letters that O sends and the letters she receives and bind them into a book. This will be a wonderful keepsake for her to have. I keep a journal of letters to O and Ema, but I've always wanted Elliott (and O's grandparents) to do something similar. I've never been able to get them started on a journal for her, but I think this will be the answer. Both girls will have wonderful keepsakes of their early letters and their family members' letters to them :)

A GREAT Deal on Children's Books

I recently ordered this set of 12 hardback children's books from Weekly Reader for O and Ema. It's such a great deal that I couldn't resist! I was won over by each book coming with a cd of the story. We had a great time listening to 3 of the stories while traveling to my mom's house (How I Became a Pirate is my favorite!), and I hope that O will also like listening to the stories as she goes to sleep at night.

The books included are:

•Corduroy Lost and Found
•Curious George Goes to a Costume Party
•Do Your ABC's Little Brown Bear
•Henry's Show and Tell
•How I Became a Pirate
•The Little Engine That Could Goes on a Class Trip
•Mirette on the High Wire
•Raggedy Ann's Wishing Pebble
•Tops & Bottoms
•What Grandmas Can't Do
plus 2 bonus books

They only cost 24.95 plus shipping! I thought there must be some catch to this, but there doesn't seem to be :)

Halloween Tweezer Transfer Activity

O REALLY enjoyed this Halloween tweezer transfer activity. She picked up one porcupine ball at a time with the tweezers and placed each one in the dish. She was very focused and purposeful in her actions :) The porcupine balls came from the Halloween section at Wal-Mart, and the dish came from the craft section at Wal-Mart.

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Rememberance Day

Today is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Rememberance Day...remembering our baby who would have been 5 months old this month.

Glowing Monsters & Jack O' Lantern

Here's an easy handmade Halloween decoration for you! Head over to Not So Idle Hands for directions and to download the faces. These were easy to make even with a baby in one arm (although I made most of them while she was napping!). Have fun!

Floor Time

I realized that all of my posts have been about O lately, and I really should include Ema a little more :) We've started having floor time in her room in the mornings, and we are all enjoying it. O is a little Mother Hen, and she LOVES her baby sister. She loves it if I need the room for a minute, and she always assures me that she will babysit while I'm gone. "Baby Sister" loves O, and she especially loves it when O sings to her. She even cooed at O a few days ago when O was singing to her. It doesn't get any better than that!!!

I will eventually post pics of Ema's semi-Montessori bedroom. You can see the floor mirrors in this picture. It appears that Ema is looking at herself in the mirror, but I don't think she can really see them at all. I need to lower them. She was laughing in this picture. I love that she has started smiling, cooing, and laughing.

Edit to Add: Several people have commented that they are surprised that I use "Ema's" name...don't worry! Her name is NOT Ema :) I didn't want to use 2 initials because I find it annoying when I read something and EVERYONE is called an initial. "Ema" is our baby's blog name...it's a play on her "real" name :)

Halloween Sensory Tub

The idea for a Halloween sensory tub came from No Time For Flashcards. I love this idea, and it was so simple to put together (I love it when I see an idea on a blog, and it is something I can do immediately with little effort!). For our Halloween sensory tub, we used dried black beans, plastic spiders, bats, skeletons, and scorpions (from the dollar store), orange pom-poms, orange beads, googly eyes, orange pipe cleaners, and orange feathers. We added in a scoop, cups, tunnels, and tongs for even more fun!

A Felt Jack O'Lantern Game

I LOVE to make felt scenes and games! This felt jack o'lantern game was inspired by the felt scarecrow game at Let's Explore. You spin the spinner to decorate your pumpkin. There are all kinds of fun and crazy combinations...bunny ears, witches hat, blue hair, green tongue, bear ears, etc. O was THRILLED when she saw the set. We haven't played the game yet, but O has had a great time deorating the "mama and daddy" pumpkins. I guess I need to make 2 small pumpkins, so she can have "O and Ema" pumpkins, too :)

Our Miniature Pumpkin Family

I love this Halloween Countdown activity from The Wonder Years and decided that O and I would give it a try. It quickly turned into a completely different activity :) After we made one mini jack o'lantern, O decided that we needed a baby pumpkin and a cat pumpkin. Then, since we had a mama, baby, and cat, we HAD to have a daddy pumpkin and an O pumpkin. We ended up forgetting about using the toothpicks for a countdown and just had fun making our miniature pumpkin family.

We have LOTS of Halloween centerpieces, and there are more to come! I may have to move a few things to the mantel :)

Halloween Ghost Tree

O and I made a Halloween ghost tree this morning. We put a cotton ball in a tissue, and wrapped orange yarn around the cotton ball. We then drew a face on the tissue, and tied each ghost to a branch. We used to make ghost trees when I was a child, but we put lollipops in the tissues. I'm sure O would have liked that version better :)

Sorting Spiders

O sorted these Halloween spiders by color using chopsticks. The first time she tried it, she said "I don't like this because it's hard for me." (She usually does not like to use tongs or chopsticks). She asked if we could do "hand over hand" to sort the spiders. She did MUCH better with the chopsticks today, and she REALLY enjoyed the activity. I hope that she'll finally start to enjoy using chopsticks and tongs now :)

A Different Spin on Decorating a Pumpkin

O was excited about today's Halloween activity...decorating the back of our carved pumpkin with plastic noses, eyes, mouths, ears, etc. I bought the set of parts after Halloween last year. The pieces are very similar to Mr. Potato Head parts which would work just as well. We're planning on buying several more smaller pumpkins and finding all of our Mr. Potato Head parts to make an interesting family of pumpkins :)

A Gingerbread Haunted House

We had a lot of messy fun decorating this Halloween Gingerbread House. I bought the kit last year after Halloween, and I love that the house was already put together! All we had to do was mix up the icing by adding water and decorate with the candy provided. This was fun and messy!

O had fun decorating the house, but she REALLY had fun mixing the orange and black icing together and smearing it all over her hands :)