Valentine's Craft Basket

The girls were THRILLED when we put together this basket full of Valentine's Day card making supplies!  The basket includes pink, white, and red construction paper, heart doilies, Valentine's stickers, glue sticks, scissors, glitter, and Valentine's cupcake liners (E's favorite).

Both girls got right to work!  O(5) cranked out at least 10 Valentine's on the first day.  She was so proud and sweet when she gave us our heart cards.  She made a small one for E (while E was in the middle of a tantrum), and E(2) threw it to the floor.  O ran upstairs and made her a bigger heart to make her feel better because she was afraid E was upset that she'd gotten a small heart when the rest of us got big hearts.  I love my sweet girl.  E later apologized and hugged her sister.

Valentine's Cutting Work

Both girls were THRILLED when I set up some Valentine's cutting work trays for them!  The trays didn't stay this nice and neat for long!


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We all love E(2)'s super cool scissors that she got for Christmas (well, we love them more than she does.  She just wants to use exactly what her big sister uses.  Luckily, her big sister loves these scissors, too!)

Valentine's 1-to-1 Correspondence Work

Both girls have enjoyed this simple work.  They put one pom pom in each heart.  I'd like to add a pair of tongs to this work, but they are all missing.  *sigh*  One day my house will be organized.

A Valentine's Math Work

Both girls were VERY excited by this work despite the fact that it's much too difficult for E(2) and very easy for O(5).  They love it because it involves candy!

O lined up numbered sparkly (or "farkly" as E calls them) hearts in order from 1 to 10.  She then put the appropriate number of candy message hearts under each number.














They got to eat a couple of pieces of candy after O finished the work.  Then, I had to put it out of reach of E because she kept sneaking pieces of candy!

Valentine's Day Sensory Box

Our snow dough hasn't seen much action since Christmas, so I decided to use it as our Valentine's Day sensory box.  I took out a few things and added in some Valentine's objects from the girls' Montessori shelves.  They LOVED it!!!



We had a lot of fun hiding and finding red treasures in the various containers.

Valentine's Day "Work"

I LOVE setting up Valentine's Day "work" for our girls' Montessori shelves.  They have been excited by all of the new additions!  Here's one simple work that E(2) has enjoyed...



She puts the toothpicks in the shaker.  She got a little frustrated that they leaned to the side, but she handled it well.




O(5) also enjoyed completing this work.  She calls this type of work a "relaxing work."




The Valentine's toothpicks are cupcake decorations that came with a pack of cupcake liners from Dollar General.

Matching Textures While Blindfolded

I recently brought out the tiny pillow matching activity that I made for O(5) a couple of years ago out for E(2).

E quickly matched the pillows, but wasn't interested in covering her eyes to do the activity.




However, O(5) was really excited to see this activity back on the shelf!  She immediately wrapped the playsilk around her head and matched the pillows.  It was too easy for her, but she still enjoyed it.



Her favorite thing was hiding the pillows when I had my eyes covered and was trying to match them!  Silly girl!

Dates with Mama & Daddy

I love the "Year of Dates" on Let's Explore!  Since we've been trying to have more one-on-one time with the girls, these "date" printables are perfect!

On New Year's Day we told the girls that they would be getting cards in the mail telling them about dates with mama, daddy, or both of us.  So far, they've had 3 movie dates with both of us (family movie night is SO much more exciting when they get a letter in the mail telling them about it), and one individual "date" each.

Here are the ideas for our dates:

watch a movie
go out for ice-cream (we did this after O(5)'s ballet practice...she's an inchworm in The Little Mermaid ballet!)
go shopping to pick out a small toy (this just happened by chance when we went to get groceries after getting ice-cream...neither O(5) nor I could resist the teeny, tiny half price teacup piglets)
go out to eat at a restaurant of your choice
go for a woods walk
go fishing
bake cookies (E(2) and daddy did this one today!)
drive daddy's remote control truck with him
go for a kayak ride
make a craft

Hopefully, we'll have at least one individual date per girl each month.  The girls have been thrilled to find the envelopes for their dates in their mailbox. There's always lots of squealing and excitement when they find mail in their mailbox :)

Easy Dulce De Leche...Argentina!

The girls and I made dulce de leche a couple of weeks ago, and it is absolutely deeeelicious!!!  It was also super simple to make!  The only ingredient is a can of sweetened condensed milk!  We took the label off the can and put it in a deep pot of water (at least 4 inches of water covered the can at all times...evidently, it will explode if it is ever uncovered).  We boiled the can for 4 hours.  After it cooled, we opened the can on both ends and the dulce de leche slid out....sooo good!  We put it on vanilla ice-cream and then sandwiched it between 2 shortbread cookies to make alfajores.

Ways To Play Fun Box

This year I decided to compile "10 Ways To Play" Fun Boxes for the girls since their "subscription" to their Monthly Fun Boxes were their favorite Christmas gift last year, and the box was the highlight of each month.  These great printouts from Let's Explore are making my compilation of fun boxes much easier this year and the focus is on doing more instead of getting random stuff that I gathered throughout each month.  
In their "10 Ways To Play in January" Fun Box the girls received the 10 Ways to Play handout, cotton balls and straws, and organic lollipops.  They were THRILLED!  We immediately played freeze dance and then listed words that rhymed with snow.  We've been collecting rain in a jar all month, and we'll do a couple more activities this weekend.  Thanks to Amy at Let's Explore for the idea and printouts!

"T" Week

E(2) had "T" Week a long time ago (November) , and I never posted about it.  Since I plan to make an ABC book for her using these alphabet posts, I'm trying to catch up and get everything on the blog!

 She recieved a tiger puppet craft kit, a T coloring page, and a growing turtle in her ABC fun pack.





She matched the tiger to her sandpaper "t."





Both girls love the letter stories in the Amazing Action Alphabet book.





We went exploring on a nearby island and noticed lots of tracks!





The girls especially loved the raccoon tracks since they look like "eeny weeny it's so teeny" baby handprints.





She played with the turkey felt board set. E dressed like a tiger.

We made a tiger puppet.