March Sensory Bin - What's the Weather?

The Wee One helped me put this together while Mister and Ladybug were at preschool.  She insisted we needed a lot of "hail" or little balls.  There is no reasoning with a toddler.

• White and blue rice - rain
• Sun - Michaels
• Rainbows- Michaels
• Cotton balls - Clouds
• Pom-poms - Hail
• Pipe cleaners - Lightening
• Snowflakes
• Bells - Thunder
• Scooping and pouring

I Know the Muffin Man

I can't believe this month is coming to a close!  I feel like we didn't do much of what I had planned, but we did have fun.

We started out by reading Snow White in our Grimm's Fair Tale book and after reading I couldn't come up with a way to make Snow White not so dumb.  The seconds were ticking and all I could think about was how stupid Snow White was and how irritated I was that it took a prince to save her.  I remedied the situation by breaking out in song. 

Muffin tin matching

Play dough muffins anyone?

We acted out being the muffin man while singing the song. 

We finished our muffin man day by eating a muffin tin lunch.

Once Upon a Time - Little Pig, Little Pig

I love the Three Little Pigs because there are so many literacy extensions for the story.  We devoted a whole day to this story (I am sure we could have done a week) making art projects, pretending to be pigs, and learning -ig word family.

I started our day by telling them the story of the Three Little Pigs.  I didn't use any props and asked them to use their imaginations as I told the story.  They were captivated and their faces were full of emotion while I told the story.  It was fun to hear them reenact the story with each other later in the day using the same inflections.

We followed up the story by making our own pig noses and wolves.

I traced a wolf face onto a piece of paper for coloring and gluing on a paper bag.

All three children painted an egg carton pink to help be our own three little pigs.

For our -ig family Mister and Ladybug generated a list of -ig words and I wrote them on a word family house for our word family neighborhood.  

They each took turns (many turns) picking a word and we acted it out.

Driving a rig.

Dancing a jig.

We had two activities that I modified from here.

Little pig's -ig bricks.  

-ig family book.  On one side of the circle is the word and the matching picture is on the other side.  

Pouring - Two Ways

The Wee One loves and I mean loves to pour.  I often find her in the kitchen with all the glasses in circle pouring from one glass to another.  So, when I had a day full of Mister and Ladybug activities I wanted to set her up with something I knew she would love.  I started with something that would be easy for her to pick up if she spilled.

The pitchers are from IKEA and hearts are from last year's sensory bin.

The second time she did the activity she picked a third container for pouring.  This one was smaller, so she had to be careful not so spill.

After she has mastered the hearts, she still wanted to pour and pointed to the oatmeal in the sensory bin.

Happy pouring!

It's a Happy Birthday!

Two things are going at our house and both are typical.  First, the Wee One is obsessed with happy birthdays (i.e. cupcakes).  Second, she has decided she no longer eats vegetables.  Wait, what no vegetables?  I get loving cupcakes, I love cupcakes, but we eat a lot of vegetables.  In order to show her that vegetables are good, we had happy birthday with carrots and zucchini.  I found this recipe and I am so glad I did because they are fantastic! 

I realized that I haven't done much cooking with the Wee One and by this age Mister and Ladybug were well versed in baking.  Of course the Wee One has to fight for space on the Learning Tower, so she usually misses most of the cooking and baking.

Her initial reaction to the carrots and zucchini was tears, but she tasted the batter (it's a losing battle) and found it was pretty good!

While the happy birthdays were baking, we made hats for CoCo's birthday. 

When the happy birthdays were ready we had our party.  The Wee One sang Happy Birthday to Coco and blew out the candle.

The Wee One gave CoCo a bite, but gave me a firm head shake no when I asked.

We often overlook toddlers in the kitchen because it can be a lot of work to manage them and the cooking. The potential for a huge mess feels frightenting, but the kitchen is such a wonderful learning place for toddlers.

It's Raining Hearts

A new Goodwill opened by my house and it was stocked with new and gently used books.  They had a so many Valentine's Day books to chose from and when I paid the cashier asked me if my kids liked to do anything other than read.

I picked up The Day It Rained Hearts and all of us enjoy this simple story.  On the last page there are hearts hanging on trees and when I saw a heart tree I knew we could make the story come alive and they could be Cornelia Augusta.

The Wee One even put on a few hearts.


The tree should still be at Target's Dollar Spot and the hanging hearts were purchased last year.  It has been a fun literacy extension.



And For the Boys

We try not to stick to typical gender stereotype toys here.  Mister might be found in a tutu playing cars or Ladybug wearing Batman undies. BUT Mister is definitely gravitates toward cars, trucks, bugs, and rough and tumble play.   I wanted to give Mister his own Valentine's Day cards and my goal was to make it more boy.  When I asked my husband if they were boyish he laughed and said, "Nothing screams boy like pink and hearts....very boy." I stammered back, "But, but there are insects...see!" 

What can I say I like hearts and pink and here are Love Bug Valentine's.