Hairy Potato, Stunts, & Swings

Today we started our Plant Theme... Hairy the Potato, was our project today. The kids were so excited to complete this activity. We started out with a baking potato, cut the top (or bottom, whichever way you look at it) off, then dug out a hole (adult help needed here!!!). We then glued on eye, nose and a mouth (I used a hot glue gun for this, they told me where and they placed their pieces on the potato). We talked about what Hairy might be missing... hum... "Hair!!" someone yelled out. So we brainstormed on how we could get hair to grow in the hole... "Yarn," "Crazy Paper," (the paper we used on our kites) and " Spaghetti" were all great ideas :) Then I offered to let them take some of the grass seed that we used on the lawn this weekend to see if we could grow some hair. "Like our own hair!!" Princess Girl said, "My hair grew after I cut it with the scissors, see."

(Don't you just love the stage when they forget how to smile)

We thought they came out pretty neat... I thought Hairy was a good name, but each of the kids came up with their own name... like, Grassy, Tater, & Henry (ok, who knows where that came from???)

It is supposed to rain tomorrow, so we decided to spend our morning outside enjoying the beautiful weather. The kids loved the new sand pit... they spent a lot of time transferring sand from the box to the pit. Then they decided that the pit was high enough to use as a Stunt Pad. So, Stunts were being performed for a very long time. I always find it amazing that jumping, off anything, can be so satisfying to children. They jumped, got back in line, waited their turn, jumped again, over and over, for the better part of a hour. Amazing...

Little Miss M showed us how she could "swing" on the big kids swing today. I am not sure if this is something she learned over the weekend or she just "got" it today. She has been experimenting, practicing and playing on the big swings for awhile now. She has wanted to move the swing, while on her belly, since she can't actually get herself on the swing yet. The kids have been showing her how to do it, going as far as manipulating her feet to push off with. But, she just hadn't made the connection until today. I will have to ask Mom & Dad if they practiced over the weekend.

Despite how this photo looks, she was very proud of herself!!! I just caught her as she looked up from her work, so I think she was a little perturbed with me for bothering her.

The big girls were cheering her on!!!

We will be making our Greenhouses tomorrow, another activity the kids are excited about. I decided not to tell them what the seeds were... we are going to plant some in a cup and some in the "Greenhouses" and see what happens. It should be a lot of fun around here for the next couple of weeks... watching everything at their different stages of growth.

Nice to be Back

What a wonderful weekend... lots of food, family and fun!! I missed my routine and am happy to be back. We spent some time this morning outside before the rain came. It was nice to run, dig and especially swing!!

We love digging... we have a wonderful sandbox to dig in. Yes, it has some twigs, leaves and acorns in it, but that's OK, right? No, it is so much more fun to dig in the dirt anywhere else. It doesn't matter someone (probably one of these 2) will come running along, chasing a friend or pushing a dump truck, and trip and fall... nope, it doesn't matter :) I think the sheer energy it takes to dig a hole in this hard NC clay is what matters. Getting their shovels, buckets and dump trucks out to begin their "dig," it is hard and they love the "work" of it. There is a lot of discussion of how to best go about starting, how large it should be or when to stop. I love watching them.

We will begin our Holiday Month tomorrow. I like to delve into Holiday's Around the World this week, and then narrow it down to Christmas. We talk about what we think the meaning of Christmas is and how our families celebrate. We then have our Holiday Program before the Christmas Break from school. It is a small thing, we have our families come, do some songs or little play, and then we watch a DVD of our first months of daycare while we eat some snacks (proudly prepared by the kids... YUM!!). So, I need to get started on those songs and props!!

Swings

Today we went to the playground. Our playground isn't huge, it has some climbing structures and some newly installed swings... Oh how we love swings. The kids are beginning to get the hang of swings. The skills necessary to get on, get them moving, jumping off, and watching for other kids in front of and behind them. I wish I had some pictures of the kids on the swings today, you see the swings in my yard are nice and low and perfect for the kids to get on and off on their own. They can also lie on their bellies and pretend to fly. Not so with the swings at the playground.

The swings at the park are so high off the ground you would think they were designed for teenagers, not young children or even young school aged kids!! Yet today I saw a determination that only a preschooler can exhibit!! I have a strict policy that if you can't get up on a piece of equipment by yourself, then you probably can't get off either... so they can only go as far as their bodies can take them. This is to prevent falls or a child using a piece of equipment that is beyond their skill level, and yes a little bit of selfish reasoning that I won't have to get a child up or down a million gazillion times (but really that is just a small part).

Anyway... the kids all went over to the swings and began trying to get up on those swings. No one asked me to help, and only 1 child got on themselves. He got down and instructed the other kids on how to do it, and even helped a few try to "jump" on. Another child got on too and was very excited. Some of the others just decided it wasn't that important today to get up and ran to the climbing structures and began a game of tag. However, we had 1 little girl who tried and tried and tried to get up on that swing. She asked friends for pointers, she tried to pull herself up, she tried getting on her stomach and bringing up her knees, for about 10 minutes she struggled to get up on that swing before she got so frustrated she started to cry. Her friend came over and tried to help her again, she was invited by others to play tag... she was having none of it. She wanted to get on that swing. Her Mom finally went over and helped her on the swing... showing her how to put her hands and pull herself up... she was happy to be on the swing, but you could see that she wanted to get on that swing by herself. It was a mixed pleasure. And because of it she only lasted on that swing for about 2 minutes... huh.

Is there a time to intervene?? Her Mom asked if she could show her some pointers, she said yes. But in the end was it as gratifying to her?? I do believe that when we go to that playground again she will have the same determination, if not more, to get on that swing herself. I can't wait to see the look on her face when it happens!!!