A Great Ending to a Great Week

We had a great week getting back into the swing of things. We received some great musical instruments from The Princess and her family... this Melissa & Doug set. The xylophone is wooden and it has the most beautiful sound. I don't mind the kids banging on it all day. I wish all our instruments made such beautiful noise :) The kids have been having a grand time having musical parades, and when I am feeding Little Man we are lucky enough to have our very own "concert" to keep us entertained. I have to position the kids right in front of us so Little Man will pay attention to his bottle while he watches, but otherwise he absolutely loves it.

Today for Show-n-Tell we had some great items!! Little Miss M brought in her Hi Ho Cherrio game. I love that game!! Though I need to get out our Don't Break the Ice game, I was checking out Ms Debbie at Once Upon a Day in Preschool, and it seems her kids are loving it. I think we would love it too. I need to pull it out for next week. But... I think Hi Ho Cherrio is great for our Toddlers also. The fine motor skills it takes to get that spinner moving was a lesson for me too, the counting and one to one corresponding is a skill I like to use all the time, and during a fun game like this is great!! The turn taking was great for Sprout & Little Miss M, lessons in patience can always be practiced.

Little Man is getting so big!! He is moving and shaking... never one to miss out on what the kids are doing. So, he is crawling all over and getting into his fair share of mischief. You see that gate behind him... yeah, I tried to create a nice little baby friendly space just for him, and no, he won't stay in it without crying for more than 1 minute. Now, if I leave the gate open he will come and go no problem. He is going to give me a run for my money... in a good way, of course :)

BFF's

Walking to the park is always an adventure!! The "big" kids are very fast and the 2's love stopping to look at everything, smell everything, inspect everything, and just hold hands and meander down the sidewalk. But, it is all worth it to explore the great outdoors.

Little Man turned 7 mths old over break, he came back to me bigger, moving, and more beautiful than ever. We found that he loves the park, even in the cold. He also LOVES the slide. He must have gone down that slide 20 times... both on his bottom and on his belly.

Oh, and I did find a way to keep the mulch out of his mouth... I flipped the hand protector things on the snowsuit, so he can't get his hands out. It kept his little fingers warm, as well as tucked inside and out of the reach of mulch!! Yeah for me... I can still think I'm in control :)

Peek-A-Boo!!!


Have a GREAT weekend!!!

A New Year

Happy New Year to All!!!

Well, the story of my life... I can't find the wire to my camera!! I just can't seem to get a handle on those darn wires. We changed the living room around for the holidays, so hopefully they are in the couch somewhere.

Anytime we have a long break I like to take a week to review and readjust to our routines. So, we are exploring the theme Friendship. We read, The Rainbow Fish, by Marcus Pfister. I love the way the kids "get" that the Rainbow Fish was very lonely when he didn't share his scales. Then when he finally did share, he was happy. A great lesson for us to learn here at Child Care.

We then made our very own Rainbow Fish, where we took scrap booking paper and tore off pieces and then passed (shared) it to our friends to have a turn with it. They had a great time gluing, tearing, & sharing. It was great for our little ones too, the fine motor skills were great for them to practice. Tearing is a hard skill for a 2 yr old to learn, but when they do... watch out :)

We also read The Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein. We talked about how the tree loved the boy so much and how she loved giving him the things he needed. We then talked about how the boy was able to give back his love to the tree when she was sad. The kids liked this book.

Nature walks, trips to the park and running around the block were among our favorite outside activities this week. My yard has been a little muddy due to the weather, so we got our outside time other ways. The baby loved going down the slide with the kids, but trying to eat the mulch was another favorite activity of his.

So far our week is going great. Getting back into routines is always hard, but as the week goes by we are remembering the rules and routines.

Photo's & Firsts

Our week in Photo's....

And Firsts... Little Man learned how to sit up from his belly!!!
Oh no, what's next... Crawling??

Busy Days

So much going on last week and this, sickness going through Child Care, trying to finish our holiday ornaments, and just the normal ups and downs with a multi-aged group, I haven't been able to post like usual.

I will put up some photos on Friday of what we have been up too, but otherwise we have just been playing, learning and exploring like usual. We are all getting ready for our 2 week Christmas break and when we get back we will get down to business again. With the holiday festivities over we will hopefully get our heads back into our routine.

Week in Pictures

Mondays

Mondays... What a day.

It was chilly here today. I think we lasted about 15 minutes at a time outside today. The wind was blowing and our cheeks and noses were red and rosy, as well as runny :) We found lots of layers of ice in the front and backyards. The kids loved looking at it, touching it (even though their little gloved hands got wet and cold) and then breaking it. Seeing the ice in tiny, shiny pieces was amazing to them. I think it looked, to them, like shiny gems or jewels lying in the sun like that.

We also put up our Child Care Christmas Tree.... it is a cute little, pre-lit tree I bought a couple of years ago, but we love putting it up and decorating it for the holidays. The wrapping paper came out and a wrapping frenzy began. We had tape, blocks, toys, and paper pretty much covering the whole playroom at one point. You know, I love these types of leaning moments. I didn't actually "teach" any specific thing, but the kids learned about sharing, patience, using their words to express frustration when the paper didn't do what they wanted it to and co-existing with their peers (something that doesn't always come easy to a 2 yr old). That doesn't include the measuring, the estimating, the predicting, sorting, and the creating going on. We worked together, helping each other have fun and learn within a child centered moment. I was only there to help, not lead. Now, the funny part... it took them about an hour to wrap these "presents" for under our little tree... it took about 3 minutes of happy, laughing, wonderful glee to open them up. I never saw a child so excited to open a square, wooden block before.

We had messes today, but we had fun!! Oh, and we did review our letters A thru J, did our calendar, checked out the weather, sang some songs to the Little Man, read some more holiday stories, and made a gift for Ms Courtney... what a busy Monday.

Books, Crafts & Walks

We have been very busy learning about the letter Jj, Jolly 'Ol St. Nicholas, Christmas, and the birth of a very special Person, Jesus. Our favorite stories right now are, The Story of Christmas, by Patricia Pingry and Merry Christmas Big Hungry Bear, by Don and Audrey Woods (2 of my most favorite authors!!).

Our crafts have been keeping us busy also. We have made some cute wreaths, hand print snowflakes, Christmas trees, and Starlet, the star from the board book The Tiny Star, by Arthur Ginolfi, who is so small no one can see her. She shines up in the sky for many years, with no one seeing her beauty, until the night Jesus is born. She then comes down to the stable, and seeing the newborn babe in the cold and dark stable, she begins to shine so warm and bright that she floats up in the sky to become the beacon for the Shepherds and Wise Men to find Baby Jesus. It was another favorite book of ours.

I wish I could show you some photos, but my camera cables are missing. I am the queen of clutter, so I am sure they will turn up soon and I will download them then.

We have had some rainy weather here, and my yard is sometimes very muddy, usually we don't mind, but it has also grown cold... and wet, muddy hands make for some unhappy children. We have also been taking some really wonderful neighborhood walks. Going to the park, our Rain Walk, Nature Hunt walk, and today we went to see how many Santa's we could find hanging out in our neighborhood (we found 6). The kids are getting some needed outdoor time, fresh air and having a lot of fun exploring their environment. (them getting tired and sleepy is just an added bonus :) )