Nature Bowl

We love going on walks. Sometimes we go in the double stroller, sometimes in the single stroller with the little one in the front pack, sometimes in the single stroller with the bigger one walking, sometimes with the little one in the stroller and the bigger one pushing a doll stroller. Any way you slice it, we love walks. Along with walking, we love talking. We talk about the trees, the dogs, the birds, the cats, the cars, and everything else we see. Recently we've also started collecting. Pine-cones, rocks, leaves, twigs, pine needles, and all sorts of other outdoor treasures. These treasures usually end up in the stroller or in my pocket. I recently had the idea that instead of chucking them at the front door, we could collect them in a nature bowl. Now every time we go out for a walk, my daughter is on the look-out for something we can put in her bowl. When we get home, she pulls everything out, sorts them into piles, put them back, dumps them back out, and shows them to all of her stuffed animals.

Toddler Collage

My little one has been very interested in glue lately. That is what inspired these projects.

First, here she is making her own little impressionist collage. She had a great time gluing lots of different little squares on top of each other.


Second, we read The Gingerbread Man several times this week before realized we could make our own gingerbread men. These two little guys have been run, run, running as fast as they can all over our house.

Beating the Heat

To cool down from the heat nothing beats playing with ice. I've seen a lot of fun ideas out there that I would like to try, but for today, we just played with ice cubes.I couldn't help but think about A Christmas Story when the ice stuck to the metal spoon and my daughter looked up at me and said, "Stuck! Stuck! Stuck!"

Waterbox

Our sand/bean box is now a waterbox. I think that's been the favorite of the three.

Squirt-a-thon

Yesterday we went on a squirt walk. It started in our backyard where we squirted the chairs.

Then we walked over and squirted the pool.

Then we squirted every tree.

And we even squirted this big green box. It ended up being a really fun walk. My daughter loved being able to 'rain' on everything.

More on Colors

I've read all sorts of blogs with great Montessori sorting activities. This was my first attempt.
I cut a bunch of straws in several different colors. I then got out an ice cube tray and put one color in each little cube. I thought my daughter would jump right in a start sorting. Not quite. After feeding the straw pieces to her dragon, putting them between her toes, and trying to throw them at her brother, she then decided to try putting them in the ice cube tray, but moved on quickly seeming pretty uninterested. Even though she wasn't interested in sorting, I enjoy watching her discover a new material through play.

Color Discovery

This week my daughter started learning about mixing colors. She would fill up the bowl with water and I would add a couple of drops of food coloring. She would stir it up, and I'd add another few drops. She would dump it out and we would start all over again.

By the way, don't you love her farmer's tan??

Diapers

We've been using cloth diapers for almost a year now. I have tried all sorts--prefolds, contour diapers, fitted, home-made (as seen above), and my favorite, pocket diapers. We have several Fuzzibunz diapers, but with our new addition a few months ago, I've been needed double the diapers. Fuzzibunz are great, but really expensive. After doing some research, I found sunbabydiapers.com. They have great deals ($5 a diaper!!!) and some really cute patterns. I made a purchase yesterday. The new diapers should be here in a couple of weeks. I can't wait!

Grandma's Flowers

When I saw this on the Artful Parent, I knew I wanted to make something similar. When we went to visit Grandma (who lives in another state), we collected a whole bunch of flowers from her garden. We stuck them in a big thick book and then waited. Last week we put them between some sheets of contact paper. As you can probably tell, I did most of the arranging. My little girl seemed more interested in handing me the flowers, but she did contribute a few flowers to our project. Now she likes to run over to the door and say, "Grandma's flowers."

Bean Box

Our sandbox recently turned into a bean box. I wonder what it will become next.