Passport Fun

Wednesday's are library day for us. We drop baby sister off at my parents (Grandpa and Grandma B) for her morning nap and then 5 and I go play and sing and read with other kids and their moms/dads/grandmas. We always have fun. This morning, my mom called to ask if 5 could stay with them for the rest of the day when we came back to pick up the baby. Mommy and Daddy both said yes and 5 was really happy about the idea so she is playing and napping there today. How many people in the 80's ask to hang out with a 2 1/2 year old for the day? My children and grandchildren are so rich! 

But Monday and Tuesday were travel days for the girls and me. Last week we learned about things we might find at a world market, beautiful carpets, lanterns, masks, etc. This week we are learning about natural wonders around the world. On Monday we got out our day 11 supplies from Mother Goose Time and found a passport for each girl. I cut their faces out of extra photos I have (why do I print up so many?) and 5 was in charge of glueing them in place since her 8 month old sister eats everything within reach. 

Then the girls prepared to board the plane for their trip to the Grand Canyon. I checked and stamped their passports and showed them to their seats. 

While enjoying their in flight snacks, the girls watched a YouTube video by National Geographic. 

Then we looked up the Grand Canyon to learn about what plants and animals live there. We found a lot of cool stuff here. When 5 found out bats live there she remembered the hibernation unit from Mother Goose Time and asked to hang upside down. 

Next she asked to play with the supplies from Day 8, She loves to wear the the loom loops as braclets. On Monday she wanted me to wear them too. We decide against sharing them with 7 because in spite of what she may believe, they are not food.

5 wanted to finish the carpet on the loom because she thought the doll house needed a make over.

And apparently the Grandpa doll is either in the dog house or he's having back trouble. 

On Tuesday it was a trip to see Ayers Rock. Back to YouTube since I had no idea where that was. Australia! We looked at the world map and decided we should travel by boat this time. Once again, passports were checked and stamped and 5 grabbed a paddle and off they went to the tune of, "Row, Row, Row You Boat"

Upon arrival they watched the video I found, we looked at Ayers Rock pictures, and learned about it from Wikipedia. Did you know the people who live there recognize 5 seasons? 

1. Wanitjunkupai (April/May) – Cooler weather
2. Wari (June/July) – Cold season bringing morning frosts
3. Piriyakutu (August/September/October) – Animals breed and food plants flower
4. Mai Wiyaringkupai (November/December) – The hot season when food becomes scarce
5. Itjanu (January/February/March) – Sporadic storms can roll in suddenly

Thanks Wiki.
Next was craft time. Yipee!

MGT had a really cool project for us. They provided this light blue card stock and red sand for 5 to make her own version of this beautiful sandstone formation. This was a great sensory and fine motor activity. 

 A perfect match.

Sometimes Mondays are hard...

Weekends are fun for our two granddaughters who play at our house during the week. They have two days of Mommy and Daddy all day long and they love it. I'm so thankful for this and not at all offended when I walk into their house early every Monday morning and the baby, now 8 months old takes one look at me, closes her eyes and buries her face in her mommy's neck. I'm pretty sure she realizes that seeing me in the morning means mommy is leaving. And every Monday morning when I open the door to her big sister's room to get her up for the day, the first words out of 5's mouth are, "I want my mommy." Before long though we are laughing and playing and our week begins.

Today was a little different. 5 expressed the feeling for both girls when before we had even left their house for mine she said,"Grandma, I need to hold you." She's in that phase of speech right now. And for whatever reason they both needed to hold me today, usually at the same time. I remember how overwhelming days like this were as a young mom with three little kids. But it's true, with age comes wisdom and I know that in about a week and a half these two will be busy teenagers with friends and lots of stuff to do and it will never cross their minds to "hold me." And that might be weird if they did. But today it is perfectly normal and I've learned the truth of that old poem, "Cleaning and scrubbing can wait for tomorrow, for babies grow up as we've learned to our sorrow. So fly away cobwebs, dust go to sleep. I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep."

So we took it pretty easy today. 

5 asked to watch and episode of Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood while she ate breakfast. It's her new favorite thanks to a recommendation from Aunt Elyse. I've recorded a few and the one we watched today showed Daniel using a box for pretend travel play. I had already brought a box up from the basement to be used as a boat for our Mother Goose Time fun this month. The theme for this month is, "Its A Small World" and we are learning about traveling around the world. 5 climbed inside to finish watching this episode and wanted her sister to join her.

Then we played a game of Travel Bingo but she wasn't interested in a game so we only played one round.

We tried a new Minnie Mouse puzzle but to be honest, I did most of it and she is a puzzle fiend. 

She always loves the things Mother Goose Time gives her to make and she loves playing with money so I thought this project would be a home run. But it is a Monday...

The last trick up my sleeve was the heart hunt, an idea I took from Aunt Elyse's blog, the blue elephant. I printed up the hearts from Not Consumed and hide them for her to find every day leading up to Valentines day. Each heart has a statement about God's love and a scripture reference. 

Valentines Day will be a new concept for her and this is a great way to reinforce what real love is. 

As always, she grabbed her magnifying glass and set off on a hunt. She found the heart from Saturday and the one from yesterday but soon ran out of enthusiasm for it. I think the one for today is still sitting in the same place I put it. 

Most of the day we read books, colored, and rocked in the chair. 

I'm glad tomorrow will be Tuesday but I'll take all the Mondays I can get. They will be gone way too soon. 

Prehistoric Postcard

Any morning we can paint is a good morning. Mother Goose Time provided this Prehistoric postcard with the suggestion for each child to make a handprint dinosaur they could decorate. What a great idea! 

My granddaughter thought it would be fun to add little dinosaur footprints all over her dino print, front and back. 

 We talked about how some of the dinosaurs had eyes on the sides of their heads so maybe they could see things behind them. At the suggestion of MGT she used the magnifying glasses to check out her work and other things around the room. She doesn't know this yet but I put the postcard in the mail addressed to her. 

After that she mixed colors and painted playdough mats. It was a messy, fun way to start the morning. 

 Then it was bathtime for the dinosaurs. That might be even more fun than painting but it was equally messy. The fun lasted until baby sister needed a diaper change, Grandma left room to attend to her, and 5 wondered what would happen if she pulled up that round thing in the bottom of the sink. Dinosaur down! Dinosaur down! 

Thankfully Papa has long needle nosed pliers and patience. 

No dinosaurs were injured in the making of this blog.

Pink Tutu Monday

We have gotten out of the habit of having calendar time every morning but now that 7 is able to sit up and play she can join us. Yesterday morning I put her in the sit and stand and we sang all of our songs, counted how many days we've had so far in the month of January, read the color pattern, guessed what color we would use tomorrow and examined the weather. 

5 was having a tough morning and I've learned that is often a signal that her sensory needs are not being met. She likes squeezy, squishy things. I think I've mentioned the unblown (is that a word?) balloons I have that are filled with rice, or playdough, or coffee beans, or flour. This little darling often carries one around and plays with it when she needs to. Over the holidays my daughter in law brought these wonderful water beads to my house and left some with us. I used them in the classroom but had not thought to have them here. I bought the ones for school on Amazon. They are often used in floral arrangements. One of the coolest things about them is that they go from hard beads the size of cupcake sprinkles to these soft, gooey, squishy beads by just adding warm water and letting them sit. If you let them dry out, in a couple of days they will shrink back to their original size. 5 loves them and playing with them for a while soothed her little soul. 

Did I mention that it was Pink Tutu Monday? The girls both have them (in all honesty, all four of my granddaughters have them, in many colors) so why not? This dollhouse has been played with every day since my husband built it from scraps of wood he had in the basement. I have furnished it with small boxes and box lids for beds, a rectangular box for a bath tub and plastic furniture I've found at second hand stores and eBay. I found people those same places. I think some of the dollhouse people were put into time out yesterday so the water beads were not a perfect cure. You have to love 5's outfit...diaper, tutu, T-Rex headband. She knows it is suppose to be teeth down but would rather turn it upside down and have it be a crown with eyes. 

Our dinosaur fun not only included the headband, but also color sorting the Mother Goose Time counting manipulatives from day 3, hatching the eggs, and sorting the babies. Day 11 activities had directions for making dissolvable dinosaur eggs around the babies but 5 does that several mornings a week in her dinosaur oatmeal so we made up our own game.  

Types of Dinosaurs

Last week was so exciting I forgot to post about our fun days. Our granddaughter's favorite friend spent a couple of days with us because her parents were at the hospital for the birth of her beautiful and sweet brand new baby brother. Yea!
We introduced our friend to the breakfast of budding paleontologists, Dinosaur oatmeal. She was amazed with the melting eggs, the tiny dinosaurs she got to eat and of course the snowflake sprinkles I usually add just for fun.

After breakfast we got out our supplies from Mother Goose Time. We looked at the picture of the Brontosaurus and then got out the shape design mats and shape manipulatives from day 4. The girls enjoyed matching the designs and then trading the mats. 

 

Next we broke out the supplies MGT provided for day 9. I know we were suppose to use this to learn about the Massaurus but our friend was about to become a big sister and we needed to celebrate! 

The plates were nice and sturdy so the girls were able to color them with markers inside and out. I divided the beans between the two tambourines, sealed them together with hot glue, turned on some loud music and a dance party celebration broke out.

Yes, my granddaughter took her pajamas off. She got too warm with her celebration dance. And our friend needed a thumb/blanket break, but it was a really fun morning. 

Dinosaur Dig

Has it been crazy cold where you live? It has been in NE Illinois. The girls only came to our house a couple of days this week because their teacher mommy's school was closed for three days because it was too cold to have kids standing at a bus stop. 

The days they were here were full of dinosaur fun, starting with Dinosaur Eggs oatmeal of course. After all, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. And why not watch eggs melt away to reveal tiny dinosaurs.

Last weekend I cooked a whole chicken in the crock pot and then dried the bones. I don't know if 5 has ever held a bone of any kind plus she's 2 so I knew she would believe these are dinosaur bones. Not to mention I've convinced all 7 of our grandchildren that I'm completely believable. 

Fortunately I was able to get some sand out of the sandbox on the deck before everything outside was frozen solid. I buried the chicken bones in the sand and waited for the girls to arrive. 

 After calendar time I reminded 5 that we don't pour sand on the floor inside the house, and gave her the paint brushes provided by Mother Goose Time plus a couple of bigger brushes. She brushed and brushed and when she found a bone she was amazed. 

Then she laid each bone on her mat, used the MGT brush for fine brushing and then as always, used her handy dandy magnifying glass. Each bone passed her rigorous and very scientific inspection. While she dug and inspected I told her about Paleontologists and excavation sites.

Later that morning we looked at the Mother Goose Time theme poster and matched the dinosaur picture cards, reading the descriptions and facts on the back of each card. It may take her the entire month of January to be able to identify each dinosaur with their correct name. Who am I kidding? She will probably have it by next week and at the end of the month I'll still be calling them by their Land Before Time names. 

 We found the matching mini dinosaurs for all of them except for the Stegosaurus. We had to us 7's musical dinosaur for that one. 

Hopefully things will warm up around here and we can learn a lot more next week.

Happy New Year!

We started this month celebrating the new year with the bonus material from Mother Goose Time. First we counted how many days we had in December and then talked about the difference between 2014 and 2015. Yeah, that didn't go over very well. She had no idea what I was talking about.

But she loved the game of jumping from 2014 into 2015. After we took turns jumping she decided to jump from 2014 and land on her bottom on 2015 and as much as she begged, I did not participate in this new version of the game. 

When Baby 7 woke up from her morning nap we used the Visual Arts materials from MGT to make footprints for the beginning of this year. It should be fun to compare them a year from now. We decided to outline their footprints with glitter glue because...well, why wouldn't we?

In the month of January our Mother Goose Time lessons and activities are all about dinosaurs. Our grandparenting adventure began with three grandsons so we already have some here and we learned that all the grandkids, the boys and girls like to play with them. Our daughter in law (#9 in the top of the blog picture) brought wonderful water beads to Family Christmas 2014. And she left some here! You can find them at several stores or online. They are a great thing to have around for sensory play. 5 just knew the baby dinosaurs would love playing in the squishiness of them. 

Then the big dinosaurs took turns giving the babies a ride.

We spent the rest of the morning playing with dinosaurs and trucks and tutus.