Father's Day!

Theme: Father’s Day

Honey Pot is 2 years and 1 month old

Little M&M is 3 months old

Dad Photo Shoot

I had seen this idea all over Pinterest, and decided to give it a try. Instead of buying the wooden letters, however, I just cut them out of chipboard myself. Honey Pot identified the letters. Then I asked her what D-A-D spells, and she said “Daddy!” Eh, pretty close. Then I did a photo shoot of my children holding the letters…and it wasn’t easy! Here are a few of my favorite outtakes:

Honey Pot poked her face and arms through the letters, kept sliding off the couch, and made grumpy faces. But eventually…and with perhaps a little bribery…I was able to get some decent ones. I printed them out and placed them in a frame. On Father’s Day, it was out on our kitchen table waiting for him, along with a photo collage I put together in Picasa.

Daddy Books

The kids and I made a trip to the library at the beginning of the week, and picked up a couple books about Daddies. We kept them out in the living room, along with a couple that we owned, and read them often until Father’s Day. Here is what we read:

Daddy Is a Doodlebug, by Bruce Degen
Daddies Do It Different, by Alan Lawrence Sitomer
Daddy Kisses, by Anne Gutman
On My Daddy’s Shoulders, by Peter Lawson

Story Walk

The idea for this came from Green Acres Hobby Farm, which I discovered on Pinterest a while ago. I decided that instead of taking photos from a book, I would create my own pages, and make it personal to Daddy and our kids. I first collected pictures of them together in various settings (the beach, a hike, the snow, etc.), from the time Honey Pot was born until the present. Then I added some simple text to go along with it. I matted them onto cardstock and attached Popsicle sticks to each.

Then on Father’s Day, we took a trip to a local park. I placed each one into the ground in a path along the water. Daddy and Honey Pot walked along, and read each page together.

I think they really enjoyed looking back at some of the wonderful Daddy moments they’ve shared.

Letter Identification

We had a quick lesson on the chalkboard as well. I wrote down a few short words, and asked Honey Pot which one spells “Dad.” We reviewed how to spell it, and then she pointed to the correct one.

Then we had some drawing fun. I drew a circle, and asked if she could draw one too. She can do pretty well, but keeps going after completing one circle, lol. So it comes out as a big swirl.

Honey Pot and I also talked about other Daddies. I asked her if she knew who Mommy’s Daddy is, and who her cousin’s Daddy is, etc. I think she’s somewhat understanding the idea that we all have Daddies.

Dressing for the Occasion

We also dressed Little M&M in an outfit sure to flatter his Daddy!

Father’s Day Picture Search

I’m a huge fan of word searches, but obviously it is a little soon to create these for my daughter. (I did do a shape search during our Valentine’s Day theme, which worked out really well!) So for today I decided to make a picture search instead. To personalize it for Daddy, we had to search the box for some of Daddy’s favorite things—favorite sport, animal, game, etc.

Honey Pot did fairly well with it, but quickly lost interest. I’m sure the promise of our upcoming dessert had nothing to do with it…

“I’m going to have a cookie! And a piece of cake! Be a big pig!”

Well, that’s what holidays are all about, right?

Happy Father’s Day!

There Is a Bird on Your Head!

Theme: There Is a Bird on Your Head, by Mo Willems

Age: Honey Pot is 2 years and 1 month old

We are participating in our first Virtual Book Club! This month we had to choose a story by Mo Willems. I had never read his work before, but I am so pleased to have discovered these books! The wording is so toddler-friendly, and perfect for early readers as well. The illustrations are simplistic yet funny. We really got a kick out of this story. Here is what we did:

Reading The Book

We chose There Is a Bird on Your Head, by Mo Willems. As soon as it arrived, Honey Pot asked to read it. We laughed together quite a bit at the ending. And she asked to read it over and over!

Balancing Birds

Honey Pot practiced balancing birds on her head. We acted out the opening scene to the story multiple times. “Is there something on my head?” “There is a bird on your head!” “Aaaaaaghhh!” She even helped to balance one on my head.

Building A Bird Nest and Egg Counting

Later in the story, the birds build a nest on the elephant’s head. After discovering this fun craft from the blog No Time For Flashcards, we decided to give it a try. We didn’t have any brown yarn, so first we painted our yarn.

Then, once it had dried, Honey Pot squirt out a whole bunch of glue onto a plate.

We slathered the yarn into it, and placed it on a balloon. This took quite a bit of my assistance, and was very messy! It is meant to dry for 24 hours, but we became impatient and decided to deflate the balloon and test out our nest later that day.

We pulled out some Easter eggs and counted them, just as Piggie does in the book.

And then we balanced the nest and egg on Honey Pot’s head.

Birdseed Sensory Bin

We completed our theme with a fun sensory bin full of birdseed. Honey Pot had so much fun with this! We began by exploring its properties. “Mmm, smells good!” she said. I provided her with a few old kitchen utensils and Tupperware containers, and she started scooping.

“Here you go, birds. Eat!”

Finally she dug her hands right in. This always takes a little encouragement because she is hesitant of getting messy. But she’s always so happy when she does.

Needless to say, the deck became quite a mess by the time she was finished. So she cleaned up after herself! 

Such a great day of activities! And we so look forward to continuing with other books in the future!

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We are linking our activities up to the Summer Virtual Book Club!

This is a blog hop! Check out what some of our blogging friends did with the Mo Willems theme:

Letter: H

Theme: The Letter H

Honey Pot is 2 years and 1 month old

Play-Dough H

Honey Pot brought me her playdough (a homemade Kool-Aid version we made) today, so I thought it would be a good day to resume learning the alphabet. I brought her my cookie cutter and asked her what letter it is. “H” she replied. (Huh? When did you learn that??) I helped her roll out the dough and she pushed the cookie cutter down.

“I made a H!” she exclaimed.

H is for House: Do-A-Dot Art

I printed this from Making Learning Fun, and brought out Honey Pot’s dot markers. I unscrewed all of them and let her have at it. She identified the letter and we talked about the image.

Then it became a color-matching activity, as well as fine motor skill practice, as she twisted the caps back on where they belonged.

I stretched the theme a wee bit to allow some scissor practice too. I drew an H on a piece of scrap paper, and asked her to cut along the lines. She did okay, but mostly just tore it up into tiny pieces by hand.

But she brought every last one to her garbage can without me asking her to do so. That’s my girl!

Leap Frog Fridge Phonics

I collected a few letters in one place, and asked Honey Pot which was the H. Instead of pointing, as she used to, she started removing one at a time until just the H remained. Then we listened to the little ditty that good ol’ Scout sings, about what H sounds like.

Words That Begin With H

During lunch I just talked to Honey Pot about various words that begin with H, emphasizing the H sound. “H-h-honey. H-h-heart. H-h-hair.” Then as I was running out of things that begin with H, I excitedly called out, “Hey! One of your bath toys begins with H! Can you think of which one?” I didn’t know what to expect. But after a short pause, she proudly said, “Hippo starts with a H!” Mommy’s jaw dropped here.

Daddy continued the game when he returned home from work, to see if it was a fluke. He gathered a few of her barn animal toys. “Which animal begins with H?” he asked. She picks up the horse. He then gathers up some puzzle pieces depicting images of different vehicles. “Which of these begins with H?” She picks up the helicopter and says, “Helicopper!”

I think our Tot School has just been raised to a whole new level. And now that I see how smart she is, I feel these activities are more important than ever.

H is for Hunt

I had other plans for this hunt, where I would hide various images around the yard that begin with H. But it rained today, and really, I hadn’t yet printed any pictures by the time we were ready to start this. So when Honey Pot picked up my rechargeable candles, I improvised. I hid a few bath toys around the bathroom and turned the lights off. She turned on her little light and used it to hunt for objects. Sorry for the poor picture quality!

H is for House: Popsicle Stick Craft

This is another great printable and idea from Making Learning Fun. First we counted the Popsicle sticks.

Then Honey Pot put some glue down. I told her where to put it, but she also decided some other places required glue too.

Yes, we’re learning about the letter H today, but we’re building a house, not the letter!

And with just a little guidance, it started to resemble a house.

Leap Frog Fridge Phonics, revisited!

We happened to be having ham for dinner, so I thought I would show her what the word looks like. Honey Pot identified each of the letters, and we reviewed what each sounds like. Then I put the different sounds together to create the word “ham.” Levels beyond where we’re at, but I thought it’d be fun to pop some spelling into today’s theme.

All in all, a successful day indeed.

Summer Bucket List 2012

Anyone who has been on Pinterest recently has seen one version of this or another. I think it is a great idea! I wanted to keep mine simple, since Honey Pot and Little M&M are too young to participate in the list making and design. So I went to a site called Wordle, where you can create the most wonderful word clouds! After refreshing the design and tweaking the color scheme to my liking, I placed the word cloud into Photoshop Elements to add a title and bucket clip art. This is what I came up with.

 

I am so excited to get started!