H is for House!

Books

We borrowed a few books from the library this week about houses, combined with the classic in our collection, The Three Little Pigs. Our favorite here was If I Built a House by Chris Van Dusen. We had borrowed If I Built a Car during our C is for Car unit, and loved it. This one was just as creative and thought-provoking for preschoolers. 

Letter H - Magnetic Pom Poms

We printed off our usual page from Shannon's, and this week Little M&M chose to use magnetic pom poms instead of dot markers.

Following a "Blueprint" - Lego Duplo Bricks

In a few of our house books this week, we learned about architects and how they create blueprints. I created this one for them to follow.

Here is Honey Pot building her H.

Then Little M&M gave it a try.

Building H's with Various Materials

We learned that houses can be made out of different things, called materials, and about the big trucks that are used on the construction site. I pulled out a few of the kids' toys, and supplied them with a few materials I had on hand. Then I asked them to build H houses out of these.

Here is Honey Pot building her H house out of sticks:

She pulled out some of the makeup sticks from her Aristocats party, so pardon the red "whisker" smears on her face!

After building an H she wanted to really build a house. It's hard to see here, but she actually built the whole foundation before adding the floor.

Always a fan of pretend play, her truck helped her the whole way through construction.

Little M&M had his turn building an H out of sticks too. First he build his favorite letter though, an I. Though he hasn't learned this one officially, he's been spotting them and creating them for months!

Here is Honey Pot building her H out of paper squares.

And then out of straws:

A few straws would do, but she wanted to use up every straw in the pile!

And here is Little M&M's much smaller H.

Once he finished this project, he decided to grab his scissors and cut up every single straw.

Wow.

Hammer and Nails - Carpenter Skills

We learned about carpenters and a few of the different skills they use while building a house. I grabbed the pretend nails, and had the kids hammer them into playdoh.

Grab your hardhat!

They loved this, and each did it multiple times.

Drawing with a Ruler - Architect Skills

We also learned about architects this week. So we practiced one of those skills, by grabbing our rulers and drawing straight lines. I provided dots as a guide so that their lines would resemble a house when they finished.

Honey Pot even drew windows, a door and a person!

Here is Little M&M giving it a try!

Shape Hunt

This idea and printable comes from No Time for Flashcards. It was a fun shape review, and had them searching the whole house. Right away Little M&M knew where to find a triangle, his pizza toy! And while we were there Honey Pot noticed the circular pan. So they colored in those shapes.

A square!

And this was a tricky one, but we did find a pentagon in our farm blocks.

Ta-da!

Paper Bag House Craft

We completed this fun craft by first painting our bags white. I love how they have two completely different methods. Little M&M was quick and painted from top to bottom. Honey Pot took her time, first painting the whole border...

And then filling in the middle with neat lines.

Once the paint had mostly dried, we drew doorknobs on our doors and bars on our windows.

Then we glued them onto our house.

Once everything was glued on, we crumpled up some newspaper...

to stuff the bag with, and we topped it with a roof! Honey Pot's became a haunted house, because as you can see, she drew a zombie, a ghost, a spider and a...

bat under the roof!

Types of Houses - "I Have/Who Has" Game

I had been seeing these all over Pinterest, featuring pictures and words to help kids learn their shapes, letter, sight words, etc. What a neat idea! So I created my own to help the kids learn about different kinds of houses over the years. I was inspired by the Gail Gibbons book we borrowed from the library. On the final page she lists a few houses from our past. We learned about log cabins, igloos, tipis, earth huts, caves, castles and even skyscrapers.

They had fun playing, and it was an awesome way to learn about these structures!

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Aristocats / Kitten Birthday Party!

Honey Pot is 5! Her favorite movie is Aristocats, so she requested an Aristocats birthday party this year! Since the movie takes place in Paris, we kept a French theme throughout. Take a look at our decorations, foods and party activities!

Invitation

Here is the invitation we sent out to family and friends.

Decorations

This sign was hanging on the door to greet our guests as they arrived:

Always a sign on the bathroom door, in this case, saying "Litterbox" of course!

Kittens love mice! The characters in Aristocats even have a mouse friend named Roquefort, so here is our tribute to him. I cut these out of black cardstock, and taped them up in the dining room where we had brunch.

Also in that room, a picture with the real Marie, during our trip to Disney World. She was just starstruck in this picture, meeting her favorite character!

Party Craft

We always like to have a craft for our guests to complete as they arrive at the party. This time they could turn themselves into a kitten!

I created these out of headbands, felt and my trusty hot glue gun. A pretty ambitious project for a paper crafter like me, but I think they came out cute!

Beside these, we had a small mirror and some makeup sticks for the kittens to draw on their whiskers. Also, I don't have a picture of the craft table, but on it we had a container of pony beads, shaped pendants and colorful laces to create their own kitty collars. Here is Little M&M, who chose red for everything.

And here is the birthday girl. This photo was taken after the party, and by this time she had taken off her headband ears. But you can see the collar a bit here. Also notice her cute Marie shirt, created by this great Etsy shop! (Please pardon where I erased her name from the bottom of the shirt.)

Brunch In Paris

After the kittens had completed their craft, we led them into the dining room for brunch. Here is the room at large. Aristocats party supplies are impossible to find, so we had to improvise, lol. 

We tried to make the room fancy, while still kid-friendly, by displaying some bright pink flowers on the table.

Kittens love yarn! So also on the table were these cute yarn balls I made by wrapping yarn around styrofoam balls. Super cute, and look, a "hidden Mickey!"

This banner was hanging above the food table. Again, pardon the whiteout!

And also a Bon Appetit sign!

Here is the food table. I had asked my dear French friend for ideas to make this a real authentic French brunch. Here is what we went with...and keep scrolling for food details:

First some delicious cream puffs and chocolate croissants.

 We provided some pre-made ham and cheese crepes...mmm.

Additionally, we had a crepe bar! The whipped nutella mousse was incredible! Here is where I found the recipe. And take a look at all this yumminess:

In case anyone needed ideas, these signs were posted directly above the crepe bar for inspiration.

We also served french toast in maple syrup:

French baguettes with either jam or brie:

For drinks we offered mimosas (both virgin and alcoholic) and milk...

as well as coffee:

Party Game - Obstacle Course

The highlight of the party was the fun we had outside in the backyard. We had been watching the weather since it came into the 10-day forecast, and were so grateful for a beautiful day. In the Aristocats movie, the kittens are kidnapped and need to find their way home to their owner. So we set up an obstacle course for our kittens to travel through as well.

Here it is:

Station 1: roll the ball past the cones using only your nose

Station 2: crawl through the tunnel

Station 3: throw the ball into the bucket

Station 4: walk across the balance beam

Station 5: climb up and slide down the slide

Station 6: jump [your age] times into and out of the hula hoop

Station 7: find your mouse friend in the ball pit

The final station in particular was a huge hit. We had hidden one mouse toy (purchased from the pet store) for each child in a pool full of ball pit balls. Most of the kids hung out in here for a while. Some kids completed the obstacle course a few times!

For party favors we just handed out these "kitty-kat" bars, wrapped in a label I created. I whited-out my daughter's name.

Super fun party!

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