Edible Acorns.... almost

Ok, so I would truly attempt to eat these acorns, but feel free to snack while crafting!

This was one of our autumn activities from last year. It’s fun, cute and easy prep (using things I already had around the house).
Before hand, I cut out a square with cardboard (the original activity said to use a paper bag, but I didn’t have any). I also drew the acorn onto the cardboard.

I first had J use a brown crayon to color the “hat” of the acorn and a white crayon for the bottom. He then glued the chocolate unto the hat and the oats onto the bottom. We focused on trying to fill the ENTIRE hat/bottom, making that the goal. At 30 months, that was an accomplishment! Fortunately he had no idea you could EAT the chocolate and so didn’t try until I suggested it (when he was finished with his acorn).

Once the glue was dry we emptied the excess and our final products:


Becca also blogs at Fun and Engaging Activities for Toddlers.

Paper Plate Apple {plus fine motor bonus}

So this is my other fun activity from Kaitlyn's preschool class I wanted to share. It is a paper plate apple with a fine motor activity. You could do one or the other or both together.

The paper plate apple is a very simple craft. You paint the paper plate the color you want it. Then you cut out and glue a green leave to the top. You could also add a brown stem. Children LOVE to paint. You could also color it or do cheating paint and paint with do-a-dots. If I want to do "paints" but don't have the patience for paints, we use do-a-dots.

The other is a worm fine motor writing activity. There are simply pictures of worms, a dotted line for the path the worm took, then the apple the worm ate. You could find pictures of worms on the internet. Then find pictures of apples on the internet. Copy them and put them into a Word document. Then make dotted lines.

OR 

You could print the little pictures, cut them out, and paste them onto a page and draw the dotted lines yourself.

OR 

You could just draw the whole thing. I am not artist, but lately I  have come to prefer that method. Then it turns out how my head wants it to :) But I do check the Internet first in case someone has previously stolen the image from my head and kindly put it on the Internet first ;).

You then have the child color the pictures and trace the dotted like. This builds fine motor control for preparing for handwriting. You can see these lines Kaitlyn did get harder to do, and you can see how her top lines are perfect, and bottom lines are not. Good practice!

Simple Apple Sort

Kaitlyn (4) is now in preschool three days a week. Last week she learned about apples at preschool and came home with lots of fun ideas. I just love her teacher. This one is very simple. The children each got a little baggie of apples. These are die-cuts. You could do printouts or stickers as well. They then sorted them by color into the four different sections on the page. 

For younger children, you could color each section the colors of your sorting ideas. So one red, one green, one blue, and one yellow. It would make the sorting easier for younger children (like toddlers). Quick and easy!

Pizza Pizza!

Kaitlyn (4) started preschool this year for the first time. For her first homework assignment, her teacher gave her this slice of "pizza" (the white triangle) and told her to decorate it like a pizza. 

We talked about all of the things we could do to decorate it. Kaitlyn's favorite pizza is cheese pizza, so she wanted to make a cheese pizza. We decided shredded paper would be fun. I shredded up several pieces of paper. Then she put glue on the pizza and pressed the shredded paper on. 

For toppings, you could use buttons, felt, magazine cut-outs, pipe cleaner, etc.--whatever you can think up. It was a fun project that brought in some sensory activity to it. 

Leaf Rubbings

Rubbings are a great activity that seem magical to children.

Supplies

• Paper
• Leaves (not dry)
• Crayon with paper removed

Activity

Take your paper and put it over the leaves. Turn the crayon on its side and rub it all over the paper to reveal the print of the leaves. Easy and awesome!

Fall Round-up 2011

Counting Down November

A fun counting game to get you through November!











Fall Books 2009Great Fall books

Fall Books 2010Even more great Fall booksFall Do-A-Dot

No doubt one of my favorite activities ever shared by Raegan!























Falling Leaves Picture
A great activity for Toddlers especially.
















Fall: Nature Walk

A fun way to collect Fall items on your walk.











Fall Scenery

Absolutely adorable bulletin board for Fall!








Fall: Texture Sort
A great way to get sensory and sorting into your season.







Fall Wreath

It is always nice when your activity creates a nice decoration for the season!











Family Outings

Leaf Man

This activity coincides with the book Leaf Man.










Peanut Butter Pumpkins

Um, yum. Super, super yum.







Pitch a Tent!
Fun fall activity!








Pumpkin Faces
A fabulous shape activity.







Pumpkins, Pumpkins, Pumpkins



Carving and painting pumpkins!









Sponge Painting Fall Leaf Picture

This is great for children of all ages. Even a toddler can make something that looks like an actual tree!

Pudding Sensory Bags

Ignore my shadow, please. :)

An easy way to practice writing and drawing shapes, letters, lines, numbers, and more!!

Working on addition? Give them a problem and let them draw the answer!

Call out a word and have them write the beginning, ending, or entire word!

Call out shape attributes and have them draw the answer (I'm thinking of a shape that has 3 sides and 3 angles).

Supplies: pudding (I used already prepared snack packs), zip lock or other zip closed bag.

Put the pudding in the bag, flatten the air out, and you are ready to go!

My daughter used a Q-Tip (her idea) for easy writing...and she was right! It's even easier that way. :)

Have fun...and don't forget to save one for snacking. :)

Blogiversary! Two Years...

Today is our two year blogiversary! Happy Blogiversary ladies! We have made some big changes this last year. We added Becca to our mix, and I know you have all loved the addition of her. She has fabulous ideas. We also got our blog make-over from Design By Tracy with a fun new look, Facebook page, and Twitter account! Thanks to all of you readers for visiting our blog! Here is to another great year ahead!

Fabulous Fall Fun: Hiking

Hiking in Zion National Park in Spring

Isn't Fall fabulous? I love the season and all it brings with it. I wanted to do a little series on all of the fabulous things you can do in the Fall. My first highlight is hiking.

Hiking is a tricky thing to talk about with a global audience. For some of you, Spring is the best time of year for hiking. For others, Summer is the time for such activities. Some might even find the best hiking weather in the Winter. For us, however, we prefer Fall hikes. 

Hiking in Yellowstone National Forest in late Summer

Hikes are walks on steroids. A walk is a great activity to do. A hike offers even more learning opportunities. You are much closer to nature on a hike. You can see amazing geological formations. You can gather Fall leaves. You can see animal tracks and nesting places. 

6 month old McKenna in the Kelty

For young children, we find a hiking backpack to be well worth it. We own a Kelty and love it, but I know others who love other brands. 

Hiking close to home in the Fall

Here are some tips I have for hiking with children:

• I suggest you keep your hikes so that you can get back to home/car/camp quickly if needed. This doesn't mean you have to do only short hikes--just keep hiking trails close to civilization. Don't overestimate your child's abilities. I once found myself pregnant and carrying 3 year old Brayden for a mile--not fun!
• Wear sunblock if needed. Usually hiking means rising in elevation, which means closer to the sun. It also means time spent outside.
• Wear proper shoes and make sure your child's shoes fit well.
• Bring lots of water.
• Bring snacks.
• Bring hats (summer hats, winter hats), jackets, and whatever other clothing might come in handy. 
• Go at your child's pace.
• Be on the lookout for cool discoveries like animal prints and nesting spots. 
• For added fun, you can make a card of things to find on the nature walk. 
• Another idea is to gather nature items and make a collage when you get home.

What's in season?

Summer is quickly coming to an end and fall is rapidly approaching. Hopefully you and your family were able to take advantage of fruit and veggie picking this summer at a local farm or even in your own garden. So what now? Don't forget about the next line of fruits that are starting to ripen!

Here on the East Coast, the season for grapes kicked off this week. I had never been grape picking, so we went to a local vineyard to have a little fun. I love grapes and so do the kids, so it seemed like it was a perfect outing.

The vineyard we visited had Scuppernong and Muscadine grapes, neither of which I have ever tasted. One of the girls loved the green ones, the other loved the red. The owners were great...they charge a $1 grazing fee (which they didn't end up charging us) and provided the buckets. That is something a lot of farms won't do, so come prepared!

Well, it was definitely a learning experience. Like, for instance, not all grapes are created equal. And some are downright disgusting. :) All in all, it was worth the drive.

It was a great learning experience: picking technique, hand-eye skills, patience, weighing and measuring, money (since they only accepted cash). And I love that we were supporting a local business in the process.
Next on the list....Apple festivals!!

Are we there yet???

We recently evacuated due to Hurricane Irene and took a road trip with our three kids, a 4 year old, 2.5 year old, and 7 month old. They'd ridden 3 hours before, but nothing like this trip. Twelve hours there, 9.5 on the way home.

So you can imagine how many times my 4 year asked, "Are we there yet? Are we almost there?"

Someone recommended I try this little trick for the way home...oh, I could kiss whoever came up with this idea.

We set up a timeline in the car. We tied a ribbon (you could use string) across the ceiling of the car to the handles at the doors, making a straight line. We drove 450ish miles, so I divided the string,making a mark for every 25 miles. I used a hair clip (hey, it was last minute!) to mark the halfway point. Every time we drove 25 miles, I moved the clip. It was a great visual representation of how far we'd driven and how much was left. There was a huge cheer when we got halfway. :)

So, on your next trip, try this and see if the "Are we there yet"s are fewer and less often?

:)