Classics- Rock Painting

Rock painting is fun and easy and a classic Montessori based activity. My niece and I went searching for rocks. Didn't find many big ones but that's ok! We still had fun painting the small ones. (I painted a lot myself!) "Indy" didn't have much interest in it at first, much to my surprise. (I fear he is much less interested in a lot of stuff I present. Maybe it should be more challenging? Also, since Big Brother is home all the time now he wants to hang with the Big Boys and not me. :( Oh, well. I keep on trying anyways. ) Eventually he painted a few when I told him we should paint some gold to use as treasure in the Moon Sand etc. We used some sparkly paint like the gold and they came out really cool looking. My niece LOVED painting the rocks and made sure she had plenty to take home.

Weekly Unplugged Project- Petal

I have a secret plan to try to use up ALL the craft sticks in the house. Of course we will never really run out but it's nice to have a goal. :) There just seems like there is a neverending supply. Here is one such project using craft sticks. And incorporating the Weekly Unplugged Theme of Petals.

This was a collaborative project. He colored the "stems" (craft sticks!) green one day and then lost interest. So my niece cut and glued on the petals with me the next day. Then after they dried...

I had them play this game with the flowers they had made. They started off with one flower and had to run down the yard and stick it in the ground by the other flowers then run back grab another flower and do the same thing. They each had 3 flowers to stick in the ground. It was easier because the ground was still damp from all the rain. Next time I would have them run down to a pot with dirt in it and stick the flowers in. Would have been much easier! You live you learn.

Weekly Unplugged Project- Magic

For this weeks Unplugged Project I pulled the only two "magic tricks" I know out of my hat. :) I have remembered these since I was a kid. We did the "I bet I can walk through this piece of paper" trick and the "Bet I can put pins/needles/thumbtacks into this balloon without popping it" trick. You love my terminology I know.

Cut along the lines and then cut only the middle apart and walk through!



Scotch tape was the secret in this magic trick.

Muffin Tin Monday - Theme: Children's Literature

Our Muffin Tin was based on the book Growing Vegetable Soup (Books for Young Readers). We used craft sticks to labels our vegetables like they did in the book for their garden.

Inside the book:

Last Minute Mothers Day Present

I had a lot of ideas running around in my head for his present to make his mom for Mothers Day. I decided to use up the Plaster of Paris that has been sitting in their closet for 4 years. So, we made Plaster of Paris collage heart. We used glitter, scrabble tiles, glass rocks etc. He helped make one for me too. :)

Weekly Unplugged Project- Powder

Does flour and baking soda count as powder? I sure hope so. So today for the Weekly Unplugged Project we used his favorite product FLOUR and made stress balls. We made some with flour and some with baking soda. We didn't have any cornstarch. :) Or a real funnel and my homemade one was a total FAIL. While we had balloons out to tried to make bean bags like Flip Flops and Applesauce. So not as cute as hers! Plus my computer died in the middle of reading the directions fully.

Pretty boring.

I admit it. I have been slacking lately on the exciting project front. Between neighborhood garage sales and weird "working" hours and birthdays we have been basically just hanging out. The most exciting things lately have been 50 cent sand art (garage sale find!), giant Cars puzzle (birthday present!) and discussing Titanic! Oh! I also bought him a canvas bag he could decorate so he could hold some of our many library books. Yes, he drew the Titanic and an Iceberg on it.

He turned 5 years old a week or so ago. 5! I have been watching him since he was a little over 6 months old or so. It's crazy. He starts kindergarten next school year. :(

Next week I am going to start some hardcore project making and exciting activity having because once summer comes and Big Brother is home all the time it will be harder to get him to concentrate on me. :)

Random Pictures:

Fingerprint Sunflowers

I got this idea from Preschool Daze. Unfortunately, I can not free hand draw anything! Like a sunflower. So I printed out a template he traced around it and then took brown paint and dipped his finger in and made the sunflower seeds in the middle. So cute!

Weekly Unplugged Project- Science

Both of the "experiments" we did today today for The Weekly Unplugged Project came from this book: Simple Science Experiments With Everyday Materials

For the first one we took 1 tsp of baking soda and 1oz of water and dissolved it in the bottom of an empty water bottle. Then he poured in the 2 oz of vinegar and I QUICKLY slipped the balloon over the top of the bottle. And...tada the balloon inflated. (because of carbon dioxide you create)

The next project was called Magic Colors. This took some time. He painted the front of two circles blue and the back of one yellow and the back of the other red. (I held them when he painted the backs.) Then we hung them up to dry and then we waited and waited and waited...When they were mostly dry I poked holes (two on each side) and threaded some string through them. Then you are supposed to twirl it a around and then release it and your eyes are supposed to see the color purple for the red/blue one and green for the yellow/blue one. At first it didn't work because our circles were too big. So we cut down the circles and tada! It worked! Make sure to look right at the circle.

Muffin Tin Monday-Theme: MTM Goes Awol

Boring I know, but we ate our MT in bed today!



Puffcorn, Bananas, Cheese
Ketchup, Veggie Dogs, Corn

It was an unoffical yellow day as well. :)

Weekly Unplugged Project- Transportation

This weeks Unplugged Project Theme was easy. Transportation. Someone has been OBSESSED with The Titanic lately and this was a perfect opportunity to do a project I had been planning anyways. We made a book featuring The Titanic with the story and pictures by the little guy. He knows way more about the Titanic than the book says. :) All he draws is the Titanic so he's had a lot of practice. He really liked making his own book and said today was the best day of his life. Haha.

Muffin Tin Tuesday- No Theme

I got a bit more creative today with our Muffin Tin. Yes, I need a life. Anyways, I made bologna flowers with black olives in the middle. (olives are a favorite around here) The cheese in the lower corner is supposed to be a sun ;). Strawberries and a leftover Easter Bunny cookie finish it off.

The Last Of The Easter Projects

I just realized we didn't get around to making the hand print bunnies! :(

We blew out eggs a couple days ago and then washed them. The next day we decorated them with markers. One suffered a terrible accident as you can see. He really liked making the holes in the ends of the eggs.

Then we played a Egg Match Memory game. I took two of some random items and put them into different eggs and mixed them up. Then we found the matches. Those little egg holder are from the Thrift Store (99 cents for 3) and they were originally from Pier One! :)

Carrot Collage

This turned out so cute! And it as beyond easy! The inspiration for this project came from No Time For Flashcards!

At first I picked out a small piece of cardboard to use, then he said "I want a HUGE carrot!" So, we cut some poster board in half and used that.

I had him cut up pieces of Green and Orange construction paper and Green and Orange Tissue Paper into baskets. He loves using scissors! Kids could also tear up the pieces with their hands. Then he applied glue ALL OVER the a carrot shape I drew on the paper. I helped a bit because it was a HUGE CARROT and I added more glue as needed. We let dry and then I cut it out. So cute!

Foil Easter Eggs

This was another project I have seen on numerous blogs.

I cut egg shapes out of cardboard (empty cereal box) and covered them in foil.
I had him paint the whole egg and then use a Q-Tip to draw designs or whatever he wanted in the wet paint! Easy! Then we strung them together and hung them next to the Easter Egg Collage in the window.

Easter Egg Collage

I've seen this done on a bunch of different blogs so we decided to try it yesterday! It worked out great. I took a piece of contact paper, cut out a egg shape and taped it down (face up) on the work space. I set out different materials. Pom Poms, Feathers, Tissue paper, Sequins, Felt, Etc. I told him to stick on whatever he felt like sticking on and that's it. I then sandwiched all the stuff in with another square of contact paper, then trimmed around it. We hung it up in the window when we were done.

Weekly Unplugged Project- Words

This weeks Unplugged Project theme was Words.

We did Unscramble The Sentence. I wrote down short sentences out of a well loved book and cut apart the words mixed them up and had him put the sentence back in order.

We also played with the Alphabet/Word Chart.

Muffin Tin Monday-Theme: Spring!

It's Monday again! That means Muffin Tin Monday! This weeks theme was Spring...

Pink Go-Gurt (Pink is THE color of Spring right), Strawberries, Goldfish (with basketballs, which is a Spring Sport, right?)
Scrambled Eggs (leftover from some an easter egg project), Same, Carrots (Easter Bunny loves carrots!)

Hey, I tried!

Embroidery Thread Eggs

I have been seeing these eggs EVERYWHERE lately so we decided to try it.


Yeah, not so good. He liked the balloons he LOVED the popping of the balloons when they dried but it was a little too hard for us to do. Oh well. They still turned out pretty cute.

We took some water balloons (just the right size!) and blew them up. I hung them up and we dipped the thread in a half glue half water mixture and stuck it around the balloons. He waited very patiently while they dried but couldn't wait to pop them!

Simple Ship Craft

How many 4 year olds are obsessed with the Titanic? I only know of one. This kid over here. I am in desperate NEED OF Titanic/Ship related activities. Here's an easy project I found over at Enchanted Learning. He wasn't too impressed with it because it didn't have any smoke stacks.

Muffin Tin Wednesday-Theme: No Theme

We are a bit late on Muffin Tin Monday!

Oranges, Oranges and Go-Gurt
Spaghetti, Spaghetti and Pickles!

Flour and Peas and Sieves oh my!

"Indy" ALWAYS asks to play with the flour when we cook anything involving it. I let him every now and then. When I saw this idea at The Wonder Years I knew I had to try it. I used flour and black eyed peas that we usually use for counting activities. He put the black eyed peas into the flour and stirred it up. Then he used the sieve to fish the peas out. It worked really well. Our sieve wasn't as small or cute as The Wonder Years one but it was small enough for him to handle. He learned to tap the sieve against his other palm to shake the flour out. Of course all the tools were soon abandoned for his hands!

Homemade Playdough

I can never remember which recipe I like the best for play dough so we always use a different one. :) I found this one via a google search for Best Play Dough Recipe and it gave me Super Crunchy Mamas site. Here is her recipe:

1 cup water

1 Tbsp vegetable oil

1 Tbsp cream of tartar

1/2 cup of salt

several drops of food coloring

1 cup of flour

Visit her site to get detailed directions.

Puffy Paint

We did this awhile ago when we did Corn Syrup painting the first time so I decided to introduce this again. The Artful Parent calls it Puffy Paint. He loved it! I didn't mix it very well because chunks of flour or something kept getting stuck in the nozzles. (another thrift store find!) I saved it over the weekend in the refrigerator and he painted again with it today. We just stirred it back up and it was as good as new.

To make you'll need:

• 2/3 cup of flour
• 2/3 cup of salt
• 2/3 cup of water
• 2 squeeze containers from craft store
  
• 1 Tablespoon tempera paint –at least 2 colors

It takes DAYS to fully dry.
Full instructions at The Artful Parent.

The finished dried artwork. You can't tell how much it sparkles!

Today we made an Easter Egg with the Puffy Paint.

Nuts & Bolts

I introduced this a couple weeks ago and he wasn't too interested. I set it out again last week along with the two short and long labeled baskets. In theory he was to screw a nut on the bolt and put it in the long or short basket. I really thought he'd like this activity being crazy about tools and all. I was wrong. He did about three and then just wanted to dump them out and have them attack each other. Maybe I will try again in a few weeks. Luckily they were only a dollar at the dollar store!

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

I can't take credit for this one. He brought this home from Preschool earlier this week and I was mad I didn't think of it first! ;) After reading The Very Hungry Caterpillar they made this project about the life cycle of a butterfly! They used a seed to represent the egg, spiral pasta to represent a caterpillar, shell pasta to represent a cocoon and bow tie pasta to represent the butterfly!

Penny Boat Race

Last night I took the kids to Science Night as the 9 year olds school. I've took them the past couple years and it's always pretty fun. The 4 year olds favorite activity was "Penny Boat Race". Of course this is nothing new and its been on to-do list for awhile. I promisded him we could do it all day today if he wanted and he did do it for a looooong time today. Like, hours, seriously. I started out by making two ships and he made one. Then I made a chart to see how many of each coin ended up sinking the boats. I was very proud of his counting to some very large numbers! :)

Anyone out there have an IPhone? IPod Touch?

If you do you should visit my husbands post about a Free App for the IPhone or IPod Touch. He develops applications for them and he is giving away his first app for free to 15 people! It's a fun little time wasting game called "Hi-Low".

Pretty please go visit his site! :)

Going In Circles

Ok, this is really starting to get on my nerves. I see a project somewhere. I save it either by Starring it in Google Reader or bookmarking or even clipping it using evernote. Now I can't find out where I first saw this project! I've looked everywhere. Oh well. Here is goes anyways...

Easy and fun! I used a left over Styrofoam cup. I cut the bottom off to use as a stamp and then we also used the top as a stamp. They worked great and they were really easy for him to hold.

Idea from here.

Graphing With Trix Cereal

This was our first experience with graphing. The book where I got this idea said to use M&Ms maybe that would have made him more into it. He graphed out as many has colored Trix as his attention would allow and then he counted them up and figured out which color had the most cereal.

Corn Syrup Painting AKA Shiny Paint

Original instructions came from Kinderart. This is the second time we made this type of painting but the first time we did it was over a year ago and he had forgotten all about it.

I put some corn syrup into a cup and had him spread it on the paper with a big paintbrush. This stuff is sticky!

Then I put a few drops of yellow food coloring and a few drops of blue food coloring to start. I gave him two Q-tips and had him mix the colors in the corn syrup to make green. I told him he could use his fingers if he wanted, but he decided not to. Smart boy. Then I put some more colors around for him to mix into new colors. After a few days the painting dried really shiny.

Weekly Unplugged Project- Long

The Weekly Unplugged Project this week was long. We took the noodles/pasta we dyed last week (that will be another post) and I cut a long piece are yarn. We threaded on the colored noodles. I started at one end and he started at the other end and threaded until we thought it was loooong enough.

I have been wanting to make this Snake since I first saw it and I thought today would be a good day since it's also kinda long. And rainbow colored. :)

I had to use a drill for the first time today. I drilled a hole in the bottoms of plastic eggs. Then we strung them together. I pushed the yarn through because my holes weren't very good. Then he pushed them together at the bottom. You use a whole egg with holes drilled through the top and bottom for the ends.

Muffin Tin Monday-Theme: Rainbow

This weeks Muffin Tin Monday theme was Rainbow. Easy, right? We just started making our rainbow jello so it was not near ready to eat, but we had plenty of other foods to make a colorful lunch today.

I love your blog, too!

Lucky me! I just received the I Love Your Blog Award from Lucky Me! Thanks so much! These awards might seem silly to some people but I really appreciate them and they let me know people out there are actually paying attention to what I am posting. Which encourages me to post more. Thank you!



Here are the rules:

1) Add the logo of the award to your blog

2) Add a link to the person who awarded it to you

3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs

4) Add links to those blogs on your blog

5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs!

I would like to nominate:

1. Blissfully At Home

2. My Two Happy Homeschoolers

3. Play, Explore and Learn

4. Teaching Tiny Tots

5. Funny Days With Mommy and Maddie

6. A Mommy's Adventures

7. Wilson-Parkes Family Tree

and an extra one ;) The Snails Trail!

Cherry Blossoms

This idea came from Perpetual Preschool. That is one of the first websites I found when searching for art activities for kids a long time ago.

We changed things from what they listed. I used watered down brown paint instead of food coloring.
I used a dropper to drop some of the paint in the bottom corner and had him use a straw to blow OUT and push the paint up and to the left and right to form branches. (Where did all my pictures of him using the straw go??? Oh, well. )
Then he dotted glue along the branch.
He took small squares of dark and light pink tissue paper and balled them up and stuck them on the glue.

I thought his came out so pretty and spring-like that I made one too. :)

Check out more projects for kids at We made It, Showcase Saturday!





More projects at:

The Day After St. Patricks Day

The actual St. Patrick's Day was kinda weird. We had an older brother home sick and the little one can't really concentrate on anything but him when he's around. We did have a Treasure Hunt for some chocolate coins but that's about it. So, Wednesday we did some St. Patrick's Day/Green oriented activities.

I used the green colored cards from my old Phase 10 deck and some green glass stones to have him practice his counting and number order.

We got the colored rice out again and I hid special green coins in it for him to find. He did this for a long time.

We also did another "rainbow" project. I found this nifty "rainbow maker" for $1.75 at the store. It was pretty fun/interesting. The three colored brushes come off so they can be used separately or stuck together to make rainbows. The paint tablet is in the sponge applicator so you just have to dip it in water and paint! He wanted to cover every square inch of his giant piece of paper.