March Top Ten: A Little Late

Girlygirl top ten of March has changed a lot since February but have a little. Here the are in no order.

1. Bubbles
2. Dolls
3. tongs: we use for table time and move things with them.
4. cutting and pasting
5. books: favorite seek and find books. Like this one we have a few different kinds. I also found a few I Spy board books at the Good Will. I she likes a lot too.
6. play dough
7. cleaning stuff.
8. Dora and Diego puzzle
9. Car/bikes outside
10. wagon

I am glad I started this to see Girlygirl's taste change from month to month. I would love for you to join me. Sorry it is late I hope to get up on time next time.

Reasons to buy a Gallon of Ice Cream

I have been buying gallon ice cream for about a year now. It is not as good as the name brand ice cream so from time to time I do still buy the name brand stuff when it is on sale. I have found lost of reasons to buy a big tub of ice cream.

1. It is cheaper: There for I get it more often.
2. The tubs make great buckets for cleaning, play in the sand, etc.
3. The tubs are a great place for small toys or stuff for table time
4. I can afford to get topping for my ice cream and it is still cheaper.
5. I use the tubs for a GB (garbage blow when cooking)
6. I have a tub with cat food in it.

As you can see I mostly love all the things you can do with the tubs there for saving me even more money. I am glad I have started buying gallon ice cream to save money. What is something you buy and reuse the container it came in? Tell us about it.

Gone

I am going out of town for and will be back next week. I will not be blogging this week. I will be back middle of next week.

Tot School: Week Nine Spring is Here!!

~31 months~

We spend a lot of time outside this week. The weather was great. Girlygirl loves it so much more than last year. We also got some new Tot School table time toys. Girlygirl loved them.We brought Girlygirl's little people to work. The Twins loved playing with them. Girlygirl had to work on sharing. I played with them for a long time and we talked about jobs, animals and colors. The kids all three loved it.Tuesday we went were Larger motor skills are learned endlessly. Here she is on the stairs. Here is she balancing. She spent about half the time at the park walking around she improved her skills a lot by the time we left.shorting Pompoms with tongs. Raping gift for our friends new baby.Gilter Glue. I am not sure why she had to do it on the easel it was not easy. Showing daddy her hard work.Twin Boy has the great marble maze. Girlygirl loved it. I want to get one of these. We worked with our Color Bags. We love them. I don't get picture of them much because she always wants to sit on my lap when we do it. (if you are wonder I am sign shoe in the picture)Girlygirl cleaned she loves to clean. We started talking about Easter and hung some stickers in the window.I bought plastic tooth picks at the Hobby Lobby. Girlygirl match them by color in the plant foam stuff. (FYI: I got the plant foam stuff for a good deal but not worth the mess I would get the regular kind next time) Girlygirl loves the foamEgg match.Thursday she sleep over at my sister's. She is always great at planning things for Girlygirl to do. As a former preschool teach she is great at it. And I think Girlygirl wants to be her when she gets big. We went to the Morton Arboretum (which will be doing a lot of we got passes for Christmas) to ride bikes. We stopped and talked about the buds on the trees. I explained that it was the tree waking up. A closer look. I will be doing more this later. Looking at another tree.Up in the trees. The first time around she was scared and only daddy could help her over come those fears. And by the third and last time around she just followed behind him.

If you are looking for what other are doing just click on the link below.

Tot School: back to work week eight

~31 months~

We didn't do much of Tot School this week. We just started a new nanny job and I had to change things around. I think next week should go better. Here are the few things we did do. I am very late on this this week. I know but with life changes that is what happens. We now care for twins which we will call Boy Twin and Girl Twin.

We went on a walk and Girlygirl pushed her bike. I was amazed how far she was able to walk.

She painted. And for the first time in a long time would use finger paint with out a brush. She likes to do everything the "right" way.

We got a new toy for Table time(tot school) which she loved and played with it a lot. I am not sure how it is learning but I know she had fun. She like to pretend it was a birthday cake and candles. She would then sing Happy Birthday and blow them out. Please visit 1+1+1=1 to learn more about Tot School and see what others are doing or maybe even add a post of your own.

An Other Great Blog

Today when reading Tot School. I was clicking around on the links on the blog and I found a new great Tot Blog. I think I will be getting new ideas for Girlygirl Tot School from ABC and 123. I will be looking around this site for a while and if I do like at much as I think I will I will be adding it to my links on the side bar.

Three Ways to Get Cheep Sand Toys

I was at Target to buy a gift Girlygirl always likes to look the toys and it is cute to hear her say, "I save money. Not Mommy's money. OWN!" Anyways we went down the lisle with the summer stuff. I was shocked at the price of the toys. So when I got home I thought I'd let all you know what I do to keep sand toys cheep. I would say spend the money to get one nice shovel for each child. I have noticed that with shovels it make a big differences. Other than that here are a few things I do.

1. The Dollar Tree has great cheep sand buckets. At least last year the did they are big and come with a shovel. (the big kids broke them a lot) 2. Save your plastic food tubs; butter, peanut butter, sour cream, etc. are great. The size are fun to making castle (at least for me) 3. A few years ago I had a ton of formula scoops. Whenever I brought them every kid that the pack loved them. I wish I saved more but I trying to get my sitters to save theirs. If you start save your stuff now your kids will have fun all summer at the beach, park or in the back yard sand box.

Remember to play in the sand with the kids they will like it more even if you have nothing. What is your or your child's favorite sand toy?

Mommy!! A Monster!! A Monster!!!

What do you for your little one who is scared for monsters? I have a few idea I have heard over the years and have been thinking about it a lot because Girlygirl is sure that monsters live in the dark.

• a scare light-this is just a flash light to shine and see what is there and scare the monster away.
• monster spray-can be just water or air freshener. I have heard that people make a new label with a monster with an x over him to make it look like it is the real stuff.
• a night light-if they can see what is there it may be less scary.
• a brave toy-with a little boy I baby sat in high school he had a loin that was brave and stayed on his bed to keep in safe. Any toy could work.
• pray-we pray that God will keep her safe and know that God is there with her.

What do you do to keep monsters away from your little on and keep your little one happy at night?

Tot School: Week Seven Playing Outside

~31 months~

We have spent most the week playing outside. The weather here was great this week. We went outside a lot for a long time each day.

Cutting this has been a favorite the last few weeks.

We made banana bread. It was lots of fun and so good we made it later in the week again.

Play dough. I have add it to our new homeschool shelf (look for a blog to come about this) She does not get all the play dough stuff at school time just a few and it is working out good.

Bug catch. The was a little moth in my house and for hours she tried to caught it.

She like here new puzzle from the Dollar Tree so much I bought one more. We played games a lot this week.We are slowly making a garage sale pile. This day Girlygirl got to pick 10 stuff animals she wanted to keep.Toddler art at the library.Again with the puzzle this time with two.Learning to put clothing away. And below is our trip to The Morton Arboretum with my sisters and nephews.Tell everyone what your are doing for Tot School or just see what others are doing.

Kissing Shoes: Getting the Shoes on the right feet

So I have seen lots of people do the Works for me Wednesday. I have loved reading all the tips found though We are THAT Family. I have thought many times I should join but then can't come up with a good idea to join in with. Well, I have an idea. My mom told me about a little girl at her school who has kissing shoes. Her mom put smiley faces on each shoe when they can kiss they are on the right feet. It has worked great with Girlygirl. Now I only needed to ask Girlygirl "Can the kiss?" she knows to cheek her shoes. It works great for my daughter who hates to be wrong.

Top 5: Favorite Blogs

1. Preschool and Peace- Written by Kendra who is mom to eight children. I get a lot of encouragement from her. She has great tips to be a mom to young one.
2. The Crafty Crow- A great place to find ideas of thing to make with and for the kids. It is update Monday-Friday with great links.
3. 1+1+1=1 is written by Carisa. This is where I found Tot School which I love and she shares a lot about what her homeschooling life looks likes. She does a great job.
4. Totally Tots has many author and many ideas from its readers.
5. Chasing Cheerios written by Melissa. She shares a lot of great Montessori style ideas. I don't really have a style of teaching yet but I love her ideas and she does a great job of showing and explaining them.

Bonus site it is new blog and I am very excited about it so it may bump it off of my other top 5 soon. Homeschool Bright and Early written by Mother Bear who plans to post each day. I look forward to getting ideas from she. What is you favorite blog about preschoolers (ages 0-5)?

Tot School: Week Six a day late.

~30 months~

We didn't do much over last week. I was in a funk and being lazy so the little we did do I didn't take pictures of. We do go to Jump and Jiggles and up to Wisconsin with Tomboy, Mr Man, their Mom and sister. Here are a few pictures of learning on our outings. First Jump and Jiggles Gross Motor skills or is it just plan fun?Playing with the big blocks sorting by shapes.Adding roofs to the make houses. Then the giant destroys the houses.Help trying to tie my shoes and the I talked about what I was doing while they watched. Girlygirl tracing her name. She didn't get it really but we will work on it more she like having her name on the paper.Her games where even more fun with a friend. It was great to see them help each other. Well that was our simple unschooling tot school week. Now we are trying to get back to more of a planned week. We'll see how that goes. For more ideas don't forget to cheek out other's Tot School over at 1+1+1=1.