busy bags or boxes

I love the idea of busy boxes. The idea of busy boxes is having everything all ready for your child to do an activty when you need them to be busy because you are. I have not done it but I think I may try it. I have found it in a few different places. I wanted to put the links all together.
Play at Home Mom has busy boxes 
Intrepid Murmurings calls her's toddler and preschool activity bags
Chasing Cheerios also calls her's toddler activity bags and she has better bags to use in this post.
My Delicious Ambiguity calls her toddler busy activity bags
Tired and True has homemade stuff in hers
Money Saving Mom calls hers busy bags
The Princess and the Tot call hers the toddler busy bags
The View from 5'5" calls her quite time boxes and they each have a few things in them.
Mine for the Making has some great ones. She calls them busy bags.
Playing House calls hers busy box. They have a few things in each one so she has a little more time.

I think you could do a lot of different things the same way. Those site have good stuff to get you started.

Collage Tray

Girlygirl loves to glue. She often can be found sitting at her little table making a collage. It is great open end craft project and now is out and ready whenever she wants to do it. The great thing about collages is you can put to match a theme or just random things.

I just keep a store bought veggie. I just ask for it after the church potluck. Veggie tray are great for a few reasons. It is dived to keep the different things in there own place and has a lid. What I like best is if you get them from a potluck like it did it was free. Now here are some list I found of stuff to put in the Collage Tray. Earth Kids has a great list that can be found here. This list is almost the same but has a few different ideas.

4th of July fun

We had a fun day we talk about 4th of July. I don't think she gets it but we had fun. We made cards that will send out Wednessday.We color rice.

Then Girlygirl played with it for a long time. We put up window stickers. Then we made Fireworks with the rice to hang on the wall.

We had tons of fun. above you can see them drying. Remember to play with your kids today. It make the happy.

Free: Table time/ Tot School Tools

As I was looking at blogs this morning I saw a few people use droppers for different things. Like the water transfer over at My Montessori Journey and marbleizing paper over at Chasing Cheerios. You can get free eye/med droppers from your Pharmacy. I have gotten them from Walgreen's without buying any meds. You just have to go ask. I ask for 3 and they just gave them too me. I have not done this because I got paint cups for $2 at a garage sale last year but Michelle over at Her Cup Overfloweth had a great idea to use Ice coffee cups as paint cups. Take a look here. Just some good ideas to have good cheep fun with your little one. As always remember to play with your child today.

Preschool Craft time: Coffee Filter Butterfly

Preschool Craft time: Coffee Filter Butterfly These are great fun but a little messy to make it. Step One: Gather 1 or 2 coffee filter(s) and 1 1/2 pipe cleaner. A cup of water, water colors paint and bushes. Young kids have fun using more than one brush. You may put down pager on table because paint does go through the filter. (I don't mind cleaning up the mess so didn't do this.) Step Two: paint the filters and let dry.

Step three: If using two filters put together. Then pinch mild together. (like in picture above.)

Step Four: Wrap the half a pipe cleaner (the are easy to cut with scissors) around where you pinched it. Step Five: Place the whole pipe cleaner through the pipe cleaner that is there. Fold in half and twist together. This is held to make the butterflies fly. Girlygirl loved that she made something she can play with.

Fall Crafts: 5 Leaf Craft Projects

All this crafts are things you can do with all those leaves in your front and back yard during the fall months. Ours are just now really falling so I put this together kind of late in the fall but here are 5 leaf crafts I found or have done with the kids.

1. make a tree-picture on right of Girlgirl's (I did the glue)
2. Weave Leafs
3. paint them-can just paint or use as stamps
4. Leaf Match
5. make leaf people

I hope that you still have time to enjoy some of these this year but if not maybe next. We just did 1 and 3 this year but I really liked the others so hopefully I get a chance to do them next year. I hope you take the time to enjoy what God has made and talk to your kids about it.

Doll Bath

I have read about letting your toddler give their babies a bath. Today we did and Girlygirl loved it. I just filled a toy tube 1/4 wit water and soap. Gave Girlygirly a a doll to wash. It was easy and she did if for about 20 min. That is always good. When she got up I told she had to be done no coming back. We then cleaned up together. Here are some cute pictures of her playing

Toddler: Starting Table time

Table time is something I learned to do long before I became a mom. I have been a nanny for 3 years and my last Mom/boss had me do it with her girls. The oldest was easy like Girlygirl. I started when she was two and she would sit for over an hour doing whatever you told her to. The younger did not like it much. She started when she was a little over one. I would put her in her high chair with a few toys well I cleaned lunch. It took me 10 min top. For over a month she would cry before the time was up and all the toys would be on the be on the ground. By the age of 2 she could still not do table time for more than 25 min. Just go with your kid and start small and move to more time when you can. Remember you are the boss not your child.

Homeschool Preschool: The Jar part 2

Here are some pictures of Girlygirl playing with the jar.  She loves the stuff and it make her have to use her imagination.

Homeschool Preschool: Sticker Table time

When I posted last time I said that Grilygirl needs to help with the sticker so I took of the back ground well she no long needs help with it. She has learned to do the stickers all by herself. This is one of Girlygirl's favorite table time active. I give her a notebook or paper stickers and markers or crayons. She will do this for the whole 30 min. It is great when I am hurrying to make dinner.

Homeschool Preschool: The Jar

The Jar is just full of stuff found around my house that I thought Girlygirl could play with.  I got the idea from Guilt Free Homeschooling. Carolyn uses it as a math tool for children to do sorting. Look at her blog for ideas.  Right now Girlygirl really just plays with it at table time. I am sure it will later change as more of a teaching tool. I found a dog treat jar at the Dollar Store.

I filled it with all kinds of fun stuff. Look at the pictures and list for ideas. You  don't need to buy any thing.

In The Jar:

• fake followers
• old caps
• foam letters
• clothes pins
• pompoms
• paper clips
• an few old game pieces
• army men
• baby spoons
• small meal toys
• broken wand top

When making your jar just add things you have in the house if you don't have much to start that is fine things will show up later. I plan to add more and change ours as time goes on.

Homeschool preschool: Table time!

Table time is something that I have start to bring into Girlgirl's day. I do it most the time when I am helping the big kids do work. We are all at the table then and she enjoys being with us. I give her a quite thing to play with. She will sit at the table for 30 min. She does two different things at table time things everyday. I don't just put something in front of her and walk away. I help her get started and show her what I would do. I then for the most part let her do her thing. There is no right or wrong way to play. Here is a list of things she does:

• bean & rice bucket-I just got a small plastic bin from the Dollar Store and filled it half way  dried beans and rice. I put a few little cups, old caps (like from the milk) and a few brushes.  Some times I do add small toys in it too.
• letter and number magnets- Again I got a small cookie sheet from the Dollar Store. I got a hug bag of letter and number magnets from a garage sale. With this one I often ask a big kid to sit with her and tell Girlygirl the letter and the sound. (this has helped Five learn her letter sounds)
• other magnets- when at a toy store on our last vacation I found some old ball magnets Grilygirl loved them. I have add more to them now. I give her the container (a small cream cheese container) and the cookie sheet and let her play.
• puzzles- We have gotten them as gifts, and passed down to us from friends with older kids. Girlygirl loves them. I give her one at a time and try to change them before she gets bored with it. When we do puzzles it is for the whole 30 min. but she gets about 5 different puzzles. (if you need to just go between a few it works good too.)
• the jar-I will do a post  about what the jar is soon. But is a cookie jar filled with stuff I found around my house. No toys.
• color-I sometimes just give her one pen and one paper and let her fill it up. Other times I give her a coloring book and her box of crayons. When she is really lucky I give her makers. (be ready for a mess with them)
• books-I just give her two or three books to look at and play with. Hey maybe she will teach herself to read. (lol)
• play dough-I use a place mate and try to get her to keep it on the mate. 
• stickers-I don't do this much because of the cost buy Grilygirl loves it. I give her a few sheets of stickers and let her put them in her note book. Girlygirl is still young and can't get the stickers off if the background paper is still on. I take the background paper off all but one sheet. That way I can see when she doesn't need me to do this any more.
• cards-I use a few different Sesame Street cards we have as well as a real deck of cards. It is fun for her. I am not sure why. We keep cards in her pack back too for when we are out.
• beads-I bought a some big beads (made for kids) she can string them. Girlygirl is not really ready for this. If she does something for a long time I will bring them out for a few min (5 max). She gets mad because she can't do it.
• lacing cards-we have truck ones that where given to us. I have not used them yet. I will let you know how it goes when we do.

I am sure there are many more things you can do. I will be adding to the list later in latter post if you add more things.  I will also be adding picture of Girlygirl at table time in the next few weeks. Keep you eye out for them.