W's Book Choices

W is loving book time right now. Here are his two current favorites: How Do You Make Baby Smile by Philemon Sturges and We've All Got Bellybuttons by David Martin. We seem to rotate genres from week to week. This week is animals, last week was trains and the week before we read about construction vehicles. I love the library!

All Aboard!

This alphabet book is one of the best that O and I have discovered. The art is fantastic. He had a blast trying to find the hidden letters in each of the pictures. Can you find the hidden letters? We checked this one out from the library, but we might have to add it to our permanent collection! Check out All Aboard!: A Traveling Alphabet -by Bill Mayer.

Ready for a Luau

I have been planning a return trip to Hawaii for the whole family. It looks like it won't happen because of the long flights and the expense of 4 tickets. So what to do with all of my Hawaiian dreams?

How about an end of preschool luau? The highlight definitely was watching a volcano explode. The kids used two bottles of vinegar and still weren't tired of the action! I used this super simple recipe from Create Kids Crafts.

We learned the actions to the Hukilau song, ate fresh pineapple, coconut and macadamia nuts and after reading books about Hawaii, used photos of Hawaii to make postcards of our favorite sights.

We also had the best banana bread in the world: Coconut Lime Glazed Banana Bread. Mary Ann hooked me up with this recipe from Cooking Light a couple of years ago and I haven't made a different banana bread since. I love it!

O's Favorite Read

"A Visitor for Bear" by Bonny Becker and illustrated by Kady MacDonald Denton is one of our new favorites. The story is so sweet and the artwork really lovely. We checked it out from the library last week and already have read it more than  a dozen times. O particularly likes exclaiming one of his favorite lines from the story, "Away with you! Vamoose!" 

Volcano Land

O came up with this idea on his own. While looking at our egg carton he was inspired by the mini-volcanoes and decided to make a volcano land. Each of the volcanoes is painted with hot lava and it is a great place for his mini-dinosaurs to live. I was impressed by his creativity on this project.

Learning Letters

I love this idea that my friend Mina uses to teach letters. She cuts out things for the children to glue on to a letter that she has already traced. O loves doing these projects. For K she did Kaleidoscope and used bits of different colored paper. For M she did Metallic and used bits of shiny tin foil. 

Cookie Bouquets

I made these little flowers today as a thank you for our Primary chorister & pianist. They are so simple; I thought they would be a fun craft for preschool or a sweet spring surprise.

Pizza Toasts

 When I asked S to make dinner for the boys on Sunday night this is what I came into the kitchen to find. The rocket and blackbird jet were for O of course and the elephant was W's . He loves elephants and it is one of his few words. I was lucky enough to eat the race car and S had the shark. YUM! Also, it turns out there is a very specific process for toasting the bread, before applying the toppings and then broiling them so as not to let the bread get soggy. S had it down to a science.

Perfect Play Clay

This is not the most beautiful picture in the world, but it is the best play clay I have ever played with. O & W both play for it completely content for over an hour. That is saying a lot for a 3  year old and 16 month old! It stays soft for months and is so much fun to shape and mold. O on this day was making the sun out of this big orange blob. We also had planets surrounding it out of many other colors. I am posting the recipe below. One word of caution: Follow the recipe precisely. I tried to improvise a little once and got a sticky, gooey mess! It calls for a lot of salt and cream of tartar too, so you might want to check your stock before you get started to make sure that you have enough!

Combine in saucepan:

5 cups water

2 1/2 cups salt

3 Tablespoons Cream of Tartar

and food coloring (1 tsp for pastel color and 3 Tablespoons for vivid color)

Warm over low heat and stir with a wooden spoon. As the mixture heats up, stir in: 

10 Tablespoons oil and then

5 cups flour slowly

Keep stirring until the mixture starts to look dry and pulls away from the sides of the pan.

Remove the pan from the heat at this point. Pinch a piece between two fingers, If it is not sticky, it is done. Otherwise, continue stirring over heat.

Place the dough on the counter and knead until smooth. Store in a plastic bag and enjoy!

Indoor Games

One fun game we tried out during preschool this week was dress-ups. We dressed up as astronauts: can't you tell? Everyone had to sit on an imaginary line while the person who was 'it' put on the hat, coat, and big boots. After dressing, each child posed for photos. It was amazing how much entertainment the five boys got out of this game. It was good for practicing those self-dressing skills too. After it was over my baby had to play too. He thought he was the most adorable baby on the block after putting on the 'astronaut suit' like the big boys.