In anticipation of the arrival of our second daughter, we took a week to focus on Little Cutie becoming a big sister and our family. I didn't take many action shots as it was getting difficult to get around, but we did have a good time learning about our family.
Books Arthur's Baby by Marc Brown A Baby Sister for Frances by Russell Hoban The Berenstain Bears' New Baby by Stan Berenstain Big Sisters Are the Best by Fran Manushkin Franklin's Baby Sister by Paulette Bourgeois I'm a Big Sister by Joanna Cole The New Baby by Mercer Mayer
Activities
Little Mommy Baby So New
We worked on showing Little Cutie how to be gentle with the baby doll and how babies sometimes use pacifiers (Little Cutie is a thumb sucker, so we don't have any pacifiers out). We also rocked the baby in our arms and tried to encourage her to carry the baby that way instead of holding it by it's head. :)
Little People Happy Sounds Home
Little Cutie played with this house for a while. She loved to put all the people and furniture through the door. She also loved making the toilet flush and the phone ring.
Family Photo Album
I put together a small 3x5 photo album of pictures of some of our immediate family members. Little Cutie loved flipping through the pages and we talked about who each person is and how they are related to her. We do not have any family that live close to us, so it was a good way for her to see family members that she doesn't get to see in person very often.
Books Whose Toes Are Those? by Jabari Asim Whose Knees Are These? by Jabari Asim Where Is Baby's Belly Button? by Karen Katz Clap Your Hands! (Sesame Street) Baby Faces by Margaret Miller Horns to Toes and In Between by Sandra Boynton Here Are My Hands by Bill Martin
Activities
Mrs. Potato Head
Meet the new Mrs. Potato Head! She's slimmer and has sprouted feet! Little Cutie loved this toy all week and it was the first one she went for when she saw all the toys on the shelves. For some reason she really loved Mrs. Potato Head's ears and kept carrying them all over the house. She also took out the lips and would stick them in her mouth so it looked like she had lips. We took all the pieces out and let Little Cutie put them in how she wanted. Great for fine motor skills!
Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes Song
We read Knees and Toes (Scholastic Rookie Toddler) and then sang the song version while pointing to the body parts on myself and then on Little Cutie. She was giggling the whole time and loved this song!
Hairbrush, Mirror, and Washcloth
We set out a hairbrush, hand mirror, and washcloth for Little Cutie. She loved playing with her hairbrush the most. We had some visitors over and she kept brushing everyone's hair. She also used the washcloth to pretend wash her face and looked at herself in the mirror.
Fisher Price Laugh & Learn Love to Play Sis
Little Cutie loves this toy. She loves to hug it and carry it around the house. We tried to focus on pointing out the puppy's body parts, which are labeled, and pushing the buttons on those parts to make the puppy talk.
Well, everyone in our house came down with a cold in the last two weeks (hence why Little Cutie is in her jammies in every picture in this post). Fortunately, that didn't stop us from learning about letters two weeks ago! (Just delayed mom in posting about it!) The goal wasn't so much to teach the alphabet, but to just start talking more about the letters that are all around us.
Books A Is for Adventure by Irene Kilpatrick (The Backyardigans) Dr. Seuss's ABC by Dr. Seuss The Alphabet Book by P. D. Eastman A to Z by Sandra Boynton ABC (Scholastic Rookie Toddler) Alphabears by Kathleen Hague Chicka Chicka ABC by Bill Martin The Hullabaloo ABC by Beverly Cleary My First ABC: A Lift the Flap Book (DK) I Spy Little Letters by Jean Marzollo Discover Letters: The Alphabet in Nature (Baby eyelike)
Activities
LeapFrog Fridge Phonics
Little Cutie has always loved this toy. She likes to push the button that sings the ABC's. But she usually doesn't let the song go all the way through, so it just says "A...A...A..." She does like to change out the letters and dances to the tune.
Magnetic Learning: Let's Learn our First Words
I knew this would be too advanced for Little Cutie, but we played with it anyway. She liked putting the letters on the pages and making them stick. We talked about what the pictures were on the pages and played with the magnets.
Mini Foam Alphabet
I found this little alphabet at the dollar store. Little Cutie likes to take apart our large floor alphabet mat, so I thought this little version would be better for her to play with. She loved to take the squares apart and pop out the letters. We talked about each letter, but she wasn't very interested in putting the letters back in the squares. She also put all the letters in a container and stirred them up with an ice cream scoop. She played with this the most during the week.
Mega Bloks ABC Spell!
Little Cutie loves to build with her Mega Bloks. This set is actually meant to build the words to match the pictures on the blocks, but we mostly just built with the blocks and talked about the letters on them.
Last week, we focused on colors. In addition to the activities and books, we made sure to talk about colors in everything we did all week, whether it was getting dressed, eating food, or looking at things outside.
Books Eyelike Colors by PlayBac Many-Colored Blessings by Dandi Daley Mackall Elmo's Guessing Game About Colors (Sesame Street) Shiny Touchy Smelly Colors by Dawn North Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin Jr. / Eric Carle Richard Scarry's Colors by Richard Scarry My Very First Book of Colors by Eric Carle Colors by Xavier Deneux Colors with Albert and Amy by Tony Potter Brainy Baby Shapes and Colors by Edith Reynolds Baby Colors (DK)
Activities
Harold and the Purple Crayon Coloring Page
We read Harold and the Purple Crayon by Crockett Johnson and of course did some coloring with a purple crayon. I created this coloring page simply by scanning one of the pages from the book and printing it out. I think she really liked the purple crayon because it showed up a lot better than some of the other colors we have colored with in the past.
Blue Jell-O Play Dough
Because Little Cutie is still putting things in her mouth, I wanted to find a play dough recipe made from edible ingredients in case she tried to put it in her mouth. I found this recipe using Jell-O and whipped up a batch. It was super easy to make. I was surprised at how long she played with the play dough. We did have to stay close by because she tried to eat some a few times though. We also got out a cookie cutter to make stars in the dough. Daddy was making little people and animals for her and she enjoyed making them move around and tearing their limbs off!
Red Sidewalk Chalk
I recently found two pieces of sidewalk chalk and a holder from the Target dollar spot on clearance for $0.30! I liked that they came with a holder...less mess! Little Cutie thought the chalk was really neat. She even tried drawing on my foot and the flowers. She didn't fully understand the concept of drawing on the concrete though; she occasionally would just hit the sidewalk with the chalk.
Yellow Balloon
We actually got this balloon from a car dealership a little while ago, but it no longer has helium and has seriously decreased in size. Regardless, Little Cutie loved carrying the balloon around the house. We also kicked the balloon around and tossed it up in the air and watched it slowly float down.
Green Bead Discovery Bottle
Little Cutie loved the seashell discovery bottle I put together for her a few weeks ago during our summer theme, so I decided to incorporate one into our color week. I found some green beads randomly a while back and knew these would be perfect, as they are too small for her to handle independently. She loved shaking the bottle and watching the beads whirl around in the water.
Matching Poms in Stacking Cups
I really wasn't expecting her to be able to match the poms correctly in the stacking cups, but it allowed us an opportunity to talk about the different names of the colors. She did get one out of six correct though!
Everything was red, white, and blue last week in honor of America's birthday! We didn't set up the shelves as we were traveling some of the week and didn't have as many activities as we have in the past.
Books Looking for Uncle Louie on the Fourth of July by Kathy Whitehead Apple Pie 4th of July by Janet Wong Fourth of July Mice! by Bethany Roberts Happy Birthday, America by Mary Pope Osbourne Red, White, and Boom! by Lee Wardlaw God Bless America by Irving Berlin (illustrated by Lynn Musinger) Hooray for the 4th of July! by Harriet Ziefert
Activities
Color an American Flag
This week, we got out some colored pencils to color with. Little Cutie was interested for maybe a minute and then walked away. She only colored with the red. I tried showing her the blue, but she was not interested.
Yankee Doodle Rhyme
This was our song/nursery rhyme for the week. I found the book by Mary Ann Hoberman to follow along with. It ended up going into much more detail than the traditional version of the song that we knew. Little Cutie loves when we read in a sing-songy voice (usually only where there are rhyming books). She dances to the beat and waves her hands.
Red, White, and Blue Bead Necklaces
Little Cutie loved playing with these necklaces. She put them around her neck. She shook the container. She took them out of the container, and put them back in. She dragged them all over the house. They were definitely a favorite of the week.
Red, White, and Blue Pom Chute
I taped an old paper towel tube to the wall and got some red, white, and blue poms. We started with 3 different sizes, but the large ones were too big to fit in the tube, and Little Cutie put the small ones in her mouth right away, so we just stuck with the medium sized poms. She wasn't real interested in this activity, but we had her attention for a few minutes.
We hope everyone had an enjoyable 4th of July weekend!
