A few things we've been doing...

Last weekend I made a little farm board for the girls.  It was inspired by a cool farm set I saw on Pinterest.  Gramma Deb had given the girls some great little animals and fences that we use with our fold and go Melissa and Doug Barn.  I debated about using foam board but finally decided to use a piece of cardboard that had been used to hold a large picture frame I bought- has a little hook so we could hang it on the wall.  I like how it's all contained when it's put away.  Emma pulled off one of the fence sections nearly right away, but that's fine- Ada likes that there's a "door" now.

Ingredients:
Got glue gun, cardboard, green construction paper, brown construction paper, back of an old calendar that had vegetable/ fruit illustrations, blue foam for a little lake, tractor stickers.- ALL of this was stuff laying around in the craft room.

The girls discovering this after nap...

We've had nice warm weather and Ada has been saying "Icky mud"...I have got to nip that attitude in the bud. We've been talking about how soil is nice because it grows plants, trees, and food and even when it's wet and muddy- WE LIKE DIRT.  For anyone reading who knew me when I had my S10- remember the "Girls love dirt" sticker?  Man, that was a great truck.  Anyway,  here's a little video of Ada playing with her animals as they find their children/ parents.  Pretty darn cute.

We did a little science experiment inspired by a conversation Ada and Tony were having about density.  Well, they were talking about why something was floating (while baking- pancakes I believe).  I overheard and remembered a post I had seen on Chasing Cheerios (easily my favorite mommy blog).  I grabbed a few baskets and we wrote "sink" on one and "float" on the other.  Then we gathered a collection of random items, I made a quick chart and we went through each one and Ada made a prediction that I recorded.  We talked about what a "prediction" was and she did pretty well.  Next it was time to put each item one at a time into the basin of water and Ada told me which ones sunk/ floated.  I was surprised by a few of the results- which we also recorded.  Emma had fun with this one too... but note to anyone who is going to do this with a 16 month old- don't walk out of the room while she is playing with a basin of water unless you have MANY towels handy :)

Sticky paint is what we've been calling this little concoction that I learned about on Two Hens and a Chick.  It's just corn syrup and food coloring. We had been talking about changing our window decorations for spring and wanted to make rainbows and flowers and trees.  We made trees with sticky paint so there is brown and 2 shades of green.  I pulled up some google images of trees for Ada to look at and the first couple she made were more "abstract".  She asked me to draw one for her to paint.  So I drew some basic tree shapes and she told me she was going to paint the trunk brown and the leaves green.  So she did.

These were fun to make and I would do sticky paint again, but we decided to say goodbye to these as they were still sticky after a day and we/I didn't want them drip and attract ants so they didn't make the window.

Speaking of the window.  No more snowflakes!!  We made some rainbows and hung them in the shape of a rainbow.  This was just a thrown together, I don't want to put on a movie, and we need to do something inside kind of thing.  I put some coffee filters down on the children's table and sprayed them with water.  Then we used watercolors to paint on them.  Let them dry and voila!  Ada liked it so much she asked to do it again the next morning. I decided to cut flower shapes before painting this time and we dried them and hung them with construction paper stems.  Ada glued on some leaves too.  And now we have a more spring-y window.  Yay!!!

Last but not least, after a weekend of glorious weather and a full day of outside play we shared a treat after Em was asleep.  Ice cream cones + marshmallows + chocolate chips + peanut butter chips + tin foil + oven = yummy

Artist vs. Crafter

It is very clear to me that I am not an artist.  I like to create things with my hands, but have a hard time just going with the flow.  I like to have an idea of the finished product and prefer to make functional items.  When I went to Mass Art briefly I took things like clothing, metal, and ceramics- all things that you can use rather than simply appreciate.  I appreciate art, just don't have the confidence level to make it.  That said, my husband was raised by artists.  I was raised by a crafter.  My mother is a skilled quilter, knitter, cook, basket weaver, you name it- she can make it.  My mother in law is a talented sculptor and we have some of her pen & ink drawings that are amazing as well.  She is the type of woman you are psyched to go to a museum with because she understands it and can help someone like me see the artistry more clearly.  I'm one of those- "I like this" type people.

When we are all home and Ada has the urge to do some artwork it is so clear to me this difference in rearing.  I have all the materials and have to hold myself back from helping to create the specific end result while Ada just creates.  Recently Tony was home and showed Ada a technique for using watercolors that you would never assume he knew... paint with water then paint over it with the paint and let the color bleed.  Well this is the only way Ada paints anymore.  She has been loving it.  In fact, she went on a little watercolor exploration.

This is Ada's "Study in Blue"

I guess time will tell with our little Emma, but for Ada we will continue letting her do her thing.  But this weekend I hope I can convince her to make some flowers for the front window- I'm sick of looking at snowflakes and need a little spring inspiration.  

Rainbow Tree

For some reason I love rainbows.  Maybe it's because I had a childhood cat named Rainbow.  Maybe it's because my mom's Chevelle from when I was little had an awesome rainbow sticker on the rear window.  Maybe they're just super cool.  Whatever, I love them.

St. Patrick'sDay has brought a slew of rainbow themed crafty things to do on Pinterest.  With yesterday's 60 degree March day in Minnesota we decided to head out and rainbow-ify the tree in our back yard.  I read about doing this using chalk that's been soaked in water so we pulled some old yogurt containers and soaked some sidewalk chalk before naptime so we could go out when everyone woke up.

The result was pretty cool and I imagine we'll be doing more of this as the weather warms up.

After a while we ended up in the driveway making sharks and turtles and ducks and "A"s and "E"s.  Em helped a little, but mostly sat on the edge of the driveway drinking water while wearing her necklace.  This kid has totally stolen my heart.  Look at those eyes!

Other stuff we do

I was recently trying to think of things we do around here to give a friend some ideas for fairly stationary activities for her daughter to do while she's on bedrest with baby #2.  It got me thinking I should put some of that stuff up here.

We do loads of craft stuff.  We have 2 of those itso boxes from target that have shelves and trays of different things.  It's stacked and on wheels next to the children's table in the living room and the girls have access to it anytime.  It's a great self-occupier when I need to get dinner ready or something.  Plus they love it.
*Stuff that stays all the time:  plain paper, dabbo markers, play dough, watercolor paints, dry erase letter/ number practice tracing books.
*Stuff that rotates: stamps, stickers, glue/ collage work, special projects (like the Valentine cards)

Probably my favorite "toy" I've made was out of a desire to have one of these object permanence boxes but being unwilling to spend that kind of $$ on a box.  C'mon people.  When this box came into our house the yankee in me knew it had another purpose I just needed to come up with it.  It landed in the office until it hit me one day.  I simply closed the box, wrapped it in white contact paper then used my exacto knife to cut a door and a circle hole on top.  The door was going to get a fancy adorable handle, but has a little loop of ribbon instead.

Emma uses it fairly regularly and it's actually nice that the handle is so little because it helps her strengthen her little pincer grasp.

And sometimes you just need to take a break and kiss your big sister.

Another nice activity that I put together after going to a "Montessori at home" night at Ada's school is a leaf polishing tray.  It used to live in a tray, but after getting a card from a dear friend that had a cute little plant on it I decided to put it in a box with that label on it.  It's a pretty common Montessori activity and I like it because the plants need to get cleaned off and it gives them practice on being gentle with plants.

In the box is a small pitcher (so you can control how much water they are using).  This one has a little chip in it, but I bought it in Sicily and it makes me happy that it gets used rather than just sitting somewhere.  There's a small sponge and 2 little dishes.  One for pouring the water in and one for squeezing the sponge into.

I just fill up the little pitcher and give it all the girl who is using it and give them a plant that needs some attention.  Then they pour the water, wet the sponge, squeeze it our and start wiping the leaves.  Good stuff.

So far Emma mostly just goes through the motions, but she enjoys doing this work.  

Recent outings

With Tony's hours what they are we have tried to make a conscious effort to make the most of the time we have together as a whole family.  After our vacation we have been trying to keep the ball rolling with doing some sort of outing on Sundays when he is off.

We recently got a babysitter for Em and took Ada to see her first live performance.  It was really intended to be her birthday present, but arrived in February.  One of my mom's great friends gave Ada a book when she was born calle Harold and the Purple Crayon which is a stellar book.  We read it a lot and it's one of the books Ada will sometimes "read".  When I saw it was being performed in the cities at the Children's Theatre Company it seemed like the perfect introduction for her, plus it was a nice thing for us to do as a mama, papa, Ada date.  SHE LOVED IT!

We have also loved using our membership to the Minnesota Children's museum.  It's totally worth the drive and the girls love it.  We spent most of our time in 2 rooms and didn't even touch about half of the museum.  This was one of my favorite visits since we've been here.

Didn't take many pics, but here are some highlights.

Building a trolley...

Playing with some water...

Looking at xrays...

Review...

The whole family...