Story Bag

We are always reading books, but I thought it would be fun to start creating stories together.  So I bought a bunch of these already painted shapes at Michael's (less than $1 a piece) to guide our stories.  The first time we did this activity, I had Bam pick a shape out of the bag to start the story --he picked a car so the story started..once upon a time we went on a road trip.  Then Bob picked a lighthouse--to see a lighthouse, but we had to get out of the car and hike to the lighthouse.  Each one took a turn.  We enjoyed this activity so much that I want to buy some more.

Egg Game

Both Bam and Bob really like playing with the plastic easter eggs thus I usually remove all eggs from the house shortly after Easter because I get tired of finding them everywhere.  Today we played a fun game which I call the egg game that I saw at the Tired, Need Sleep blog. Basically you roll the colored die to pick an egg stuffed with either a chick or other animal and the person with the most chicks wins. To see how the game is played and to download the free printables (chick, other animals, and color die--we have a large colored die from another game) visit Tired, Need Sleep.  

Learning about Japan part 2

Bam and I made origami talking dogs and sailboats.  Bam really liked making the dog.  Since I didn't have any cute origami paper we used white paper and colored it and glued on eyes.  This was a fun activity.

Although Daddy is home from his Japan trip, we are still talking a lot about Japan.  I showed Bam where  Japan was located on the globe and that it is an island which is a hard concept for him to get.  To help with this we colored a map of Japan.  For some reason he knows that earthquakes occur in Japan so he thought the lines on the map were earthquakes.

Coloring Carnations

Bam added carnations to colored water (gel food coloring).  He was so excited and kept checking on the flowers.  The blue water flowers showed blue on the flower edges within hours of being in the colored water.  The orange water flowers showed very little orange after 24 hours and the green water flowers never showed any green.  So...

   

 Bam redid the experiment using regular food coloring and used blue, orange, and dark purple/black. We cut the same flowers and placed them in the new colored water.  

Overnight the orange water flowers turned yellowish orange and the blue water flowers turn more blue.

The dark purple/black water flowers showed slight coloring on the edges of the flowers after 24 hours.  

Tissue Paper Blending

Cover the poster board with starch then add tissue paper.  Ideally when the different colored tissue papers touch the colors blend.  This project didn't hold Bam's attention for long.  I want to redo this project with him because it is fun and normally he would be into it.

Another idea from we teach.

Learning about Japan

Coloring the Japanese Flag.  I found a website that has flag coloring pages.

In honor of Daddy trying sushi for the first time while in Tokyo, Bam and I made mock sushi using rice crispy treats, gummy worms, and fruit leathers.  Bam liked them while Bob wouldn't even try them.

Exercise

This week the weather was good so we got to be outside every afternoon.  Bob really liked playing t-ball.  I was surprised he could hit the ball so well.

We went to a gymnastics party with the local mother's club and had lots of fun.  Bam really enjoyed this and did a great job with both listening to the teacher and following instructions.  Both boys have been tired every night, yeah.!

Flubber

We added the 3 ingredients plus food coloring to the bag and mixed. But for some reason we were unable to get everything to mix.  We tried twice.  Bam was a little disappointed, luckily Bob woke up from his nap and distracted Bam.  Our flubber experiment will have to wait until another day.

Japanese Gardens

Daddy is heading to Japan next week so we are learning about Japan.  We have checked out some books from the library and today we visited a local Japanese Garden.  The boys had fun feeding the fish, walking through the bamboo forest, and looking at the waterfalls.  More Japanese activities planned for next week.  Plus we hope to make flubber and goop for our science projects this week.

Weekly Roundup

We did several activities this week, just never got around to posting them.


Cutting and Pasting:

These pages are from Let's Cut Paper! (Kumon First Steps Workbooks) and Let's Sticker & Paste! (Kumon First Steps Workbooks).  These books are geared more to 3 yo, but it is still good practice for Bam especially the cutting book.  

St. Patrick's Day Coloring: 

I use the dot to dot and roll and color sheets a lot.  They work for both of the boy's ages--Bam can do the sheets and Bob gets to color the same thing as Bam.

Colored Crystals

Supplies:
rock salt
food coloring
container
cookie sheet

We colored rock salt with food coloring.  Of course, Bam had to have orange so we mixed the red and yellow dyes into the rock salt.  Bam dug right in which surprised me because he did not want to mix the dye into the clay we made last week.  He was very proud of his hands.  Once you get the color you want place the rock salt onto a cookie sheet to dry.  

While Bam and I were dying, Bob found several small containers and was content for a LONG time transferring and dumping the crystals into the containers.
Thanks to gidgetandfroggis mommy's at we teach for posting this idea

Rock Show

I took the boys (and dragged some friends with us) to one of the local rock shows last week.  The kids enjoyed looking at all the rocks on display.  Bam picked out these bottles of rocks for him and Bob.  The show had a bear skeleton on display which fascinated Bam.  He keeps talking about the bear bones.  

jello mini muffins

For some reason my kids will not eat jello in a bowl, but they devour it if it comes out of a mini muffin pan.  Today Bam wanted to cook something with me so we decided to make jello for dessert.  These are very easy to make, dissolve 6 oz of jello in 1 1/3 C boiling water then pour into mini muffin pan.  It makes 24 muffins.  Sometimes I will add fruit such as 1/2 grape or a mandarin orange into each well.  If you want to make 2 different flavors, use a 3 oz jello packet and 2/3 C boiling water for each flavor.  

Mud Soup and Puddle Jumping

Between the am and pm rain storms, we got outside for some fun.  The boys played in a very wet sandbox and were excited to make mud soup.  Also the yard was full of puddles,  perfect for jumping in.

Making and coloring clay

Bam and I made the clay (cornstarch, baking soda, and water) and colored it while Bam was napping.  We divided the clay into 4 balls then mixed food coloring into each one.  Bam was so excited to play with the clay that he wanted to go wake Bob up.  Both boys had a lot of fun playing with the clay.

Thanks to gidget and froggi's mommy for posting this at we teach 

Ice Skater

This is a fun experiment (Bam loves using this word) with ice. The boys pushed the skater across the table and watched it slide and spin as the ice melted.

Fill a dixie cup with about 3/4 full of water. I used a larger cup but the smaller cup matches the younger children's attention span.  Cover the cup with foil, make a hole in the foil, and place a craft stick through the hole.  Place filled cup in freezer.  I colored a little ice skater picture and glued it to the craft stick.  

Bob kept saying uh oh because the ice was melting which was pretty cute.  He also kept trying to dry off the table.  All in all, this was a fun activity.