Puzzle Problems

Addilyn loves puzzels, but she is at the stage where the traditional 25-100 piece puzzles are too hard for her but the kiddy ones with the knobs are too easy.  What's a mom to do?  Then it hit me.  I would take a few of her "big-girl" puzzles and make them "little-girl" friendly.  It's so easy that I was suprized I had not thought of it sooner.  All I did was remove one piece of the puzzle at a time and trace around the edges with a sharpie marker.  Once I had traced every piece I removed them all and let Addi try her new and improved puzzle.  It worked perfectly!  By drawing the shape of the missing piece on the background  it helped Addi make a decision on which one fit in that spot.  It really made all the difference.  Instead of having a frustrated little girl asking me "Where this one go? where this one go?" I had a perfectly happy and content puzzle-putter-together.

The Ernie puzzle and the Big Bird/Elmo puzzles were especially hard because they have all straight edge pieces, unlike typical puzzles.  Not any more...now they are perfect for my little one who is becoming great at matching irregular shapes!

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Counting Cards

This is another really easy busy bag to make.  You can use card stock, index cards, construction paper, or whatever you want.  You draw a numeral (or use a sticker like I did) on one set of the cards and draw pictures or use stickers on the other set of cards.  The goal is to get your child to count and match the cards together correctly.  I only made this set up to five but you can go as high as you would like.  Also, you could add a set where the number is spelled out (i.e. one, two, three, etc.).

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Bottle Top Matching Game

This is one of the easiest busy bags I've ever made and you can make so many variations it's amazing!  First, I throughly cleaned the bottle top lids and let them dry.  Then I placed matching round stickers on the caps.  That's it.  With younger toddlers you can play a simple matching game to see if they can identify which ones have the same picture.  With older toddlers you can turn over the caps and play the memory game.  So simple, and so fun!

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Egg-citing Games

Who knew a dozen plastic eggs could provide so much entertainment?  This set has instructions for seven different games!  Yep SEVEN!!!  

I bought a pack of 36 bold plastic eggs and another pack of pastel plastic eggs for $1.98 each.  You don't have to buy that many eggs but I was planning on making some sets for a few of our friends and I also wanted some left over eggs for some Easter activities. 

I typed up some simple directions and printed them on index cards, which fit perfectly in the top portion of the egg carton.  The first three games are super simple.  To clarify the 3rd game, the child would match the dark purple and light purple, the dark pink and light pick, etc.

Game 1

The last four games require a few extra components.  You can use whatever manipulatives you want.  I just used some things I had lying around the house.  Just make sure if you have a little one who is still putting things in their mouth that you pick larger objects.

Game 4

Game 5

Game 6

Game 7

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We love because God first loved us!

Most people in our culture could not tell you the history or origin of Valentines.  Most would not know the story of St.Valentine who was imprisoned for performing weddings for soldiers and ministering to Christians being persecuted under the Roman Empire.  Most would not know that the day was also celebrated as a fertility festival with rather risqué elements that I won't go into here. However, to most individuals, Valentines has become a day to celebrate the idea of love.  Weather it's flowers, candy, a nice dinner these things are meant to be shared with those who are special to you.  So, regardless if it's origins are nobel or revolve around pagan rituals, and despite our societies transformation of the day into a "Hallmark holiday," in our house we celebrate Valentines as a day to focus on LOVE.  True love.   Love that comes from the Creator God himself!  Last year, when Addi was one we told her over and over again "God is Love"  (1 John 4:8).  This year our verse was 1 John 4:19, "We love because God first loved us."  We made a point to teach Addilyn that the only reason we can love others is because God has shown us love.    Some other verses we read together and tried to live out included:

• Deut 6:5- Love the Lord your God with all your heart!
• 1 Cor 13:4a - Love is patient, love is kind. (This is how we can put love into action)
• Matthew 22:36-29  Which is the great commandment? “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. (This is why we sent cards to others and hosted a party)

Here are pictures from our fun week trying to remember God's love for us and striving to love others from the overflow. 

These were cards we sent to grandparents and great grandparents.  On my mom's side of the family we always used the sign for "I love you" when leaving the house so when I saw this idea on Pinterest I couldn't pass it up!

This was the card we sent to Addi's great-great grandmother! Underneath all the pieces there really is a heart, I promise.  ;)

Addilyn made a heart butterfly to give to her Daddy.  So sweet!

Some of our friends who live pretty far away are going through a tremendous life change in their family by taking in a few foster children who desperately need love.  We collected letters, notes, and scriptures from others who knew them before they moved and put it into a Valentines care package. 

This is our Valentines morning breakfast tradition.  We LOVE cinnamon rolls in our house!

Addi and Siah had almost 20 friends coming over for their Valentines party so I thought we needs a few yummy treats to share with everyone.  Here is a homemade heart-shaped cookie cake.  I was so gooey when  took it out of the oven and began to crumble on the left side, but my oh my did it taste good.  

There was at least one friend who could not eat chocolate so of course I had to make another dessert so he could have some too, right?  It gave me a great excuse to make a homemade red velvet cake with homemade cream cheese icing.  I love baking, but feel I need excuse to do it.  This was my chance!

Since the party started around 10:00 I thought it might be good to have a few breakfasty items.  This was my attempt at at tray of raspberry danish bites and heart-shaped wild berry muffins. I think the muffins turned out rather silly looking, but oh well.

We had a fruit bowl full of heart-shaped strawberries and bananas.

Addi was thrilled to decorate for her party. She put decorations on the table...

...and sprinkled silk flower petals and heart garland all along the food counter.

For lunch, I could not pass up the opportunity to provide bagel pizzas with heart-shaped pepperonis.  So fun!

All the children helped make cards for a few ladies in our neighborhood.  They colored and used tons of stickers to really make the cards stand out.  I wish I would have taken pictures of a few of them.  They really were beautiful.  In addition to craft time, we also had game time.  I had made some Valentines busy bags for Addilyn and Josiah to play with and I pulled them out at the party to keep some of the kids entertained.  All in all I think everyone had a good time.

Heart size and color matching. 

Broken heart sticker counting.

Size sorting.

Cookie cutter match.

Candy heart pattern matching.

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Letter of the Week - Letter M

Letter M week was full of all sorts of fun!  Addi learned about everything from monkeys, to mountains, to magnets, and much much more!  Here is our curriculum for the week and a few pictures from some of the activities we did.

I forgot to take a picture of a bunch of the books we had borrowed from the library.  Here are the ones we had left when I finally remembered to pull out my camera.

Handwriting practice.

One day we made capital M Mountains.

Another day we made capital M Mosaics.

We made a lowercase m with marshmallows and ate a few for a snack too.

We played with magnets.  This was one of the 6-7 games we played with magnets.  Addi thinks they are just the neatest thing ever.

I love how in this picture you can see her sounding out the letter m.

We did lots of little monkey activities.  Her was a mask she made.

We also played some matching games.  For this particular one, I gave Addilyn a set of children's playing cards with the numbers 1 though 13 (pretty convenient since our number of the week is 13) and had her match the characters on the cards.

I also made another matching game from scrapbook paper and had Addi match the mittens together.

Addi painted a mouse.

And then we made a mouse.

Addi painted on a mirror with shaving cream which was also really fun.  Well, it was fun after I found her a paint brush.  She didn't like the feeling of the shaving cream on her fingers today.

We did a little marble painting. Thank you Pinterest for the idea on this one!

And least, but not least, we took out letters from letter l week and we learned about the mail.  Addi matched the letters with their correct envelope.  We addressed the letters, put a stamp on them, and then took them to the post office.  I wanted to see if we could get a tour of the mail center so the kids could see the process, but you have to contact the local postmaster several weeks in advance to do that.  Maybe next year!

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