Summer Love Books Exchange

Let me tell you I was SOOOO excited to participate in the

Summer Love Books Exchange (hosted by The Educators Spin On It).

It was crazy,

I was totally like a little 5 year old the night before Christmas

waiting to receive our package in the mail.

Ok so now, you are wondering what I am talking about, huh?

I’m getting ahead of myself with all this anticipation,
let me back up a bit.

I was blog cruising one morning and came across this post

  over at The Educators Spin On It.

Instantly, I was like, Oh, Me ME ME I wanna play!

and you know maybe Bam Bam will enjoy it too
 :-)

The idea is you choose a book,

gather the supplies to complete a related activity,

then package it up and ship it to another family.

You get a similar package in return.

So here we are.

I got a box in the mail!!!

Ur… I mean…Bam Bam got a box in the mail!

From Mrs. Mandy and her girls over at I Can Do That! So Can You…

What’s inside?! What’s inside?!

Well lets just take a look….

A spatula!!! :-)

and a duck

This is as far as we got for a couple days.

Later in the week….

I read the book we received

Raffi Songs To Read

Five Little Ducks

I put some magnet tape on the back of the cute duck puzzles included in our package

(from owensfamily-gwyn.blogspot.com)

“BAAACCCKKK” (his version of quack)

We hadn’t used our dot-a-dot markers recently,

so I set those out with the paper to make

Five Little Ducks (& a Momma duck too) puppets

(from mamasmiles.com)

Butterfly came over to see what was going on

After he was finished coloring his, I cut them out

while he decided to color Butterfly’s ducks as well

When they were ready Bam Bam put some glue on the end of craft sticks and attached the ducks

and I am sure the idea was to play with the duck puppets when complete,

maybe even act out the story…

but Bam Bam only wanted to keep going with the dot-a-dots…

On another day I set out some colored water with the bathtub grippers

and  dropper the ladies had sent

and Butterfly came over to help

He greatly enjoyed this

Mrs. Mandy had suggested that we make duck prints with the spatula…

GREAT IDEA!!! but we haven’t gotten that accomplished so far…

The spatula has been a prized possession for a couple days now,

  he  is not willing to dip it into the (dreaded) paint …

so far…

A little of it is my fault…

we haven’t (yet) painted with many different things other than brushes,

I’m not sure he understands that I want to paint with it (??)

Wasn’t that such great fun!?

Thank you  to Mrs. Mandy and your girls for a fun book and package!

And

Thanks to The Educator’s Spin On It for hosting a great

Summer Love Books Exchange 

If you would like to see who else participated in the Summer Love Books Exchange 

 take a look here to meet the players.

Also, check out their blog posts about the books and activities they received.

Make, Do, & Friend

Taming the Goblin

Growing Book By Book

The Vincent Family

No Doubt Learning

Enchanted Homeschooling Mom
Here Come The Girls
Mommy and Me Book Club
I Can Do That So Can You
Among Many Blessings
Creekside Learning
3 Readers
Adventures In Reading With Kids
Domestic Goddesque
Play Dr. Mom
B-Inspired Mama
The Educators Spin On It

(all have not posted about their packages yet I will update this as more go up)

Thanks for stopping by!

Feel free to leave your thoughts below.

Play-dough Hair Growing Man

Yardsale SCORE!! ;-)

$1.00

He loves this thing, has played with it everyday for over a week!

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Wall Décor From Kiddo Art

Bam Bam and Butterfly made some beautiful paintings.

Lots of them in fact.

(see some more here and here)

 Paintings, dot-a-dot marker art, crayon scribbles
 are all starting to pile up but 

I just can’t bring myself to throw them away

so I’ve been brainstorming ways to display them.

One way I do this is to hang them up in our play room.

(how do I not have a pic of this???

and it’s now taken down 
because we are in the middle of painting the walls :-/..

anyway it’s not super special..
 a string and clothes pins to hang up the master pieces.

I put the new ones up and put the older ones in a file folder.

I grab from there when we need to make birthday cards for close friends and family.

I’m also taking pictures of them and plan to one day 
make a photo book of all the great artwork)

But today I’m sharing with you what I did with a couple of the pieces

(linked above)

I thought of some words to express some of what I want my house filled with

Love

Joy

Peace

  Who doesn't need more of those three in their homes ?

 :-)

Then I Google’d images I thought went along with the words.

I made a MS word document and played around with the fonts.

When I liked the look I printed them out on cardstock then broke out my X-Acto craft knife.

a whiiiiiiiillllllle later, I backed the cut outs with the kids art  and framed them.

I am quite happy with them.

A nice pop of color on my gray walls :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

What kinds of things do you do with the kiddos art work?

Feel free to leave your thoughts/ideas below in the comments.

 

Busy Bag Pom Pom Magnets

When I saw pom pom magnets on the web, I thought they were so cute that we certainly needed a set. So I purchased some colorful pom poms (or make your own tutorial here from Confessions of a Homeschooler) and some magnet buttons, broke out the hot glue gun…and…voila!

Easy and Fun!

Bonus: it’s great for working  fine motor skills, building strength and dexterity in those little fingers.

Sort them by color or size and/or add in some activity sheets and now you're learning too!

Need some free printable activity sheets? take a look here and here

We purchased one of those oil drip pans form Wal-Mart to use as a giant magnet board.

For fun on the go we grab a cookie sheet.

Would you like your very own set of fun pom pom magnets?

Here are some tutorials

Mama Jenn

Raising Knights

Or you could save yourself the hot glue burns :-D and see if I have a set in my No Prep, Just Play! shop on Etsy.
 

Do you already have a set of pom pom magnets? What fun have you been up to with them?
Share in the comments below.

Thanks for stopping in!

**Pom Pom magnets can fit through a toilet paper tube

therefore, they are considered a choking hazard and should be supervised during play.

Magnets can be harmful if swallowed especially if multiple are ingested.

Seek medical attention if this should happen.**

Pom Pom Magnet Activity Sheets (free printables)

I created some activity sheets designed to go with pom pom magnets.

You could also use dot-a-dot markers, stickers, small toys, or just color in the circles..

what ever makes it fun for you and your little.

Here they are  free for you to download

(click on picture to open in Google Docs)

and enjoy for your personal non-profit use.

Looking for black and white?…

Here you go :-)

More to come soon.
Here is round 2 shapes edition!

If you download these please leave me a comment letting me know about the fun you had.
I’d love for you to leave me a link if you blog about them. I’ll come check out all the fun you had.

Thanks! Hope you enjoy them!