First week back!

So many new beginnings!

I have moved house, into a lovely little village and very much enjoying country life once again. A house move has resulted in new children starting with me, including a few older ones after school, which is a change of pace!

Days are already going by so fast, I can't believe a whole week of work has passed already! You would think moving to the country would make life slow down but no! There is playbus and toddler group in the week, Bingo every fortnight, Zumba another night of the week (I do want to start getting out to that). We have had a power cut, for which the Mrs actually saw the powerline go up in flames as we were driving past. We've had the council cutting back fallen trees at 11pm. And we're now steaming ahead into another week exploring Chinese New Year.

I had so many things to share as this first week has been a busy one, unfortunately I have just discovered the majority of photos I have taken over the last week have been corrupted and so are worthless! Many cross words have been exchanged between my mobile and I. But lesson learnt; keep my camera with me, do not rely on my mobile!

None the less I thought I would share a few of the highlights from the week, and pictures where I have them!

 We went out on a very muddy walk! Up one of the lanes past the school, we went to find some sheep and horses, but mainly lots of mud and puddles.

 Little 'E' had a bit of trouble staying on her feet, so much slippery mud can make things tricky for little ones, but she did have fun splashing through the puddles anyway.

'W' is a bit bigger and was off ahead with the dogs, he was making big splashes in the puddles, to a point where we had to stop and empty his wellies!

I am discovering 'W' has the most amazing imagination. This week we have been shopping, been on a long train journey, run a restaurant, been firemen saving people from fires, pirates on a ship, we have been in a snow and ice covered land with crocodiles who might eat you, we have hidden in a snow cave, we have been good knights protecting our land from a dragon, we have been Witches, mummies and daddies, and I'm sure many others that I lost track of!!

This week we also enjoyed a sensory 'Winter' tray. This consisted of rice, wooden blocks, a few selected animals, some plastic snowflakes and various scoops and containers.

'E' became engrossed in collecting up the rice, she started out trying some of the scoops but resorted to just grabbing handfuls of rice. She filled containers, poured them into each other, emptied them out and then started all over again.
I have already noticed 'E' is a bit of a collector, a number of occasions this week I have seen her collecting up little bits of toys, finding a bag to put them in or just making a pile. A potential Schema uncovering itself?? This most definitely calls for some exploring in the coming weeks.

'W' was just as intrigued with the sensory tray, his ever present imagination creating a dialog for the Polar Bears and Reindeer. The Reindeer in particular was enjoying rice being poured over it's back. 'W' commented "he likes the feel of that".

With Burns Night on Friday we also spent some time this week exploring Scotland. We looked at the flag and a book on Scotland that talked about castles and the Loch Ness Monster. 'W' and I spoke for some time about why there were no knights in the castles, I explained that we don't really have knights any more, we just have Soldiers and Policemen now. He didn't really like that concept though!

We finished off the week by making some yummy shortbread together and paying a trip to the park to collect some logs to put in the garden.

A Lovely Monday!

Baby 'A' and I had a lovely morning together, we popped out to our local library to get some new books!

He really loves the 'That's not my....' series and always goes straight to where the texture is, even if he's never seen the book before!
We went home with four new books to look at and I'm sure they will be coming out a lot this week!

The librarian also gave baby 'A' a bookstart bear club pack, so each time we go to the library he gets a stamp in is passport, and every six visits he will receive a certificate. He really does love looking at books so I think we will make good use of this!

Then little 'C' arrived after lunch and we headed off for an afternoon of fun with http://wormseye-view.blogspot.com/.

She had a lovely St Patrick's Day treasure basket to explore, baby 'A' spent lots of time looking at all the different things.

Little 'C' joined in exploring the sensory box and found this lovely hair band and rainbow!

Next up was some lovely colourful hand prints....

....which magically turned into.....

LEPRECHAUNS!!!!

I do try not to do too many 'adult focused' activities, especially with very young ones. It's so easy to get caught up in having something to send home for parents. The focus really should be on the process not the product, but sometimes these things are just too cute not to do!! I've got another product focused idea to do this week but it is mother's day so I think I'll get away with it!!

The weather then started to warm up a bit so we decided to spend the rest of the afternoon in the garden

Having a look at new surroundings

Learning how to get around a new environment safely

Playing with Pippa's fantastic outdoor music wall!!

And meeting Pippa's lovely chickens Matilda and Gertrude.....oh mind your fingers!!

Such a lovely start to the week and great to get the kids in the garden! I can't wait for summer to arrive!

Space Week - Part 2

We had a visit from http://wormseye-view.blogspot.com/ later in the week to join in on the fun!
It's summer holidays at the moment so my nephews Brendan and Kenzie came along too, we had quite a house full!

We found another box to put together a third spaceship....but it actually ended up being Geoff from top year...lol the pair of them do make me laugh. Baby 'R' even climbed in for a ride!

Next we needed to finish making the laminated planets for the window display

Some writing practice for the names!

All finished!! It's a bit hard to see in this picture but we also put up some glow in the dark stars, it looks amazing when the sun has gone down in the evenings, unfortunately all the children have gone home by then so it's just for me!

My new space set was a big hit with everyone, even baby 'R' couldn't wait for her turn to have a play!

Another play with the sensory tray, 'C' used the spaceship arm to pick up the beans, great for fine motor skills!

Next we made some space scenes with card rockets on lollypop sticks!

With a little detour to decorate each other....

hehehe

So that was our space week!  I had so much fun planning all these activities and loved watching the children all really get into it. I'm already planning our my next big theme!!

Space Week!! - Part 1

It's was my Birthday week this week, and my partner Georgia has taken the week off work (she works very long days) to be at home with me, unfortunately I was not able to have time off too but I'm planning as much fun as possible with the children so she'll never want to go back to work!

Recently I bought a little 99p book about space and the solar system from a local shop, just because I saw it and thought we didn't really have anything spacey yet! So it was a bit of a surprise when the kids found it and just fell in love with it!
It got to a point in fact that it was comming out everyday and I was being asked questions about the planets and the sun, 'can we go there can we go there?', and was having to sort out squables out about who had it first and whos turn it was!

So following the childrens interests I decided to devote the week to all things SPACE!!

We started off with making some tissue paper laminated planets, 'C' wanted to make the Sun and Earth, and 'I' wanted blues and greens so we made them Neptune and Uranus. These planets became the base to my new window display which was a wok in progress through the week. The children were fascinated watching the sheets go through the laminator and were asking all about how it works!

Next up, was making some of our very own spaceships! I just happened to have a couple of boxes around the house, we drew on the basic spaceship design and then handed them over for the finishing touches!

Once they were all decorated we were ready for a space race around the garden, on your marks....

After that spurt of energy we came back inside to have a look what else there was to do!

I had been getting some ideas together from other blogs on a space sensory tub, mine consists of black eyed beans, marbles, some glow in the dark stars, some pots and scoops for pouring practice, some jigsaw pieces and a globe to have a look at where we are. Theres also a jigsaw book, a 'Pepper Pig' space rocket and the solar system book which started it all off!!
Both 'C' and 'I' had a fantastic time looking through all these bits. 'C' is a bit older and got straight into the jigsaws as he does love a good puzzle, 'I' at just 2 years old was fascinated by the little stars and pots I had put in there and spent ages scooping the beans and digging around.

We finished the day by cooking some 'Planet Cookies' and 'C' spent some time practicing his writing, asking for spacey words which we dot out first. We also had a look on YouTube and found some footage of some real spaceships taking off.

By the end of day one I was very tired and the children were very excited about what I had in mind for the next day!!