Barnyard Dance

There are times that I wish I carried my camera on me at ALL times so that I could get pictures of the simplest things that mean so much to me!  I don't want the photos for my blog or Facebook, I want them for myself, so that in future years I can remember the precious times that were so normal and at the same time so special!  For those times that I don't have a camera, I try to write them down to remember.  Unfortunately, there are many times I forget to write them down, but today is not one of them!

Today my post doesn't include any photos, but it includes a memory that I will cherish for a long time and I am thankful that this blog will help me remember it!

While getting my daughter dressed this morning, my three year old came into her room.  He went to her bookshelf and grabbed the book Barnyard Dance by Sandra Boynton.  He sat down next to her changing table and started "reading" the book to himself.  We haven't read this book in a long time, so his rendition started with, "The pig didn't want to play with the horse."  "The cow didn't want to play with the sheep."  He kept turning the pages and when I was done changing my daughter, the three of us sat on the floor in the middle of the room and read Barnyard Dance.

Of course, if you have read Barnyard Dance, you will know that this book doesn't lend itself to sitting on the floor.  By the time we had finished the first page, we were skittering like mice, sliding with the sheep, and twirling with the pigs.  I loved watching my son put his hand behind his back as he bowed!

We had so much fun!  My son learned what it meant to strut, bounce, and twirl.  My daughter got a good laugh out of our silly dancing, and I got a stress free 10 minutes that included two of my favorite things: my kids and a book!

The Night Before Kindergarten

I recently participated in the Love Books Summer Book Exchange hosted by The Educator's Spin On It and had such a great time that I thought it might be fun to do something similar in our neighborhood.

The idea was to take a group of six families in our area and pair them up to exchange books and activities.  I sent out the email to my friends and I was unsure of the response I would get, but everyone was interested and excited!  I decided to set up a school themed book exchange so everyone would have a starting point!  I certainly didn't want people to be intimidated by this project!

Here are some of the guidelines we set up for our Back to School Book Exchange!

1.  Choose a school based book (new or used).

2.  Create a project or two to go along with the book.  Send enough supplies for all kids in the family to participate.  Of course, we left out supplies that we knew our friends would have.

3.  Deliver it to our book buddies before July 27.

4.  Complete the delivered book package with our own families before our celebration (aka playdate).

I had a lot of fun planning our book exchange for our friends!  Our book buddies included a 6 year old boy, 4 year old girl, and 2 year old boy.  The six year old is starting kindergarten in a few weeks, so the book we chose was The Night Before Kindergarten by Natasha Wing.

The Night Before Kindergarten is a story told in the same rhyming pattern as The Night Before Christmas, but follows children as they get ready for school and then go to their new classroom.  In the first pages there are visions of school supplies dancing in the children's heads.  The last few pages of the book touch on how it is sometimes harder for the parents to leave the kids than it is for the kids to leave the parents, and in my experience so far, I find this to be SO true!

Here are the activities I included in the book package along with the book.

Activity Number One

Pillow Cases

I sent three pillowcases with some paint.  This activity included decorating a pillowcase to use on the night before kindergarten.  I included a few ideas like making a hand print, stamping apples, and painting their names on the pillowcases.

Activity Number Two

Countdown to Kindergarten Chain

I included a calendar and scrapbook paper so that the kids could count how many days until kindergarten starts and then make their own countdown chain.

Activity Number Three

Brownie Chalkboards

I know that this family loves to bake so I wanted to include something that involved cooking.  I included a box of brownies with some white icing.  The idea was to make brownie chalkboards and use the icing as "chalk".  I included some ideas for decorating from Betty Crocker's website.  The chalkboards pictured on the website are white, but I thought the dark background was more authentic!

I sure hope our book buddies have as much fun with their book package as we did with theirs!  Here is a sneak peek into what the book package we had delivered to our house included.  Isn't it adorable?

For more book package ideas check out our Zoomer book package that we sent out for the Summer Love Books Book Exchange and for even more book related activities follow our Facebook page!

Hiking

We spent the last half of our week at a state park and had a wonderful time!  While we were there we...

Missed the Waterfalls! :-(

Spent Quality Time Together Without Distractions!

Felt Small!

Spotted a Bald Eagle!

Walked Among Many Trees and Searched for the Perfect Stick!

Hiked to 6 Different Canyons!

Looked for Good Skipping Stones!

Climbed Steep Hills!

Jumped Off of Logs!

Found Lots of Bugs!

Last year we went on a trip to the same state park and before we went I found My First Hike at the library to take along with us.  Before we left this year, I made sure to check out the same book!  

My First Hike by Catherine Maria Woolf is a board book that tells the story of a grandpa who takes his grandkids on a hike.  At the beginning of the story the little boy doesn't want to go for a hike, but the bluebird, plants, leaves, spider, waterfall, and animals change his mind.  This book has charming pictures that illustrate a family enjoying the simple joys found in nature!  

Talk Oscar, Please!

Can you believe it was already time to turn in our completed summer reading to our library this week?  The summer has gone by so fast, and I am dreading the start of school in a few weeks.  I wish our summer was a little longer, but I know that we have made sure we have enjoyed it as much as possible.

One of the prizes from our summer reading program at the library was a free book for each child that participated.  My six year old was so excited to look through the big basket of books to find his prize!

  He quickly picked out a book about a dog.  He chose Talk, Oscar, Please! by Karen Kaufman Orloff and told me "I love books with dogs!"

When we got home he was very happy to have a bag full of new chapter books, a couple of movies, and his free book!  It was one of the three books he chose to read tonight and it was a very sweet!

Talk, Oscar, Please! is a book about a little boy who wishes that his dog could talk.  He imagines what it would be like to go to school, hike, and visit a restaurant with his talking dog.  The illustrations in this book are delightful and by the time you are done reading you will wish you had a dog as cute as Oscar, or if you already do, you will want to give your dog a hug!

Peek-a-Boo

Baby Says Peekaboo! is a DK Publishing board book.  This book is a touch and feel book and lift the flap book!  On each page babies can lift up a beach ball or hat to find the baby that is hiding.  The pages are VERY durable and the photographs are bright and colorful.  I have read this book with all three of my children and it is still in terrific shape.  We have MANY of these lift the flap books and love them all!  

During some very rare quiet girl time in our house last night, I decided to take this book off the shelf for Baby Girl. 

While we read, she loved looking at the pictures of the babies and tried her very best to lift all of the flaps.  We also played a fun game of peek-a-boo after we read and had so much fun in our quiet empty house...for 20 minutes!

Catching Lightning Bugs

We have done a great job of keeping up with our summer leap lists.  I am happy that we kept our lists short and simple because they have reminded us of things to do when we have a free day, but they haven't kept us feeling like the list was something we could never complete.

One of the things my six year old had on his summer leap list was catching lightning bugs!  I remember staying out late to catch lightning bus when I was little, and I remember seeing LOTS of lightning bugs.

Can you believe we only saw one?  Luckily we were able to catch him!

The boys put him in their bug container, but were pretty upset that there is such a limited amount of lightning bugs this year!  We may have to give it one more try this summer, but for now, at least we can mark catch A lighting bug off of our summer leap list.

Before we went outside to catch lightning bugs, we read the book, Summer Days and Nights by Wong Hebert Yee.  In Summer Days and Nights, you follow a young girl through her very busy day filled by chasing butterflies, a picnic, playing at the park, and a moonlit walk.  The author captures all of the simple joys of summer in one book!

Slime

At the beginning of the summer my son picked out this great series of books for beginning readers that give directions for different science experiments.  We had such a great time making a tornado in a bottle

that we knew we needed to try another book!  We found How to Make Slime by Lori Shores.

How to Make Slime is a great book for new readers because of the large photographs and large text.  It is great for little ones to follow along with directions.  Unfortunately, I think I chose the wrong time of the day for this project and my six year old was a little too anxious to get this project going, and it didn't go as well as it could have.

We started off well with measuring and following directions.

When Daddy came home I walked away from the table and all of the corn starch went in at once.  This messed up the consistency!

The other problem...mom didn't buy enough corn starch!  Ooops!  

We still want to try out the slime.  In fact, my six year old asked me if we could try again just a few days ago.  I would love to try again as long as we take our time and have enough corn starch!

Villain Soup

About a week ago my six year old had a friend over and they spent a lot of time dressing up like their favorite Skylanders, playing video games, drawing, AND making villain soup!  To make villain soup they headed outside and started adding all sorts of "poisonous" things to their villain soup.  Their plan was to defeat the villains by feeding them some soup.  They added rocks, plants, grass, sticks, and bubbles to their soup.  The bubbles made the soup smell very good, maybe that was their plan to attract the villains to the soup lol.

I loved watching them come up with all of their play ideas on their own!  The kids had a lot of fun creating their concoction.  It reminded me of when I used to make "perfume" from all kinds of plants and flowers outside.

We have been back to reading lots of Super Hero books again.  I always have mixed feelings about super hero books, but this book about team work is one that my son enjoys reading and I really like the lesson from the story.  Marvel Super Hero Squad: Team Spirit! by Lucy Rosen is a story of three super heroes that enjoy working together to beat the villains, but learn that they can work just as well with other members of the squad too.

Pets I Wouldn't Pick

There are a few books that I can vividly remember reading when I was little!  They were all from the same book club that my mom had signed me up for and I still have them for my kids!  One was But No Elephants by Jerry Smath and another was Pets I Wouldn't Pick by Susan Alton Schmeltz.  Since, we have added a couple of fish to our family I thought it would be a good time to bring out this hilarious pet book.

Pets I Wouldn't Pick is a silly rhyming book full of animals that the main character thinks would not make good pets.  The girl in the book lists animals such as frogs, mice, elephants, and crocodiles.  For each animal she gives plenty of reasons to stay away from them!  After reading all of her advice, you may be very surprised by the animal that she decides to keep as a pet!

My three year old giggled throughout the whole story and enjoyed the friendly illustrations.  Even though the animals might not be animals you would want in your house, they are still very cute!  My son loved the muddy pig in the bathtub, the moles digging holes, and the sticky bear sleeping in bed.  After reading, I asked him what animals he would like to have as a pet.  He came up with some interesting ideas. My favorite...a whale!

As a quick and simple project to calm the boys down before bed, we decided to make posters of animals that we would like to have as pets, and animals that we wouldn't want to have as pets!

I grabbed all of our magazines, some crayons, glue, paper, and scissors.

We started cutting and gluing animals that we would want on our "yes" pages and animals we wouldn't want on our "no" pages.  My three year old decided that every animal he saw, he wanted as a pet.  He may not have learned about what animals would make good pets, but he did get some good scissor practice in!

 He decided right at the end that he wouldn't want a bee as a pet!  Unfortunately, the bee got chopped in two with the scissors, and we had a little three year old meltdown. Daddy came to the rescue and did some bee surgery so the bee was as good as new!

My six year old did a great job looking through the magazines and wanted to make sure that he had an equal number of "yes" animals and "no" animals.

Here is my six year old's finished project.  He wanted to talk to me about his choices before he went to bed, so we took his posters to his room and went over all of the animals before we read our books.  I agree that I wouldn't want a skunk as a pet, but a panda living in our house?  No way! :-)

Our New Pet Fish

Meet Zoomer!

Meet Kipper!

About a week ago we added two family pets to our household! We did this as part of our reward for keeping our rooms clean the week prior.  Their names are Kipper and Zoomer and the boys have been taking good care of them.  They love checking on them every morning.  Zoomer lives up to his name since he loves to swim around the tank quickly.  Kipper is a little more relaxed and is seen hiding by the dragon in our tank a lot.  Unfortunately, it looks as though Zoomer's tail isn't doing so well.  I hope he is ok, but we are all a little worried about him!

While picking out our fish we learned that it is best to set up a tank first before taking our fish home...I didn't do this when I was little, but we took the advice and bought all of our supplies before the fish.  The boys were very patient in setting up the tank without any fish, but they were more than ready after a day of waiting!  At the pet store we saw guinea pigs, hamsters, cats, and dogs!  It was quite an experience and a nice little field trip for the day.

We have had our fish for a week and are enjoying watching them everyday!  The boys have even learned to tell the difference between them!

Today before EVERYONE in the family took a two and a half hour nap, I read the Usborne book, Pets by Sarah Khan.   This is a great introduction to pets for little ones.  The photographs are interesting, there are plenty of facts, and the flaps make it interactive for the little ones.  My three year old loved looking at all of the pets.  In fact, he remembered seeing all of the pets that are in the book from our trip to the pet store.  We read about hamsters, gerbils, fish, dogs, cats, and rabbits.  The first page was all about guinea pigs and my three year old let me know right away that he doesn't like guinea pigs!  There is a lot of information on each page, but it is spread across the pages and makes it easy to read just a few sentences per page, so my son didn't get overwhelmed by the length.

In The Pond

One of my very favorite experiences with my boys is catching tadpoles!  I remember the first time my oldest son caught a tadpole, and thought it was so neat.  I probably thought that because it was something I had never experienced before!  Having kids has definitely made me feel as though I need to give my kids as many experiences as possible for them to learn, grow confidence, and just enjoy being a kid!

For a new experience for my three year old this summer, we visited our arboretum.  While there we walked barefoot through the tadpole pond to catch tadpoles.  

The look on my three year old's face the first time he caught a tadpole on his own was priceless.  We let them swim in our hands that were filled with water, just for a second, and we put them right back in the pond.  

After catching tadpoles and talking about how they develop into frogs, we came home and read the In The Pond by Anna Milbourne and Mat Russell.  I enjoy reading these Usborne picture books not just for the fact that they are filled with lots of information, but also because the illustrations and presentation keep it from feeling like a non-fiction read!  In The Pond is filled with all kinds of animals you find at a pond. We see snails, swans, ducks, dragonflies, and my son's favorite is a large fish that tries to eat some of the tadpoles.  The greatest part about this book is that while it takes you through the pond, you also follow the life cycle of a frog!

Play Ball!

Play Ball with Me! by Lynn Reiser is another one of those books that I feel so lucky to have found at the library!  My three year old and I had a wonderful time reading it together!  Play Ball With Me! is a book that allows the reader to guess which sport the cat is playing at the park.  There is a flap on each page that you lift up to find the answer.  My son loved looking at the picture clue and then screaming the answer before we turned the page.  On the opposite side of the page is a picture list of all of the clothes and equipment that go with that sport.  The front cover of this book even has a paper doll and sports clothes that you can photocopy for your kids to color and play with!  Such a fun book for little ones!  It will make you want to run outside and play ball with your kids.

After reading Play Ball With Me!, we made some simple sports crafts.

I put out paper plates, paint and paintbrushes, and a few other supplies and had the boys make their own soccer balls and basketballs.

My three year old started with an orange soccer ball.

He glued some black hexagons that I traced from a pattern block onto the paper plate.

We all sat at the table and painted for a while.  It was one of those enjoyable and quiet moments after a very busy day. 

The boys wanted to make a red, blue and orange soccer ball and a blue basketball.  I decided to stick with a baseball, white and black soccer ball, and a football.  The boys told me I was boring.  I kind of agree!

Be sure to follow along with our 366 day long journey at our Adventures in Reading with Kids Facebook page for more book suggestions and related activities!

Farm Fun Baby Pool

Today was HOT!  Even though we couldn't go to the pool, we made sure we fit some water fun into our day.  We filled up two pools in the backyard.  Baby Girl and I had so much fun playing in her little pool!  Before she started playing, I grabbed one of her bath books and a bunch of related toys to go in it.  I guess you could call this farm themed baby pool fun!

Farm Fun! is a bath book made by ALEX.  It is a waterproof book shaped like a barn.  Inside you find pigs, a cow, sheep, and a rooster.  The sounds of each animal are shared on each page, and my daughter seems to love the little door on the cover of the barn.

We usually play with this book in the bath tub, but not today!  Today the farm book was thrown in the pool along with a bunch of plastic farm animals.  Baby Girl had a great time!  

She of course wanted to eat most of the animals.

Reaching for the animals seemed to be fun.  She certainly wasn't afraid to get wet!

We even made some animals float on the book.

Later on, Big Brother joined her in the pool.  He made some farm animal sounds while they played.  So sweet!

This was so simple and fun!  I am thinking I should try this with the boys...maybe a pirate theme?