Crafting and kids.
As promised, here’s a fun summery layout. Of course the pictures are from January, but to be fair we were playing in the water table. 🙂
I had a blast playing with my new The Pier goodies! Man, I love this line.
I added in some of this fun washi tape and these wood veneer stars.
This title was not quite what I was expecting when I ordered the pack, but I think it’s growing on me. 🙂
I’ll post a layout this afternoon. Raptor and I are headed out to the pool at present. 🙂
And the tradition continues. 🙂
I love this tradition. I wonder how long she’ll let me get away with it…
And an outtake. In which Kate demonstrates her disdain for my photography skills. lol.
We should be starting G is for Garden today, but we’re having so much fun with the frogs that we’re going to stick with them for one more week. Love that we have the flexibility to do that. 🙂
I spilled a brand new pack of teeny tiny wood veneers all over my floor the other day. After I finished cursing, I realized that I needed to find a better storage solution for these. I actually have some single layer small tackle box things that I used to use when I sorted all of my embellishments by color. Since I haven’t opened them in years, it seemed like I should repurpose them. 🙂 When I opened the first one up, I found tons of fun fiber from a million years ago. Score! I decided to use it on my next layout.
I layered a bunch of ribbon and fibers to make a frame around this photo and then stapled them in place. I really wanted to use 2 of my slide frames on other photos so I knew that I needed something to make this focal point picture stand out even more. The ribbon was perfect. I used to use this technique all the time and it was super fun to do it again.
I love these slide frames from The Pier! I’m actually getting another big order of stuff this weekend and most of it is from The Pier collection. I’m so excited!
I used the cut apart sheet for this journaling card.
And here’s the finished page. It fought me a bit as I was putting it together, but in the end I really like it.
I found some new digital printables! Y’all, I even broke down and paid for these they were so cute. 🙂 I ended up getting Candy Shop and Bright Basics. Precious.
Of course, I changed them up a bit and I also included some of the cards that I already had. Still loving this project!
Time for a new Letter of the Week! We’re doing F is for Frog and I’m pretty excited because I found these really cute little frog bulletin board accents at the teacher store.
We’re doing a fair amount of math this week. First up are these counters for E (3.5). She wasn’t that into the elephants last week so I found some 3D frogs and only did 1-5 instead of 1-10.
Then I have some addition for A (almost 6) and Raptor (almost 4).
I also have some tracing work for Raptor to practice forming her numbers.
I made up some sight words that go along with The Cat in the Hat. Not frog related, but Raptor recently told me that it was her favorite book. 🙂 This week we’re doing CAT, HAT, THE, ONE, TWO, and NOW. Each word is a different color to make it a little easier to complete.
She also keeps asking about the color wheel and primary and secondary colors. Since these frogs came in rainbow colors, I thought we could practice putting them in order. I also checked out a kids’ book on color from the library. A loves rainbows too so I thought this could be fun.
“I can do it!” Words that strike fear into the hearts of preschool parents everywhere. 🙂 I had a lot of fun with this layout. Supplies are all from Crate Paper’s The Pier aside from the wood veneer butterflies, washi tape, ink, and mists. Can I just say again how much I love this line of paper? I have a feeling I’m going to be ordering more very soon. 🙂
I was a but stumped on how to adhere the letter tiles, but I settled for stapling them. My stapler wasn’t big enough to reach the middle of the page, so I opened the stapler up and bunched up some fabric underneath. Then I stapled into the fabric (like when you staple things to the wall?) and bent the ends over. Clear as mud? I’m not sure why I’m even trying to explain this. Everyone knows how to do this. lol.
Lots of blurring this week. I should really try to remember to ask Kate’s friends’ moms if they mind their kids being on the blog. lol.
That middle picture was taken underwater. I can’t decide if it’s awesome or creepy.
It’s been a while since we did letter of the week, but now that Raptor and the girls are out of school for the summer it seemed like time to buckle down and plan a few more. Next up, E is for Elephant! Inspiration and credit for the cute elephant belong to this awesome blog.
I made 4 trays this week plus our sandpaper numbers (0-10) and letters (E e)which I’m leaving out.
First up are these sequencing elephants. There are actually 5, but I couldn’t get them all in the picture.
Next up are basic numbers and counters, elephant style. It would be obvious to use cutouts of peanuts for the counters, but E is allergic to peanuts so it seemed unwise to use them as part of a game even if they were the paper variety. After a facebook poll, I decided to go with umbrellas instead. I doubt that Raptor will want to do much with these as she’s pretty much mastered them, but I think they’ll be perfect for E (3 1/2).
Now for some math for A (5) and Raptor (almost 4.) This will likely be too easy for A who just finished kindergarten, but I thought it would be a fun confidence builder. Raptor’s preschool teacher told me that she was working on addition (wow) so I figured I’d see what she could do. I haven’t gone all out and made the little board like they use. If this is too hard for Raptor I’ll work on it this week. As I understand it, she’ll add it using the elephants. (So for this problem, she’d lay out 6, then lay out 3, then count them all, and write down the answer.) I’m going to ask her to give me a “lesson” and see how it goes. I laminated this so that the girls could do it over and over.
Last tray is just some wooden blocks and rods that I found at Hobby Lobby. I figured the girls could match the colors and then work on some fine motor skills putting the rods through the holes.
I’m going to try something new this summer and try to do circle time in the mornings when the girls get here. They’re all used to school now so I think they’ll like it. I’m thinking of reading a book and then singing a song. We might only last a week. 🙂
I kept it a bit more simple this week since I’m in catch up mode.
And yes, that card actually has text.
In other news, I sat down with the girls to make a summer bucket list. We went around in a circle and took turns naming things we wanted to do. Are you ready?
I’ve come to 2 conclusions. First, kids are really easy to please. Second, I’m going to have to add some stuff to our bucket list or I’m going to get bored. lol.