I know I’m cutting it close this month, but I’ve been swamped! So better late than never is apparently my motto these days! Anyhoo, here’s my October Meal Plan. It’s not too much different than the September 2010 plan but I did swap out some meals that my family didn’t like as much for new ones. Otherwise I kept to a similar schedule. Download October 2010 Meal Plan ~ PDF Download October 2010 Meal Plan ~ Word Mangi! (That means Eat! in Italian, we’re not quite to Italy yet, but I’m Italian and apparently I’m a little excited) … [Read more...]
Sep
29
What’s in the Box Wednesday: Teeny Tot
What’s the Teeny Tiny Tot been up to these days? Workboxes of course! Here’s her line up and some in action: 1. Her new Fisher-Price Laugh & Learn Piggy Bank Numbers Puzzle 2. Bead sorting. I found this tiny ice cube tray at Wal-mart and couldn’t resist getting it for school! It’s the perfect size for sorting little beads into: 3. Felt Strawberries. We used chopsticks to transfer the strawberries to bowls. 4. Dice to stack, roll, toss? 5. Stacking Cups, to, um, stack? 6. Leapfrog Fridge Phonics to drive Mommy crazy. 7. Stickers and paper, this is one of her favorite boxes, she loves to put stickers on things. 8. Pom-poms, bowls and measuring cups to scoop. Coloring book, I did tell her to ‘do it on your desk’, guess she’s a literal type person. Magnets, she loves to put the magnets all over the white board, too bad she doesn’t like to take them back off again! Biggie Beads by Fun Fusion and a Water Bottle. She loved to put … [Read more...]
Sep
28
Expedition Earth ~ South Korea
Ahn-yong-ha-seh-yo! We had a great week learning about South Korea, my preschooler especially liked the song this week, the vibrato was right up her alley! I apologize for the lack of pictures for this week, but the unthinkable happened on day 3…that’s right…I dropped my camera on the hard wood floor and well…let’s just say it’s apparently not okay to do that. First I panicked, next I tried desperately to fix it, then I called my mommy crying and she happened to have a spare camera which she so kindly donated to our cause. Thanks MOM! But despite this sadly lacking in photos post, we did have fun week! We worked on our Animal Unit lapbook components: Here is everyone displaying their favorite animal: We added our animals to the Classification Wall: We did our lapbook activity: And we made jeweled crowns: Here are some more of the things we learned about this week some of which will sadly only exist in our memories now: Completed our Mapping Worksheet Learned … [Read more...]
Sep
27
Letter A for Apple
Since we did upper case letters last year, I thought it would be fun to go back through and do lowercase letters this year! Our first week was the Letter A! Where can you find all my Letter A activities? Download the Letter A for Apple activities! Download the entire Letter of the Week curriculum at once! We put all of the completed letter’s in a fun 3 ring binder so we can read through them as we go! I get most of the ideas for our letters from my wonderfully creative co-writers over at Totally Tots! They have some super cute letter ideas, if you haven’t checked it out yet, make sure to stop over! So here was our page for the letter a. I used red, green and black foam for the letter pieces. We glued all the pieces in order for a sweet little apple a craft! Click here for step by step instructions from Totally Tots! Here are some more of our Letter A activities this week: Sign Language letter A: Numbers review with help from the Teeny Tiny Tot Letter … [Read more...]
Sep
26
Guidecraft ~ MagNeatos!
I’m so excited to announce that I joined up with an awesome group of Mom Bloggers who are teaming up to write reviews for Guide Craft! We’ll be doing lots of reviews and giveaways throughout the year so make sure to stay tuned in! And just to start things off with a bang, we received a super fun set of Magneatos from Guide Craft to review. This set was so much fun, it comes in straight pieces and we recently got the curved set as well. Every one loved playing with this, and it’s particularly friendly for your Teeny Tots since all of the pieces are large! Here is the creation my daughters worked so hard to on: And here it is again…after “help” from the Teeny Tiny Tot Here’s my son calling someone: And here’s the best part! The super nice people at Guide Craft are hosting a Back To School Party with over $1,000 in prizes! How can you enter? Click below for more info! Disclaimer: I received a free set of Magneatos from Guidecraft in order to review the product … [Read more...]
Sep
25
China Craft ~ Paper Lantern
This craft was a fun and easy addition to our China studies this week. Supplies: Construction paper or cardstock Decoration items like jewels, ribbon, markers etc Stapler Instructions: STEP 1: Fold an 8.5 x 11 piece of cardstock in half long ways. Cut horizontal slices every inch starting from the folded side and stopping about 1” from the other end. STEP 2: Cut a 1 x 11 inch strip from another piece of cardstock for the handle STEP 3: Unfold cut paper and decorate as you like: STEP 4: Roll decorated lantern together and staple ends, then staple on handle to inside of lantern. Enjoy! Use the lanterns to decorate your classroom, or dinner table!Click here to see the rest of our China ActivitiesClick here if you’d like to follow along with our Expedition Earth Geography Curriculum Journey! … [Read more...]
Sep
24
China Craft ~ Paper Fans
Ni hao! For our study of China we decided to make paper fans! They were really easy and fun, but make sure to follow the directions, or like me you’ll be adding paper to them to make them work! Supplies: Paper (48 in. x 7 in.) I took 4 sheets of copy paper and glued them together end to end to get the 48” long. Then I cut that to be 7” tall. Markers, crayons, stamps etc to decorate Large popsicle sticks Glue Directions: STEP 1: Decorate your paper. STEP 2: Accordion fold your paper fan STEP 3: Tape around bottom of paper (about 1/2 inch worth) and glue popsicle sticks on each side so that about 1” of the sticks are above the paper line: STEP 4: Unfold and enjoy! (This craft idea was found at Activity Village)Click here to see the rest of our China ActivitiesClick here to see our Expedition Earth Geography Curriculum … [Read more...]
Sep
23
China Craft ~ The Great Wall
This activity was such a fun addition to our China week that I think we’re going to use it for part of our Geography Fair display! We decided to use FloraCraft Styrofoam Bricks and they worked so well, I think we’ll use them again just for fun! Are you tempted? Want to make one? Here’s how: Supplies: FloraCraft Styrofoam Bricks (I used 1 ENTIRE bag for this wall) White Craft Glue Foam Poster Board Fake greenery Cardboard (for the floor of the wall) Toothpicks (to secure stairs on ends of Wall) Directions: STEP 1: Draw 2 parallel curved lines across your poster board and then trace over that with a strip of glue. Place blocks along curve. STEP 2: Put another bead of glue on top of bottom layer of bricks and stagger so bricks aren’t right on top of each other. Repeat until wall is to desired height. STEP 3: Cut cardboard to fit curves of wall and glue on top of the brick layer. STEP 4: Put another layer of bricks on top of the floor (cardboard) layer. And build up castle … [Read more...]
Sep
22
All About Spelling
We just started using All About Spelling this year, and frankly at this point you couldn’t take it from me if you wanted to! Yes, we LOVE it that much! And not only do I love it, but my kids LOVE it! Every now and then I’ll let them pick the order of their workboxes, and I’m not kidding you, unless there’s a candy bar in one of the drawers, they’ll pick the All About Spelling box first every time! Some benefits to All About Spelling: The program is multisensory, approaching spelling through sight, sound, and touch. The lesson plans scripted for you. They are easy to follow and leave nothing out! And it’s not just spelling, it’s a phonics program as well, and they teach all the rules in an easy to follow and understand manner. It works! I can honestly say I’ve noticed an improvement in both my 1st and 2nd grader’s spelling since we’ve started. It’s fun! This is an activity that we do one-on-one and since it involves many different activities, the … [Read more...]
Sep
21
China Craft ~ Handmade Paper
This week for our study of China we made handmade paper! It was surprisingly easy, so if you were fearful, let me assure you that YOU CAN DO IT! Supplies: Blender Shredded or torn paper Water 2 Felt sheets (You will sandwich paper between felts, so if you want to make more than one sheet of paper, you’ll need more felt sheets) Window Screen (I found this small one at Lowe’s) Large plastic basin for water and pulp mixture dishtowels Directions: STEP 1: Fill your blender about half way with shredded paper, then add water to blender until about 3/4 of the way full. STEP 2: Blend paper/water mixture until pulpy STEP 3: Pour LOTS of water in your the large plastic basin then add in blended pulp. Mixture will be very watery. STEP 4: Dip your screen into the water and gently swish under water until pulp is evenly distributed. Carefully lift up screen out of water. If you have a blank spot on your screen, you can start over, or grab a handful of pulp and put it on manually. … [Read more...]
