Posts Tagged ‘snow’

Who Says It Doesn’t Snow In Africa?

Monday, January 23rd, 2012

If you caught last week’s Toddler School post you will know that we studied the letter W and focused on winter.  I feel that it is important to continue to teach Mikayla about the seasons even if we don’t really have big differences.  Since it is winter back in the states and my friends have been posting all kinds of fun activities they have been doing with their kiddos, I couldn’t pass up the chance to jump in on the fun.  On Sunday we (by we I really mean me, but Ben was a trooper) decided to make it a winter fun day.

We began with a breakfast of snowman pancakes and bacon.  Mikayla had a blast using the sprinkles my grandma sent her for Christmas to decorate her snowman.  And if you look really closely, you will be able to see that she made two eyes and a mouth all by herself!  She had a blast and proceeded to make and eat three snowmen pancakes when she usually only eats one!  (Apology for the lack of shirt, but it is hot here so she only sleeps in underwear most nights.  We hadn’t gotten dressed yet!)

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We laid low for the rest of the morning and then while she was napping I hung up snowflakes all around the hallway and living room.  I have been secretly making these when Mikayla is cutting in her cutting box.  When Mikayla woke up we told her there was a surprise, but that it had gotten really cold in the house so she needed to put on a scarf and hat.  Her reaction was priceless.

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After she explored the "snow" we had a family snowball fight using marshmallows.  She thought it was hilarious to throw snow at mommy and daddy.  After our snowball fight, we built a couple of snow forts by stacking the marshmallows.

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Trying to catch the snowflake.  She actually got a little frustrated that they weren’t falling down for her.

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It took her a few minutes to catch on to the snowball fight, but in the end she understood to throw them and not hand them to you!

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Building a snow fort with daddy.

When we were tired of throwing snow, we moved on to building a snowman.  We took empty plastic grocery bags and stuffed them with other grocery bags to complete our snowman.  She lost interest pretty quick, so we didn’t actually decorate him. However, she was able to make the connection that she was dressed like her snowman we made last week all on her own.  She just looked up at her footprint snowman and said that she looked like him. 

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Our wimpy snowman – it is no Grandma and Grandpa Kickert snowman!

After all the snowball fun, we made some snow to play in.  We mixed 4 cups of flour with 1/2 cup of baby oil and mixed with our hands.  When we were finished we had a mixture that was a snowy consistency and could be molded fairly easily into snowballs.  Mikayla had fun using her Goofy and Donald Duck characters in the snow!

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Our final winter activity for the day was driving through a snowy scene on our Wii Mario Cart game.  She was not the best driver, but she still had fun!

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We had a fun winter day, even if it was 90 degrees outside!  She actually kept saying, "I am going to go play in winter now".  So sweet!

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February Sensory Tub, Snow and More!

Thursday, February 10th, 2011

For February I chose to do a red themed sensory tub.  It has lots of heart goodies in it, so it also doubles as a Valentine’s tub!  Mikayla loves to pull out the little heart shaped games and shake until her heart is content!  She is also a fan of stirring the items with the large rose.  Check it out.

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This is just a sampling of the items in the tub.  Obviously there are more of each item shown.  From top left and around clockwise you have foil heart garland, silicone heart shaped baking cups, heart maze game, heart bracelets, red roses that smell like flowers, red foil/filler pieces, red beads (leftover from our Christmas tree) and a large red rose given to me from Ben when we were in high school. 

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She couldn’t hardly keep her hands out long enough for me to take a picture!

Stay tuned for our march tub, the theme is green (in honor of St. Patrick’s day and the hopes of Spring)!

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On February 2, we also had a little groundhogs celebration.  I found a cute little cupcake here.  I thought it might be fun to make at school with my kiddos.  They had such a blast I brought the supplies home to let Mikayla join in on the action.  Thanks to the kindergarten classes, we also got a cute little groundhog headband.  We ended the evening playing a groundhog game on Starfall.

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Digging in!

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This kid loves her some candy…wonder where she gets that?

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I love Groundhog’s Day mommy!

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I promise the ones I made at school looked cuter!  Between Mikayla and Ben helping out, ours at home got a little messy!

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We have had a ton of snow here in BG this winter!  I am loving it, besides having to drive home in it!  We got so much yesterday that school dismissed early and we had another snow day today.  That hardly ever happens for us!  Mikayla has become quite the little snow bunny.  When she hears the word snow or sees the white stuff in the sky she immediately  grabs her snowsuit and boots and demands to be taken outside.  The other day Ben told her it was supposed to snow before it actually started.  In typical Mikayla fashion she ran and grabbed her snowsuit and boots and demanded they be put on.  When she was all bundled up he took her outside and she was a little disappointed to find that there was no snow on the ground.  Needless to say she was a little happier the next morning when there was snow to play with.  She even cried yesterday when we told her it was time to come inside.

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Snow angel

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Night night sledding with daddy.

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Notice her gloves.  Somewhere in the along the way we have lost the second mitten that goes with her snow suit, so we have to double up on gloves/mittens on her second hand. 

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Cheesing in the snow!

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Snow Day Fun

Wednesday, January 26th, 2011

When I first woke up this morning and looked out the window I knew we would be having at least an hour delay so I went back to bed for a bit.  When I woke up the second time and looked outside I saw even more snow.  I thought to myself, there is a small chance we will be out of school or at least a two hour delay instead.  I hopped on the computer and much to my delight we had another snow day.  Now, I know some people might be tired of snow days (I myself wasn’t wishing for one, but I will take it), but I love the snow.  We are trying to cherish every "snow" moment this year, because it could be the last one for awhile.  Here is a recap of our snow day so far.

We started the day with a yummy breakfast.  I made French toast with a homemade blueberry and raspberry sauce.  I used a recipe I found on Finding Joy in My Kitchen (a new favorite food blog of mine) and it was delicious.  We also made Sugar and Spice Bacon.  Some of the best bacon I have ever had!

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Then we ventured out into the cold in our "suit" and "boots" for some more snow fun.  We pulled Mikayla around in the snow, threw some snow balls and even made a snowman.  I need to give credit to Ben for making the snowman, Mikayla and I didn’t really help that much, unless you count watching and gathering/eating accessories!  Mikayla really loves snowmen, so she thought this was pretty cool.

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After we were good and frosty from the cold we headed inside for a little snowman treat.  He looks kind of creepy, but Mikayla loved him.  He is made from "marsh" (Marshmallows), bananas, pretzel sticks, sprinkles and fruit leather.  If she had been asleep I would have tried these, but he turned out cute for a quick snack. 

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Love at first sight! (Please ignore my shirtless girl, she has become a fan of eating without a shirt.  I am not sure why!)

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Digging in!

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I think Mikayla has enjoyed her snow day, I know I have.  Now to go list some items for the Little Angels Attic Sale before she wakes up and we have some more snow day fun!

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Who Needs Snow?

Saturday, January 15th, 2011

Who needs snow when you have bubbles!  Last week when we got a little snow it was a little too cold for a girl with the sniffles to go outside, so we created our own fun indoors.  We made some snow cream, filled up the sink with bubbles and made some "snowmen".  Mikayla loved it!

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Sugar Mamma’s Shop

Thursday, February 11th, 2010

One of my students at school always has the cutest bows and hair clips.  She is not overly girly, so her clips are pretty down to earth.  Right up my alley!  She even made MLK a few of her own (which Ben decided to put in her hair all at one time)!

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  After careful inspection (and a few conversations) with the mom, and some encouragement from a fellow teacher (who also braved the world of clip making) I decided to give clip making a try.  It might look intimidating, but it is actually quite simple.  After making my first clip I vowed to never again by a clip I could make.  Here are what my first few looked like.  Nothing too hard, simple ribbon glued on a clip with a button or two for some added glam!

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This was fun for awhile, but then I decided I wanted to elaborate some.  I got some flower petals and put them together with brads to make some bows.  I don’t have pictures, but they look similar to the clips the parent made for MLK (pictured above).  After making these clips for awhile, scouring multiple Etsy sites for ideas, and a quick sewing session with my dear friend Dacia I decided to venture into the world of felt.  All you ladies (or gentlemen) out there toying with the idea of making felt creations I encourage you to do so.  Once you get the blanket stitch down it is a piece of cake!  Here are some of my favorite creations thus far.

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My team teacher and I have decided to team up and host a table at a Spring Craft Bazaar hosted by our school (if anyone is interested tables are $25 and you get to keep all the money you make).  Hopefully these little clippies will make us some money!  Oh, and just for fun, I have coined my clip "shop", Sugar Mamma’s Shop.  It is not a real shop anywhere, but I would love to sell some clips if you know anyone that might be interested!

I have made some other crafts lately, but I will save that for a later post.  I have also been busy playing in all our fun snow with this little bundle of joy (and her daddy and Shiloh too)!

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She’s perfect…

Monday, February 1st, 2010

…even the doctor agrees! We already knew that she was perfect, but Dr. F. confirmed it this morning at her nine month check up.  Those were his words…"she’s perfect"!  Here are her nine month stats:

Height – 27 inches, up 7 inches from birth.  Pops, I think we have a ball player on our hands.  She has always been in the "above average" category for height.

Weight – 17lbs 5oz, up almost 10 pounds from birth (she was 7lbs 7oz in the hospital).  This has been an up and down battle with us, but she is right at the 25th percentile.  Dr. F. says that is great, so we will take it!

Head – 43.5cm…we are moving on up.  Her head has actually just made it on the average growth curve, she has always been below average in this category.

MLK has grown so much in these past nine months, I can’t believe she is only 3 months away from her first birthday!  She has accomplished so much.  Here are a few of her latest tricks.

  1. MLK can crawl.  If you have followed this blog at all you already knew that, but she is really moving these days.  All over the place.
  2. Pulling up.  Again, she has been doing this for some time now, but has really perfected it in the last few weeks.
  3. Standing on her own for around 20 seconds.  It won’t be long now before she is walking.
  4. Feeding herself.  She actually prefers this method much more than us feeding her.  She uses her hands (we will work on manners later) and makes a big mess, but she is doing great.
  5. One tooth and one more on the way.  This has caused quite the battle at night time, but we are managing.
  6. Mimicking.  She is at a really fun age right now because she tries to do everything we do.  If we click our tongue, she attempts to click hers.  If we wave our arms around, she will do the same.  It is so cute!

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Snow Day – In case you didn’t get the memo, BG got a ton of snow this past weekend.  A ton for us anyway.  We got between 6 and 8 inches.  It was beautiful.  MLK wasn’t a huge fan of the snow, but really all she can do at this point is sit in it.  Maybe next year.  Here are a few pictures from our snow adventures, but please excuse her "snow suit".  It is a Snoopy Halloween costume and it was the warmest thing we could find for her.  She showed a little resemblance to Randy from A Christmas Story, but at least she was warm!

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Snow Day

Friday, January 29th, 2010

So we got a snow day today.  I was pumped when I heard the news.  A day off from school, an extra entire day with my baby, and snow to play in.  Then I looked outside and saw this:

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Nothing like a snow day in Kentucky!!  Don’t get me wrong, I am not complaining.  The snow is supposed to hit later, I just found this to be humerous!  Enjoy your "snow day"!

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