Hide in the sink

A favourite game we play at home is hide and seek, but for some reason Little Miss thinks it is called hide in the sink. No one has ever hid in the sink. But sink and seek are pretty similar words. She probably doesn't have seek in her vocabulary yet. Once I did hide in the bath, much to B's amusement. B then hid in the bath when it was his turn to hide next and he ending up getting wet from a bath toy which he wasn't too happy about.

The counting is creative so you have to be really quick to hide and once hidden we call out hotter or colder to give the seeker some help. At first Little Miss really didn't get the concept of hiding and would just cover her face with her hands, but now she is often the hardest to find. She curls up very small and still.



I love the kids faces when they find me. They are so surprised and we all end up laughing for some silly reason.

Hide in the sink is teaching my kids to have a really good look, not just a quick glance around. Looking is a really important skill, useful for finding that piece of lego they need, or finding a pair of matching socks, finding their school bag, lunch box, reader, hat, drink bottle and later in life car keys, glasses, handbag and even the butter.

Find out what other Mums are playing at childhood101.

There's no place like home

Little Miss says, "I want to go home."

We fill our homes with the objects of our choosing personalising our space. Living out our days and nights, a place to return to, our haven. We line the walls with memories. Placing sentiment within bricks and mortar. We come together as our type of family, enclosed and safe. Freedom within. We are in control of these little worlds, and they are so personal.

There is nothing like the comfort of home.

Home is a place not only of strong affections, but of entire unreserve; it is life's undress rehearsal, its backroom, its dressing room. - Harriet Beecher Stowe

I love to be home in the warm, when its raining outside. I especially love it when everyone is home with me.

When do you love to be home?

Finger painting

It would seem not all little girls enjoy finger painting. There was a promising start, mmmmm feel the nice wet slippery paint...

Make some hand prints

But then as the paint dried and went crusty one little girl was not happy.

We put it down to a lesson in opposites - wet then dry, nice then yucky.


Here is a link to a world of amazing creative Mums

Sweet treats

You have probably seen these babycinos at parties or in your local cafes. My kids go crazy for them so because I wanted to be a nice fun Mum we made these very sweet treats for an afternoon tea we went to recently. They were really easy to make and B was adept at the required glueing, but Little Miss just wanted to eat the freckles.

I used tick tock biscuits, marshmallows, freckles or speckles depending on where you buy them, and musks lifesavers, except for the life of me I couldn't find musk lifesavers in the supermarket so I used musk lollies instead.

I cut the musk lollies in half to make handles, using a bread knife and a sawing action.

Using white icing, B glued the handles to the marshmallows to make cups

When dry we glued the cups to the tick tock biscuits making a cup with saucer.

Lastly we added the cappuccino froth by glueing a freckle on top.

Once dry these are quite sturdy so are great to transport to parties, picnics and afternoon teas.
However B ate about six of them so I had to brush this teeth really well that night.

Playing with food

Pizza is a regular favourite in the chapter forty house. Not because it's a delicious treat type junk food, but because the kids get to play with the dough and make their own. I buy ready made pizza dough, call me lazy, but it tastes so good. I have also found that getting my kids involved with making dinner actually helps them enjoy the meal more. Then I do as well.

Of course things dont always go according to plan as Little Miss gets the pizza cutter out before its cooked...

But she enjoys the mark making

And B decides his pizza should take on a snail shape

But whatever the shape, once the pizzas are topped with goodness and cooked they are eaten up by the proud children. Sorry there are no photos of the finished pizzas - I wasn't quick enough.


Find out what other Mums are playing with here

Food Face #7

This little punk turned up for dinner the other night. He wanted sauce and he wanted it now! But who could refuse those watery eyes. But even with sauce he still did not smile.

Stains and Snacks

I hate to sound like a stereotypical stay at home Mum.

Or do I?

I mean we, are the ultimate underclass of overworked, under appreciated, work for nothing - not even a thank you, keep carrying on as you are, group of workers. What in God's name is wrong with being a stay at home Mum? Us Mums are the ultimate employees, and ironically we are actually doing a really important job of raising the next generation. Hear me! We are responsible for the next lot of butt wipers, cleaners, shop assistants, nurses, doctors, entrepreneurs, lawyers and rulers that you will have to deal with.

But quite frankly I need to discuss stains and snacks. Well it is the topic of conversation in the school yard. Snacks and stains people, are our greatest challenges. The snacks that must fall into line with school rules, no packaging, no peanut, no sugar, no salt, no additives and the stains that the children bring home with them. What will it be today? I wonder with eagerness as I see B come out the class room. My eye checks him over, oh its some type of texta. Another Mum looks at me and offers me some condolence "The Exit stick will work on that" she offers with sincerity. And I question what the point of my life really is?

For the snack companies that frequent this blog I've compiled a list of the attributes of the ultimate snack food (Yes yes, I know about fruit or brain food as the school has rebranded it, but B still needs some type of snack as well) We need a snack that has;
No allergen
No sugar
No fat
No salt
No guilt
No additives
No artificial colourings
No packaging of any kind
Minimal expense
Robustness so it remains edible after being jump on, or thrown about,
Long shelf life so it can be forgotten about for a day or two in situ
Easily opened not requiring adult intervention
Easily eaten and not leaky, drippy or splashy so as not to cause the next problem - stains.

For real stain removal us Mums need a product that;
Doesn't require a second mortgage to purchase
Is easy to apply
Is timely, not requiring hours of soaking or even several minutes to take effect
And actually removes all traces of -
snot
grass
blood
poo
general garden dirt
food of all kinds
washable paint (apparently)
oil paint
acrylic paint
pen ink
texta ink
mysterious ink
chalk and
sun screen.

Then we can get on and really concentrate on the work of raising decent, healthy, human beings.

Alphabet box

I have been feeling really guilty lately that I just cant find the time to spend with Little Miss like I used to with B. I remember being able to do lots of preschool activities with him at home with letters and sounds, like making little books together with basic words. The kind of one on one play that lets you get really close and gain an understanding of your child's thinking. With Little Miss I just seem to have no time. The fact that she is going through phase of constantly whining or screaming might have something to do with it (and I do have a blog or two now). So the guilt remains and its time I made more of an effort.

I found this fantastic Alphabet box idea from Pink and Green Mama and thought this would be a great start for us. We purchased the box with 25 drawers from K-mart for $20. (It came with a collection of screws so the husband was happy). B and the husband labeled the drawers sticking taping the upper and lower case letters on each drawer. The letters X and Y were combined on the one drawer.

We then got a big container and searched high and low for little bits and pieces that we could file away according to their letter. Little Miss and B absolutely loved this activity and even took it outside. They liked rediscovering their little trinkets that had gone by the wayside. We then filed them away in the drawers according to their letter. B was really good at this (as a 6 year old) and Little Miss was enthralled by it all.  She loves pulling out and looking in each drawer and wants to know where each drawer goes.

Here is the P drawer with a pom pom, peg, person, paperclip, pencil, pin and the colour purple.

For the letter B we have a block, bugs, bottle top, button and a book.

In the letter S drawer you will find a star, stamp, sheep, stone, shell, spoon and some snakes.

Getting a drawer out and naming each item is a fantastic activity to reinforce letter sounds. Little Miss has recognised the letter L for her name (Ah no, her real name is not Little Miss) and she is getting lots of practice of the alphabet song. I am also really happy there is now a home for all those annoying little things that the small people collect.




Find out what other mums are playing at here.

Discovery

Recently in a carpark Little Miss discovered her shadow.

"It can dance Mumma" she said jumping up and down.

Later as we got out of the car in the shade at home she exclaimed,
"Mumma! where's that silly shadow gone."
"It was just visiting" I explained, "But dont worry it will always come back."

Colour peace play

I am really sick of my kids fighting all the time, so in a desperate attempt to keep the peace I divided the Duplo lego into colours between my children. B got the warm colours, red, orange, yellow and brown, Little Miss got the cool colours greens, blues, white, gray and black.

There were still a few gripes about base boards to work with, but generally this colour coded play was peaceful for a while. Thankfully Little Miss didn't notice she had much less lego than B. It also taught them some negotiation skills as they did swaps for the pieces they wanted of each others. Best of all I got some peace.

Find out what other mums are playing at here