WFMW - "C" Adventures

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Last week we gave you the "C" activity trays. Now here are the "C" adventures that worked for this 25-month-old during our two "C" weeks.
Review: Colors.
Song.

• Rainbow Song

Book.

• Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin Jr & John Archambault. I love singing this! It's scary when all the letters fall out of the coconut tree. Check out the Scholastic DVD with this title for more fun!
• The Mixed-up Chameleon by Eric Carle. Fun to look at.
• Cars! Cars! Cars! by Grace Maccarone
• Is it red? Is it yellow? Is it blue? by Tana Hoban. I loved looking at the pictures in this book by myself and showing them to Mommy.

Food.

• Coconut-coated marshmallows - After reading Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Mommy put some marshmallows into the microwave for a few seconds, then gave them to me with a bowl of coconut and some toothpicks. I tried dipping the marshmallows into the coconut, but I decided I liked the marshmallows better without coconut.

Computer Time.

• Pre-school Library Colors activities - online story and color matching
• Crocodile Smiles -smiles of different colors

Science.

• Color bottles - we filled up three bottles with water, some oil, and a drop of food coloring. Then Pappa used hot glue to glue the lids on so I couldn't open them. I got to play with these "lava lamps" all week on my activity shelves.

Physical Activity.

• Color Twister - we used a regular Twister mat. Mommy would name a color, and I would put a little animal on a circle of that color. Then I just started putting animals on circles without worrying about the colors...

And of course, I had my tub of alphabet puzzles and books and magnets and flash cards and all that stuff...
Lapbook: Circles & Clowns.
Song.

• Construction Worker Song

Book.

• My "C" Sound Box by Jane Belk Moncure - lots of pictures to name.
• Color Zoo by Lois Ehlert - one of my favorites to look at! Animals, shapes, and colors.
• The Clown of God by Tomie de Paola - one of my absolute favorites! (Mommy's note: Esmé loves books that show emotion - sadness, scared, etc. She shows lots of empathy when the clown gets jeered at by the crowd and then takes off his paint, and finally makes the baby smile. I was a little surprised by how much she liked this book at her age. I did paraphrase a little for theology concerns, but overall, this was a sweet story that she really enjoyed.)

Food.

• Circle snacks: sandwiches in circle shape and other circle foods.

Computer Time.

• Clown fun - identifying differences, consequences, emotions, etc.

Science.

• Black marker on coffee filter - Mommy drew some black circles on a coffee filter and folded it up. I dipped it into some water, and then we watched the colors come out of the black mark. First the blue, and then (after this photo was taken) some reds came out, too.

Physical Activity.

• Spinning in circles - one of my absolute favorite things to do! I especially love the dizzy part!

And then our lapbook, of course!
First page: circle prints on a block "C" - I used a toilet paper roll, a circle sponge, and a circle cookie cutter.
Second page: Color Cars, sign language cards ("C", color, car, cat), Bible verse cards (1 Peter 5:7), Letter Book, Counting (to 10) using Commandments cards
And a ziploc bag stapled on one side to store all the other fun "C" things we made in the course of the 2 weeks.
Back: caterpillar coloring page
And we made a clown from shapes, too. We put it into the ziploc bag to store for playing later.
Excursion #1: Cats, Climbing, Creeks.
Animal Shelter: We went to an animal shelter and checked out the cats! Of course I wanted to take them home with me, but Mommy said no.
Creek: While we were waiting for the shelter to open, we came across another "C" - a creek! I liked walking across the bridge.
Climbing: And I went climbing! This McDonald's slide is perfect for cloudy/rainy days, as long as you have hand sanitizer...
Later that week we visited my friend Gabe, and his cat had kittens! They are adorable!
Bible Story: 10 Commandments.
Song.

• Ten Commandment Song

Book.

• Everybody Makes Mistakes by Christine Kole MacLean. Mommy says she has a hard time finding Bible story books at the library. But she thought this was a nice addition to the day - explaining that no matter how hard we try to obey the 10 commandments, we all make mistakes. We were born that way. But we keep trying, because Jesus loves us and the commandments are all about love.

Food.

• Bagels - these are shaped like an "O" for obey.

Computer Time.

• Forty Years - an online book about Israel.

Science.

• We picked up rocks and tried breaking them, though Mommy wouldn't let me throw them...

Physical Activity.

• Simon says - obey game. This didn't go very well!

Mommy tried to do 10-commandment charades, but that didn't work so well for me. Then she made a sewing card for me out of the 10-commandments coloring page I did.
Science: Cats.
Song.

• Hey Diddle Diddle

Book.

• The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Seuss. This is a bit long for me. But I did like watching the movie!
• Cats, Cats, Cats! by Leslea Newman.
• If You Give a Cat a Cupcake by Laura Numeroff. One of my absolute favorite books!
• Grumpy Cat by Britta Teckentrup.

Food.

• Cheddar sticks - "whiskers"

Computer Time.

• Pets Dress Up Game - we dressed up a kitty cat with funny eyes, shoes, etc.

Science.

• Taste test - I dished out three kinds of food for Flamey and then lay beside him and watched him eat. He liked the flaked food best, then the minced food. He chowed down both of them. The dry food was his least favorite - he hardly touched it.

Physical Activity.

• We played copy cat! Mommy did everything I did. It was great fun trying to think of things for her to do!

We played The Cat and The Fiddle board game. Pappa tried to show me how to play it, but I knew better. Cuz the dish ALWAYS goes on the dish square. And the cat ALWAYS goes on the cat square. And the cow ALWAYS goes on the cow square. No matter what you spin. You just spin for fun.
And I made a cat paper bag puppet! Mommy bought the kit at WalMart on clearance, so it was all ready to make. I LOVE it! I take it everywhere - even while practicing for the balance beam...

I also like to take it apart. Here I am with a cat nose on on my nose and the eyes on my cheeks. Just like a regular kitty!

Here's a "C" adventure I made up all by myself - stacking cat food cans to make castles! Of course my own ideas are best...
Social Studies: Cowboys & Cows.
Song.

• Home on the Range - this is a great slow-dancing song!

Book.

• Cowboy Slim by Julie Danneberg & Margot Apple
• The Cow that Laid an Egg by Andy Cutbill
• Cowboy Small by Lois Lenski
• The Cow Who Clucked by Denise Fleming. I LOVE books with animal sounds like this one!

Food.

• Cornbread and beans and hot dogs.

Computer Time.

• The Barnyard Chorus - A little girl sings Twinkle Twinkle Little Star to the barnyard animals.

Science.

• Feed the horses - we fed our neighbor horses some carrots. I LOVE feeding them - I get the carrots out of the fridge all by myself whenever I see them.

Physical Activity.

• Musical chairs and dancing with country music - like Home on the Range.

We made clothespin cowboys! I helped Mommy cut the ribbon and squeeze the glue for these boys. We used tiny google eyes and made the hats and boots using clipart.
Then I stuck toothpicks into potatoes to make cacti. I love sticking toothpicks into things. (Last year we painted everything green and it looked a little more authentic, but we didn't bother with the paint this year.)
Then I had great fun playing with the cowboys and the cacti together.
Excursion #2: Construction.
We didn't go far with this excursion - just to Pappa's shop behind the house. Here I am in my steel-toed purple dress shoes, sans purple hard hat, assisting Pappa as he saws some studs...
And we worked on framing a miniature house!
Here I am sawing the studs to the right length...
And passing studs to Pappa to hot glue together...
Mommy and Pappa were trying to get all the studs in the right place before gluing. I got tired of that and made my own design. Just pass the hot glue gun, please!
And of course I helped Pappa with the tiling in the bathroom, too...
Kitchen: Cooking, Cupcakes, Celery, Cookies.
Song.

• Five Little Cookies - I loved looking at the picture Mommy used for this songsheet. And we sang it with MY name - even better! Though of course I would never eat all five cookies at once.

Book.

• The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss.
• The Enormous Carrot by Vladimir Vagin
• The Little Cookie by Margaret Hillert. One of my favorites, to Mommy's surprise. But why would she be surprised that I like stories about COOKIES?

Food.

• Sugar cookies - we made these for church potluck. Shaped like "C"s, clouds, and circles. I liked to roll the dough out. Though silly Mommy burned them a little...
• And "C" week couldn't be complete without cauliflower, carrots, celery, cucumber, corn, and cabbage! Not that I ate them or anything like that.

Computer Time.

• Dora's cooking game - you get to look for all the ingredients to a recipe. It's fun to match things up!

Science.

• Colored celery experiment - we put celery stalks into glasses of water with different colors of food coloring in them - yellow, red, blue, and green. We don't have a photo of them after they'd been in there for a couple of days, but the red and the blue comparisons were pretty striking. Green and yellow weren't very exciting. Note - use the inner stalks with leaves for the best effect.
• A side effect of this - I really wanted to drink the colored water! It was interesting to note that the color didn't change the taste at all, but it was still more fun to drink colored water than regular water.

Physical Activity.

• Crawling practice! Yep, Mommy had me practice crawling. How silly...

Cupcake: We made a cupcake using construction paper, cotton for icing, and candles.

Of course, I then wanted to have a real one with candles to blow out, so Mommy came to the rescue with a chocolate muffin.

I made carrot prints with orange tempera paint (plus a sticker I really wanted to put on my painting). Note what happens when you give a girl a carrot, though...

And Mommy is starting a cookbook for me of some of the recipes we are making together. She got this cookbook template to start with, but is looking for an easier one...

Miscellaneous
Books

• Wee Little Chick by Lauren Thompson
• Caps for Sale by Esphyr Slobodkina
• Clickety Clack by Rob & Amy Spence
• The Caboose Who Got Loose by Bill Peet. One of my absolute favorites! Mommy sometimes shortened the reading, but I LOVED the emotional and scary parts of the story and watching the caboose fly through the air and survive happily ever after.
• Coral Reefs by Gail Gibbons. Another favorite - surprise to Mommy. For a non-story book, this is great - lots of cool pictures to look at.
• Cork and Fuzz: The Collectors by Dori Chaconas
• Where's Your Smile, Crocodile? by Claire Freedman

Activities

• Cloud watching - we watched clouds outside. Then we did some cloud blowing - blowing cotton balls through a straw. Of course, I had most fun chewing on the straw...
• Computers - we spent LOTS of time on http://www.jumpstart.com/. We won a CD and membership in a giveaway - and I just LOVE it! We'll do a review in a little bit, and maybe even have a giveaway for you...

Act of Kindness

• Card making - we made a card for http://www.colorasmile.org/.

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