Mozi Esmé: V Crafts

We've been having fun with "V" in alphabet school this week! These are the crafts and activities that worked for this 22-month-old.
Writing "V." I have been loving my dry erase markers! I can scribble all day with those things! Or half the day, and erase the other half. And "V" is now my second favoritist letter to write (after "O")! "Down, up" - that's all there is to it!

Vest. We made a vest out of a brown grocery paper bag! I colored with my markers, and I had Mommy trace my hands and feet over and over on it. Then I cut a fringe all around the bottom as Mommy held the vest for me. Way cool!

Vases. We took two glass jars, took the labels off (oil works great to get them off), and then painted them!

Then Papa bought some flowers for us to put in them. Aren't they pretty?

Vowels. We did a couple of drills through the vowels again. I get some of them mixed up, still, though I can ALWAYS recognize the "O"! It's been a while since we focused on them - not much since I was just a baby and vowels were the only sounds I could make! And we watched the vowel and V stuff on http://www.starfall.com/.

Valentine's Crafts. We had all kinds of fun with Valentine's crafts! I LOVE hearts...
Conversation Candy Hearts. I took a small box of those candy hearts and sorted them out by color. Mommy had put colored clothespins on empty yogurt containers, and I put the right hearts in the matching clothespin container - with a little corrective assistance from Mommy... But I did pretty good all by myself!

Then I put them very carefully onto a rainbow sheet! I have very good hand-eye coordination, Mommy says... We talked about gluing them down, but it was much simpler just to place them down without the glue.

One box of candies wasn't nearly enough to fill the whole rainbow, but it was just about the right amount for little me.... Now comes the important part - cleaning up and putting the candies back in the box!

Tissue Suncatcher. It's been a while since I've made any suncatchers - tissue paper torn up and put onto a contact paper shape, then a mirroring contact paper put on top of it. For this one, we tore up pink and red tissue paper and put it on a LARGE sheet of contact paper. Then Mommy covered it with another large piece of contact paper and cut heart shapes out of it (heart shape from a cookie cutter). Then she cut holes in each heart and ran a ribbon (bought in after-Christmas sale) through the hearts to make this garland. Pretty, isn't it?

Sticker Cards. I LOVE stickers. Especially pink heart- & butterfly-shaped ones! Here I am making a card with them...

Stamp Cards. I LOVE rubber stamps, too! We got a red and a purple stamp pad, and I went stamp-crazy with Valentine shapes! I even stamped the stamp pads directly onto my paper!

Chocolate Fondue. What's Valentine's Day without some chocolate fondue? We dipped strawberries, bananas, cut up cereal bars, and graham cracker pieces into chocolate fondue and yogurt! I loved using my fondue stick. And my favorite combination? Scooby Doo graham cracker dog bone dipped in chocolate and then vanilla yogurt...

Play Doh Hearts. I have been loving my play doh! We got some heart cookie cutters - used for several of these crafts, but mostly for making pink play doh hearts!

Dancing. What would Valentine's Day be without some romantic music and dancing? Here I am teaching my cousins' doll how to dance. And Mommy and I have been listening to Top of the World by The Carpenters each morning while we eat breakfast!

Salad Spinner Heart Art. We dropped some paint onto heart-shaped cards cut from a cereal box. Then we spun them in a salad spinner. This was my first time using a salad spinner - I got to learn how to pull the string out quick and then let it back in again so I could pull it again!

The hearts would have been a little more dramatic with more paint. We have these paint brushes with paint in them - that's all the paint we have at the moment, and they really haven't been working for me - I still haven't figured out how to squeeze the paint out. What we need is some BIG bottles of tempera paint that we can pour into bowls for our projects.

Felt Sewn Heart. Mommy bought this felt heart kit with holes already punched into it and a big plastic needle for sewing with yarn. It was my first sewing project - after making ziti bracelets last week, Mommy decided it was time, even though the whole project was a little advanced for me.

I did pretty good, though! Mommy held the hearts together while I pushed the needle through the hole she pointed out to me (great hand-eye coordination again...), and then pulled the needle and yarn out the other end. I must have done at least a quarter of the stitches myself over a 3-day period! Oh - and my doll helped me do some of the stitches.

Here's the finished project:

1 Corinthians 13. Here is a fun way to learn 1 Corinthians 13 - all about the ultimate love! Mommy printed out heart printables from Totally Tots. I helped color them, and then she cut everything out and just scotchtaped little magnet pieces to the back of each one. She hands me one heart at a time and I get to put it onto the fridge as we talk about what the heart says. Check out the printables link for other ideas on how to use these!

Heart Stamping. Here was another use of our heart-shaped cookie cutters! We dipped them in paint and stamped them onto pieces of paper, which we can make cards out of later. I helped Mommy with the one on the left, and I did the one on the right all by myself!

Hugging Heart. We made a hugging heart using a cereal box. Mommy cut one big heart shape and 2 little heart shapes out, plus two strips to fold zigzag. Then I colored the hearts and she taped it all together. See my face on the big heart? I am now a face EXPERT!