Toddler Tuesdays: Bees

 Hello, thanks for joining us again. This week we have a lot of black and yellow around the house. I'm talking about Bees! Our sensory bin is full of wild rice (I was going to use honeycomb shaped pasta, but could not find any safe for Panda), sparkly yellow pom poms, a bumble bee or two, a beehive (I'll have instructions on how to make that later), tweezers, and a tube for pouring things through. 

 This was a new activity. I had Panda suck up nectar (colored water) with a turkey baster and put it into the honeycombs (ice cube tray). He did surprisingly good, There were of course some spills, but he caught on to the turkey baster right away and loved it. 

 I scavenged the spice jar from last week and used the other side of the cap. Panda had to stuff yellow and black pipe cleaners through the holes. While he usually focuses real well on activities on like this he kind of had a been there done that attitude with this activity yesterday. Of course it was a holiday and having Poppy home was a huge distraction. Sunday he loved this activity.

 Panda ignored the tweezers for this activity since we've done activities like this in the past without them. Then about halfway through he found the tweezers and tried real hard to use them to sort the pollen balls (pom poms). I call it a success.

 I got the idea for these adorable pool noodle bees from this blog. I added felt wings and googly eyes, but the credit is all hers.

Instead of having Panda go up and down the stairs with them like she suggested, I hooked them up outside and Panda LOVED running them back and forth. This might stay up longer than this week out there.

Last of all I had to post this cute garland I made. It will stay up for the rest of summer. Next year I plan to hang them outside in the trees. Maybe we will get lucky and birds will use them for nests. I got the idea from the local grocery store. They made their bees with large coffee cans. I fell in love with their cuteness and down scaled it to soup cans. We have other fun things planned for this week, like Panda's first taste of honeycomb, a trip to the nature center to see the glass wall with a real beehive inside, printing honeycombs using half an okra for a stamp, and even a craft making honeycombs with bubble wrap and paint! There is a buzzy crazzy week ahead of us. Please keep us in your thoughts. Hopefully things will start to slow down after this week. Fingers crossed. I can at last see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Have a blessed week and shine on!

Toddler Tuesdays: Butterflies

Hello, welcome, and thank you for bearing with us. Toddler Tuesdays are a bit sporadic lately and I'm sorry. Hopefully this will be the last week of upheaval in our home. We are switching to a new OT for Panda and things should calm down once we have therapy times in place. 

This week we are working with butterflies. I wanted to do this for Mother's Day, but.. you know.. Upheaval.. Our sensory bin has fresh cut grass, the four stages of a butterfly's life, flowers, rocks, a butterfly sipping pool, a net, magnifying glass, and tweezers. This bin went over real well. 

These are the books I've chosen for this week. I know we've done 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar' before, but he really likes this book.

 As Panda enters his 'squashing bug' phase of toddlerdom I thought this would be a good poem for us this week. It is in the 'Treasury of Poetry'.

I made a caterpillar out of a clothes pin and then printed out several pictures from 'The Very Hungry Caterpillar' book. Panda had a lot of fun "feeding" the caterpillar by tossing it through the holes in the fruit while making loud lip smacking noises. It was adorable and an exercise in imaginative play and fine motor skills..

 

I put a paper butterfly in a baggy with paint, and then taped it to the table for Panda to squish. He did not like touching the squishy bag one bit. Oh well, we will try again today. It's a new sensation. When the butterfly dried I slipped the clothes pin caterpillar on the wings and Panda was in love. He played with both the caterpillar and the butterfly for a long time. The painted butterflies for the rest of the week will be saved for cards.

 I cut butterflies out of felt for this activity. Then we matched like color butterflies with like colored blocks. It was a simple activity for color matching. Not all activities need to be spectacular. 

This is an idea I got off of Pinterest. I didn't have the energy to make cute beaded felt butterfly wings so instead I opted for printing out pictures of real butterflies.

 

This last activity was the favorite one of the day. I bought a tube of butterflies at the craft store and cleaned out an old spice jar. The butterflies only fit in sideways, so Panda had to concentrate to get them in right. He LOVED this activity so much that he emptied out the jar and stuffed them back in 5 times!

Thank you for stopping by. I hope you like this weeks activities. I've wanted to do Butterflies for a while now. Hopefully things will be quieting down soon. Till then, thank you for your understanding. Shine on!

Toddler Tuesday: Bugs

 This week we are continuing to work in the gardens. Our sensory bin was supposed to be noodles, but I never made it to the store. So instead I turned our dirt bin from last week into a buggy filled mud bin.

After playing in the mud it was time to clean up with a warm soapy bug wash.

 

Our days this week are filled with a lot of heavy outdoor work. Panda responds well with physically active work in his therapy for a Sensory Processing disorder. Here he is helping with the gardens. After helping me clear out all the old plants he decided to go plant a few dinosaurs ; )

These are our books this week. Log Hotel is a wonderful book. It is about the stages of a decomposing log. The words are short and the pictures are exquisite.

 

Last of all I made a Log Hotel for Panda to play in. He has stuffed bugs in a basket that I always leave out. They are his "Acceptable toys for throwing" that I try to redirect him to when he gets into the throwing mood. This week they are being thrown and crawling through his tunnel. That's it for this week. I'm in a bit of a hurry this morning. A woman from the district is coming over to assess Panda, if he qualifies he may be getting some help for his speech delay. Fingers crossed for us. Have a blessed day, and Shine on!

Toddler Tuesday: Garden

Hello, We are a little late posting in the day because we just have not been up to snuff today. Panda has a bit of a cold and well.. Things have been stressful around here lately to put it mildly. For this week's sensory bin we used potting soil (note this is outside this week), garden tools, pink flamingos (because everyone needs pink flamingos), and silk flowers for planting. He liked this bin, but a freak hail storm drove us inside for today.

 

A few garden books to set the tone for the week. 

 Panda helped plant the seeds for the garden yesterday. I sprung for peat pellets this year so things would be slightly less messy. Panda enjoyed helping to sort them into their separate compartments (reminiscent of the ice cube tray and pom poms we played with last week).

 Once the peat pellets were hydrated, he helped poke the seeds down into the peat with a chopstick. Each day we will check on them and and he will help water them if needed. We will be watching for the first sprouts wake up and raise their heads. 

 I found this cute scrub brush at the dollar store. Bear came up with the idea of using it as a paint brush this week. 

Good call Bear. It worked well. When Panda is feeling better we will work outside in the big gardens each day prepping them for planting. We still have a ways to go. Planting does not start till mid May in Minnesota. Thanks for jointing us.  Have a blessed day. 

~Shine on~

Toddler Tuesday: Birthday Special!

 Today a special little boy turned two!

We threw him a Tinkerbell birthday party with special figurines. Today he opened the last one; a Gruff figure from the latest Tinkerbell movie. 'The Legend of the Never Beast'. 

There were lots of Tinkerbell decorations and cupcakes with green grass frosting and white butterflies.

 

They were very yummy.

Special wings and crowns were made, but Panda didn't want to wear his this year.

 

His very sweet friend loved hers and was thrilled to be able to take them home.

There were many friends, and many thoughtful gifts. Thank you everyone for coming and sharing in this special day. 

 We even had a surprise visit from a sweet neighborhood girl who made a guest appearance as Tinkerbell!!! An idea all of her own. Thanks A. That was and incredible, thoughtful, wonderful surprise!

Happy Birthday my beautiful boy! May this next year be filled with light and love. 

Shine On!

Love,

Mum~

Toddler Tuesday: Fairies

 Welcome Back! It's so good to be blogging again. I had a fun post planned for Saint Patrick's Day, but things were just still up in the air last month. Next week is Panda's birthday and we have a special Tinkerbell Birthday party planned for him, so to build to that his daily activities will all have a fairy theme this week. I know I know, Tinkerbell is Disney and we don't watch much TV in this house, but Tinkerbell is one of those rare movies I don't object to, and It's Panda's favorite thing. For his sensory bin this week I used soap scented split peas, rocks for a path, pine-cones, felt flowers, bells, and a few special new figures. He had so much fun wiggling his feet in the peas and making Tinkerbell swim through them. He played with this bin for almost an hour yesterday!

 I borrowed a butterfly punch from my sister and made several construction paper butterflies for sorting. This activity was a flop till Bear got home. Bear started scooping the butterflies up with a spoon and dumping them into the bowls. Panda was only to eager to help out. So it's not what I intended, but this activity did work out in the end.

 Fairy dust ball sorting. All this is, is a ice cube tray and pom poms, but Panda loves stuffing the pom poms into the holes. It works on his pincher grasp and focus. He played with this activity for about fifteen minutes. He filled and dumped them three times.

 Fairy hockey! One of the things we are dealing with is a diagnosis that Panda has a sensory processing disorder. He craves motion, movement, and impact. Whacking this ball around the house with wooden spoons fills some of that need.

Another activity we've started doing each morning to help fill some of his sensory needs is to have tunnel time. We are still so new to figuring out what will help Panda so I can't write to much on that right now, but Toddler Tuesdays will now have a few special sensory items added in each week as we try to unravel the mystery that is my sweet boy. Soon he will be getting a platform swing and a small fort to hide in when his senses overwhelm him. For now, This is our start. Any suggestions are more than welcome. Panda loves little sensory things (like his sensory bin, clay,  ripping paper, and painting), but it's the BIG things that he craves. Finding peace with loosing most of our furniture while he learns what is safe and what is not all over again has been a difficult transition for us. Currently he is seeing four occupational therapists a week, which while helping, is also frustrating and interferes with our natural rhythms. We are slowing figuring this one out,.

Again, I'm so happy to be back and will be visiting blogs again as time allows. I've missed you all. Have a blessed week, and shine on!

Toddler Easter Recap

Hello, Some people asked me how I keep Easter small and meaningful for a toddler, so here is our Easter recap. We started the day by baking bread. The house smelled heavenly and it was a nice soothing way to start the day. (Sorry, no pictures).

 Our Easter basket is pretty small compared to some. We don't have a lot of candy. There are some gluten free cookies, and one piece of candy in his basket. Egg shaped chalk, a new plate and cup, a book about spring, and a small stuffed lamb. We also have a christian Easter book that I've been reading to Panda all week in preparation for today. This helped lend meaning to what we were doing for him.

 We do an egg hunt outside, but we use wooden eggs. Bear's family used hard boiled eggs when he was little and I don't see the point in having extra treats and goodies in plastic eggs if there is already a basket. My son gets overwhelmed easily, so using wooden eggs works well for our family. I don't use hard boiled because I don't want to attract animals.

This year Panda painted eggs. We used non toxic finger paints. 

 They turned out beautiful! Next year we might try the trick where you put the egg inside a whisk and have the toddler dunk the whisk in dye, but this year needed a more tactile approach.

 Then we packed ourselves up (and our fresh bread) and headed over to my sister's house for a family dinner. They surprised Panda with a small adorable Easter bucket. There were gluten free dairy free cookie bars and organic gummy bunnies for treats, caterpillar socks, a new book, apple scented bubbles, sidewalk chalk (it's a thing with my family), and a sweet little duck for Panda. My sister's family was watching an adorable 4 year old girl for the day (yes, she also got an Easter bucket). She and Panda are best buddies. Being able to play with her might have been Panda's favorite treat of the day. All in all, it was a lovely Easter. While we packed a bit in, it was still slow and smooth enough to avoid over stimulation and sugary melt downs. There was one melt down, but that was more due to a needed nap than anything else. What did your family do for Easter?

Shine on!