our birthday boy

 

 

Last week our West turned 2. We celebrated with birthday morning donuts, a pizza party followed by chocolate cake and a bike ride on his new balance bike.

early spring at Bauman Farms

The past few days have been beautiful so today my two sisters and I took the children to nearby Bauman Farms. Less than a 20 minute drive through rural countryside, Bauman Farms is a local favorite. Today we enjoyed our picnic in the garden, toured the barn and fed the animals and played on the slides and other fun areas they have there. We finished with marion berry ice cream cones in the farm store. I'm looking forward to many summer picnics here soon.

a trip to the BIG city

This weekend the girls and I drove up to Portland to visit my two sisters who live 2 miles apart and meet up with my mom. We had a great girls' day of shopping on Alberta, lunch at the Kennedy School and even French pastries from Petit Provence bakery. We loved touring my sisters' apartments and the girls especially loved a store called Scrap that sold all kids of random trinkets (AKA junk). Annah was excited to find bottle caps and wine corks for only 25 cents per handful. They each came home with a bag of junk and immediately created "art". It's a good thing Shane stayed home with the boys - he thinks our garage could be its own Scrap store and was not as excited about the girls' purchases as they expected him to be.

a tea party

Some friends from church who have seven beautiful daughters (and one son) recently invited the girls and I to a tea party at their home. There was more food than we could possibly eat - brie cheese platters, petit four cakes in pink, cucumber sandwiches on homemade bread, herbal tea and most wonderful of all; sweet fellowship.

these busy days

This week has been oh, so busy as we're getting close to Mira's production of the Wizard of Oz. That means were making twice, sometimes three weekly trips up to Portland for her rehearsals with Christian Youth Theater. During our time at home this week we've been enjoying tea parties, play dates with friends and helping Silas learn to roll over.

montessori inspired activities for little ones

Now that West is almost two, I've been putting a lot of thought into how to homeschool with him in the room and how I want to structure his time. As tempting as it sounds to stick him in front of Sesame Street so I can do math and language arts with the girls in peace, that's just not something I'm comfortable with. And having him on my lap, crying or grabbing at the girls' pencils while trying to work math problems isn't an acceptable option either. I really want him to feel like he has something worthwhile to do too and that we don't just push him to the side. So the last few weeks I've put a lot of time into rearranging our school area and shelves to incorporate special spaces for both the boys and age appropriate "work" activities for them.

I've also been doing a lot of reading up on Montessori methods as I've planned all along to homeschool preschool with a Montessori approach. I love how it builds self esteem, initiative and independence and gives the child something meaningful to do rather than something to just distract them. It doesn't hurt that I now have my own advisor as my sister is studying to be a Montessori teacher and just got a job in a Montessori children's house (AKA preschool) in Portland.

Here are just of the few practical life activities I've created for West to be rotated weekly or as needed.

Garlic press sponges (as seen in photo above and an idea I got from this blog). Saturate sponges with water and let child squeeze into a bowl.

Discovery baskets - also seen in photo above. These are baskets with 30-50 various objects in each basket. For example one is a nature basket with shells, feathers, small pieces of driftwood, etc. and another is random, interesting metal kitchen utensils.

Pins and pin cushion. West loves this one. Bowl of pins and toddler puts pins (they learn to be careful real quick) into pin cushion.

Cracking nuts

Juicing an orange

Clothes washing and mini clothesline. Perfect for a warm spring day or summer. We also do it inside in the winter but without wet clothes. West enjoys hanging the clothes on his mini clothesline strung between two chairs in the living room with little clothespins. This keeps him busy for at least 30 minutes.

Drying dishes

Polishing with Bi-Carb Soda paste and small felt cloths.

Coffee grinding with mini grinder

Grating (with mini grater) nutmeg or wine corks

Beading with big wood beads and pipe cleaners

Sewing/lacing cards

Pouring/transferring water (with towels under tray and under his chair)

Peeling (with mini peeler) carrots

Making play dough with mom

Nuts and bolts activity

Hammering and nails (child set)

Tea time party (setting up - carefully - real porcelain children's tea set) and serving "tea"

Sweeping and mopping. West uses his children's broom every morning while helping the girls with chores.

Musical instruments basket

For Silas, I created a special little corner for him with a thick foam mat, a mirror at his level and I made a few mobiles for him to interact with. The one above was inspired by this blog and I have some other ring style ones that he can use to pull on and also kick. I also have a basket with a few special grasping toys and teethers.

If you're looking for more ideas to involve your toddler in meaningful activities this site and this post are great resources and this WSJ article is also very interesting. Teaching Montessori in the Home: The Preschool Years is also a great book to have on hand.

farm chores

Mira (10) has her first job. She's been "hired" to be a farm helper for some friends when they are out of town. They walked her through the daily morning and evening chores, left her with a typed list, told her she'd be paid $10 a day and left for the beach.

She's taken this new job very seriously, pouring daily over the checklist which she put in a special protective cover. I've been so impressed with how responsible she's been and how she's insisted on doing it all herself, even though that means doing things outside her comfort zone like having goats bigger than her jumping on her. It will get interesting in the fall when the goat has its baby and milking in on the chore list.