Fall Activities

Here is a look at the activities we have for fall this year.  Nearly all of them our leftover from last year.  So nice just to pull something out at be done.

Maple Leaf stamping

Pom Pom transferring with a small spoon.

Scarecrow puzzle

Clothes Pin Counting

Patterns, Sorting, Counting etc

Fall Rice box

Line drawing practice

Felt Pumpkin Decorating 

Pumpkin Counting

Fits nicely in the bin.  Now I just need to remember to pull it out.

Our Skytrain Adventure

I meant to post this on Monday but it's now Thursday and I am not sure what happened to the last couple of days.  hehehehe.  Monday is Andrew's day off and probably the kids favorite day of the week (mine too).  Monday morning Hannah woke up with the idea that we should all ride the Skytrain (the equivalent to an above ground subway).  In fact, I walked into Hannah's room to hear her tell Ethan that we were going to ride it that day.  Since, we had nothing else planned we thought it was a great idea.  Here is a little look at our day:

Skytrain

Of course we had to buy tickets (the kids were both free).

Hannah handing me my ticket.  She was VERY excited. She bounced as we walked into the station.

Their first look out the window.

 

Our destination was the Vancouver Public Library.  Its the second larges library in Canada and has a fun children's department.  Its also free.

  The building is really cool to look at.

Hehehehe  Andrew and I enjoy watching the show Fringe.  Its filmed in Vancouver, the library also happens to be one of the setting locations.  Anyway, here is a screen shot of the library from the show.  No its not New York.

Besides books there were lots of games, toys, and puzzles.

On the way back to the Skytrain we found a fountain they enjoyed sticking their hands in.

I'm not sure but I wondered of Ethan thought the bull was real.

I was a bit camera happy.  Driving Andrew a little nuts.

Pretty stained glass window.

On the way back.

Mommy and Ethan.

Wordless Wednesday

Week 6 - Letter F

Letter F week went by very quickly.

Math: Fly counting.  Pretty basic.  Choose a number card and count out the appropriate flies.  Simple but enjoyable none the less.

 Art:  GONG SHOW.  For our art activity, I put out some feathers and paint.  This went really well until the phone rang.  I came back to find my usually paint hesitant boy covered in Hannah's hand prints and Hannah covered in Ethan's hand prints.  I threw them outside (happy that it wasn't raining) and gave them cloths and a basin to wash up.  In case you can't tell it is Hannah's hand print right over Ethan's left eye.

Nature Study:  Our nature study this week was disgusting.  I bit my lip and washed my hands a lot in order to get through it.  They had fun examining flies.  Hannah and Ethan both love bugs and I don't want to bias them because I loathe bugs.  They looked through magnifying glasses and colored a picture of a fly.  Hannah and Ethan enjoyed matching the picture to the actual fly.  But Ethan's favorite was pulling the wings off the poor dead fly.

Reading and Language Arts:  We did our craft page on capital F.  I think this was my favorite activity page so far.  Hannah and Ethan did a good job of finger painting their F's green and adding some fish to the pond. We also (Hannah and I) played a rhyming game.  She is getting quite good at rhyming, Ethan is not interested in these activities for the most part (the language exploration section after each letter).  


This week we read Thank You, God by P.K. Hallinan.  I love the pictures in this book because each one is filled with light.  Its very simple but it does a good job of pointing to God as our source for all things.

Just for Fun: I took out the fabric squares that I made last year for F week and blind folded them using their monkey hats (now that I look at this pictures more closely, I find it a little creepy) they each felt the fabric and told me how the pieces of fabric felt.

Faith Foundation:  This week week we finished up learning about our hands using them to bless others.  Hannah and Ethan made helping hand posters using their feather painted pictures.  Then they each told how they can use their own hands to be helpful.  Hannah said that she could use her hands to clean up, bake dough, and wash the table.  Ethan said he could use his hands to pick up things, play play dough, and get things for me.

Humor in the Flops

 I thought I would share one of my recent flops.  I had high hopes for this activity.  Actually, I have high hopes for anything I personally make for the kids.  Sometimes they love it and sometimes they do not.  That's life right?  However, it can be be disappointing and or discouraging too.  I try really hard to amuse myself at their refusal to think that everything I do or make is AMAZING.

Recently, I made some play dough mats for Hannah and Ethan.  On one side are the letter A-E, and on the flip side is the outline of a face with the features removed.  I laminated them and waited.  I waited for Hannah or Ethan to suggest we play with play dough and I didn't wait long.

So I brought out the mats got our the play dough.  They sat virtually unused.  Ethan happily stuffed play dough into the rolling pin.  Hannah cut snakes into hundreds of pieces.  Oh well another time perhaps. :D

Wordless Wednesday

Week 5- Letter E

Math: For our math activity this week sorted googly eyes.  Three sizes extra large, regular, and tiny.  It was fun using the eyes as our sorter item.  

 Art:  We did 2 art activities; one on the fly and the other planned.  Our "planned" activity with the earth hand prints.  Its really simple and I loved how they turned out.  Paint your hand blue and then add some green paint onto carefully so that the paint doesn't mix too much with the blue.  Then make your hand print.

Our second activity was a crayon resist at Hannah request.  No she didn't request a crayon resist, she asked if we could paint and I decided to make it a little more interesting.  Draw a picture or write a message with white crayon on white paper.  Paint everywhere and wipe the extra paint off with a paper towel.  Voila.  Hannah and Ethan we suitably impressed.

Nature Study:  We went on a nature walk and collected some things look at when we got home.  I gave Hannah and Ethan their own nature bag (goodie bags from a birthday we went too).  I was surprised at the variety of things we found.  Hannah was THRILLED with finding dead beetles.

Reading and Language Arts: We continues working on our AAR Level Pre-1 by doing capital E.  Hannah and Ethan have been enjoying this a lot.  They love the cute animal stories and the craft page.  Our craft page the week had us fingerprinting some peanuts for the elephant.

This week we read, which unsurprisingly was all about the differences in seasons.  The text is really sweet and I loved the illustrations.  We ( I made, they played) seasons boxes.  It is a small folded box has a lid that pulls off to reveal pictures of seasonally specific items.  Its from kizclub.com.  As well as a season pom pom sort that I found here for the tree.

Just for Fun:  This was a really fun idea using plastic Easter eggs (painted white) as a sound matching game.  Each egg had a different object (coins, beans, rice, and nothing).  I made two sets so so that Hannah and Ethan could use them as a sound matching activity. I really enjoyed watching them do this activity because it was a little difficult at first.  

Faith Foundation:  In this weeks lesson, we learned that God gave us hands to be used in many ways; working, playing, communicating, helping, and praying.  We can use our hands to bless others.

Clap your hands, all you nations; shout to God with cries of joy. Psalm 47:1