(And All My) Work Be Praise

A few weeks ago I was inspired to create a real calendar board for the preschoolers in my house. After scouring the internet for ideas (there are hundreds), I ended up with this: It's a calendar/magnetic white board/corkboard that I've had for a long time. I made everything myself, using construction paper, random strips of thin cardboard out of some packaging, packing tape. I thought about buying fun things, and visited several dollar stores in search of the perfect "back to school" paraphernalia, but to no avail. So, it was just me and the scissors for an hour one night! Included on the board, we have: The Calendar Construction paper and stickers "laminated" in packing tape for the months, thin cardboard with Sharpie numbers (again "laminated") for the dates. They're stuck on with Scotch brand removable mounting squares, cut into even smaller squares (because I was too cheap and short on time to look for Velcro dots). We'...

Drummer Hoff  is as much of a favorite with my sons as it was with my brothers when we were children, which gives it a special place in my heart! It's a simple little book, with classic Ed Emberley illustrations, that shows the progression of loading a cannon to be fired, but there's something magical about shouting "kah-bah-bloom!" and watching the whole illustration turn red on the last page. Each page builds upon the actions of the previous page, so that by the end, you have this: General Border gave the order, Major Scott brought the shot, Captain Bammer brought the rammer, Sergeant Chowder brought the powder, Corporal Farrel brought the barrel, Private Parriage brought the carriage, but Drummer Hoff fired it off. (Yep, I did that from memory.) Silas pointing to Major Scott's shot, back in March. I mentioned  about a month ago that Owen had no concept of rhyming words, so last time we read Drummer Hoff (maybe two weeks ago), I made a huge de...

To go along with our ocean theme, I picked two story books that we already own: Mr. Seahorse by Eric Carle, and The Rainbow Fish by Marcus Pfister. It's a good thing I did, too, because sickness kept us home from library story time two weeks in a row! Mr. Seahorse  is a strange but true book about father-fish who take care of fish eggs until they hatch. Besides the usual Eric Carle illustrations, every few pages is translucent. "As Mr. Seahorse drifted gently through the sea, he passed right by . . . ." A stonefish hiding behind a rock, for example, and you can just see the stonefish through the rock on the translucent page. I hope I'm describing that adequately. So for an art project, I first had the boys draw pictures of fish: Owen's lion fish, with black and brown stripes just like in the book. Levi's purple flounder. Then, I cut apart a page protector (because who has transparencies around anymore?!) and had them color "ocean pla...

Fact: if you want a preschool theme with hundreds upon hundreds of ideas, oceans are the way to go. Holy cow there's a lot of stuff.  Printables: Royal Baloo and 3 Dinosaurs teamed up to do a week-long theme (which could easily be way MORE than a week, if you're as casual about completing activities as I am). They have activities for tot through first grade. Gift of Curiosity also has a ton of ideas and printables (free with e-mail subscription). I ended up with so many worksheet packs saved that I spent an hour sorting through, printing the ones I liked, and making folders for Levi and Owen to work on throughout the month. It worked well; one bored morning, I pulled out the folders, they did as many pages as they wanted, and I tucked them away for the next time.  Owen's first dot-to-dot. Word search, scrambled words. Gluing on the beginning consonant. Roll and graph ocean creatures. Random shot of growing baby in big boy high chair. :D ...

Our customary breakfast donuts. Levi's five! It was a pretty low-key day around here: our usual donut breakfast from a local bakery, followed by presents from Mommy and Daddy (and my aunt, if she happens to have sent anything on previous visits). This year Levi got Locomotive  (which I blogged  about recently, but we've only ever had as a library book before) and a bicycle (plus helmet)! Very excited to see the book. Trying it on . . . backwards. And, he's off! We had planned an all-family trip to the library for story time, but Silas had a bit of a stomach bug in the morning, so just Levi and Owen went with Isaac. We met my mother-in-law and her dad (Oma and Great-Grandpa, to the boys) at Skyline for dinner (Levi's suggestion), then came back to our house for cake and ice cream. Levi's request: a reprise of his two-year-old-birthday clock cake and moose tracks ice cream. Easy enough! (You can find a picture of the original clock cake h...

Quite some time ago, I promised to post Levi's birth story at his next birthday. That was at least 2 years ago, maybe 3, and I never did it. So tonight, in honor of my firstborn's fifth birthday tomorrow, I will at last revisit my first-ever childbirth! (Re-posted and edited from the original Facebook "note.") For those of you who want the gory details (and I know some of you will), I was quite the miracle patient at Good Sam hospital on Wednesday night (or so they say). On Monday morning at my midwife appointment, I was maybe 50% effaced and considerably less than 1 centimeter dilated. "Keep your appointment for next week," I was told. Tuesday night at 11pm, I experienced one gush of fluid that I suspected was either my water breaking, or sudden overwhelming urinary incontinence. We called the midwives, who told me to wait 3 hours and if it continued, I would need to go in [being group B strep positive, there was more concern of infection should my wate...

Berry Month: Book 3 Jamberry This is another book I've seen on a few lists. We didn't have very many activities specifically designed for the book, but I'm glad I picked it up from the library anyway. It's just a sweet, playful book, and that's just as worthwhile as a great plot or incredible illustrations! My train-loving Owen was especially delighted by the tender full of blackberries on the train-themed page. (The "tender," for those of you not up on your train lingo, is the car full of coal that follows the engine.) Food blueberry pie (using this whole wheat pie crust ) blueberry breakfast bars Craft Since all three books featured bears, we read a book about bears ( this one , but any random book from the library would do!) and did a bear craft. I printed out this coloring page  for the boys to spread glue and sprinkle coffee grounds on. Easy and effective! Spreading glue with a popsicle stick.  Sprinkling coffee grounds. It's...