Seasons

Gift Giving, Infants, Parenting, Shopping, Toddlers

Valentines Day Gift Guide for Infants and Toddlers

January 18, 2019

Valentines day will be here before you know it. The holiday is so commercialized, but for me it’s about spending quality time with those I love. I try to do that anyway during the rest of the year. When I was a kid, my mom would always buy me a little Valentines gift and I have been doing the same thing with Rosebud. If you are wondering what to get your little Valentine, here are some ideas.

Valentines Day Themed Books

Books make great gifts. There are so many options, they are educational and they are relatively inexpensive.

If you are looking for more Valentines books for kids, check out this post.

Heart Shaped Stacking Cups

Stacking cups are simple, inexpensive and babies love them! They can scoop, they can pour and they can stack. These cups have little holes on the bottom. Rosebud would use these in the pool and pretend it was raining. These even have numbers inside if you wanted to do a counting activity. We’ve had these for a couple years and she still uses them in the water.

Rubber Duckies

How about these Valentine themed rubber duckies. There used to be this cool online shop called Rubber Duck Land that no longer exists. That’s where I found these cute little duckies, but I have found something similar to link to. It’s just a cute little novelty.

Stuffed animal

I’ve gotten a lot of Valentines stuffed animals over the years, but you don’t even have to stick to a Valentine theme for this one. Anything soft, cute and cuddly will do.

First Valentines Day Play Set

These are cute during the first year. I bought Rosebud the birthday play set and she loved it. They have these for most of the holidays. They are little soft toys with different textures to touch, colors to see and sounds to hear. They make great keepsakes as well.

Flowers

This flower toy from Green toys is a neat idea. It’s flowers. It’s spring. It’s educational and Green Toys is a company that makes all their toys from recycled milk cartons. Rosebud has a dump truck made by Green Toys and she likes it. Their toys are sturdy and well made. I’d recommend this toy for older toddlers.

Homemade Gifts

More often than not, the best gifts are free. If you are the creative type, take out the craft supplies and create a beautiful card or a meaningful keepsake that will be saved and treasured later. You can work together with your kids to make Valentines for loved ones. If you are looking for something that your kids can give to others, try these salt dough keepsakes.

Quality Time

The number one gift is quality time. Just be in the moment with your kids. Whether it be playing outside, reading a book or curled up on the couch watching a movie, take the time. They will treasure it more than any physical gift just as we would. The memories together is what they will remember.

If you are looking for some fun Valentines Day Activities, head over to Fab Working Mom Life.

If you are searching for a gift idea for oder children, check out these Love Buckets for Valentines Day

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Activities, Education, Parenting, Preschool, Toddlers, Winter

Gift Giving Sensory Tub

December 7, 2018

This week, I decided to make up a festive sensory tub for Rosebud. I’m calling it the gift giving sensory tub.

What’s in the tub?

Wrapping paper,
Small boxes,
Ribbon,
Bows,
Tissue paper,
Bells,
Snowman rings,
Sparkly pompoms,
A bulb shaped ornament that opens,
A gift bag
A small stocking.

Today was the first time Rosebud got to play with this tub and she played for almost an hour. I had to tare her away for bath time. She loved filling the gift bag, putting the items in the different sized boxes and trying to wrap them. We pretended to give each other gifts. She’d open a box of snowman rings and say, “thank you Mommy. This was the best gift ever.” Then I’d open a gift bag full of pompoms and tell her what a nice gift she gave. If you are working on sharing and kindness, this would be a great sensory tub for the theme.

We worked on math skills by counting the number of pompoms in a box. We used our listening skills to guess what was inside the boxes. We discovered that we can always tell when one of the bells were in the boxes, but we could only hear the pompoms depending on the size and style of the box. Rosebud folded wrapping paper and tried to tie ribbon to practice those fine motor skills.

If your child is a little older, you could include tape so they could practice actually wrapping presents. I did not include tape because I knew it’d be everywhere. I’d love to add more ribbon of different sizes, other Christmas and winter themed trinkets for a wider variety of gifts and child scissors to cut wrapping paper. If you’ve tried something similar or have a festive sensory tub of your own, tell me in the comments.

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Activities, Books, Education, Parenting, Toddlers, Winter

Five Interactive Winter Books for Toddlers

November 29, 2018

As I’ve written about before, Rosebud and I love to read. I often buy her new books based on the season and or if there’s a holiday coming up. For the spring, I get out her books about birds, plants and baby animals. In the fall, we read books about pumpkins, leaves and of course Halloween. The winter is no exception. The books we are reading right now are related to snow, Christmas and her birthday coming around the corner.

As I’ve mentioned in other posts, I’m visually impaired so I don’t see the pictures very well. In children’s books, one could argue that the pictures are the most important thing. Well, they are to the child at least. Since I can’t see all the little details, I love to find books that are more interactive. Not only does it help me, but these extra elements make reading more fun for the children. Here are some great interactive winter books I’ve found along the way.

That’s Not My Snowman by Fiona Watt.

This book shows a snowman on each page with a different tactile element. the mittens are too fuzzy or the buttons are too bumpy. The book is short, but it’s great for infants and toddlers. Rosebud still loves this book.

PeekaBoo Christmas!: Touch-and-Feel and Lift-the-Flap by DK Publishing.

This book is large, sturdy and has illustrations that are shiny and colorful. Some of the pages include touch and feel elements like the pompom on the hat or the ornaments on the tree. Kids love to lift the flap to see what’s inside. Rosebud has always loved the different peekaboo books and this one did not disappoint her.

Little Critter: Just a Snowy Day by Mercer Mayer.

I bought this book many years ago to read to the kids I was working with at the time. Now I get to share it with Rosebud. I love all the interactive elements in this book. You get to spin a wheel to make it snow, smell a cup of hot chocolate and pull Little Critter’s sled. My only complaint about this book is that the pull tabs can be easily broken. This book has always been a hit with any of the children I’ve read it to. The book is now out of print, but you can still find it on Amazon.

The Gingerbread Family: A Scratch-and-Sniff Book by Grace Maccarone.

This story is of a day in the life of a gingerbread family. There is a scratch and sniff sticker on each page. The scents aren’t very strong, but the story is cute. When I was a kid, I never had books like these. I always loved scratch and sniff stickers and am glad I’ve been finding these cool books for Rosebud. She loves the pictures in this book as everything is made up of candy. We like to see which candy we can pick out. When she asks for this book, she says, “Let’s read about cookies.”

The Sweet Smell of Christmas (Scented Story Book) by Patricia M. Scarry.

Many people seem to remember this book from their childhood. I do not and I have not read it to Rosebud yet. It will be a stocking stuffer for her this year. This book is filled with scratch and sniff stickers and I know Rosebud will be excited to read this one.

What are your favorite winter and holiday books? Let me know in the comments.

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Activities, Education, Parenting, Preschool, Toddlers, Winter

First Snowfall Sensory Tub

November 20, 2018

We had our first real snowfall on Friday. When Rosebud woke up, she was so excited to see snow. Unfortunately, both of us have been fighting off colds for the past few weeks so I’ve only taken her out a couple of times since the weekend. However, I figured why not bring some snow inside to play with? I don’t have to stand outdoors and freeze and she gets to play with snow. An almost perfect compromise.

Here’s what I put in this sensory tub.

Snow,
Acrylic crystals,
Glass stones,
Safari Ltd Penguins
Scoops and a shovel,
Small cups.

The stones and acrylic crystals were our treasures. She liked those the best. Digging in the snow and watching it fly everywhere.

She loved finding the different penguins.

Of course, those scoops and shovels were used to dig and uncover those treasures. Not to mention the added benefits of getting snow all over mommy. It was the perfect snow to make snowballs and we found out that when we put it into the little containers, the snow would be shaped like them when we took it out. We watched how snow melted and how we could put it together and break it apart.

It’s play, it’s science and it’s fun on a winter day. What are some of your favorite winter activities? Let me know in the comments.

6 Comments

Activities, Education, Fall, Recipes, Toddlers

Pumpkin Spice Play-dough

October 30, 2018

I love anything pumpkin spice, so I couldn’t let fall fly by without making this play-dough. For some reason, it took me forever to get all the ingredients on hand to make this play-dough, but I’m glad I finally was able to make it. It smells fantastic and goes great with any Halloween or fall themed activities.

As soon as I opened the container, Rosebud said it smelled good enough to eat. And yes, she took several bites even though I kept telling her not too. I’m sure it smells way better than it tastes. I set out some play-dough tools. We have rolling pins, mini spatulas, play-dough scissors and cookie cutters. I found any Halloween related trinkets I found in my kitchen as well. I have a tiny ghost cake pan and some ghost and pumpkin rings that came on a cake.

We tried making pumpkins. Well, I would and then Rosebud would squish them.

We made ghosts, squished them up and then filled the pan again.

Finally, I made different shaped pumpkins like in the book, The Legend of Spookley the Square Pumpkin. It’s a book about a square pumpkin who saves the day for a farmer because of his differences. It’s a great book for Halloween, but the underlying theme is diversity. Even though we may look different, you can find something wonderful and worthwhile in those differences.

Here’s the recipe I used.

Ingredients:

2 cups flour,

1 cup salt,

2 table spoons cream of tarter,

1 table spoon Pumpkin Spice,
2 table spoons vegetable oil,

1&1/2 cups boiling water,

A couple drops of glycerin to add shine,

Red and yellow food coloring.

Directions:

1. Mix together dry ingredients.

2. Stir in oil.

3. Add water and stir until the lumps are gone and it comes together.

4. Kneed. Add food coloring, scent, glitter and or glycerin at this stage.

Store in an air tight container. All of my batches of play-dough have stayed good for a couple months at least.

Enjoy and happy playing. What are your favorite fall activities with play-dough? Let me know in the comments.

9 Comments

Activities, Art, Fall, Parenting, Toddlers

Glitter Leaf Sun Catcher

October 15, 2018

Lately, we’ve been doing activities with leaves. I was inspired by this post from, On Your Own, But Never Alone. I thought why not use the glitter leaves as sun catchers?

What you need:

Leaves that are dry, but not crunchy,

Glitter glue,

Paint brushes,

Mod podge,

Contact paper or clear sheet protectors,

String.

What you do:

1. Lay leaves on a flat surface and paint them with the glitter glue. You can paint just parts of the leaf or the entire thing. We used three different colors of glitter glue.

2. Set aside to dry.

3. Paint leaves with mod podge.

4. When dry, arrange leaves in contact paper or sheet protector. I didn’t have any contact paper so I just glued the leaves inside the sheet protector.

5. Punch hole in contact paper and tie a string. If you use a sheet protector, the holes are already there.

6. Find a nice place to hang your creation. Some leaves will catch the sun and others will not depending on the color. Either way, you have a nice glittery fall decoration.

What are you making with leaves this fall? Let me know in the comments.

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Books, Education, Parenting

Five Fun Halloween Books for Toddlers

September 19, 2018

In the beginning of September, I brought out all Rosebud’s fall and Halloween themed books. She has been wanting to read them every night, so I thought I’d share the ones she really enjoys.

1. Five Little Pumpkins.

I’ve had this book since her first Halloween and she loves it. It’s a simple rhyme about pumpkins. They have finger plays and songs for it as well. She loves to read along and his it memorized now.

2. Who’s There on Halloween.

This is another cute Halloween book. It has hints for different Halloween related characters like the witch, ghost and spider. She has this book memorized too, but she hasn’t figured out that the point is to guess by the clues before you turn the page.

3. Boo! A Halloween Peek-a-boo.

This is a short, but silly Halloween book. A dog chases different Halloween characters in costume who say different things. Rosebud likes when I do silly voices with this book. I just introduced this one to her this year because it has paper pages, but she always asks to read this first.

4. Scratch and Sniff Halloween.

Who doesn’t like scratch and sniff books? They are fun until they lose their scent, but Rosebud has been having fun reading this one regardless. You can smell the minty witches brew, the spooky pumpkin or the sweet lollypop.

5. Big Pumpkin

I just ordered the paper copy of this one, but we like to listen to the audio version I found on Youtube because it’s sung to a song. If you’ve never read this book, the witch wants to make pumpkin pie, but the pumpkin is too big to take off the vine. The witch, ghost, vampire and others try to remove it, but it doesn’t work until a bat comes along with the solution. This book is good because it’s an actual story, but it is not too long that an older toddler won’t sit through it. Rosebud is growing out of the simple board books. Although she still loves them, I think she’s ready for longer stories.

What are your favorite Halloween books? Tell me in the comments.

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Activities, Art

Leaf Painting

September 18, 2018

Here’s a simple painting activity for the fall.

What you’ll need:

Paint,
Paper,
Leaves,
Tray or some other way to set up the paint.

I just took a cookie sheet, lined it with foil and put some globs of paints in different colors on it. Then I put one leaf in each color of paint so they wouldn’t be mixed at first.

All you do is cover the leaf with paint and stamp it on the paper. I showed Rosebud once and then she got to work, creating her pictures.

I didn’t have much paint so by the time we got to our third picture, I showed her how she could use the leaves as paintbrushes.

I’m looking forward to doing more fall activities. What are your favorite fall crafts and activities? Let me know in the comments.

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