Week of May 31, 2021 - Zoo

 Monday

I wasn't planning to do any kind of mommy pre-school today, but after getting home from the Butterfly Pavilion Charlotte asked me if we could, so why not? Good thing I was prepared!

For practicing names, I printed this nifty editable printable from Playdough to Plato. Clesse did really well, and even though I wasn't forcing him to line up the pictures, he could tell when one was off and would tell me, "uh oh mama! What happened??". It was pretty stinking adorable!

Since we didn't do any activities with counting last week, I started this week off with one. I grabbed a couple of sheets from this printable. I helped Clesse roll the die and plot a few dots with some guidance, then decided to just let him go bananas with the dabber. Charlotte did super well with her data gathering and plotting! She seems to like that type of methodical work.

On a parenting note, my pediatrician has told me with each developmental stage to let the kids make mistakes where it's safe for them to do it. Don't let them touch the stove or anything, but when they have a chance, let them get into a mess and help them learn how to fix the problem they make. I love this advice - I try really hard in my parenting to set foundations for puberty and young adulthood when my kids will have the choice to come to me for help, try to fix it themselves or lie to me. I hope that with little exercises like this I can have a healthy relationship with them as they struggle through their desire for independence as they grow. So today, when Clesse and Charlotte were playing with the sink in the bathroom and I heard a little splash and "uh-oh, that's a lot of water", I sat back and observed what they did. I expected Char to grab a towel because she's normally quick to do things like that, but she was a bit preoccupied. When Clesse saw me walk by, he just let me know, "mama it's wet." Haha, ok buddy. Let's clean it up together with a towel.

Tuesday

The art project for today was inspired by Lion King. The kids used water colors to make a beautiful background (in my head it would be like a sunset), and I cut out some silhouettes of animals using my Silhouette Cameo. The kids glued on the silhouettes once the paint was dry enough, and I think they turned out great!

Char took a little longer on her painting, so I got out a dabber worksheet for Clesse and we did the letter C. He did awesome! When he was done finding the Cs and still wanting to use the dabber, I grabbed another color and we pointed at the other letters and named them. He did "H", "J", "K" and "O" all on his own! I'm so proud of what my bubba picks up on all by himself.

While I made dinner, the kids painted their own binoculars. Charlotte was very determined to have hers look real and wouldn't stray from black paint, but Clesse was a little more fun with it and added some animal stickers. I also glued some cardstock after folding it like an accordion so it could easily expand and retract when the kids use them. We'll add some string for them to put them around their necks and hopefully I'll remember to bring them to the zoo tomorrow!

Wednesday

We went to the zoo! The kids are such good listeners and are always captivated by the animals. Clesse's favorite animal was definitely the elephants (we got to see them play fight, or maybe real fight, who knows) a little bit and Charlotte loved the sea lions! It was a super beautiful day.

One of my favorite moments was when we were about to leave and got to see 4 huge lions napping. Clesse was a bit disappointed that they were sleeping, and kept saying, "Wake up lions! Wakeeeee uppppp!!!!" I think after seeing so many active animals, he was wanting to see a little more from the giant sleepy cats. Another funny moment was that on the drive home, Clesse was eating fruit snacks. I heard crinkling for a solid minute, and then a very triumphant, "I GOT IT MAMA!". Then I saw a little hand in my rear view mirror sticking up with a fruit snack clenched in it. That last one is real tricky to get out of the bag! Haha.

The boys were really tuckered out after the zoo and took super long afternoon naps. Char watched a little bit of tv while I caught up with life from an adventurous morning, and then we made some rainbow rice to add to the sensory bin and played our current favorite game, Sequence! Clesse joined after his nap and actually does pretty well with some guidance, but the second I leave to do anything he usually starts to destroy the board, much to his sister's annoyance. Overall, a super fun and wonderful day!

Thursday

Lest you think we live some picture perfect life, here's how I ended up getting Clesse to eat breakfast this morning. The kids were C-R-A-N-K-Y, probably from a full and fun day with going to the zoo and then to a friend's house for dinner. So we watched Daniel Tiger while eating breakfast and stayed in pajamas for a really long time.

My "sensory" activity for this week was to get some animals muddy (with paint) and then giving them baths. My secret? I actually SUPER need to clean these Little People animals, and this way the kids do it for me! Buahahaha. I put blue and orange into a cup so the kids could mix them together and say "woah! look how it's brown!" but instead it kind of ended up green :shrug:. Clesse also declined to do mommy pre-school today. Which is fine. I do this to be enjoyable for me and the kiddos, its not something I need to force them to do. It also meant I could focus more on Charlotte, and we did some more formal pre-school worksheets, which she loved!

Friday

On Friday, we played!