Preschool and Pizza

Awhile back Aunt Theresa sent Paige a package of craft supplies and in them was a little booklet of preschool for a year. It has a theme for each week and three units per week. Paige and I both thought that would be a fun thing for Baylor to do. So I decided starting this new year that I would do this simple preschool with Baylor while Paige is in school. I love having something to focus on and I know that Baylor will love the things we do and it will be fun to watch her grow and learn. It will give Baylor and I something to focus on and do while Paige is busy with school and I'm really looking forward to this quality one on one time with my busy little girl who is growing up WAY too fast.

We are doing it Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. This gives me Monday to do cleaning, laundry, and grocery shopping and Fridays Nate gets home early. Since the packet had three units I figured three days would be perfect. Each day there is ideas for indoor play, art, music, learning time, outdoor play, and story time. I am using their ideas and also making and adding to it so that it fits for Baylor and I.

For our very first week our theme is winter. On Tuesday we started off with playing with kinetic sand. Baylor loves it and I am letting this be a Baylor led thing where we do something as long as she wants. We played with the sand much longer than I thought but it was good She loved building castles with it and had a table knife it cut it down. We hid little toys in it to find and it was a fun way to start our day.

For art we made a snowman. I had all the pieces cut out and then I helped her glue the snowman together and we talked about which circles are the biggest and smallest. She had fun drawing on the face and wanted to make her snowman a happy one. She was drawing fingers on the sticks which led to stripes on the one arm which led to her drawing a striped kitty on the bottom of the snowman. I loved watching her talk her way through her drawing process. Then she would tell me where to put the glue dot and she stuck on the snow and snowflakes to add the finishing touch to her masterpiece.  

Then we sang "Once There Was a Snowman" and a couple of other songs before we did our learning activity. The activity in the booklet wasn't what I wanted to do with her so I came up with my own activity. I knew this would be fun for her and it would also be something that was active since it was raining and we wouldn't be doing any outside time for the day. We talked about snow and how it was cold. We had a tiny bit of snow right before Christmas and so we talked about that and how Paige and Dad had thrown some snowballs. We then made our own snowballs with some paper. First we threw them into the laundry basket. She got so excited when she made it and would keep getting closer and closer to the basket so she could easily make more.

Then it led to her wanting to be in the basket.

And me throwing the snowballs at her and into her basket while she giggled and threw them out of her basket and at me. She thought this was so funny and I loved watching her smile and her reactions. We ended our simple preschool day with a story. Paige was on break from school for the story which actually helped. I held up her snowman picture and said, "On a cold winter night I looked out the window and saw Mr. Snowman playing..." The point of the story was to make up your own but Baylor took it literally and ran to the window to see the snowman. Paige helped her understand and I asked Baylor what she wanted her snowman to do and she just shrugged her shoulders. Then Paige said some ideas and we went with it. I don't know if Baylor fully got it but it was a fun way to end our preschool day. The whole thing took maybe 1 1/2 hours so it was super simple but it was really fun.

Wednesday she started her day with playing and washing her dishes that she got from Santa for Christmas. She didn't last very long doing this activity but it gave me enough time to get the art set up. First we looked on the computer at igloos and snow sculptures and then she made her own. I had glue that I watered down and had a paintbrush that she could brush the glue on the paper plate and then she used mini marshmallows to make her very own snow sculpture. At first it was a small circles and then she added a fence and then she was filling in the entire plate. The ones she built up she called a temple. It kept her busy for quite awhile and she loved lining up the marshmallows row by row.

We let the glue dry and then she painted her ice sculpture with watercolors. I enjoyed doing a little painting myself.

Then we sang a couple of songs. I tried to teach her a new song but she sang it once and then was not interested in singing it anymore so I ended up just singing random songs while she danced. Then for learning time we talked about how ice melts. We put some ice in a glass and felt it with our hands and she licked it and sucked on it. She loved holding it in her hand until it started to drip. We talked about the heat from her hand and from her tongue made the ice melt. We added water to see the ice cubes get smaller. We ended up doing our outside play while we waited for the ice to melt more. When we came back inside, she loved how tiny and cute the little ice cubes were.

For outside play the plan was to go out and jump in puddles but she had no interest and instead she wanted to ride her bike. She ended up riding her bike through puddles instead. We ended our day with the reading of a Bernstein Bear Winter book and then of course that led to reading a pile of other books she picked out.

Thursday we started our day off with playing with blocks. She loved this and she built a garage for the cars and built and rebuilt the roof over them so the rain wouldn't get on them. She did this over and over and rearranged and changed it up. I loved watching her think and process and problem solve. She did this for about 45 minutes which is impressive for this little one who never holds still. I sat next to and watched, got art ready, and did some Sudoku puzzles. 

For art I first showed her a picture of a snowstorm and talked about how it is a lot of snow coming down all at once. First she drew a person on her paper to be in the snowstorm. She wanted to draw a guy with a diaper. It is the picture of the left- on top you have the two eyes, nose, a chin, and lips. The coloring in middle was a circle at first and I asked her if it was his belly button and then she quickly colored it in so that his belly button was covered. Next the bigger circle is his diaper and the rectangle is his pants and then his feet. This is the most detailed she has gotten with drawing a person so I had to take a picture before it got covered with "snow". The drawing next to her person is an apple tree.

Then she painted her picture with glue and covered it with rice for a snowstorm.

For music we sang and danced with the ribbon wand.

Oh how I love this smiley, cheerful little one!

For our learning time, we first talked about the seasons and the different clothes we wear in each season. She was fixated mostly on summer and how she really wants to go to the beach and wear her swimsuit and build sandcastles. Then we talked about the weather and I made this fun little chart so that each day she can look outside at the weather and put what the weather for the day is in the black square on top. The plan for outdoor play was to draw on the cement with ice. The problem was that the cement was wet from the rain the day/night before so the only dry spot was where Pop's truck had been. We tried drawing but it was hard for her little hands to hold an ice cube in a rag or paper towel. I decided it wasn't worth it so we went back inside and did ice skating with our socks down the hallway. Then we ended with a Sesame Street book we have about seasons. Our first week is done and it turned out just as I imagined and was really fun. Baylor thoroughly enjoyed it and so did I!

A little update on Paige- she had her first week back at school and loved it. She enjoyed doing a read aloud this week and had fun doing a craft for one of her math lessons. She had art club and after class one day she chatted with one of her friends online so that they could wear matching clothes the next day. :)

She has also really gotten into cooking. She loves it and she especially loves when she can make something all by herself. She has the two cookbooks that she has told me that I am not allowed to use. If I want something out of them then she has to make it. Last Sunday she made some chocolate chips cookies. Then Monday she was in charge of treat for family home evening. She made some homemade ice cream that you don't have to churn from her cookbook and also some homemade chocolate sauce that hardens when it hits the cold ice cream. She made an ice cream bar and used a muffin tin to put bananas, raspberries, some different sprinkles, crushed Oreos, and some caramel sauce in. So we got to make our own ice cream sundae. It turned out so good!

Then Wednesday she was in charge of making dinner. She decided to do personal sized pizzas. She made the pizza dough the night before and let it raise slowly in the fridge overnight. She made a homemade pizza sauce and then each person got to put together their own pizza for dinner. They turned out so delicious!

She also made some fresh raspberry lemonade to go with our dinner.

I love that she loves cooking and that she is cultivating that talent. I'm also glad that I get to be her taste tester and so does Nate and Nona and Pops. :)