Tot School – 26 Months

J is for John Deere : Alex is TOTALLY and COMPLETELY in love with John Deere tractors, so I couldn’t imagine doing anything else for J week.  It’s just a basic farm theme, though.

Daddy & Alex had tractor races on the living room floor one night.  It wasn’t really Tot School, but it fit into our theme quite well.  

We made a cardboard box barn for Alex’s toy tractors, figuring he’d LOVE to drive his tractors in and out of the barn.  Making this barn was actually really fun, but Alex doesn’t care for it.  Keith suggested I cut off the doors and then “hinge” them on the inside with duct tape so it’s easier for Alex to get his tractors in & out.  I may try that. (I colored the barn with red bingo marker because I was too cheap to go buy red paint…but Keith pointed out that was a good idea, as marker won’t flake off over time!)

This one is from another Tot School blog – a printable Pigs In The Mud file folder game.  (And a quick plug for the Along The Way blog – she’s a fun mommy!) The “mud puddle” has the uppercase alphabet on it.  Each pig has an uppercase letter printed on it.  Add some velcro circles, match the letters, and have fun!  Alex loved it!  I only gave him Pigs A – J, and he was begging me for the rest of the pigs (which weren’t laminated & didn’t have velcro yet…)

Farm Puzzles – I believe we can thank Aunt Deb for both of these puzzles – the LeapFrog Farm puzzle and the dollar store farm animals puzzle.  I love the Leap Frog puzzles because the pieces are magnetic, so you don’t lose every piece when your toddler dumps it upside-down!  (Uh, not that my toddler would do such a thing…)

  

A simple homemade game – pictures from Google images, printed twice, one copy stuck in a page protector, the other cut into pieces for Alex to match.  He did this over and over…and over…naming each vehicle:  “Gator, Mom!"  “Look – a combine!”

I grabbed some pictures from Google Images to make this J is for John Deere coloring page.  I guess I didn’t take any pictures of it once it was colored?  Hmm…

This is another homemade creation. Alex chose the tractor image from Google, and I designed (a rather imperfect…) magnet page.  He was so happy!  We printed two copies, and he “decorated” the other copy with a green bingo marker. (He also decorated his face while I got the baby out of his crib.  Sigh.

(If anyone wants these homemade pages, I’d be happy to send you the files.  Trust me – they are nothing special, but if it saves you a bit of time, you’re welcome to use them.)

This Peek-A-Boo Barn was a huge hit!  I cut out the barn, added the white detail, and printed some animals from Google Images (gee, are you surprised by that website?!).  Alex glued it to the blue paper, and he glued the animals in each window (with help, of course…)  It’s now hanging on the refrigerator, and Alex keeps opening windows and saying “Peek-a-boo-goo!”  I have NO clue where the “goo” part came from.  Strange child *Ü*

We already own LOTS of John Deere books, and we have a set of John Deere DVDs that Grandma P gave Alex for Christmas.  We also picked up some tractor books at the library and Aunt Deb gave Alex a new John Deere ABC book that she found at TJ Maxx.

I’d been thinking about taking Alex to the John Deere store since it’s only ten minutes from our house, but we ran out of week!  Seriously, this week FLEW by!  We could easily do another tractor week…but it’s on to K is for Kite next week…with a few St. Patrick’s Day activities tossed in for fun.

Here are some favorites, not only this week, but EVERY week!  Good luck reading the Old Macdonald book without singing – I can’t do it! :)  We’ve read that book at least twice a day for the past 6 or 7 days!

To see what other tots are doing, check out: