Tot School – Gingerbread (36 months)

Our little guy is THREE!  Going by the Tot School request, I’ll still show his age in months for those looking for activities for kids of the same age.

Traditionally, I think that gingerbread themes are for December.  When I was teaching, we never had time in December because of Christmas program practice, Christmas activities, etc…so we always did gingerbread activities in the first week of school in January.  I guess it’s ingrained in me now, as we saved our gingerbread week for January!

First off, I want to say HE DID IT!  And if you can’t tell from his face, Alex is proud!  (And Mom is proud of him, too!)  With no help, no encouragement, no prompting…Alex sequenced the gingerbread men.  Yes, there’s a mistake, but he finally understands the concept and he is VERY proud of himself!  These cards came from Musings of Me.

This one is from Jolanthe’s Gingerbread Baby unit.  It’s the Roll A Gingerbread Baby game, and (like last week’s Roll A ___ activity) Alex just loved it!  I added the numbers with crayons to help Alex.

We made gingerbread cookies, but Max woke up before we could decorate.  (Yes, we cheated & used a mix…)  I’d hoped we would find a little time to decorate later in the week, but it never happened.  We did eat the M&Ms that had been set aside for decorating, though :)

Alex adored this activity, although he couldn’t resist sneaking candy as he worked…

It’s from Making Learning Fun, and you simply match the M&Ms to the colored circles on the gingerbread man.

We put the extra M&Ms into Alex’s favorite little snack toy – his “M&M Shaker”, as he calls it. It’s battery operated, and it dispenses the candies one at a time.

This activity was done multiple times throughout the week.  It’s also from Making Learning Fun.  Each gingerbread “cookie” has a shape on its belly, and you match the “cookie” to the spot on the “pan” that has the same shape. 

Another attempt at lacing using this adorable little gingerbread girl from Musings of Me.  Mommy laced the head, leaving the rest for Alex.  He laced it through two holes, and then he handed it back and said, “Here – you do it, Mom!”

Yeah, we’ll just hold off on the lacing for a while ;)

I *know* we did much more during the week, but I don’t recall picking up my camera very often.  Guess that’s all the proof we’ve got!

To see what others are doing, check out the Tot School website!

He Did It!

Guess who’s finally potty trained?  Way to go, Big Boy!

Alex can’t wait to go to the tractor store & pick his prize. :)
He’s also pretty excited about going to Wee Worship and Sunday School with his church friends.

I know every child does this, but it’s just so amazing to see him stop what he’s doing, run to take care of business without being told, and be so proud of himself.  It just took ALEX making the choice to do it independently.  We’re so proud of you, kiddo!

Slovakia

Keith travelled to Slovakia this past week on a business trip for work.  There was no time for sight-seeing in daylight, but he took a few pictures around the city before dark on the night they arrived.

He can (hopefully) add some text to this later, but for now, here are the few pictures he was able to take in the city of Kosice. (Koh-see-cha, in case you wondered)

 

For Jessica, the McDonald’s lover…

Keith said it was very interesting to see this very modern building in the middle of all the beautiful, old architecture.

The menu selections are a bit different from the US!

Bellaboo’s

We wanted to do something special with the kids while Daddy had some time off from work for the holidays.  The days flew by, and suddenly it was New Years Eve and we had yet to do anything!

Alex needed bloodwork done at the hospital for allergy testing, so we decided to get that out of the way in the morning and then reward him with a fun afternoon at Bellaboo’s.  So, while he definitely didn’t like the morning, the afternoon was a hit with boy boys!

Alex really loved the ball pit.  You can send balls through that target, and they get sucked into a ball washer – which then returns the clean balls through a tube in the top of the ball pit.  He (and a bunch of other kids) did this again & again.

Max loved the soft play area’s steps.  He just kept walking up and down, up and down.  He liked the ball pit, too, but kept getting squished by bigger kids so I couldn’t leave him in there!

Water table ~ It’s a good thing they provide aprons!  My kids’ sleeves and the bottoms of their pants were soaked.  I can only imagine if there were no aprons…

The train room – it’s no secret that my boys love their trains!  I don’t think a day goes by that they don’t play with the Thomas tracks at home.  A room full of trains?  They were pretty happy about that!  Max kept stopping to stare at the electric train that circles around near the ceiling.

Max was completely fascinated by this bread shelf in the pretend grocery store.  When Daddy took Alex to the potty, we’d moved on to the construction room at the opposite end of the building.  Max took off running across the museum and headed straight for this pretend play area! (Mama was close behind, of course!)

Alex had no interest in dressing up in this room, but Max loved it!  He put on all the safety gear and climbed up and down the giant wooden blocks. We did more, but I chose to focus on the fun & set aside the camera for much of the day! :)

Afterwards, we came home for pizza, homemade pretzels, and bedtime…and sleeping through the new year! Aren’t we exciting people?! ;)

December Random Photos

I just went through the December photos to find what hadn’t been posted yet.  Rather than think (why would I want to do that?!) I’m loading them all in one random post.

Lunch at Panera in mid-December.  I think this is the day that Aunt Deb & Aunt Donna gave the boys their adorable red Jingle Bell Rocker shirts – shirts that are seen in almost every December blog post, I’m sure!   

 

A bit of an uh-oh moment with the Christmas tree.  Alex said it’s because he wanted to plug in the lights all by himself.

Max – looking way too grown-up for my liking – playing with his Zany Zoo

 

A near-daily occurrence in the month of December…my boys with a pile of tools!

Tools have many uses at our house…

Helping Daddy balance the checkbook…

Christmas pictures by Grandma & Papa P’s tree