Name Recognition #7

Tot School/Preschool Activity

Need help recognizing and writing the alphabet? How about your child's name? Here is a perfect activity!

I prewrote the Alphabet (you can write their name) and have the kids paint with Q-Tips each letter.

This is a great activity that is little mess, and it is controlled.

It helps with pencil grip, name recognition, and focusing!

My 2 year old loved this activity as well. There are so many words you could have them paint.

Last name, sight words, spelling words, capitals, lowercases, etc.

Have fun with it and enjoy the quiet focused time with your kiddo! 

Easter Egg Flair

I will get to the Soap Cloud's next week. But I forgot to post easter fun!

My kids love to dye eggs, but when they are done...they are done. Left wanting more.

Are your kids the same way?

This year I decided to let them paint with Q-tips to add to the fun. I LOVE how they turned out.

Here is mine...

Here is the set!

White paint I had in the Art Closet. This added an egg-tra 15 minutes of our egg dying fun. They are going to look so pretty on Easter Sunday!  

Scheduling Toddlers/Toddler Tips/Potty Training

Potty Training Continued.


1- Make sure your child is ready.
Adding to what I wrote last week - make sure you are following the right cues. Push it and you will have to start all over.  If they are showing interest - then go ahead and start.

2 - Have the right equipment for YOU and your KID.

Potty Seat vs Potty Chair and Underwear.


3. Decide what is going to work for your Child. Most kids love hugs, kisses and high fives for praise and motivation. But for some they need a little more.  Potty Chart and Rewards worked for 2 of the 3 kids in my house.  My youngest just wasn't interested in charts. So I skipped them. For my oldest - we used Jelly Beans. For my second I used M&Ms and my third I used Gummi Bears. 


Print one of THESE potty charts and take your child to the store.  My kids got to pick a special Potty Reward. I bought it then and took it home. Once they filled up the chart they got the toy. If the accidents started to come again, they lost the toy and had to start again with a new chart. The consequence for not going potty is losing the potty reward.


Remember to emphasize the pottying NOT the reward.


Every child got 1 candy reward for EVERY urination and 2 candy rewards for EVERY bowel movement.
Slowly I stopped giving rewards for urine but kept up the bowel rewards until they slowly forgot about them. (the reward)

March 2009 - Kid #2

Please remember that Potty Training is a process of development, it happens at different times in children's lives. For some its at 2 and some its right after 3. There is not a specific "perfect time" to potty train. Just because YOU want your child potty trained doesn't mean THEY are ready. If you do it before they are ready the only person you are training is yourself.  Children feed off of your frustration, and trust me having accidents is frustrating and hard. Wait and your life and potty training period will be soooooo much easier!


Ultimately you need to do what is going to work for you. You need to devote sometime to actually potty train and make sure you have what is going to work for you. For me the potty seat is better because I never have to transition to "big potties" and stores and other places are not scary since they only know how to use the "big ones."  

Good Luck and as always I hope this helps! This as always is a post to help give you ideas or help with situations. Not a post telling you WHAT to do...because every kid is different! :)

Easy Toddler Christmas Idea #3

Toddler Made Gingerbread Houses!

Okay so I have been saving these for awhile.

 So we opened them up and cut the tops off

 then tape the middles together. and trim the triangle edges off

 Now tape again

 then cover it with a paper bag or book covers

 this is what it should look like when it is traced properly

 now cover the box with glue and doublestick tape

 Now the toddlers can have at it.  We used white tempra paint and q-tips.

 Everyone had a fun time

 N did his pretty quick so I let L (my kid) do one too.

I forgot to take a picture of the finished product but - I added a white door and windows and they looked so cute!

This Toddler Christmas activity required a little prep ahead of time (see above) but they were ready to go and dried fairly quickly.  The best part is that they will store with the Christmas decorations easily because they are flat! Nothing 3D to pull off or tear.

Pink Math

First I made a graph, and then colored directions.  The gray represents the color white.

Then I gave the kids Q-Tips to apply the number of dots.

Then mix to see what color it makes.

She was actually more excited than this picture shows. :)

I left 3 columns blank so they could make up their own pink recipe.

This was very fun, and they learned that a little red goes a long way!

Winter Scenes

Here is what you need...

Dark Construction Paper, White Construction Paper, White Paint, Black Marker, Q-Tips (I used the baby ones because the tips are bigger)

Draw an outline of a tree and let the kids put snowballs on the trees and branches to make a scene.

Then cut out circles for a snowman and let them glue them on.  I just added the coal for the mouth and eyes and there it is...

The kids loved this.  It is simple and looks great because of the contrast!  Have fun!

Fist Ladybugs

Today we embraced what little sun we had and read a few books outside on the porch.  The above 2 were our favorites and K actually had the left one in his backpack!  Lucky us! So here's what we did...

We sang this cute little tune that is to the same tune as 5 little pumpkins...

Five little ladybugs, climbing on some plants,
Eating the aphids, but not the ants!
The first one said: "Save some aphids for me!"
The second one said: "These are tasty as can be!"
The third one said: "Oh, they're almost gone!"
The fourth one said: "Then it's time to move on!
The fifth one said: "Come on, let's fly!"
So they opened their wings and flew through the sky.

Then we got to work!  Paint the side of the fist like so... 

Make five of each side then you wash the hand with a wipe and connect them with the other fist, making 5 heart shapes.

While those are drying, find ugly scraps of paper and cut them into grass, I was really lucky and found this hideous piece of scrapbook paper that looked like clouds and it totally worked for this craft.  That just goes to show you NEVER throw anything out.  (my husband just rolled his eyes reading that) :)

So here we are gluing grass on the aforementioned paper...

See what I mean hi-de-ous!

While the kiddos were doing that I freehanded and cut some bodies.

My son glued all of the bodies to the hearts.

He is nice like that.

Then we glued the spotless ladybugs to the grass.

I meant punched them to the grass.

Then it was time for the spots.  I used infant Q-Tips and let them make the spots. While they were drying and the kids were eating pineapples I did the antennae.

And voila! 

I know SUPER cute right? Go on, grab a kid and do one today!

(Preferably your own kid)