Working Steadily On Daydreaming

We are working steadily through our preschool schedule!  The kids are learning to recognize the shapes and colors, all of the alphabet through the letter Nn, the numbers 1-14 and their names. 

I have to admit- Daylight Savings time has taken it's toll on me.  I can't fall asleep when I need to, so I've been dragging.  This is why we worked on the worksheets yesterday instead of something more colorful. 

Look at the beautiful tracing! 

I've also been a bit distracted.  Baby Zuko has been as well..

The gardens are waking up!  Zuko loves to go outside and hang out in them.  He's a good hunter so far- he takes cover in the garden and goes after the birds who rest on the apple tree.  

The kids are noticing the gardens, too.  I'm thinking about putting bark in the flower beds this year.  Right now I am dreaming of summer days.  Reading a book in the sunshine, swaying gently in the hanging rope chair, the kids laughing and running in the sunshine--picnics in the yard- bubbles and sidewalk chalk-- SHORTS and flip flops-  hurry up summer! 

 I'm dreaming of adventures!  Above is my handsome hubby in the back with my brother in the front.  We kayaked through the Seattle Arboretum, it was incredible!  Don't let that calm water fool you, it was easy going through the Arboretum and then we had to work hard to kayak over the rough water back to land.  SO FUN!

Today I am a daydreamer.

♥♥♥Happy Tuesday!♥♥♥

Flower Shop

The kids stopped playing with the Post Office.  It was time for a change of venue!  I created a flower shop.

Here is what it looks like from the outside.  We pulled the register over on our drawer shelf to invite the kids to use it in the flower shop.

I hung up some aprons for the flower shop workers.

They can also choose to wear some flower leis if they want to.  I thought it was perfect to snag them in St. Patrick's Day colors!  

I went to the dollar store to stock the flower shop.  I feel like it was worth it because we can reuse all of this stuff for other activities.  We can recreate the flower shop next year.  Here we have an assortment of flowers in baskets for easy storage.

I spent some time cutting the flowers into individuals so the kids can use them as individuals instead of a bunch at a time.

I found some plastic vases!  To brighten them up- easter grass.  Yes-  that stuff is horrible, but the kids love playing with it so far! 

Here we have some tissue paper and ribbons for wrapping up floral boquets.  I thought it would be fun to have some foam squares for them to stick flowers into as well.

It's fun to wear gardening gloves!

Some hats in a basket are ready for them to use if they want to.  It's fun to dress the part!

The only thing we kept from the post office is this basket filled with papers, crayons and pencils.  The kids can create small cards to go with the flowers.

I showed them how to wrap up some flowers.

They had fun exploring their new play center.

Pretty!

♥♥♥Happy Monday!♥♥♥

Keeping Happy

I didn't take any photos yesterday.  I thought I would blog this morning about some great music I downloaded.  I have a wonderful Sony MP3 player that holds hundreds of songs.  I load it up with playlists based on my mood- most of them Henle House friendly.  There is no mood that good song will not fix.  Someone posted something on facebook yesterday that said something like, "Skip the therapist and spend that money at the record store."  That is so true.  I love to have music playing most of the time in the house.  It keeps my mood in check.  That is important when I work alone.  Running a small center like this can be demanding!  All of the kids are pulling on me at any given time- they all need something- they all want my attention. It can be exhausting.  I handle it well as long as there is music.  It affects the mood.  Classical can sooth and calm everyone.  Rock can hype them up for a dance party.  Jazz is a creativity booster.  This morning I found two albums on Amazon in the Folk section.  They are perfect for today!

The first is a band called "Jamestown Revival".  The song above is called Fur Coat Blues.  The album is called Utah.  $6.99.  You can hear the samples here.

The second album is by The Wailin' Jennies.  This song is called "You Are Here", on the Bright Morning Stars album.  It's a melodic harmonized dream of an album.  $6.99.  Listen to the samples here.

New music- $13.98.  Brain enhancement and mood maintenance- PRICELESS.

♥♥♥Happy Friday!♥♥♥

Traffic Light & Worm Story

This is a repeat offender.  I like it, though.  The kids have been learning the traffic light song in group time.

To reinforce it, we created a traffic light.

They glued the pieces together and painted the paper plate halves.  Easy peasy.

The finished project!

The torrential downpour took a break and we rushed outside.  We actually stood in the sunshine.  It was actually WARM!  We found a worm.  It sparked so much conversation, it was great.  In the past, when the kids find worms they have moved them into the garden.  They know that worms are important to the plants.

My favorite part of the day was when this little one started telling "worm stories".  "I found a worm THIS big.."  I laughed.  It makes me want to go fishing.  I skipped fishing last year completely.  This year I told my handsome hubby that it will not be happening like that again.  If I have to go alone, I will.  I love to go fishing.  I love to eat fish even more. Is there anything better than a trout slathered in butter and baked?  YES- it's if I have ANOTHER one for the next night.  I am also very happy that Daylight Savings time is happening this weekend.  I miss my walks after work and now it will still be light and I can pound some pavement.

It feels like Friday- the kids are out of school for the week due to conferences.  We might skip everything today and play.  We shall see.

♥♥♥Happy Thursday!♥♥♥

Thirteen Books

We rocked some sunglasses, hats and scarves for fun yesterday.  

Chaos is good as long as it's organized.  

In group time we are counting thirteen items.  Yesterday, it was books.  It's so much easier for the kids to grasp what a number looks like if they can see,  touch and assign an item a number while counting. 

They would've counted the books over and over if I hadn't stopped them for story time.

On to the table for some painting.  Thirteen stars!

Sometimes things go so smoothly that I get bored.  That is a good complaint to have in a childcare setting!  It only means that the kids are so well behaved.  I haven't had to worry about chaos at the art table or anywhere, really.  These guys know what I expect and are really good at meeting those expectations.  I am so lucky!

Look at the wonderful colors. :)

Even Smudge is sick of the rain.  Even though Spring is near, that doesn't make the rain stop.  It will probably increase.  At least Smudge stays in with me more often.♥

♥♥♥Happy Wednesday!♥♥♥

Birthday

Look at the birthday girl, giggling in anticipation that this day was FINALLY here for real!  "I'm big now!" she told me.  Oh boy, time to get a job! 

It was cupcake time!  I usually choose a small pack of cupcakes and have the kids decorate them or we create a cookie and frosting sandwich.  This time I saw some little shortcake cupcakes that were perfect for the birthday girl. 

 Make a wish!!

There was lots of conversation about what comes after turning 3.  They asked me how many birthdays I have had.

"35".  Look at the blank stares---- I died laughing!  They couldn't believe it. 

We played with balloons.  It was the birthday girl's choice, she said balloon dance party!  We jammed out to "Birthday" by The Beatles.  It looks like the little red head crashed face first into the brick corner over there, but she didn't. 

 Last week sometime, we took the bubble wrap off of our ancient windows.  We put it up there to insulate.  It worked!  Now it was time to pop pop pop. 

He was trying different items to see what worked the best.

We learned that jumping was the best way!  

♥♥♥Happy Tuesday!♥♥♥

The Sun Was Shining

"Mrs. Nicole, the song worked!"  YES!  When the sun comes out, the kids remind me that the "Rain Rain Go Away" song worked.  We wandered to the park on Friday.  It was a beautiful sunny day!

The slides were soaked in morning dew, therefore, everyone's pants were soaked in morning dew.  No biggie.  The sunshine was having a hard time reaching up over the top of the TALL trees.  We decided to go to a sunnier park.

Woo-hoo- this one had full sun!  

We could see Henle House.

Teeter totter time.

The view is always beautiful around Blackmans Lake.  We are so fortunate to live where we do!

This sunny day was worth skipping preschool.  We regret nothing!

This morning we had to avoid our path to the bus stop because it turned into a river.  The rain was falling so hard that even with the umbrellas, we were soaked!
♥♥♥Happy Monday!♥♥♥