What's On The Trays?- Post 3

D is 32 months
S is 12 months

In addition to doing Tot School with Dude we also do Tot Trays as inspired by Carisa over at 1+1+1=1.

I try to put these together with both boys in mind. Although there are obviously some small items that are reserved only for my older son.

On the trays this week:

1. Counting links from Oriental Trading (I bought ours on sale so the colors are a bit different than normal) & a juice bottle

2. Heart picks from Dollar Tree and pony beads

3. A popsicle mold set from Dollar Tree, 8 matching pom-poms, tongs, & a wooden popsicle stick

4. Melissa & Doug Deluxe Latches Board

5. Pipe cleaners made into loops, mini clothespins colored to match

6. Stack & Roll Cups , 10 plastic straws

Both boys did like playing with our counting links. Dude hasn't necessarily figured out how to make a long chain yet. Instead he tends to just pick out one ring and connect lots of rings to it. Right now I think the fact that he ends up with chains is almost more of an accident.  I had included the bottle thinking of Spudder, but Dude also really seemed to enjoy trying to lower his chains down into the bottle. So in addition to the fine motor skill of connecting the links, he also got some practice with hand eye coordination. Gotta love that!

 

Spudder tried pretty hard to get the links into the bottle and had some success. He also really seemed to like trying to pick up as many links as he could with one hand, even when they were spread out. That desire wasn't helping him too much when he eventually tried to put them in the bottle though.

Dude also really enjoyed his beading. I think he spent the most time with this tray this week.

  

 

I included the wooden popsicle stick with this tray for Dude to use as a "tool" to get the pom poms out of the popsicle mold. After I showed him how to do it a couple of times he worked at it for a minute or two and quickly became a pom pom retrieving champ. 

 

Spudder also played with the popsicle mold set a little bit. He was most interested in trying to chew on it though. The poor little fella is cutting several teeth right now.

Color matching & fine motor work opening the clothespins. Check, Check. (This idea was from a picture I saw on the 1+1+1=1 blog.)

  

The Melissa & Doug Deluxe Latches Board is always a popular choice. I left all the latches undone for Spudder and just let him have fun just playing peekaboo with the doors and fiddling around with the latches. 

  

This was the last tray that Dude choose, although the Stack & Roll Cups have become one of my personal favorite toys for the infant/toddler stage. There are just so many ways to use them. You can stack, nest, sort, order from 1-10, and snap them into balls. Dude didn't seem too excited when he was getting these off the shelf but he did play with them for quite a while in different ways. I was excited to hear him explain how this one was too big or that one was too small as he matched them up into balls.

I never got around to offering this tray to Spudder, although he and I have played with the cups extensively in the past. As I said, I'm a big fan of this toy!

I'm linking this post up to Tot School  at 1+1+1=1 & Tot Tuesdays at My Delicious Ambiguity.

Read More: "What's On The Trays?- Post 3"

Simple Fun! - Balloons

For the past week my guys have been having tons of fun with BALLOONS!

Obviously not a new idea, but it's easy to forget how much fun something so simple can be, especially to a toddler. I bought both my boys helium filled balloons as Valentine's day presents and they've been having a blast with them!

Banging on them!

Pulling them down for close examination.

Admiring the pretty colors.

Taking photos of them.

(photo used with explicit permission of the 2yo photgrapher)

Running with them.....

 



....which occasionally leads to falling with them.

(He was fine! And still smiling when he got up)

So the next time you're looking for a little something special for your tot you might want to stop by Dollar Tree or your local grocery store and pick up a balloon for some good, simple fun!

Read More: "Simple Fun! - Balloons"

What's On The Trays?- Post 2

D is 32 months old.
S is 12 months old.

In addition to doing Tot School with Dude we also do Tot Trays as inspired by Carisa over at 1+1+1=1.

I had originally started doing these with my older son, but have recently started trying to come up with ideas that allow Spudder to join in on the fun as well! Our trays for this week include some things for both boys.

 

On the trays for this week:

1. A milk jug with a large hole cut in the side, a basket of colored clothespins, macaroni, a measuring cup, and the top portion of a cut-up 2 liter bottle. (I didn't have a funnel that would work for this so I improvised one.)

2. Hide N Squeak Eggs

 

3. Guidecraft Interlox

4. Stickers and a notebook from Dollar Tree

 

5. A paper towel holder, plastic bracelets I borrowed from our February sensory bin, & scraps of fabric with slits cut in them

6. Flat glass beads, a spoon, & baby food jars in various sizes

And some action shots:

Both boys enjoyed the Hide N Squeak Eggs , but Spudder played with them significantly more than Dude. This seems like such a simple little toy, but each egg squeaks, has a different face on it with a corresponding face on a removable top shell, and has a shape on the bottom that fits into matching recesses in the carton. That makes for quite a lot of ways to use this toy! Dude had fun matching everything up properly, while Spudder mostly liked the squeaking, taking the shells off, trying to put them back on and trying to fit the eggs into different containers.  This is really a great toy for use by various ages.

The milk jug with a hole cut in it has been hanging around our house since last fall when Dude used it for a water pouring activity. I was recently reminded of it after seeing a post over at Chasing Cheerios. I kept the original idea of having Dude use it as a funnel/pouring activity and added the clothespins for Spudder to experiment with. I couldn't find a funnel that the macaroni would pass through, so I cut the top off of a 2-liter bottle. These fit together perfectly and worked great! (Watch for sharp edges if you use a 2-liter bottle. We didn't have that problem with the milk jug though.)

Dude poured and put the macaroni through the holes in the basket.
 

Spudder first did a bit of put & take play using the large hole and having the jug on its' side. He then moved on to putting the clothespins into the top of the jug and removing them from the side. He was really adorable to watch with this one!

The Guidecraft Interlox were a recent present from the boys Nana and this was Dude's first time playing with them. I thought they were a bit difficult to connect and take apart so I stayed close by to prevent any potential meltdowns. (Dude gets very easily frustrated and is still a bit below the 36 month age recommendation.) After a little bit of instruction on how & where to hold, push, and pull he did do pretty well with them and seemed to really enjoy himself. I did do all the disasembling for now. With the way they connect it was just too hard for him to tell what and which way to pull them apart.

 

Spudder was also close by one day so I let him play with a few pieces. We mostly played by handing them back and forth between us. I also tried to say and emphasize the color words as we played.

Dude seems to have a love/hate relationship with stickers so I gave him a small notebook for some extra incentive this time. It worked! I did end up having to remove the sticker sheeting around the stickers to make it a bit easier.



The paper towel holder tray was another that I'd planned with both boys in mind. I gave it to Spudder with the plastic bracelets. He took them off, tried to put them on (He wasn't the best at this yet.) and had lots of fun just clanging things around!
 

The fabric swatches were for Dude. I had cut small slits in different spots on them just big enough to fit over the paper towel holder. I just used what we already had, so ours weren't very pretty. In order to put the fabric on the holder, Dude had to find the slit, turn the fabric the right way, then use both hands to pull it down the holder. I also had him do it alternating a piece of fabric with a bracelet. I can't say that Dude loved this activity, but he was intrigued enough to do it a couple of times. As he did it I could tell that these skills were a bit out of his comfort zone, so we'll have to work on similar activities in the future.

And Dude did some spooning, spontaneous sorting, and pouring with his glass beads. Gotta love the sound of glass hitting glass! He sure did at least. I hadn't intentionally given him jars of different sizes, it was just what we had, but I was impressed to see that he had sorted the smaller beads into the smaller jars, and the larger ones into the larger jars. I was very proud of my little man!

Overall, the boys seemed to have a really fun week exploring their Tot Trays!

     

Read More: "What's On The Trays?- Post 2"

What's On The Trays?- Post 1

D is 31 months
S is 12 months

In additon to doing Tot School with Dude we also do tot trays as inspired by Carisa over at 1+1+1=1.

I mostly use these to keep my older son occupied while I need to get something else done like preparing meals. For that reason I try to pick out things that'll entertain him without me needing to supervise or instruct. My younger son, Spudder, has recently gotten in on the fun too. Of course when he plays with the trays I'm much more involved, both for safety reasons and so that I can soak up all those sweet little smiles!

On our trays for this week:

1. Macaroni, a measuring cup, a couple bowls, and a watering can that's seen better days (A bird got after it and removed the part that made the water sprinkle, so now it just dumps, which actually makes it perfect for this activity.)

2. A frisbee and some "ants" from an Ants in the Pants game

 

 

3. Colored cups, tongs, & colored clothespins.

4. Hole punch & a scrap of colored paper from some junkmail

 

5. A few alphabet stamps, ink pad, & a scrap of paper

6. Melissa & Doug Pets Sound Puzzle

Most of these trays have gone over quite well with Dude. The hole punch did prove too difficult for him, but he was really excited to try it when he saw it on the tray. So I'll definitely try putting that one out again in the future.

 

The macaroni was especially popular!

 

And as you probably could have guessed from the first picture of it, Spudder was quite fond of this Sound Puzzle .

 

Both boys had turns playing with the frisbee and ants.

Dude used it as expected, trying to land the ants in the frisbee. I was actually a bit surprised at how much he liked this, even requesting it over multiple days. The last time I tried to let him flip the ants into a bowl, he HATED it! I'm not sure if it's the age difference or the fact that the frisbee was a larger flatter target, but it went over much better this time.
 

Spudder liked this tray just as much! He loved shaking the frisbee and knocking the ants around & eventually out. Then even picked the ants up off the floor to put them back into the frisbee to do it again. I was SOOO surprised to see him do this so purposefully! He also seemed to enjoy watching the ants slide down the tilted frisbee in his lap. My watching how he was observing everything really cemented it into my mind that this guy needs some more trays!
 

I included this tray for Dude to work on both color matching and fine motor skills. He had a little trouble at first with grabbing multiple clothespins at a time, but figured it out fairly quickly.
 

And the stamps, nothing too earth-shattering there, but Dude did enjoy the process and especially the yelling out of "I made a ....!" And it let me get some dishes done, so we were all pretty happy with it.

More trays coming soon!
 

Read More: "What's On The Trays?- Post 1"