We took a wonderful stroll over to Village Park today for a picnic lunch. As you can see from the pictures, Jackson and Owen had A TON of fun climbing on everything from monkey bars to the giant spiderweb. Adelyn enjoyed crawling through the grass but had little interest in the sand. She was really excited when she found this stick. The two boys helped some bigger children build sand art before checking the creek for fish and heading home. What a great summer day! Duplo blocks were a big hit today. The children built all sorts of stuff. Owen invented what he called the 'super duper looker'. He helped make enough for each friend to have one and the children enjoyed running around "looking" through them. Jack built a tower that he worked hard on and was very proud of. Leightyn's goal was to build the tallest tower she could. It fell over at about three feet high. Klayden built a wall (with a little help from Owen) under the loft. He's getting really good at building. It's fun to watch him figure out what will stand up and what will not. Here they are hiding out with their super-duper-lookers. Adelyn has been very interested in our Fisher-Price Zoo. She's been busy chewing on each animal. You'd think they were different flavors if you were watching her.
Owen and Ella made some yummy blueberry muffins this morning with oversight from Adelyn. The children helped make a fort today using blankets on the loft and then had fun playing with flashlights as well as pretended to be bats in a cave. We read about bats today so it was nice to hear them in the fort talking about all the new information they learned.
Adelyn has been wanting to participate with the "big kids" in their activities. Here she is joining in at the art table. Klayden liked checking out a new bike that I pulled out during outdoor play time. We have started our studies on nocturnal creatures and today read and learned about owls. The children helped pick white raspberries today and loved eating them for snack. They ate every last one!
Klayden, Alex, and Owen finished up their bumble bee art and spent some time buzzing around the daycare this rainy Friday. Adelyn loved playing in the tunnel with her brother for the first time. She was very excited. The bucket swing was also lots of fun.
We spent some time reading books on bees and wasps. We all had a dance party to some of our favorite Disney songs. Klayden has been really getting into driving trucks around the past few weeks. He finds various parking spots all around the daycare but then goes back and re-parks the trucks where we tend to put them away. He's such a little sweetheart! Owen and Klayden helped me build a sandcastle today at the park. They liked learning tricks to building big walls. Alex liked rock climbing and practicing on the monkey bar. Adelyn checked out the sand a bit but wasn't a big fan as it didn't taste very good. She preferred swinging with Mommy, as usual. This afternoon we continued our study on bees and began some bee art.
We had another great day enjoying the outdoors! Building in the sandbox was a big hit. Jackson and Alex did a lot of running and playing on the play set. Ella built a cool vehicle during free-time this morning. Adelyn's still chewing on anything she can get her hands on. The group loved reading a book entitled Honey...Honey...Lion by one of my favorite children's authors, Jan Brett. The illustrations in her books are amazing and if you've never read anything by her, you should!
We were busy outside this morning and wow was it warm already! Just as we were about to eat lunch I realized it was quiet. I found these 3 buddies reading very quietly to themselves...a sight that would make any teacher's heart sing! Adelyn's back to teething but still a happy girl! Klayden had some fun checking out some new music toys. Leightyn and her multitasking always amazes me! She's always traveling around with her arms full!
A big thank you to Owen's Grandpa for donating an awesome paper wasp hive to our daycare! The children are very excited about it and have lots of questions so what better theme to study this week than bees and wasps! Frog man was helping people all day today! Superheros has been the pretend play of choice lately. Spider-man and Frog-man have been out helping babies and little old ladies all day today. I'm pretty sure Owen and Jackson would sleep with these masks on if I let them. What cuties! Adelyn has decided crawling is under-rated and is quickly moving on to walking. Her cruising skills are picking up speed so I got out the walking today. She's still trying to figure it out but I'm sure it won't be long.
We spent the morning on a wonderful walk and a visit to a new park. The children had fun on the new equipment. Adelyn mastered the sippy cup today. What a big girl!
The children had fun playing letter twister today...even Adelyn. Jackson, Ella and Leightyn worked on their pottery during art time today. Owen did some beading and Klayden colored. We spent much of the morning outside playing. Adelyn was very smiley while checking out our new outdoor exersaucer. As an extension of our geology unit from last week, we are learning a little bit about volcanoes this week.
Klayden was dancing along to the phonics songs on the fridge today. He's got some great dance moves. Ella, Jackson and Owen had fun playing a new letter cookie game. Ella did a wonderful job coming up with words that began with the letter sound while the others identified the letters they were finding. What smarties! Adelyn got lost in the vehicles today and may have found a new love for fire trucks. We harvested some of our summer vegetables today. We ate the green beans and white raspberries for lunch but also picked snow peas and some swiss chard. It was awesome to see how excited the children were to bring the food we grew to the table for a meal. Some of the children were ready to paint their pottery today while others began making theirs. Adelyn spent most of the day practicing her cruising skills. She has been pulling on everyone and everything for leverage in getting up. Owen, Alex and Klayden were wonderful cooks this morning. We whipped up a batch of mixed berry pancakes in no time and they were the perfect way to start off our Friday. Adelyn is pushing limits here as she tries to take over her big brother's book. Owen did a nice job easing her back off and asking me for help. I know that this will not always be the case so I am going to cherish this memory. Adelyn has been loving anything with music and will bop to just about any beat. She found this musical stacking toy today and spent quite some time with it. The children had fun making bowls from clay today. I was impressed by their direction following. I had started Klayden's bowl off for him but he then followed my instructions nicely and took his time pinching the walls of the the bowl to make them bigger. It turned out beautifully. Owen was creative and made a cover for his bowl and Alex worked hard to have nice smooth pottery. I can't wait for the rest of the group to make one and for everyone to paint them up next week!
The children had fun looking and learning about a variety of rocks today. Here's Jackson with his favorite. Alex brought in his small rock collection and was very excited to share it during circle time. Here's Klayden on a stroll with baby. He would stroll her around and then put her down for naps. He did this several times throughout the day. There is so much for Adelyn to see throughout the daycare now that she's crawling and pulling herself up on furniture. She was quite the busy body today--having fun with the play house and kitchen set under the loft. The group did stenciling of letters today during art time. Alex traced the whole alphabet very neatly and was proud!
We had a busy, busy day! This morning the children chose all sorts of wonderful activities throughout the day care. After breakfast we headed outside where Ella found a collection of rocks all over the yard. She's really excited about geology and found most of them herself. Leightyn was actually pumped for nap today as she brought her new Little Critter to snuggle with. We love the Little Critters here and read many of Mercer Meyer's books.
The children started to make pet rocks that we will finish up tomorrow. We continued our studies on geology and learned about minerals today. Here's a picture of Adelyn jamming to music. She's loving her mobility and is all over the place now. I turn for a second and she's off in a new part of the room. Klayden really liked setting up the train system with me today. We used every piece we had to make the biggest track system we could.
The children enjoyed seeing each other and sharing all the fun things they did over the long weekend. Ella, Owen, and Alex helped a little in our garden this morning. We now have peas, swiss chard and strawberries ready for eating. Adelyn proudly figured out how to pull herself up and cruise the couch this morning! It's the perfect height and she was determined. This afternoon the children hung out inside and played board games. Here they are playing Don't Wake Daddy. We started studying geology this week. The children really enjoyed The Magic School Bus book that travels to the center of the Earth. We started learning about sedimentary, metamorhic and igneous rocks which will continue throughout the week. Next week we will focus more on plate tectonics and volcanos.
The children did group art today and made fireworks with paint, brushes and straws. I love when they work together on projects like these because it offers the perfect opportunity to practice all the skills it takes for strong collaboration ---sharing ideas, making decisions together, practicing verbal communication skills, showing respect for other's feelings, thoughts, work, and space as well as sharing tools, and expressing emotions, just to name a few. They worked well together and it turned out very colorful. It will be up on display in the daycare.
The children really put their mental gears to work today while playing with a very large tube we have. It was so wonderful to watch their brains at work as they experimented with objects to send down and how the objects traveled through the tube. They investigated how adjusting the angle of the tube as well as positioned the tube on carpet and vinyl flooring would affect the projection of the object. Adelyn and Klayden were both sporting the same awesome badger gear today that proudly stated that they are the product of Wisconsin Alumni! We loved switching our calendar to the month of July today! During circle time, the children learned about the bald eagle and its symbolism to the USA. We spent time outside riding tikes, cars and playing chalk games. Ella liked a new hopscotch game. Klayden checked out the radio flyer trike and put wonderful effort into pedaling. Owen enjoyed racing around on roads we made with chalk. Adelyn has officially been on the move since last Thursday. Here's a photo of her making her way under the loft.
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