Weekend Bonus Post for Superstars

Well, even though I didn't win the "best local blog in Brooklyn" contest (but, really did I expect to?) I still feel like a superstar.

First, because so many awesome readers chimed in on my last post to relieve my snack ennui.

Second, because I was featured at "Mommies Who Blog" back in July.

Third, because I am the current "Where to Find Inspiration" feature on the Huntsville Education Activities Examiner (check out the super-neat slide show at the bottom of her page). You should check out Starr's 3 part article Preschool Activities 101: TV free ways to keep your kids busy while you work, and not just because I am also featured (no. 40) but because there are some excellent ideas. In fact, you should just subscribe to her feed.

Excuse me now while I go bask in my glory. At least until there is another poopy diaper to be changed. Which I believe there soon will be.

Snack Time

Dear Internet,
I have hit a snack brick wall. I want to prepare healthful snacks for my Kiddo, but sometimes I need something else in addition to fresh fruit and veggie sticks. I've tried nuts and dried fruit, too. But I'm bored and need great inspiration. What other great snacks are there that don't come wrapped in plastic, cardboard or are extruded?
Please help me.
Sincerely,
Mom.

Window Washer

As you know, I love free entertainment, especially when it involves Kiddo doing chores and cleaning up after his window painting. I had to finish up the task, but this was almost as much fun for him as the painting.I know you are dying of suspense wondering what Kiddo chose as his new toy. He has made his choice and I will post as soon as it arrives in the mail. Thanks for all the great suggestions!

It Wasn't Me...

... but I sure wish it had been.
I have been walking by this sign all summer long. It makes me want to scream.

For more on my pet peeve, visit here and here.

Buttoned Up

I found some button stampers I made years ago (BC - Before Children) and gave them to Kiddo to try out.
Paint works better than a stamp pad but you need to spread the paint thinly in a tray or else the paint globs and you don't get the design of the button.
This is a great use for those extra buttons you still have for clothes that are long gone!

Window Painting

For a change of pace from paper, I mixed a small amount of dishwasher liquid in tempera paint and let Kiddo loose on the windows.I can't remember exactly what he said, but while painting he made a reference to The Big Orange Splot. I'm going to do this again on a rainy day... what a nice way to experience tempestuous weather. Also good for disguising dirty windows.

Weekend Bonus Post for Amateur Gardeners

I've been wanting to post about the bounty I have been gathering from my tiny community garden plot, but was put off by 1. forgetting my camera every time I went, and 2. not being able to get good photos due to a. the backdrop of weeds in the plots that border mine (argh! they should just let me use their space!), and b. the awkward shape of my plot (sort of trapezoidal).

But I'm posting about it anyway.

For the second year in a row I planted one of my favorite flowers of all time: the sweet pea. And for the second year, my plants failed. I got a wall full of leaves and one flower. I grew these all the time as a kid, I don't know what I am doing wrong!Here are the delicious cherry tomatoes that are going crazy. This plant is huge! I had no idea tomatoes could get so tall. This is a sungold cherry tomato. I found out later it, as well as my eggplants, is a hybrid. I am going to try and find heirlooms next year, but as I only grow one or two plants, I prefer seedlings to seeds for these crops.
Roma tomatoes. Daddy-O bought this seedling for me for 49 cents!Mmmm, I am loving the ruby red swiss chard this year. I planted two rows, and just put down seeds for a third, hoping I will get more in the fall.In the above photo you can see, left to right, sweet peas, peppers and eggplant, chard, arugula, kale. I had great success with my lacinato kale, too. I just put down two more rows. At the end of the chard row is a lavender plant which never took off (so sad) and a rosemary. Also Kiddo's mini sunflower.

Fairytale Eggplants.I planted bush beans, but they never got higher than a few inches, and produced about 10 beans. I think they had too much shade.

I also grew a lot of mesclun greens, arugula, basil, dill, lemon thyme, rosemary, cilantro and parsley.

One last view, from different angle, the tomatoes are far to the right. You might be able to see some of my cosmos and coreopsis. I am especially proud of my cosmos. Last year I mostly grew flowers for cutting, I saved the seeds from the orange cosmos, since I liked them the best.

Unfortunately, some creature has been eating the blossoms off the mini pumpkin plant we planted from the seeds we saved.

Things I learned about gardening this year:
Don't plant tomatoes so that one plant shades the other. Duh, duh, and duh again.
Cool rainy weather is not good for eggplants and peppers.
Cool rainy weather is great for swiss chard, kale and salad greens.
I should grow salad greens only on my balcony fire escape for ease of eating and to free up space.
I'm really not that into lilies. If they don't perform well next year. I'm giving them away.
If my tulips survive the wet soggy summer (they like to stay dry in summer), I will transplant my lemon thyme over them, since that needs little water in the summer. This will also free up valuable space.
Plants will do well much closer together than the spacing guidelines on seed packets.
Cilantro bolts very quickly.
No need to pull out an entire chard or kale plant at a time, just cut the leaves needed... the plant will keep producing!
Arugula will grow in the shade of the tomato plant.

Shhhh.... It's Quiet Time

I've written before about how Kiddo goes berserk in evening. It's an ongoing problems, and every "solution" we have tried to introduce works for a while, but then wears off. Please don't suggest we have a "routine". We've had a consistent routine for 3 years. While Kiddo still goes crazy during his bedtime routine, it is really the period between dinner and bedtime that is the hardest for me. Most of the time, Daddy-O is not yet home and pre-New Kid I could sit down and read books with Kiddo. For various reasons... I won't bore you ... that is no longer an option.

My latest tactic is the "Quiet Time Jar".

I covered a cardboard salt container (I have been hoarding them, because I knew they'd come in handy for something!) with fancy paper and gave it a label. It's a little bumpy and messy, but seriously... if you want pictures of beautiful handmade crafts, this is not the blog for you.
Inside I placed popsicle sticks with a variety of activities on them. Kiddo can add his own as he thinks of them, too. Each evening he can choose an activity out of the container -- either randomly or by design -- to occupy himself.

Let's see how long this strategy lasts.

Kitchen Magic

Kiddo likes to help in the kitchen. Today he got a magic lesson.
How do you turn purple beans....
green?Why, you cook them, of course!

Game Day

How to have a Sunday to yourself (oh, and the baby): Ship off Kiddo, Daddy-O and Grandpa to the minor leagues.
Via the best deal in NYC:Go Cyclones!

The Inadvertant Scientist

Kiddo spotted this bit of light on the ceiling and wondered what is was. I showed him how to investigate by moving his body between the light source (the sun shining in the window) and the spot. Eventually he figured out that it was the sun bouncing off our small greenhouse. He then had great fun opening and closing the lid of the greenhouse to make the spot of light dance on the ceiling.

A little bit of everyday science.

Request for Toy Recommedation

Kiddo has a ton -- a TON -- of those metal and plastic cars. I hate them (to put it mildly), and most of them are broken in some way. I am going to offer him a trade-in for all his broken vehicles for a brand spanking new toy. I want to offer him three toys from which to choose -- all pre-approved by yours truly. But I am overwhelmed my the toy choices that are out there! What do your children like? Please, please help me! My criteria are these:
1. Preferable made of wood, but will not turn up my nose at plastic -- after all Lego and the engineering marvel that is Wedgits are made of plastic. Have you seen Wedgits? They are AMAZING.
2. An open ended building/construction toy. We have some unit blocks, Wedgits and Dado blocks, but that is it.
3. Does not beep, honk, squeal, squeak, squak or sneeze or need batteries.
4. I prefer not to have a lot of little parts for Kiddo to lose and New Kid to eat.

Your suggestions are most appreciated!!!

I Scream, You Scream

Mmmm, sooo delicious.
You know it must be good because Kiddo NEVER lets his hands get messy and sticky!

Pop Science

Have you ever tried amaranth? It is a highly nutritious grain, similar to quinoa, but much smaller. But even more important is that it makes the world's tiniest popcorn! So... of course we had to conduct a crucial kitchen science experiment to contrast this...with this... Making popcorn on the stove (we are bizarre people and do not own a microwave) is a fun treat for kids and if you've never tried it, it's much easier than you think. Pour some oil in a pot, fill with about 1/2 c popcorn, turn the heat on medium and just wait... no need to shake or stir. We use coconut oil and it never burns (in the past I've had burning issues with canola oil). Amaranth is popped differently: heat a dry pot and after pot is hot add 1TBSP of amaranth at time, it takes only a few moments to start popping. It can burn quickly, so as soon as it is popped, dump it in a bowl and pop another TBSP. It's quite nutty tasting. Enjoy!

Oodles of Noodles

Another table set-up activity! I adapted this activity from the book Games for Math. I wish I had planned ahead and found a picture book to go with the activity, but I didn't. The unspoken lesson behind the activity is to learn that shape does not determine quantity. In this case, to discover 6 different ways of arranging 6 noodles. I added the sorting into muffin tins (I wanted for Kiddo to sort with chopsticks, but I couldn't find them.) and the printed instructions (I love that I can use written instructions! -- ignore my grammatical error... I was too lazy to write it again).
This turned out to be an excellent quiet-time activity and Kiddo would certainly have worked at it longer, had I given him... say 12 muffin cups and 12 noodles each! (next time....)
I think a great extension of this activity would be to choose a shape such as a triangle or rectangle and challenge your child to make as many different ones as they can, but with the same number of noodles. More than 6 noodles would be required though -- maybe 10 or 12?

Of course you could do this with materials other than noodles: flat marbles would be great, toothpicks, straws... you name it.

Ice Fishing

This is something I used to do all the time last year because the surprise factor helped Kiddo get in the tub when he was going through an "I hate baths!" phase. It's really easy... just freeze some small toys in a plastic container. When you put it in the bath, the ice slowly melts to release the toys.I decided to try it again this year but with a literacy twist. Instead of freezing random objects I chose a couple of fish toys and the letters F I S H. Kiddo liked the idea of a scrambled word mystery and asked me to do it again for tomorrow's bath.

Composting Fun

As you may have noticed, I like for Kiddo to do my chores while I pretend it is an educational experience.
Case in point:This paper bag needed to be shredded for the compost...
skills exercised: fine motor, finger muscles
nature/science lesson: paper can decompose just like kitchen scraps since it also comes from a plant
math lesson: a whole can be divided into smaller parts
good citizenship lesson: reduce waste for a greener world.
My work here is done.

Ocean in a Bottle

For my second table set-up I put together the items to make an ocean in a bottle (continuing on the seashore theme...). This is a standard science and nature activity so I won't bore you with the details. There is a pretty amusing video here if you want to see it in action (we added shells and glitter since everything is better with glitter). Kiddo likes to read instructions (I'm sure he'll grow out of that as his testosterone kicks in) so I wrote some out. Granted, this was an activity that required my help at the onset, but the completed ocean provided much entertainment. As we were walking back from the library later that afternoon Kiddo said he "needed to get back to his ocean in a bottle."

Extra credit reading:
Wave
The Seashore Book
Come to the Ocean's Edge
One Small Place by the Sea

Seashell Art

Kiddo is in a summer program and after I pick him up there is always the question... what do we do now? Usually I try to take him to the park, but when we get home he needs something to focus on lest he drive me crazy. My plan (such as it is) is to place a new (or relatively new) activity on his table for him each day. My hope is that the activity will capture his attention for at least 20-30 minutes while I take care of other business (ie. New Kid and dinner). Since Kiddo's summer program has been engaging in a bunch of ocean-themed activities, I thought I would start from there. Fortunately, Kiddo brought home a seashell collection from our recent beach trips.

This is my first table set up:
I showed Kiddo how to trace the shell. I discussed observation of the shell pattern and demonstrated replicating that pattern on the outline (you can tell which are mine in the photo above).

He used watercolor pencils but when he applied the water with a brush he basically just made a mush.I worried that this was going to be too old for him, but he made it is own. And it kept him busy and engaged. Mission accomplished (at least for day one).

Extra credit reading:
Discovering Seashells by Douglas Florian (out of print)
What Lives in a Shell?
A House for Hermit Crab

And the Winner is...

Send me an email by Monday so I can get an address to send it out. momandkiddo [at] gmail [you know the rest]

I have a complex of feeling bad for people who didn't get their name picked and I've decided that this was fun and so I'm going to do it again soon. I'm thinking of doing it as a way to support my local community bookstore..... still thinking about the best way to do that....