Green Day Collage

Presenting the first page of our color book

This is our second attempt on collage so far and not really bad if we compare the above collage to this... But it was not easy at all to get M to make one even after eight months.We really had to put in" efforts" to make this work attractive to her. I am glad though that at least she was interested in putting on glue to the paper (it was a bit difficult to take that away actually) and then she just pasted the leaf and she was done to finish the thing I had to place the pieces one by one asking my self "Were will it look good ?" "where should I put it?" REAL LOUD and then M would suggest a place and that's how we get here.
I didn't suggest the overlapping of pictures at any point and I am totally exited that it was purely her Idea

we'll try the recycled/junk collage in the morning... so do come back and check it out :)

Happy Earth Day

CELEBRATE EARTH DAY ....... every day

Celebrate morning
The cry of a loon on a lake in the night
The dreams that are born in the dawn's early light
Celebrate morning

Celebrate living
The laughter that sings in the heart of a child
The freedom that flies at the call of the wild
Celebrate living

Celebrate evening
The stars that appear in the loss of the son
whispering winds," we are one ...we are one"

Celebrate Earth day, every day
Celebrate Earth day , every day
Celebrate land and sea
Celebrate you and me
Celebrate Earth day, every day

words and music by John Denver

Green Eggs and .......

Never knew Our Green celebrations would start this way....
yup!!! M's latest obsession with Dr. Seuss 's "Green Eggs and ham" lead us to this green treat :) she loved it so much that i know it by heart by now and after reading it for 20 or so times this morning she wanted to eat Green eggs and ham..... Hmmmmmmmmmm ... what to do? what to do?
make green eggs what else !!!

my lil one didn't seem to mind the squarish shap of her eggs a bit

Here is the Recipe:

To make 2-3 green eggs

3-4 bread slices
2 Eggs
3-4 tbs Milk
3-4 tsp Sugar
a few drops of Blue food color
oil for shallow frying

1. Beat eggs, add milk and sugar.
2.Make two toasts by dipping one slice in the batter at a time, turn over covering the other side then fry in pan with 2 Tbsp oil.
3.Add 2 drops of blue food color it will turn the yellow better into green (u can also use green if blue is not available) repeat the above process to make one green toast.
4.Now using a Cookie cutter cut a hole in each yellow bread. Using the same cutter cut 2 circles from green bread now place two green pieces in each hole you can also switch the circles and your green eggs are ready. Yummmy.....Enjoy !!!

My lil one loved them and I would love to hear if you try them :)

Earth Day Celebrations

Well Now that the Earth Day is just around the corner, here is what we plan to do for this week...Yeah It would be the whole GREEN week

1. Read "From Acorn to Oak Tree " by Jan Kottke, the whole life cycle of a tree is written in simple and accurate way and any other books on Earth that we find .
2. Plant some seeds on our own and watch them grow with time.
3. Make a bird feeder
4. Make a recycled collage
5. Introduce the World Map to M, there are a lot of fun ways (I love this and this the best) .
6. Make our very own world puzzle.
7. Have a Green Day (that would actually be the 22nd April )
8. Make a lot of Bugs (M is seeing bugs everywhere these days)

visit us again to see us in action :)

Are We Going To The Other Extreem???

After reading a first few pages on amazon I am dying to get my hands on this book. Here are some aspects of gender this book talks about

The brain develops differently. In girls, the language areas of the brain develop before the areas used for spatial relations and for geometry. In boys, it's the other way around. A curriculum which ignores those differences will produce boys who can't write and girls who think they're "dumb at math."

The brain is wired differently. In teenage girls, emotion is processed in the same area of the brain that processes language. So, it's not too difficult for most teenage girls to talk about their emotions. In boys, the brain regions involved in talking are separate from the regions involved in feeling. The hardest question for many boys to answer is: "Tell me how you feel."

Girls hear better. The typical teenage girl has a sense of hearing which is significantly better than a teenage boy. That's why daughters so often complain that their fathers are shouting at them. Dad doesn't think he's shouting, but Dad doesn't hear his voice the way his daughter does.

here are some of the reviews:

....we may have gone to the other extreme and tried too hard to feminize boys and masculinize girls. Sax makes a compelling argument for parents and teachers to tread lightly when it comes to gender and raises important questions regarding single-sex education,...."

"Although Sax repeatedly makes clear these differences do not limit what either sex can achieve, he does contend they play a valuable role in determining the most effective methods for teaching, disciplining and understanding children and young adults."

......Hmmmm now how to get this book???

* B* Eggs Bunny :)

M is asking for these cute bunnies with chocolate chips eyes every morning for the past few days so yesterday I thought it would be fun if she try making these herself ( she loves to slice boiled eggs anyway). And here is what she came up with.
Well M made a sad face bunny..... probably coz it doesn't have any eyes :) ( our chocolate chips were finished by this time)

note: the egg piece at the bottom is the sad mouth and the yellow yolk is the nose (as per M's description :) )

Dr. seuss and Babushka dolls

Yeah that's it !!! I know the title sounds crazy ... what does Dr. Seuss has to do with Babushkas, it should be SABUSHKA or LABUSHKA still its plain Babushka . And me and my lil one are in love with them.M just like me fell in love with them at first sight. I unexpectedly saw these cute little babushka dolls in a local handicraft store this evening (which is a rarity in itself) and it was a complete set with ten dolls the tiniest is so so small.... when we presented them to M she went all crazy
she played with them for so long that I don't even remember the hours and still we were unable to part her from them. Finally she went to bed crying because finally the Bushkas were all sleepy and couldn't play with her anymore.
Today even I'm going crazy as I also found 8 of Dr. Seuss books and can you believe they cost me even less than Rs.400.... yeah the price is one thing but I cant get enough of the funny, imaginative characters my mind is racing high on different possibilities and activities that I can plan around them.
By the way I love Green Eggs and Ham the best check it out here on you tube.
it tickles my tongue :)

Pencil and Crayon Holders

Finished these cuties for my cutie and a friend's a couple of weeks ago. They are high on Montessori philosophy as it has a Velcro fastening the kids as young as mine (I believe even younger) can put their pencils and crayons back with ease then roll them up and fasten with the Velcro fastening.
These are supper easy to make and a sure are a good start for your lil ones even if that are not so little any more these are also fun for kids who are ready to try there hand on sewing as it has a lot of straight lines and top stitches.

Here is the tutorial..... the first one on my blog.

To make one roll all you need

• Two 1/4 yard pcs of fabrics (matching or contrast)
  
• Matching Velcro
• 1/4 yard foam lining (or you can also uses two pcs of fabrics)
• Matching threads
• A Large button

Cut the fabrics and the lining as shown in the pic 15 1/2" x 11".The measurements are with 1/4 seam allowances all around . The measurements are for the standard set of 12 pencils each 7" long.
Now on mark a 3 1/4" line the outer fabric from the bottom edge , this will fold and make your pocket later on.
Fold the matching strip of fabric on both sides 1/4" as shown in pic.
Set Velcro (the soft/loop piece) in the middle of this using common pins.Then in the center of the upper portion stitch in your Velcro.Here I have used a length of Matching fabric to decorate (as in the one with yellow button) but you can skip it and use Velcro directly as

Then place the Inner fabric right side up on the lining and then your outer fabric right side down, put in some common pins if you like then sew all around (for a beginner mark stitching line 1/4" from the edges). Leaving a small opening on one side to turn it inside out.

Turn and Press. Top stitch the side with opening. Now fold in on the red line (marked earlier) to make the pocket. use pins if required, top stitch all around.
On the inner side mark and draw lines with tailors chalk starting from your left hand edge , first one 1/2 " the thirteen lines all 1" apart that will leave 1 & 1/2" on the other end
Sew on these lines using top stitch closing the last larger opening. This will create 13 small pockets I have added one for a lead pencil

(please note that the picture bellow only has 1/2 " left on right end).

Now set a 1 to 1/2" piece of Velcro (Hook Side) above the closed pocket , right up on the outer velcro and stitch, repeating the stitch on short edge for more security . here's a close up.

To finish up hand sew a large contrast button on the outer left edge (yeah right up on the velcro)
That's how your end product will look like

These are my finished pieces .

VARIATIONS:

• The size can be varied measuring the pencils or crayons that you wish to place in it for instances for M's chubby 4 &1/2" long crayons I used 15&1/2" x 5&1/2" (for twelve colors)

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial. I value and appreciate constructive feedback. So please let me know if any part of this is confusing, misleading, etc. and I will do my best to make improvements.

More on Art/Drawing

I don't know if its the next milestone or what but Now a days instead of drawing her complete focus is on COLORING. some time ago she used to ask one of us to draw something saying "wancho buttafly" "wancha cat" etc and then make one of her own Now when its drawn all she wants is to grab a crayon and Color color color. I love the efforts she puts to control her hand movement so that the color doesn't go beyond the lines .....though it still does :)

next one is one of her earliest attempts I colored the bird in this one to show her how but I Love what she did with the Dog

and very rarely we get this from her these days. Just check out that to make a "O face" smile she made another face in her mouth that's smiling . It sure is a long way from this to this and now the coloring

Color Forcast 2010 by pantone

would never ever want to miss this one so here it is on "how about orange" . A COOL cool find after a whole month !!! but it sure was worth waiting and searching blindly ( actually i was looking for something else when stumbled upon How about Orange !!! still have to dig it .

My favorite is Green Market

I just Love the colors.You can check out Apartment therapy for details and two more cool palettes.

Egg Hatching and Library Books

M is practicing her ever expanding vocabulary all the time now a days even in her sleep she cant stop. And the experimentation with newly learned words is hilarious. The other day she was "hatching" an egg by holding it in her hands what amazed me was that she knew it will turn into a chicken and then rooshter only that she cant hatch it not by holding it in her hand :)
Her books these days are all"library" books and our heater's pipe is "climbing" up.

Matching Sounds Bottles

Yesterday unexpectedly I found "the empty bottles" they are just the right size (that I was searching and searching for ages to make the Matching Fragrances Game) There were thousands of them bundled in this shop near the one we go every day for grocery and Yup never new they were there...... got them for 3Rs. each. But once they were nicely sitting on my kitchen counter that I realized, I don't have enough essences! So Instead I made a Matching Sound Activity.Traditionally these are called matching cylinders here you can check out how to introduce them. I made mine my way :)

To make these I used 8 bottles to make 4 pairs, simply wrapped the bottles, I used a wrapping sheet that had a striped pattern, to wrap up the bottles and screw top lids. For half of the bottles I used 3 toned patches and for the other half plain blue to complement them, then I used the regular punch to punch some matching circles to be glued on top to further dress them up. Finally poured 4 different types of grains ( make sure that they all vary in size and quantity) to make one pair of each. Now for every 3 toned we have a matching sound in the plain one. You can put in different things , like rice, small bells, wooden beads etc to make more distinct sounds!

Although I have seen a few similar activities with colored markings on bottom as a control of error I didn't put them under mine as the sound bottles have a fantastic built-in control of error

I love this super di duper game and so Does M, as she listened to them so enthusiastically, shaking them alternatively, making music. She is not interested in making matches yet.To me that is perfectly fine she is never interested in it (never puts things in pairs right or wrong) and I hope that will come eventually.
the best thing is that she is still working with them and making lots of music :)