The Letter B

B is for Boo!

This is my favorite book for the Halloween season, ever. I love it and every one of my kids has loved it. I've done this activity once before, but we did it again and it was a hit.

 I like acting out each part as we read this book together and your kids can help with the sounds that each part of the (spoiler-alert!) scarecrow makes. My two year old was so nervous by the time that jack-o-lantern said, "BOO!" I knew that was the word that we needed to run with for the letter B.

 Every Fall, I add a bit to my collection of Halloween crafts and I happened to have a bunch of foam pumpkins left over with sticker faces that make them into jack-o-lanterns. You could use construction paper, felt, or even have your child paint faces onto a paper plate pumpkin to make their own jack-o-lantern. The possibilities are overwhelming.

 I let my little ones decorate as many pumpkins as they wanted and we traced some hands because someday I will burst into tears when I open my Halloween bin and see those tiny fingers.

 We talked about the story and decided that we needed to go find a pumpkin head for our own scarecrow we had made out of Edison's clothes, pronto. He currently looked like a lifeless toddler-sized body laying on our front stairs. 

We went on a field trip for Joy School that same day to an elk farm in the valley, which happened to have a self-serve pumpkin farm close by. That's when I realized that I had no cash and had to take all of my children into a local grocery store, by myself. Then back to the pumpkin farm. Then back to the grocery store where they actually had better prices on pumpkins.

But that's another story.

 Gosh, I'm lucky.

 But we did find just the right sized-head for our own scare-crow and Charlotte drew on a face that seemed to shout, 

"BOO!"

"B is for Bats"

The next day, my older girls didn't have school so we kept the ball rolling with our Letter of the Week and did "B is for Bats."

 This idea came from a cute blog I recently found called Crafty Morning.

I like it because it's an activity that can work for a variety of ages.

First, I printed off a few of the templates provided by Crafty Morning, HERE.

Then I had the able-scissor-handed kids (did I say that right?), cut them out. 

As modeled so brightly by Charlotte here.

Tape the bats onto white or black paper, depending on the color of paints you want to use.

I gave each kid a paper plate with paint on it and a pencil with an eraser for the dots.

Dip the end of your pencil into the paint and outline the bat first, then move outward, keeping the dots heavy around the bats so they show up when you remove them after the paint dries.

Knowing my personality, I would have never guessed that making a big crafty mess on my table with a bunch of kids (we had a few extras) would be my thing. 

But this picture makes me so happy.

 Even my two year old enjoyed this activity for about 30 minutes. I gave him a paintbrush and he later added some of his sister's discarded bat stencils.

I always try to drive it home with one last refresher before we move on. Today we read some more "B" books from the library and practiced writing the letter B on paper.

I had some bug stickers that we used to cover the B, reiterating it's shape.

 

Here are some more books that help teach this letter:

The Letter B

Last week we did our Letter of the Week activity for the letter "B." We started off by talking about the sound a "B" makes and tracing it on our white board. Then we opened up our collection of library books that talked about our letter, focusing on bones and black widows (my girls were fascinated by those spider facts!).
 
After reading through some of our books, we played a game with balloons taped on the wall in the shape of a lower case "b." I had filled the balloons, with the girls' help, beforehand with trivia questions about the topics we were going to discuss during that activity time. I ended up tweaking a few questions to fit the facts that had caught their attention the most. 

 

 

So I could finally blow up a balloon by time I reached my early twenties...it's so hard for me!

And my little four year old makes it look so easy.

The girls took turns popping the balloons (with a small pin) and answering the questions. Some questions were trivia about black widow spiders and bones. Others asked them to name a few words or animals or sounds that started with the letter "B." One question asked them to write an upper and lower case "B." I kept the questions simple, fun and age-appropriate.

This is Charlotte making a sheep noise, which of course starts with the lovely letter "B."




And their prizes! Left over candy "beads" from Charlotte's birthday party. The possibilities with the letter "B" are endless. Another fun one we've done before and will surely do again is ALPHABET BUGS. You print out each letter of the alphabet, cut them out, and tape them all over your body. Then you start moving and dancing around and ask your toddler to help you get the alphabet bugs off of you! Ask them to find the bugs in order and stick them onto a board where you can review when they're done and sing the alphabet song. 

So fun.

 P.S. HELLO Valentine's Day coming soon! Wow, I can barely keep up...Tomorrow we're making some cute heart-shaped hand warmers to kick off this next holiday. Don't forget to hit up your local JoAnne's Fabric for their V-day craft kits at 40% off! They make great "do-it-yourself" activities for your kids to try out during crazy hour.

Spring Activities for Preschoolers: Little Love Birds

So today was a perfect example of why I started this blog. I wanted to come up with a service activity that we could do as a family this Easter, to keep it more Christ-centered. I found these little birds and thought we could make them for a local children's center called the Christmas Box House. I called the shelter and they told me that they currently had five children at their shelter, so our plan was to make five of these "love" birds (to show the kids how loved they are) with hand-written notes from my girls. Sounds simple enough right? And if I were to post the pictures of my girls making these birds, writing their notes, and taking this basket of love birds to the shelter, it just might have passed for a perfectly planned activity that was a great success.

Fledgling Friends from Family Fun

But the point of this blog is NOT to make activities like this look easy! Let me just pull the curtain and reveal the back stage realities of this activity. The birds were delivered with love, but not without a few little mishaps along the way. Everything started out so well. We had a lesson on the Easter story and the Resurrection. We talked about how we want to remember the Savior this Easter by doing service. We made the birds, wrote the notes, and all was on track. Then, right before we left, my three year old started crying because her love bird's wings were uneven. She refused to eat dinner and when she started telling my husband and I that she'd never be our daughter again, she was put in time-out.

(She chucked pieces of her magnetic calendar out from under her door one by one... and her underwear. She knows that really ticks me off.)

Once she calmed down enough to come downstairs and get in the car, we were on our way. Then my sweet little girl (same one) lost it again. Her little sister got to choose what movie was on in the car, and that was pure injustice. To give her credit, she had stayed up late with the babysitter the night before and needed to call it a day, but our goal was to DELIVER THE GOODS. We pressed forward. Once we arrived at the shelter, Hazel (over-tired 3 yr old) offered to carry the bag of candy. I should have known that that was a bad idea. Once she realized that after her behavior that evening she wasn't getting one bite of that candy, she started pouting again...

We did deliver the basket of love birds and candy and wished everyone a Happy Easter. We speedily drove home while our precious girl (yep, same one) cried about not getting the biggest carrot in the snack bag. She was sound asleep within 30 minutes of returning home and we are left with HOPE for a brighter, more sane tomorrow...and the age of 4. (I hear it's better than 3).

Easter Love Birds

Materials:

Styrofoam balls in 2 different sizes

soft fuzzy yarn

toothpicks

tacky glue

scissors

feathers

black ball-head straight pins

Step One:

Stick a toothpick into the smaller Styrofoam ball and drizzle the ball in glue. Wrap yarn around the ball, starting at the end and working towards the middle. Cut the yarn, move the toothpick to the opposite end, and wrap the remainder of the ball in yarn, again working toward the middle. Repeat with larger ball.

Step Two:

To put the bird together, press a glue-tipped toothpick into the end of the smaller ball, dap the other end of the toothpick with glue and connect it to the bigger ball (one is the head and one is the body...in case you weren't following). Use toothpicks to poke four holes into the larger ball (2 for wings, 2 for legs).

(My husband is the lovely hand model here)

Step Three:

For the legs, bend the end of a pipe cleaner into four zig zags and pinch them together in two's (for little toes). Trim the legs to about 1 1/2 inches and insert them into the holes with glue on the tips of the pipe cleaners.

Step Four:
Insert wings into the other holes you made in the body. Trim the feathers if needed to make them the same length.

Step Five:

For the beak, cut a triangle from a piece of folded orange felt and bead glue along the outside of the crease. Press into place on the face and add two straight pins for eyes.

Step Six:
My girls drew pictures and wrote "Happy Easter" on little notes with John 3:16, "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life."

Happy Easter!