Summer Activities for Toddlers and Preschooler: Grassapillars

Remember around Earth Day we planted these Grassapillars? Well lo and behold, I can grow something. Every plant I try to nurture usually ends up...well in the trash. It's so sad, but just not my forte. So after we planted these grassapillars in our egg cartons, I started to feel discouraged when nothing was growing. Then my husband stepped in and helped us remember to water the seeds twice a day and voila! They grew. It was a good chance for my girls to see a plant from start to finish and have part in the growth.

We're so proud.

Stay tuned for a lesson on the moon and a post about an amazing program called The Power of Moms. I have so much to tell you! And I've received a lot of questions lately about activities for 12-18 month old toddlers, so remember to type in "For the Wee Ones" in my search box. There's a few ideas there and I'm going to update that series with some new ideas soon.

Send in your activities; I love to see what you're doing out there.
Have a great Memorial Day weekend. We're off to Colorado tomorrow...

Toddler Activities for the Letter G

Well, we pulled into our driveway at 5:30am this morning at the end of a much needed reunion with my dad and sisters in Eugene, Oregon. I feel deeply tired; the kind of fatigue that hits you when you sit still for a minute and suddenly feel like you're spinning. We made the 14 hour trek in a speedy 17 hours on the way there, one week ago. It was one of those experiences that I hope to laugh about for a long time with my kids, when they're older. Anyone would know that driving that long with three kids under the age of four is risky, but it soon became HILARIOUS to me how much of an adventure we were having.
The plan was to leave by 10 am, so we left at 1:30 pm. Around 5pm, we were all getting antsy and anxious for Boise where we'd stop for dinner. About 50 miles outside of the city, we ran out of gas. My husband and I looked at each other in total shock. We had been so wrapped up in our book on CD (Hunger Games, book 2) and didn't even notice the little red light trying to warn us. Luckily we have AAA, so we waited on the side of the freeway for an hour while David took the girls way out into the grass and I nursed baby Eloise. At one point I looked out and saw my husband holding my three year old's legs while she went pee, trying his best to aim away from his feet. That was the high point of the trip for me.
We got back on the road, stopped for dinner and had our girls run circles (literally) around the Burger King. Around 2 am my husband pulled over for a rest (I wasn't helping much with the driving at that point) and just as he laid his head down onto a pillow, EVERYONE LOST IT. Our three year old was crying because she couldn't sleep, even though she'd just barely woken up; our two year old was miserable and wanted out, and the baby was just plain sick of being in a car seat. I could see the lack of sleep taking a toll on my husband's patience and offered to drive.
Around 3:30am, our three year old threw up and caught it in her hands. It was so unexpected and awful that it took me a second to even know what to do. We pulled over, cleaned her up, and got back on the road. Right as we pulled into my Dad's at 5:30am, she threw up again, just to end with a bang.

Needless to say, the vacation itself was much better than the drive! We're happy to be home and excited for Easter projects. I know, I'm behind but that's okay. I have our "letter of the week" from last week to share with you today. We talked about the letter "G."

We practiced upper-case and lower-case G's with " Glitter and Grains.

(It was kind of a stretch with the Grains part...)

We did some math with Grapes!

Glass slipper, goggles, glitter belt, golf ball, green flowers, girl...
Lot's of things to talk about with the letter G.

Check back tomorrow for Easter activities!