Note: Today’s post is a guest post from Rachel ~ you might remember her from the first Community Blog Review! I’m thrilled to have her with us today, helping us help our kids learn to read.

My little ones absolutely love reading books. We have hordes of books, we go to the library, and still it isn’t enough. Of course they have their favorites too, and as every parent knows, they can go through jags where the same book has to be read three (or even more!) times a day. I have 3 younger ones, ages 5 ½, 4 ½, and 3 ½, and as much as I know it’s good for them, it can drive you batty after a while! It being the summer, and of course the time when parents worldwide decide to spend a little extra time boosting their child’s skills, I’ve hit on a clever way to keep us both happy: they get to enjoy their favorite books, and I get to sneak in some great learning activities that really boost their literacy skills.

Here’s what you do:

Day 1: Help your child practice sequencing skills

For this activity you’ll need a large sheet of poster paper (or tape several sheets of paper together lengthwise) and markers. On the first day, go through a quick reading of the book, just to refresh your child’s memory. Then ask your child to retell the story. Help her paraphrase each part of the story into one sentence. (“So you’re saying that Max made a lot of trouble and had to go to his room?”) As your child tells you the story, write a sentence of what she says on a strip of paper. Make sure you write large, clear words. You want to have a sentence for each part of the story. After you finish writing each sentence, read it aloud to your child, pointing to each word as you do so. Next, have your child draw a picture to illustrate each sentence. If that’s too hard for her, ask a friend or a sibling to help her out. She can also spread out the illustrations over a day or two. (You could also just take pictures of the pages with a camera, and print them out). When she finishes, attach each picture to its appropriate sentence strip. Now it’s time for your child to sequence. Ask her to put the sentence strips so it tells a story. If she makes a mistake, don’t correct her. When you read what she’s arranged at the end, she’ll automatically catch her mistake, and want to fix it. TIP: If your child gets really good at sequencing the sentence strips with the pictures, let her try sequencing them without the pictures. This works best if your child can recognize a few simple words.

Day 2: Teach phonics by building words.

This is a game I borrowed from my teaching days. In it, your child learns how to recognize a few simple words, how to sound them out, and how to spell them. This helps not only her letter knowledge, but also teaches her how to hear the different sounds of the words, an important early reader skill. This is what you do: choose a simple word, not more than 5 or 6 letters. Write it on an index card. Then write the letters of the word on separate pieces of heavy card paper; each one should be about one fourth the size of a regular piece of paper. Next, have your child help you gather all of her stuffed animals or dolls, the only requirement being that they all need to be able to sit easily. Shuffle the letter cards, and let your child choose which toys will get which letter. Tape each letter on the front of the stuffed animal or doll. After all the letters are gone, have your child put the letters in order. If she doesn’t know any letter names, help her hear the sounds at the beginning and the end of the word; when she is able to isolate the sound, show her what letter goes with that sound. You can stretch out the word to help her get the hang of things. She should then put the stuffed animals with the letters in order, using the word card if she needs help. And that’s it! It’s an easy way to improve your child’s reading skills with a favorite book, and can be done in a day or two.

TIP: You can use new books to improve your child’s literacy skills and language development as well.

About the Author

Rachel is a mom to 7 children, 3 of whom have learning disabilities. She has over 20 years experience working with kids and adults of all ages. Her specialty is disabilities on the autistic spectrum, and language delays. You can visit her blog at http://teachingthefuture.net for more great hands on learning games that will boost your preschooler’s learning skills.

Part of being a successful work at home mom is being able to step away from the computer from time to time to have fun with my kiddo. I am a SUCKER for tie dye ~ yes, I know I’m too old and all that, but I love it! I’m trying to make Hanna a sucker for it too!

This week I took some time to look through some Youtube videos about how to tie die shirts. There are a LOT of them! Here’s one of my favorites:

After watching the videos I was pretty excited to get to it. We ran to town and found even our little tiny Walmart had 5 or 6 different tie dye kits. I let Hanna pick the color kit she wanted. We ended up with a 3 color kit with blue, pink and green.

One thing I particularly love about tie dye ~ and found that I loved about doing it was there is no right or wrong way to do it. Hanna (and me lol) have a tendency to have to do it “right”… this was a fantastic lesson in there is no right. There were a few times when she asked me if she was doing it “right”, and I was very excited to be able to tell her there is no right, whatever you like is right. Whatever you do is going to work ~ because it’s tie dye!

With the kit we received squirt bottles ~ and all you had to do was add water to make the dye. Super easy. With the squirt bottles it was really easy for her to do her own shirt ~ which was awesome!

Before she started applying the dye we talked about colors, and when they mix what do they make so she could make some decisions about where she wanted to put the colors. She wanted some purple on her shirt so she figured out she had to put the red and the blue next to one another. Not sure how exactly it happened but we also ended up with some yellow in one of the shirts ~ it must have pulled out of the green. You never know what exactly you’re going to get… but that’s part of the fun!

I didn’t realize you have to let the shirts sit for a WHILE… like 6 to 8 hours it said on the package. By that time Hanna was in bed, and I just couldn’t wait to see how they came out. We made one for me, one for her little cousin Addie (who we’ll see next week) and one for her. We did the spiral design on those three, and had a little dye left over so we did an experiment on another small shirt.

I opened up all of them but hers ~ figured I’d let her do her own in the morning. The colors were really bright, and the spirals came out great. Hers is the bright one in the photo ~ I haven’t rinsed it out yet, so it may fade when I do. All in all a very fun activity.

It’s really easy for me to get totally wrapped up in work and forget I have a life… and a kiddo. Hanna’s really good at entertaining herself these days… and the reason I chose to work from home was so I was here, to spend time with her, to make memories with her, to participate in her growing up.

It’s so easy to get sucked into a project, to think that you have to be sitting in front of your computer to make the money flow… and that’s just not true.

I’m instituting Fun Fridays

Yep, I’m going to start taking the majority of Friday off, to spend the day with my kiddo involved in fun activities.

How did we get started?

Well we haven’t exactly yet… but here’s my plan.

I printed out these awesome Summer Activity Cards. I looked at a LOT of bucket lists around this year, and found these were activities that I would actually do (which is important). I did pull a couple suggestions out because I just knew if we picked it I would dread it. And as we think of new things we’ll add more.

So I printed them out, cut them up. (I did not laminate them, yeah…) and stuck them in my favorite vase.

Every Thursday night I’ll have Hanna pick out of the vase and Friday we’ll do whatever she picks.

Some of the items won’t take all day… but I’m deciding right here, right now that creating lasting memories and moments with my daughter is important and I’m going to make Friday ~ not only Fun day, but Hanna day for the Summer. Summer will be over soon enough and she’ll be in school for a full day and I’ll probably miss her terribly.

Steps to make this feasible

I still have work to do… so I’m going to have to shift things around so I can follow through with this plan.

1. Write and schedule Friday’s post Thursday night. As we get started with these activities I think it might be fun to share some of them so they may turn into Fun Friday posts for the next week.

2. Get up a little early Friday morning so I can run through email, and any Kiss Club activity that needs my attention.

3. Turn off the computer. If it’s on I’ll be drawn to it. The internet will wait until the evening after she’s in bed. Friday is really going to be her day.

4. Schedule more writing time (for new products, guest posts etc) on the other 4 days.

5. Block out Friday on my calendar so I don’t inadvertently schedule interviews or other activities on Fridays. (maybe I’ll do that in a fun color!)

So that’s the plan, Stan… if you’re anything like me, coming up with ideas for these fun Fridays is hard. Not to worry… it’s not hard for everyone, and luckily they share. Here are some fun Summer Activities, most are free resources a couple are paid ~ and well worth every penny.

Getting Organized for Summer [SimpleMom]

Summer Survival Guide [Life As Mom]

101 Ways to Embrace Summer [Organizing Your Way]

Very Fun Marble Race Track [Home Spun Threads]

Homemade Bath Crayons [From Dates to Diapers]

Summer Fun Handbook [Downstream Parenting]

Fun Summer Activities [Kaboose]

14 Frugal Activities [Frugal Dad]

So what about you? Are you setting aside time in your work week this Summer to create memories and moments with your kiddo?

Who knew when I bought a big bucket of  beads how many hours of sorting activities it would provide. I can’t remember why I decided to buy the big tub, maybe we were thinking about making bracelets or something… but it’s some of the best money I’ve spent.

We brought it home and Hanna immediately dumped it out and started sorting all the different beads. That was a big bucket of beads, and I quickly realized they were going to need a much better organized home. So I went and picked up an organizing box ~ I might have gotten ours in the fishing department.

Hanna spent HOURS, literally, deciding which beads should go where, and how to sort them. Some were sorted by type, some were sorted by color, but they eventually all got sorted into their own little spaces in the organizing box.

Shortly after that was finished we started working on our I Spy bottles and I picked up more beads ~ all in different ocean shapes. She found a place to put them in her organizing box.

While I thought the beads would be used to create other things, necklaces, bracelets, whatever… I was wrong. The beads have been used for hours and hours of sorting activities. Some days, like today, the ocean animals are all sorted into “families”. From the looks of it, they are color coded families, with one of each animal in each family. Some days she sorts by letters, or animal shape and all the same animals get together, no matter what the color.

What I’ve found even more interesting though, is the imaginative play that comes from these sorting activities. Yesterday, while she was sorting I heard many conversations amongst the families about tornadoes (we were preparing for some bumpy weather ourselves). The brother was telling the sister it would be ok, and the mother was telling the kids it’s time to go to the basement. It was very interesting to listen to her process some of the conversations we’d been having through the day.

On some days the “families” get along great, some days the families don’t get along at all… and they fight. Sometimes I just let her work through it, and some days I take the opportunity to talk with her about how the angry family member could talk to the others to express their anger, but not hurt anyone else while doing it.

Who knew… a tub of beads would turn into such a wonderful investment, and provide her with hours of learning and sorting activities… and every once in a while I get a necklace.

rainy day activities for kids

Finally, finally, finally… it’s raining. And of course it’s the second day of Summer vacation and we’re stuck inside. I thought I’d take some time to brainstorm some rainy day activities for kids.

1. Read books… Hanna and I curled up this morning with 5 new books and it was perfect being all snuggled up with her with the rain pattering down on the roof.

2. Make some playdoh… and then play bakery (or pizza shop, or donut shop, or cookie palace) bring out your baking stuff, muffin tins, cookie cutters, and let your kiddo have at it!

Here’s our favorite playdoh recipe:

1 cup flour
1 tbsp cream of tartar
1/4 C salt
1 tbsp vegetable oil
3/4 boiling water
food coloring

* if you want fruity yummy smelling playdoh use a package of kool aid instead of the food coloring.

Add food coloring to the water (in a microwave save dish) and microwave for 2 min 20 seconds.

While your water’s heating up, mix your dry ingredients together in a bowl (we use the stand mixer).

Add boiling water and mix until smooth and blended. (the dough hook works great for this).

If you keep this in an airtight container in the fridge it will last a LONG time…

3. Build a fort… pull out your blankets and sheets, and build the fort of all forts.

4. Play games! We love I Spy, and we just made the Sight Words Game

5. Bake cookies, or cupcakes, or bread, even Pizza from scratch!

6. Stomp in puddles! Our kids are sweet but they won’t melt. Let them get out there and stomp in the puddles!

7. Do Puzzles. Hanna loves puzzles and now you can find puzzles for every age level.

8. Build a train. Grab some boxes laying around the house, and tie them together with a string. Hanna likes to put all her stuffed animals in the train and drive them to who knows where.

9. Do art. Whether it’s watercolors, or markers, or crayons. Get the art supplies out and let your little one go wild and express their inner Picasso. Need some art ideas? Check out Deep Space Sparkle… fantastic ideas to get you started.

10. Sensory Boxes. This is always a favorite for Hanna. Get a box (a plastic square box will work great) fill it with anything… sand and small toys, or pasta and things, rice, beans… give your kiddo some measuring cups, spoons, funnels and let them have at it! If you’d like some ideas on this check out Counting Coconuts. Great ideas for very unique sensory tubs.

Those are some of my favorites… what about you? Please share your favorite kid friendly rainy day activity in the comments.

It’s almost Summer (I think). Every late Winter to early Spring I get very gung ho about the garden.  Usually this happens because it warms up, and makes me think Summer’s on the way and it’s time to get started. Not so much this year… yeah, we had a couple over 100 degree days, and set a record or two, but mostly it’s been cold, and windy. Which hasn’t done much for my gardening motivation. We’ve also had little to no rain…

But that’s about to change (finger’s crossed). This week it’s supposed to rain for a couple days, and there’s chances for rain for the next 9 or 10 days, so I decided to get off my duff and get out in the garden!

Over the weekend we planted way too many watermelon and canteloupe seeds. We had this space where the corn planter wouldn’t fit, so it was perfect for planting. My husband is determined to actually GET a watermelon and canteloupe out of our garden… we’ve only been trying for 10 years! (We got really close last year, and the chickens ate it!)

Anyway… every year, I come up with this grand plan for the garden. It usually revolves around water, because when it gets wicked hot I hate going outside, and that’s when the plants need me to remember and actually water the most lol. Last year I set up some Ooze Tubes. They were GREAT. However, by the end of the Summer our terribly hard water had plugged up the holes in the tubes and they weren’t working any longer. If you have normal water, these would be an awesome solution.

So here’s the big plan for this year:

Soaker hose and mulch.

I really do suck at watering, so I’m trying to put into place strategies that will help my garden survive and thrive and allow me to be a bit of a flake when it comes to watering.

I’ve put in a fence the whole length of one side of the garden, for beans. I’m trying to grow more food we actually eat, and we eat a lot of green beans. At the base of the fence I’ve installed a drip hose. Once the seeds come up I’m going to put a nice thick layer of straw over them to help keep the water in.

Lucky for me, the soaker hose is really long so it nicely wrapped through all my tomato plants as well. I’ve already got them all covered with straw and they’re looking good. 

I also planted zucchini, and butternut squash seeds yesterday and I’ll do the same with them once the plants come up… the soaker hose was long enough to reach the butternut, but I will probably get another ooze tube for the zucchini.

I also put in cucumbers. I changed the fence configuration for them this year, to accommodate the bean fence, but also because I decided to grow fewer cucumbers. While we LOVE cucumbers and eat a lot of them, we don’t like pickles. I make them every year, and every year they just sit in the cabinet. So this year, I’m going to plant fewer cucumbers.

Although… with all the canteloupe and watermelon we planted, it’s likely I will be heading to the farmer’s market with the excess, and I could certainly take some cukes with me too.

I planted a few potatoes in the garden back in March when I planted potatoes, and they’re doing quite well. They also need a nice layer of mulch to help keep the moisture in and the weeds out. I have a huge round bale of hay in the barn, but my husband boxed it in when he planted the corn. Soooo…. we’ll have to see if I can get it out somehow.

This is my favorite part of gardening. The planning, the possibilities… every year brings another set of endless possibilities to my garden. My hopes have yet to be doused by things not coming up, the hail, the bugs, the heat… I just love Spring.

Tell me… what do you do to manage watering, and what have you planted so far this year?

I recently printed out some “ending sound cards” from The Montessori Print Shop and had them laminated (yes, my own laminator is still on the wish list). Anyway… Hanna’s been having fun writing the last letter in for words. She’s also been having a blast with play dough since I moved my office upstairs. She’s got a little table in my office and has been playing with play dough for hours and hours some days. I thought it would be fun to get her some cookie cutters in the shapes of letters so she could spell with her play dough.

So the first thing I did was check out play dough items. I didn’t really want any actual play dough, we make our own, but I was NOT thinking outside the box. I picked her up a cute little set for her birthday, and she really likes it. (Although, I must admit all the new Barbie and Tawny set and the new Nickelodeon Fit game have currently replaced fun Play dough time)

The day after I picked up the playdough kit with letters we ran to Bed Bath and Beyond to pick up a new Indestructable Cup for my husband (he destroyed his last one ~ yes, I get the irony there.) and I saw a cookie cutter kit of 100 cookie cutters, including the entire alphabet for less than what I paid for the silly play dough kit I had already bought. *sigh*

Let this be a lesson to you (and me). Think outside the BOX!! I just checked Amazon and when I put in cookie cutter kit with letters, wouldn’t you KNOW ~ there are quite a few sets of JUST letters, no unnecessary play dough involved, and for less than what I paid for the play doh set.

What are you gonna do? I’ll know better next time. I can’t wait until she’s ready to test out the letters.

On a side note: She got this  VERY cute Fox Fun Junior baking set from a friend of ours. It included a small cookie sheet, small rolling pin, whisk, 2 small tart pans, 2 larger tart pans (and more). It’s adorable. The first thing she did once it was open was run upstairs to the play dough with it. She made some KILLER cookies and pies that day.

Now her play-doh basket is so full I’m going to have to do something different… thinking a new set of squares and baskets for this room. Oh well… we’ll figure out something. What’s your kiddo’s favorite play dough games to play? I’d love to hear.

note: Since Hanna just turned 5 (yesterday) I’ve started thinking about taking her to Disney. I know NOTHING about Disney or what it takes to prepare for the trip, and have a wonderful time without spending a fortune. I do, however, know someone who does! I immediately thought of Nancy Bobby ~ my favorite Disney Travel Specialist from The Affordable Mouse! She was gracious enough to put together a guest post to help me (and all the other Disney clueless folks out there) get started. Without further ado…

Planning an Affordable Family Disney Vacation

Many thanks to Jackie for inviting me today, to discuss one of my favorite topics: Disney vacation planning!

Just about every family considers, at some point, planning a vacation to Walt Disney World. Many however, never get beyond considering it because a Disney vacation can be expensive and therefore, a luxury that gets put off until “we can afford it”.

But you don’t have to postpone your Disney vacation dreams. Because believe it or not, a Disney vacation can actually be quite affordable!

Yes you read that correctly: The phrase “Disney vacation” and “affordable” are in the same sentence. J

While it won’t happen accidentally, with planning, research, and the willingness to consider a variety of options…because there are MANY options…you can plan a vacation to Walt Disney World that fits just about any budget. Really!

Wondering how to make it happen? Well then let’s talk about a few things that you will want to consider.

Plan Far Ahead

First, try to plan as far in advance as possible. And I don’t mean weeks. I mean months, preferably at least 6 months in advance. There are many reasons for this, but the main one is that time equals money saved: the more time you have, the better the chance that you will be able to get the best deals available. Plus it gives you time to build your vacation fund. J

Next, look at a couple things that will have a major bearing on the cost of your Disney vacation. Give yourself time to research here, because making the right choices at the beginning can save you hundreds…if not thousands….of dollars on your trip.

The Time of Year

The season or month that you visit Walt Disney World will have a huge effect on the cost of your vacation: some times of year are simply more expensive than others. Typically holidays and school vacations are the most expensive of all….so if you have any flexibility at all, try to schedule your trip during the cheaper times of year.  If you can’t, then you will be saving on some of the other variables of your trip instead. This is like a puzzle to a certain extent: you put the pieces together to make them fit in the way that is best for you…and no two ways are the same.

Promotions and Special Deals

To really save money, you will want to do some comparisons to see what is actually cheapest. I always tell folks to not make assumptions: you may “think” you know what will be least expensive, but until you actually run all the numbers, you can’t know for certain. And people are often surprised about what is actually cheapest for them!

So get out that trusty calculator. Figure out your budget and know when you will be traveling (or at least the general time of year or month), then look at the promotions that Disney offers. Get a quote. After you do this, consider non-Disney hotels and even vacation rental properties too: these can in some cases be less expensive….but not always. You want to be very careful here and add in the extras that you may need to pay for that will be free when you stay with Disney, like transportation, parking, and in some cases even food.

Taking the time to plan and research for a vacation to Disney World can be a lot of work, but the reward for your time and effort will be the magical memories you create with your family at the “happiest place on earth”…and the knowledge that it is a vacation that was actually affordable.

About the Author:

A Disney travel specialist, Nancy Bobby started her blog, The Affordable Mouse, as a way to share information, ideas, tips and strategies for saving money at Walt Disney World. If a Disney vacation is in your family’s future, get the answers you need with her free Step by Step Guide to Planning an Affordable Disney Vacation.

This Summer (is not very far away! yikes) is going to be all about reading. We love to read, and I’m currently putting together a nice Summer reading list. I figure we’ll go to the library and check out books, and maybe the ones we love the most we’ll buy to have around.

However… part of what I’d really like to support her in this Summer is learning her sight words. Apparently, there are certain words her teachers will expect her to know just by looking at them, without sounding them out. Fair enough… as long as they’re going to teach her how to sound the rest of them out.

To that end I’ve been trying to find some fun sight words games to play with her. We’ve found some sight words word searches ~ which Hanna is VERY good at (and amazes me at how good she is at them).

Since Memory is one of her VERY favorite games I took one of the lists and created a spreadsheet of the words. I printed out the spreadsheet twice (on heavy card stock. Laminating it would have been even better) and then cut out the squares with the words in them. (so now there is 2 sets of the words) There are flashcards that are much bigger if you want a bigger version of this game.

We spread all the words out on the ground (face down) and then played memory. We would sound out each word we turned over, and then if there was a match we’d keep them, if not, turn them back over.

The list I did had 40 words on it. This was a LITTLE long… but she stuck with it and we had a blast. By the end of the game she was no longer sounding out Red ~ but was just saying “red” every time she turned it over. This wasn’t like learning at all… this was us playing her favorite game, and she is learning her sight words.

There are also tons of sight words bingo games out there. This is really fun. You could use the list and pull one word at a time out of a bowl ~ to play the bingo game.

I just found an online  sight words matching game. This is very cool. Hanna loves these kind of computer games. (thankfully she’s getting a new monitor for her birthday so she can get back to it!) Starfall also has an online version of this sight words game.

There are tons of fun ways to help kids learn their sight words. I have seen plenty of “flash cards” but really… who wants to sit there and go through flash cards? I remember when I was younger, my mom used to chase me around the house with multiplication table flash cards. I hated it then, and still remember how much… creating that kind of feeling around words, and reading is no way to create a love of reading in your kiddo.

There’s always a way to make a game out of learning, and make it fun.

If you’ve got other sight word games you like to play please feel free to share in the comments. I’m always looking for more resources!

Every year I look forward to coloring Easter eggs with Hanna, not only because it’s fun, but I love boiled eggs and I never seem to think to make them except at Easter. This year was no exception. We had a ton of fun. We invited Grandma over to help out, and started out with 2 dozen eggs. Those eggs lasted all of about 37 seconds, so I boiled up another dozen right then.

Looks like we’ll be having Deviled Eggs for Easter dinner.

I like to try new and different things each year. We don’t get super tricky, but there are always some new and cute looking coloring package. A couple years ago we did “glitter eggs” and those were pretty fun. This year I saw a friend of mine had done dinosaur eggs with her Grandkids and thought those looked VERY fun. I’m a fool for tie dye, so when I saw a tie dye egg kit, that definitely went into the basket.

I made the big mistake of using the tablets from more than one kit. (We keep the egg coloring cups ~ even the flimsy ones ~ for painting throughout the year so I had plenty of cups to use) This was a problem because I had maybe 8 or 9 cups of color and Hanna dropped one in each cup and bang… a dozen eggs is almost done in 5 seconds. (and we hadn’t even gotten to the tie dye box yet!!)

That’s ok. We took them out of the color and played around with them. We also mixed colors to see what would come out. Our favorite was definitely the bright pink and blue ~ which made a gorgeous purple color. We also learned that if you dip the egg in blue and then yellow it makes green, and it doesn’t matter if you do the blue first or the yellow first, it makes the same color of green. (try it yourself and see!)

The tie dye was not exactly what I expected. The directions didn’t quite make anything like they looked on the box, but a little experimenting and we got some pretty (but not so) tie dye eggs lol.

The dinosaur eggs that looked so amazingly cute in Mary K’s pictures didn’t look quite that cute at our house. But when we took pictures of them, they looked a little bit cuter. hmm…

All in all we had a great time and though we REALLY need the rain I’m keeping my fingers crossed it will hold out until Sunday afternoon so we can hide these 3 dozen eggs outside.

You know as soon as we finished dyeing our eggs I found a couple really cool posts about how to color easter eggs (without using the package lol). One of which I almost made more eggs to try… but didn’t. Who says dying eggs has to be ONLY at Easter? I think it might make a fun project for whenever.

Anyway, the great idea comes from Sandy at Moments of Mommyhood. She used tissue paper to color her  eggs. The process looks really fun and the end product is gorgeous! AND it might take a little longer than 37 seconds to do.

Another way of coloring Easter eggs I’d REALLY like to try next year is using natural dyes made from food. I think this will be a lot of fun, and Hanna will be a little older and it will be some good learning for her as well as fun.

So tell me… how did you dye your eggs this year? What methods would you like to try next year?