body fun

Jumeirah took this photo yesterday of me holding her butterfly wings, almost ready to attach. Look at my halo!! :)

Today we have been talking about our bodies.. Amahli is becoming increasingly aware of all the parts that make up her little body and they are hilarious to listen to in the acre as Jared tries to tell her what each part is. We had an episode in the bath last week when I heard her scream, so I rushed in to find her lifting up her belly and crying " where my penis gone?"

Today we started with this fantastic little wooden dress up doll and "how do you feel?" teddy set that I have had for years. We talked about what she should put on, what the weather was like and whether she would be cold. Did she need a hat? How about shoes? Jared wanted her to be "pretty" so he changed her pants to a skirt. Amahli gave her ballet shoes so she could dance rather than walk(who wants to walk when you can dance??).

We moved onto the teddy game and talked about how teddy felt, why he weas sad/cranky/happy... Jared thought he was sad "Cos he hungry", Amahli sympathized and cried too :)

Then I told them we were going to draw their bodies and lay them both down on two big sheets of butchers paper. I traced around their squiggling bodies ( you have to be quick, I tell ya!) and got them up to have a look. Jared has done this before so he was straight onto decorating with textas and pastels. Amahli stood staring at herself on paper. And then, " Look! Mali's head!" "Mali's foot!" "wheres Mali's button? ( belly button) and she too, began to decorate herself.

Jared wanted tshirt and shorts on ( funny that, seeing as he wont wear them today, I can barely keep any clothes on him at all!) and Amahli wanted a skirt with flowers. They drew shoes and stripes. They giggled as they tickled "themselves". They had a ball.


I love how Amahli's has a heart :)

sorry!

Sorry gang.. I am up to my eyeballs in silk, thread and butterfly madness.... really was this such a good idea???

Be back tomorrow :)

the very hungry caterpillar costume/ rainbow playdough

Today is short and sweet, I cannot stop coughing and feel rather average and have a cosutme to make, a kitchen to clean, and need to go to bed early..... so its a quickie but a goodie ( sometimes they are just as good;) )

Today we made rainbow glittered playdough. For no other reason but that its pretty :)

I gave them patty pans, rainbow sticks and a knife and Amahli set to work making cakes and singing happy birthday over and over and over again :)

The other rainbowliscious thing I am having a slight panic over at the moment is Jumeirahs book week costume... I suggested going as Cinderella as its one of her favourite boosk and we already have that costume but she turned to me and said " But Mum, then you wouldnt have the fun of making something fantastical for me!" So thoughtful, isnt she??

And so shes going as the butterfly from the hungry caterpillar. And so this is how its going down.....
I made a pattern using cardboard and cut out a ridiculous amount of wings. Then I began to cut out circles and placing them onto the wings.

A quick dash to spotlight today, I got Vliesofix and more rainbow fabric...hoping to conquer this weekend ( well tonight really)...
Wish me luck!!

sciencey stuff for young kids: balancing butterfies

A few weeks ago, Miss J came home so excited and full of ideas... she had seen the school science fair and wanted to do " experiments". Like, RIGHT NOW. And so I got notes written to me whilst on the phone. And then I got asked at 3am one morning because it needed to be dark. And then one afternoon when I had a million things to do she looked at me and said " lets start with something easy then". The first word in my head was "No" followed by "how about later?" but my brain actually stopped and thought now hang on. Why not now? Washing,vacuuming and folding can wait. She wont. Quite obviously :)And so I told her we would do SOMETHING experimenty and went to find the science books I had. She in the mean time, found a magic book and found a cool magic trick that was also based on balance and weight and decided that this was perfect to start with.



And so, I drew her a perfectly symmetrical butterfly which she coloured and decorated with pencils. We then got two 10c pieces and glued them in the exact same position on either tips of the wings. ( actually we used Fijian money from my honeymoon... *sigh*) The photo has three coins but you only need two.. we just had to test that the bigger coins worked better.

And now for the magic!

You can now balance the butterfly on your finger!


On your nose!


On Daddys beer bottle!!


And so talked about how its based on weight and balance which she was semi interested in... but she was more into finding out what else she could balance it on :)

And she has lots more plans... just hope I can keep up :)

Simple printing: Toilet rolls

Tonight has been a bit quiet here... Jumeirah came home from school today feeling sad as she had had a pretty rough day. A touch of horrible children ( it happens, I know,she'll get used to it, I know that too, still hurts) not playing fair, a missing drink bottle, two paper cuts.. I had the feeling it was more than that and she handed me a note from the school that told of a little boy in second class who had died suddenly the day before. I could see that she was really feeling that, she didnt know him but she was thinking about it, and about his family and how they would feel and she was really sad about it. And so we talked a bit about life and death and how she felt and she seems to be ok.
When daddy got home, she took off with his phone to play with it and I could hear her playing with the Iphone app "ocarina". Its one where you can blow into the end and play music. Very cool and she loves it. I came to her a while later and asked what she was playing.
She told me that she was creating something to play at the "Dying Centre" ( the cemetery)for the little boy who had died. I was so touched at the thoughtfulness of this beautiful 5 year old who seems wise beyond her years, that she would think to create a gift for someone who she didnt know but that had affected her.


Today, we did a really fun thing with tweedle dee and tweedle dum with the copious amounts of toilet rolls that seem to accumulate in our place. I dont know how we go through so many but they climb the bathroom wall like a tower. Today we used some to paint :)
I bent them into a few shapes: a star, a heart and left one as a circle. I got out three colours of paint on sponges and we began.


Jared was straight in today, closely followed by a very keen Amahli who really wanted to get her hands in but I stopped her until he had done a little bit, knowing full well he'd leave as soon as it got messy.

Which he did, when she did :)

Would make great wrapping paper... wonder if I could bend it to make Christmas trees????

blow pens

One of those moments... where I am torn between sitting and watching the love that pours between you two and racing and grabbing the camera so I can prove in a few years time that you two really are the best of friends :)

I got out some blow pens from the big box of goodies I got a few weeks ago that Jumeirah has been bugging me about since she saw them. I am not keen on blow pens. After doing straw blowing and having more spit and dribble come out from the straw and not much ink blowing, my stomach decided it couldnt do that craft again. I thought these might do the same thing but I was really surprised! Jumeirah got right to work, creating butterflies and dragonflies with hints of trails behind them... I loved her work and she produced heaps of them.

Then little Miss wanted a turn. I thought what the heck and gave her one pen to blow with. I am really going to have to keep up with her, for when I turned back to see what she was doing she cried " LOOK MUM! SPIDERS!" and all over her little page are tiny red spiders she created all by herself!

This activity can be done with straws and water paint but it is a bit messy and tricky for little people. Here is where we have done it before if you are game ;)

Straw blowing

Keep you eye out for things like these blow pens... you can find treasures like this from craft shops or $2 shops sometimes. Sometimes, though it may look messy and not something your kids will be able to do, try it anyway. I am finding every single day that they are much more capable than I can keep up with :)

sand writing/ beach play

Jumeirah gets up early Saturday morning to start her own "change the world" plan.... first start was a picture for one of my friends as Jumeirah knows that Saturday morning at work is hard for her.. I love her little " Be Happy" slogan :)



Wet cold and snuggly... thats sums up today perfectly :) We have gone back to a proper Winter and its chilly and drizzly and all my little guy wants to do is huggle me which really, suits me just fine. Little Miss is still happily playing outside in wet sand but she doesnt feel the cold (like me) and so shes blissfully unaware that really she should be inside and is enjoying her play.
I set her up with an activity that involved sand and water and would encourage prewriting skills and fine finger muscles.

In a tub, I put wet sand and spread it over the whole bottom of the tub. I then ran my finger through it to make a track and placed a marble at the top.

I encouraged Amahli to roll the marble through the sand track. Jared wasnt keen on it to start with, but once I drew him a "J" he came over and tilted the tub to make the marble roll through the J track. He wasnt here for long and once Amahli started to want to transfer the sand between the buckets I quickly put her outside :)

I started the day on a great note this morning. I set the alarm for 6.30 with the intent of going for a walk. When I woke at 6.23am I knew that today would be the start. And so of I trotted for just over an hour, in the rain ( which I love) and new shoes ( which have given me a blister so I dont currently love them). It felt good to be doing something about it!

Today I found a website that I intend to immerse myself in. Its called Shape of a mother and its full of stories and photos of all different bodies of Mums. Its something that hopefully will shake reality into me that this body I am heaving around in with its great big ceasar smile, isnt so bad.
And it will look a heck of a lot better by Christmas!

Over the weekend we some fun things. The weather was absolutely glorious and so yesterday we headed to the beach for more treasure hunting. Three funny cherubs found themselves "mobile phones" ( rocks) and perched themselves up on a rock each to "chat" to each other. Such children of the times... its really quite scary that they have never known a world without a phone attached to you at all times :)

They also hunted crabs and rock climbed while I sat and reminisced to this time last year when I wished Amahli was old enough to play with them at the beach. She is such an incredible little dare devil and is now up with them climbing and exploring and I will love watching them like this forever.