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JDaniel4s Mom

growing & learning with him

Deirdre Smith writes/owns JDaniel4’s Mom. After twenty years as a elementary school and technology resource teacher in Northern Virginia, she became a stay at home mom in upstate South Carolina. Her blog features ways she and her 5 year old are exploring learning, crafting, creating healthy meals and living life to its fullest. Deirdre can also be found on twitter as @jdaniel4smom and on her blog's FB page. You can also check her out on Google+.

Great Posts I Came Across This Week- April 10

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Each week I travel around the internet visiting blogs. Here are a few posts that I loved, learned from, or gave me great ideas:

Here are some child-related posts:

Chasing Marcus has a Tot School post on eggs that is really fun. I love her fly swatter activity. I would love her peg game.

I love Southern Savers. She saves me a lot of money at the grocery store. This week she posted about a fun game online on How Wheat Works that is worth checking out.

Little Llamas! is one of my new favorite sites. I love her Easter- Palooza. She did such wonderful Easter activities with her children. I really like the bread as the empty tomb activity.

Moments of Mommyhood made the cutest chick footprint as part of her Friday Book Project Ducklings Love post. I wish I wasn’t afraid to paint JDaniel’s feet.

Recipes I need to try:

justJenn has a great cupcake recipe for Whipped Cream Cupcakes.

Homemaking Helper has great recipes for leftover eggs on her Hard-Boiled Egg Recipes post. The stuffed cheese rolls look wonderful.

Posts I just loved:

Jenny Matlock posted a wonderful piece called On Easter Our Youngest Grand Sat On My Lap. I love her Alphabe- Thursday too.

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Learning To Be A Butterfly While You Are A Caterpillar

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JDaniel is still learning so much about everything in his world. He would love to fly freely and explore the world on his own terms much like a butterfly. There are times during the day that we need to crawl like a caterpillar through the lessons needed to grow into a beautiful butterfly. They are not always his favorite times of the day. Some lessons require time outs while others are teachable moments, learning from books or building on skills he has already acquired. These times can be frustrating for both of us. Learning isn’t always easy. Sometimes the same lessons need to be crawled through over and over again. Not all these times are tough. During some caterpillar times, JDaniel and I rejoice in lessons learned and concepts understood with loud cheers and flitting around the room.

Some day he will fly freely into the world. I hope he will remember the lessons he learned from his caterpillar moments.

Butterfly Fingerplay and Song

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Roly-Poly Caterpillar
Roly-poly caterpillar (wiggle right pointer finger)
Into a corner crept, (place right pointer finger in left cupped hand)
Spun around himself a blanket (spin around)
Then for a long time slept. (place head on folded hands)
Roly-poly caterpillar (wiggle right pointer finger)
Wakening by and by, (“stretch” right pointer finger)
Found himself with beautiful wings
Changed to a butterfly. (flutter arms like wings)
Oh, Butterfly!
Sung to: “Oh Christmas Tree”
Oh, butterfly, Oh, butterfly
How I love your colors.
Oh, butterfly, Oh, butterfly
How I love your colors.
You fly so high and beautiful,
You are so soft and gentle.
Oh, butterfly, Oh, butterfly,
How I love your colors.

Pollen! Pollen! Go Away! JDaniel wants to go out and play!

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On Sunday as we got in the car to go to my mothers-in-law in Georgia JDaniel must have touched a little of the green pollen that coated my husband’s car. He started rubbing his eyes within minutes of getting in the car. I washed his hands and face with Cetaphil to clean them off. (I carry small bottles on Cetaphil in his diaper bag.) He continued to rub his face and cry, “Eyes hurt.” I sit in the backseat with him when we go on road trips. It was breaking my heart to see him in pain. So, I did what I thought was best. I took him illegally out of his car seat and held him. Yes, he should have stayed in his seat. Did he stop rubbing? Yes, he wrapped his arms around me, put his head on my shoulder, and rubbed only every so often.

He was fine traveling in the car around Augusta. JDaniel started rubbing his neck on the way back home last night. This morning he woke up with a rash on his face and puffy eyes. I gave him a bath and thankfully had lotion left from an allergic reaction to grass last summer along with his daily dose of Claritin. The dermatologist can see him tomorrow. I hope we get a good rain soon. Until we do we will be playing inside.

Are you having trouble with pollen now?

I know we need pollen and butterflies and bees love it. Right now I just want it to go away!

 

Easter Quotes

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And he departed from our sight that we might return to our heart, and there find Him. For He departed, and behold, He is here. ~St Augustine

He takes men out of time and makes them feel eternity. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Picture taken from Flikr.com.

Great Posts I Came Across This Week- April 3

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Each week I travel around the internet visiting blogs. Here are a few posts that I loved, learned from, or gave me great ideas:
Here are some child-related posts:
Picky Apple has a great way to paint using a salad spinner in her Tot School post this week.
Teach Mama has a post on What You Need From Your Local Yard Sales. It includes a cheat sheet in a PDF you can take with you to yard sales.
Counting Coconuts has an Easter sensory tub that I would love to have made for JDaniel.
Fun Easter Post:
Dawns Daily Life has really funny Easter comics on a post called Easter Humor and Joy. The chocolate bunny ones are my favorite.

12 Ways to Learn Using Plastic Easter Eggs

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Learning Activities with Eggs
1. You can place a toy in a stack of eggs and search for the one with the prize.

2. You can put a capital letter on one end of an egg and its lower case letter on the other. Break them open, mix them up, and have your child search for the match. I did eggs with matching capital letters for JDaniel.

3. You can put together a set of toys or pictures and have your child put them in the egg that has the beginning letter on it.

4. You can put a number on one end of the egg and a set of corresponding dots on the other end. They can then match the tops and bottoms or place the correct number of objects in the egg.

5. You can mix up the colors of the tops and bottoms then have your child match the colors correctly.

6. You can make maracas with whole grain circular cereal. Just watch that is doesn’t come apart and become a bowl for a snack.

Plastic Egg Activity
7. You can put objects in the eggs and have the children match the sounds like Activity Mom did this week.

8. You can put them in a plastic spoon and try to carry them around the house.

9. You can sort them by colors.

10. You can use them like cupcake liners for Muffin Tin Monday.

11. You can make a nest with blocks; fill it with eggs, place in a toy bird, and talk about signs of spring.

 

Plastic Egg Activity - Sorting Eggs by Color
12. You can read the list of 50 Uses for Plastic Easter Eggs found of Geeky Housewife’s blog.

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Kate and One Special Egg

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My mom loves to tell the story of my sister Kate and her one special egg. Mom and Kate were at an Easter egg hunt that featured one special golden egg. For some reason my mom decided that egg was going to be theirs. Kate must have been about two and at this hunt two year olds were allowed to have their moms accompany them on their hunt for eggs. My mom spotted the golden egg in the field and tried to guide Kate to the egg. Kate had another plan. She had noticed a plastic egg sitting in the grass that she really wanted. Once she reached the egg she had been focused on, she sat down and started playing with it. My mom could still see the golden egg out of the corner of her eye. She really wanted to go over and pick it up for Kate, but decided not to. If Kate had the one special egg she wanted, that would have to be enough.
The way my mom tells the story I don’t think she has fully gotten over Kate’s deciding not to go for the golden egg. I hope that I will let JDaniel find and appreciate the things he enjoys and not pushing him to go for my golden egg dreams.

Almost Wordless- Easter Eggs and Books

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Today I am going to share with your an Easter egg dyeing experience JDaniel has with his friend Morgyn. At the end of the post, you will find some of my favorite Easter egg themed books. You may want to read with your children before they dye eggs.

JDaniel and his friend Morgyn had a great time dying eggs.

 

Dyeing eggs with a friend.

JDaniel and I read these books about Easter eggs before Morgyn came over.

These are the finished eggs.

eggwfriend3

These Easter egg hunt books would be fun to share.
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