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JDaniel4s Mom

growing & learning with him

Read.Explore.Learn.- The Firefighters’ Thanksgiving

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Welcome to Read.Explore.Learn.! This meme was designed to be a place for you to share the learning opportunities, crafts, field trips, and other activities you have done this week that tie into children’s books. I look forward to seeing the ways you have learned with and explored books.

Steps:

    • Link your activity below.
    • Please place the Read.Explore.Learn. badge on your post or create a link back to this meme.
                                                             
      Read.Explore.Learn badge
       
    • Please try to visit at least three of the other people that have placed links below and leave a comment. I will visit each of you and leave a kind comment.
    • If you are not linking up an activity and are just visiting, please try to stop by a few of the links below.
My Book Tie-Ins of the Week:
 


The Firefighters’ Thanksgiving by Maribeth Boelts is a wonderful story about firefighters that try to make a Thanksgiving meal on a day when they get many, many calls for help.

Lou volunteers to cook the meal if the others will pick up the food on the grocery list. By the time they get the food at 9:00 a.m. they get their first call.

They return to melted ice cream and a messy floor apparently they didn’t have time to put the food away.

Each time they seem to get ahead on the meal the alarm sounds and they are off again.

When they return, they get their equipment ready for the next emergency and try to work on the meal again.

During one of the fires, Lou is hurt and is taken to the hospital. The firefighters return to the station without Lou and to an unfinished meal. They call their families and get ready for the next emergency without hope of a Thanksgiving meal.

Something amazing happens while the firefighters answer the last call. Friends, neighbors and people they have helped arrive and set up a meal for them. They leave them a note saying they are thankful for all they do!

Some of that wonderful meal goes to the hospital to be shared with Lou.

This is an amazing book. Much of the story is told in vivid illustrations by Terry Widener. Terry does a wonderful job complementing Marybeth Boelt’s words by drawing you into the action and events.

The message of giving back to those that have helped you is truly inspirational. It left us wanting to help people that have helped us and our community.

What did we do?

Made Cookies

 


I am not much of a baker, but JDaniel loves to bake. We went to the store and selected the frozen sugar cookie dough for the firemen that work at the fire station near JDaniel’s house.

Created a Turkey Treat Bag

 


We worked together to make turkey treat bags to deliver the cookies in.

Delivered the Cookies

 



Our local fireman was excited about receiving the cookies.

 
 
This post is linked to Serving Others Thanksgiving a link up on this post and Feed Me Books Friday, Link and Learn,  Let’s BEE Friends, La La Home Daycare and It’s Playtime .
 
 

Read.Explore.Learn.- Call Me Gorgeous!

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Welcome to Read.Explore.Learn.! This meme was designed to be a place for you to share the learning opportunities, crafts, field trips, and other activities you have done this week that tie in to children’s books. I look forward to seeing ways you have learned with and explored books.
Steps:

    • Link your activity below.
    • Please place the Read.Explore.Learn. badge on your post or create a link back to this meme.
                                                             

      Read.Explore.Learn badge

    • Please try to visit at least three of the other people that have placed links below and leave a comment. I will visit each of you and leave a kind comment.
    • If you are not linking up an activity and are just visiting, please try to stop by a few of the links below.
My Book Tie-Ins of the Week:


Call Me Gorgeous by Giles and Alexandra Milton was shared during storytime by the amazing Miss Amber.  The story is really a description of a very unique animal. Each page spread shares a beautiful illustration and new attribute of the mystery animal.
 
This animal has antlers, pig’s ears, spines on the outside, teeth a beak, and frog’s eyes to name a few. As you read about its unique makeup, it is hard to imagine what it will finally look like. The final illustration is priceless.


What did we do?


Online Creature Creation

 



We went to Switcheroo Zoo and created an amazing new animal. I love this online free program that allows you to morph animals by body section. We didn’t write a story on the site, but you can create a story right on the site.


Craft

 

JDaniel created this monster with many eyes and a brain on top.







 

Read.Explore.Learn.- Back to School Worries

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Welcome to week four of the Read. Explore. Learn Summer Reading Challenge- August! This meme was designed to be a place for you to share the learning opportunities, crafts, field trips, and other activities you have done this week that tie-in to children’s books. I look forward to seeing ways you have learned with and explored books.

Remember each post you link up counts as an entry in the the August edition of the Summer Reading Challenge. One post linked up to Read.Explore.Learn during the month of August will selected to win a reusable bag and books.

Steps:

  • Link your activity below.
  • Please place the Read.Explore.Learn. badge on your post or create a link back to this meme.
    Read.Explore.Learn badge
  • Please try to visit at  least three of the other people that have placed links below and leave a comment. I will visit each of you and leave a kind comment.
  • If you are not linking up an activity and are just visiting, please try to stop by a few of the links below.
My Book Tie-Ins of the Week:
JDaniel starts preschool next Tuesday. He walked right into his new Sunday school class last week without a tear. All summer he has had to be peeled off of me. We don’t know what will happen next week when he starts preschool. He could walk in and be ready to learn, play and explore or it could be traumatic.

This week I selected two books about characters that weren’t so sure about going to preschool to share with you.

The first book is called Llama Llama Misses Mama by Ann Dewdney. Llama Llama seems ready to start the school in the book. He gets all his morning things done. He doesn’t seem to worry until his mama gets ready to drop him off. Llama Llama feels shy when Mama goes away.

The newness of everything and the unknown make him hold back from joining the other children in play. His teacher tries to engage him in activities and he doesn’t want to read, play or eat snack.

What he really wants is Mama, but he decides to try to play and get to know the other kids when the teacher promises Mama is coming back.

By the time Mama comes to school to get him, Llama Llama has lots to show and tell her.

This story reaches into little ones fears and probably some Mamas. I love how it is honest about feelings that really plague children about starting school.

The second book is called Billy and the Big New School by Catherin and Laurence Anholt. Billy his mother decides is like a bird that doesn’t want to leave the nest, but wants to fly. He wants to go to school, but something in his belly makes him feel he wants to stay home.

Billy’s loves birds. He draws them, plays outside with them, and even talks to them about his feeling about school and his new shoes that are hard to tie.

One day while out in his yard Billy finds a bird that is hurt and being picked on by the other birds. Billy’s mother helps him bring in the bird and take care of it.

While Billy looked after the bird in a special box bed they made, Billy’s mother gets ready for the first day of school.

The night before school Billy dreams in his the injured bird being picked on. His mother has to come and give him a hug and tells him it is okay.

The next morning the little bird is ready to fly back into the outside world and Billy has to go to school.

Billy has a wonderful teacher that tours him around the room. Billy starts to feel better. He feels even better when he finds a book on birds in the classroom library. He reaaly feels better when he finds a friend.

That night Billy has a dream about flying freely with the bird towards his school and the dream isn’t scary.

Billy’s new found confidence and new friend really help him feel better about school.

I love this book. Billy learns that his feeling are real and have merit. He also learns that over time his feeling change and the way he views his world changes too.

What did we do?

Painting a Worry Stone

When I was visiting the Grand Canyon, they had worry stones in the gift shop. I thought they were the greatest thing. The directions that came with the rock suggested that you carry it in your pocket when you were going into a stressful situation. When you started to worry, you were to rub your thumb on the rock.

I thought it would be great for us to make one together and then put it into JDaniel’s backpack for school. He says he will rub it and send the worries to me.

Read.Explore.Learn.- Sunflowers

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I want to take a moment to congratulate Just Starting Out! She is the winner of the June Edition of the Read.Explore.Learn. Summer Reading Challenge. She will be receiving a $10 gift code to Amazon.com.


Welcome to first week of the Read. Explore. Learn Summer Reading Challenge- July Edition! This meme was designed to be a place for you to share the learning opportunities, crafts, field trips, and other activities you have done this week that tie-in to children’s books. I look forward to seeing ways you have learned with and explored books. Remember each post you link up counts as an entry in the the July Edition of the Summer Reading Challenge.

Steps:

  • Link your activity below.

  • Please place the Read.Explore.Learn. badge on your post or create a link back to this meme.

    Read.Explore.Learn badge

  • Please try to visit at least three of the other people that have placed links below and leave a comment. I will visit each of you and leave a kind comment.
  • If you are not linking up an activity and are just visiting, please try to stop by a few of the links below.

My Book Tie-Ins of the Week:

We also read Sunflower House by Eve Bunting . The little boy in this story gets a wonderful idea about how to plant sunflower seeds in his yard. He decides they should be arranged in a circle to create a play place. What fun he and his friends have playing in it!

To be like the Sun by Susan Marie Swanson is a wonderful book about the life cycle of a sunflower seed. It starts with the dirt being moved to make room for the seed. The seed is told it will do work. Not the work of a thistle or a radish, but a work on its own. After the seed it underground the girl who planted it wants to know if it can hear the rain when it falls. Once it forms leaves, roots and a stem a bug will form.

What did we do?

Paper Plate Greenhouse

 

We had fun trying to grow seeds in the paper plate greenhouse. This is really just a plastic bag with wet cotton ball between two plates cutout to look like a house.

Wove Petals to a Plate

ABCs of Exploring Books with Children: R-Z

I helped with some of the weaving, but JDaniel did a lot of it. He was able to put the ribbon through the holes and then through the plate.

He got tired of using yellow ribbon and asked for the box of ribbon to select a new color. I had saved ribbons from a bouquet of balloon JDaniel had been given my his Nana for Easter. He loved “exploring” the ribbon

Here is our final product. It looks like it has had some of its petals plucked off. JDaniel was very proud of it and thought it really belonged on the the fridge.

 

Read.Explore.Learn- My Big Boy Bed

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Welcome to week two of The Read. Explore. Learn Challenge! This meme was designed to be a place for you to share the learning opportunities, crafts, field trips, and other activities you have done this week that tie-in to children’s books. I look forward to seeing ways you have learned with and explored books.Remember each post counts as an entry in the challenge.

Steps:

  • Link your activity below.

  • Please place the Read.Explore.Learn. badge on your post or create a link back to this meme.

    Read.Explore.Learn badge

  • Please try to visit at least three of the other people that have placed links below and leave a comment. I will visit each of you and leave a kind comment.
  • If you are not linking up an activity and are just visiting, please try to stop by a few of the links below.
My Book Tie-Ins of the Week:
Read.Explore.Learn badge
My Big Boy Bed by Eve Bunting is one of the books JDaniel added to our library sack last week. It is the wonderful tale of a little boy who is moved to a big boy bed when he has a new baby brother.
Mom goes out of her way to make the new bed a wonderful home for sleep. She buys special sheets and a new quilt for the bed along with a special book called The Little Fat Book of Fire Trucks for bedtime reading.
There are several benefits to sleeping in a big boy bed covered in this sleepy time tale. One you can jump on your bed. (JDaniel isn’t allowed to jump on his.) Two you can hide under the bed and pretend to be a dog. (JDaniel loves to pretend he is a worm dog. What is a worm dog? He is a dog that has worms as pets.) Three there is more room for toys, books and blankets. (JDaniel has billions of toys in bed now.) Four you can get out of bed whenever you want that is until your parents hear you and make you get back in bed.
JDaniel thought this book was hilarious. I bet your newly transitioned big boy or girl bed sleeper will too.

What did we do? Decorating A Clock 

JDaniel has a new found freedom now that he sleeps in a big boy bed. He loves to get up early and check on JDaniel3 and I to see if are awake. It would be wonderful he he woke up at 6:00 or 6:30 in the morning, but most mornings in is earlier than that.
I thought it would be a good idea to give him a time reference that we would place beside his clock in the morning. (Yes, he has a manual clock in his room.)
Before would decorate my clock he had to draw a robot on a plate.

When he finally agreed to work on the clock plate, he would only write my name. I was impressed that part of the scribble looks like an M.

He woke up and started calling for me at 6:15 this morning. I don’t know if the clock reference made a difference or not.

‘

This post is linked to Feed Me Books Friday, Link and Learn,  We Play and It’s Play .

Read.Explore.Learn.- Robots

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Welcome to first week of the Read. Explore.Learn Summer Reading Challenge! This meme was designed to be a place for you to share the learning opportunities, crafts, field trips, and other activities you have done this week that tie-in to children’s books. I look forward to seeing ways you have learned with and explored books.

Steps:

  • Link your activity below.

  • Please place the Read.Explore.Learn. badge on your post or create a link back to this meme.

    Read.Explore.Learn badge

 

  • Please try to visit at  least three of the other people that have placed links below and leave a comment. I will visit each of you and leave a kind comment and Stumble your post.
  • If you are not linking up an activity and are just visiting, please try to stop by a few of the links below.
  • I would love a comment too.

 

My Book Tie-Ins of the Week:

 

 Hello, Robot by Bob Staake is the tale of four robots. They each have chores they do around their house.

 

When they get caught in a rainstorm, each has trouble with their wiring. Blink, the robot that bakes tries to bake a birdhouse. Zinc, the robot that fixes things tries to repair a pie with a hammer. Blip, the robot that does yardwork tries to rake the windows. Zip, the robot that cleans shines the grass. As time goes on the problems get worse. The robots realize something has to be done. What can they do?

 

 They decide to switch heads and find that the switcheroo does the trick. They are able to go back to the jobs they love. JDaniel loved the mistakes they made after being in the rain. The mess and choas was right up his alley.

 

What did we do?

Chalk Drawing

 I drew the outline of the robot and JDaniel added the details. What looks like bangs on the robot’s head is really multiple eyes. I didn’t see it at first, but JDaniel explained that the robot needed many eyes to see.

 

 

Play Dough Robot Creation

 

JDaniel decided that a potato masher would make the best tool to smash the play dough.

 

 He used bottle caps to create a three eyed blue mouthed monster. Can you see it?

This post is linked to Feed Me Books Friday, Link and Learn,  We Play and It’s Play Time.

 

Red Ted Art: Time on your hands?! Review

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I really enjoy reading the Red Ted Art Blog every week and am super grateful that she often links to Read.Explore.Learn on this blog. The craft ideas she comes up with and the book tie-ins she frequently creates to crafts keep me hunting for great books and ways to share the ideas with JDaniel.

I was recently asked to review her new e-book Time on your hands?! 14 Fab ideas to keep you and your little ones busy throughout the whole year….. This book shows fun and creative ways to reuse cardboard tubes. She has selected crafts that would be perfect for key holidays and summer fun.

Each craft page has an overview of the holiday or season that craft was designed to celebrate along with fun tidbits about it. There is also material list, step by step directions on constructing the craft along with color photos that demonstrate how to construct it.

This book is filled with cute crafts. I love cute crafts that have an ahh factor. I don’t often come up with them on my own. This well-done book will leave you excited about crafting and comfortable about creating crafts. The step by step directions helped me to feel more confident that I could successfully complete them and the picture helped me make sure I was on the right track.

The fact that many of the materials used in the crafts are things that are recycled is another plus for me. I love being able to craft with things we already have at home. Being able to reuse in crafts is a great way for me to show JDaniel how to save things and use them again and again.

Here is a link to the e-book section of Red Ted’s Art Blog if you are interested in purchasing the book.

 
 
 

Bella- The Fairy Ball and a Bubble Wand Craft

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Bella- The Fairy Ball

All summer I have been sharing Tiger Tales books I was sent to review. Today’s book is the last one in the box I was sent of Spring releases. The book is called Bella-The Fairy Ball by Mandy Stanley. I have shared Bella with you before when she visited a birthday party. In Bella- The Fairy Ball a beautiful fairy chain Bella has made is whisked out of her hands and carried in a hole in a old oak tree. Bella finds that her chain is needed for a Fairy Ball in Fairyland. The fairies shrink Bella down to their size so she can visit the ball too. They also give her a special dress to wear to the ball. Later she is also given a wish by the Fairy Queen for sharing her daisy chain. Bella wishes that her family could meet the fairies too. I love that she makes a wish that is for others.
This book is a wonderful book filled with lessons about giving and sharing. Bella shows children how to be grateful and thankful. This is great book to talk about with your children and share ways they can give and share.
Since fairies sometimes use wands. JDaniel and I tried using a bubble wand to blow bubble fluid I colored with food coloring onto paper. JDaniel has recently regressed in his bubble blowing abilities. So he wanted me to do most of the blowing. He enjoyed popping the bubbles and rubbing the wand on paper.

The Three Horrid Little Pigs Need Manners and a Craft

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The pigs in The Three Horrid Little Pigs by Liz Pichon didn’t have the right tools to make their way in the world. They couldn’t or won’t build decent homes for themselves. They had horrible manners. They didn’t learn to look out for each other. They weren’t good for their mother either. I think that must be why she kicks them out of her house. A very kind and helpful wolf tries to mentor the pigs in homebuilding. They don’t want any help and treat him with contempt. Finally, after each has their home taken over by other animals they all decided to seek help from the wolf.

 

This is a humorous and yet telling look at the three pigs. The author opens the door for parents to talk to their children about manners and making judgments about others. I love the way the text in the story flows from one page to the next sometimes midsentence. The illustrations fill each page and beautifully paint pictures of what is happening in the story. The watercolor style is such fun.
This week we made a house out of popsicle sticks. That means we had to eat a lot of popsicles. There was no fussy from JDaniel about that.

Mom's HouseI drew this picture and had JDaniel add some of the same elements to his house.


I labeled parts of JDaniel’s house as he drew them. He hung both of our work on the fridge when we finished.

Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of this to review by Tiger Tales. The thought and opinions in this post are my own.

 

This Little Piggy and a Craft

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JDaniel is working a lot on fine motor skills with his fingers. One way we have been working on fine motor skills is to do the finger plays in the book This Little Piggy and other favorite action rhymes by Hannah Wood. He learned several of the rhymes in this book from Miss Donna, the teacher of the Mother Goose Class we attended at the library. The some we had never heard of like Round and Round the Garden and Horsey Horsey. We love to look at the book. Hannah Wood’s illustrations are colorful, fun, and helpful. Yes, helpful. It helps for JDaniel to look at the pictures in the book for guidance as to what the rhyme is about and what we need to be doing as we act out the rhymes. He seeks this book out over and over again.

We worked with our fingers to do an art project too. After reading A Bunch of Keys idea for finger painting with condensed milk, I decided to invite JDaniel’s friend Jake over to paint with us. (We invited his friend Joe too, but Joe isn’t into finger painting yet. He chose to observe.) They had a great time painting and eating with the paint. Both Jake and JDaniel ended up covered in paint and in the bathtub by the time we were finished.

 

Disclaimer: This Little Piggy is published by Tiger Tale Books and I was sent this book to review by Tiger Tales.

 

 

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