Misc. Summer Activities

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Love Justin's zebra!

Ryan and I did a shape hunt and he was able to take pictures of different shapes he found in the house.  He, like many children, loves to use a camera!  Sometimes he would use my iphone, but we also got him a durable vetch kid's camera that has been great. 

Circle from the shape hunt

and obviously squares.

Bubbles are always so much fun for kids to play with.  You can buy them or make your own.  My boys enjoy chasing the bubbles too, so this battery operated bubble blower made it easier to produce bubbles faster.

Riding bikes is also a good way to get the boys out and about.  I got tired running beside Ryan when we would go around the block.  Amazing how things aren't as level as they seem when you aren't chasing a child who forgets to use brakes as he approaches a parked car.

Ryan wanted to paint or stain the fence, which obviously isn't the best thing to have a child his age do.  Using water to do the job was just as much fun for him though.

Water is a hit!  Ryan is already looking forward to using Grandma's hose next summer when we visit.  It wasn't even a super hot day that day.  It doesn't seem to have slowed him down though.

Before we left we went to a couple of museums.  Water play is popular with Justin too.

Justin absolutely loved making flying contraptions out of water cooler paper cones and watching them fly when placed over a fan.  He got some pretty good ones.  Would be so easy to do with a box fan on its side and possibly something (even posterboard) wrapped around it so kids don't get their fingers too close and be tempted to stick fingers in by the blades.

March 2013

March was a busy month!  The weather was still not warm, but we managed to get outside quite a bit. We got to go to Portland to visit cousins.  That was a lot of fun and we spent time in museums and around the house with them.  From Oregon we flew to DC to visit Dad.

The month started off with snow!  There wasn't enough to do much in it, but the boys took advantage of the last snowfall before getting ready for spring.  It's just fun to play in I guess.

The boys made a little "house" on the corner of the deck.  They have fun playing with random things they can find in and around the yard.

Transporting snow in the truck.

A variety of pictures the boys made one morning.  They enjoy paint.

Patterns!  If Justin does it, Ryan wants to do it too.

Once again, Ryan must do what Justin does.  :)

Justin has trouble with these words for some reason.  Maybe a bit of glitter glue will help glue them in his head.

I would explain this picture, but I don't know that I can.  Justin has made up some sort of game.  He loves using dice, spinners, game boards, and random toys to make all sorts of games to play.  Creativity can be a bit of a mess sometimes.

At Justin's school the boys participated in a balloon race.  Note: do NOT overinflate the balloons.  When they pop, it can scare everyone!

Ryan, Justin, and I went with my mom to the Mobius Science Museum in Spokane.  We had gone there with Rob in January.

St Patrick's Day is as exciting as other holidays.  The boys spent days working on their leprechaun traps.  This was our second year trying to catch a leprechaun.  We were still unsuccessful. :(

One of many leprechaun traps.

Yet another trap.

A simple trap with a note promising treasure.

Justin sorted 3-D shapes by color and shape.  He then multiplied to find out how many there were all together.  Ryan, Justin, and I looked for 2D and 3D shapes in the environment and they took pictures of some they found around the house.

Tinkertoys are always fun to build with.

Justin sequenced the "I have, who has" cards using his math skills.

We went to Oregon to visit our cousins.  They played a little ball in the backyard.

Justin found that he likes marshmallows beter straight out of the bag.  It's nice to sit by the fire though.

We made paper rockets and shot them off of a pvc pipe launcher attached to an air compressor.

July Stuff

In all of the excitement to go to the US for six weeks, I forgot to post this before we left. 

We use letter tiles to spell words.  Even Ryan can do this and he loves spelling the names of people he knows.

Legos and blocks are always favorites.  The boys worked together on this project, which made it a special one.  Anything they can build together without fighting is a miracle!

One of the books Justin read suggested making an x on the floor and throwing beanbags on it.  We added numbers on the tape as well.  Ryan just called out the numbers the beanbags landed on.  Justin had to add up the totals.  The beanbags are different colors and different shapes.  That must make the activity an entire math lesson for Ryan. :)

Ryan kept getting really close to his X.

If you have ever read The Big Orange Splot you may recognize this as Mr. Plumbean's house.  The boys enjoy the story and had fun making the house as well.

Ryan is hysterical to watch as he makes his way through the tires.  We continue to go to the petting zoo to see the animals and to play on the playground.

My boys are superheroes!  Thank you to Alicia for the fun surprise. :)

I line up an alphabet with a mix of upper and lowercase letters and Ryan has to match the mommy letters to their baby letters.  It is also a good activity to make sure we have all of the alphabet pieces before we put them away. :)

Fir some reason it is hard to sing the ABC song while wearing sunglasses.  I guess it is all of the coolness in the way.

Friday, October 29, 2010

Thursday was a busy day for us!  We made some frosting for our sugar cookies.  Since they were pumpkin shaped, we experimented with red and yellow food coloring.  Amazing!  Those colors mixed make orange when you use food coloring just like when you use paint.  How did Mommy know that? I had planned ahead and made the boys smaller sugar cookies to frost.  There was a lot more eating than frosting going on on their part of the table.

We did a pumpkin cutting activity (fold pumpkin in half and cut only on black line) and a sequence the 5 pumpkin sheet.  These are Ryan's.  He obviously needed assistance, but he had fun and is very proud of his accomplishments.

 Justin did this sort by size sheet.  I think the large and medium are pretty close to the same size.  He initially made a mistake when sorting, but caught it and was able to self-correct before he glued them in place.  He wouldn't have been able to do that if I hadn't insisted that he sort first, THEN glue.  He didn't want to break it down into steps, but I knew that it was probably a good idea for him to do that.

 Justin also did the color the shapes the correct color.  He went through and did all triangles first, then circles, etc.  I thought he would do one pumpkin at a time.  He also added corn for the scarecrow.  He definitely will still have plenty of skills to master when he starts school.  He likes to color, but not in the lines. 

Friday the boys were so excited for the Embassy Halloween party that we voted to skip school.  AFN was showing some Halloween cartoons and the boys were into watching them, talking about the party, and making sure their costumes were ready.  Halloween has been fun.  I don't know if we will enjoy the Thanksgiving activities as much.  I will do my best.