Peg board fun.

Hope recently had her 2 1/2 year check up with the local health visitor and one of the things she was tested on was her fine motor skills using peg boards and pegs like these. She loved playing with them. I'd been meaning to get some for home, but hadn't seen them available anywhere. I eventually got this set on ebay for around £10.
With five boards, there were enough for the three children to spend quite a bit of time on their designs.
But it was Henry that was still engaged in this activity long after the girls had moved off to sing 'Barney' songs...
... and he filled up all these boards - using his left hand which was the injured one.

The peg boards are useful for a range of concepts such as repeating patterns and symmetry.

The set also came with some games ideas and I played Honor at four in a row just using some blue and green pegs.

Plasticine fun.

I don't consider myself to be the most creative of people especially when it comes to taking part in plasticine and playdough activities. Believe it or not, I've spent a fair few hours trawling the internet for some inspiring plasticine tutorials but have so far been unsuccessful. Hope loves getting these modelling materials out but I often feel a bit useless when it comes to giving her a bit of direction. So on this occasion we had to rely on our own creative skills; as we had just been looking at The Hungry Caterpillar finger puppet book we decided to make delicious plate of fruit.
And counted: one apple, two juicy pears, three tart plums, four sweet strawberries and five oranges. We also had to make a banana!

And a beautiful butterfly with two wings!

Playdough and hand therapy

Some of Henry's hand therapy exercises involve playdough.

I made some myself using the following method:

I mixed 3 cups of flour, 1/2 cup of salt and 2 tablespoons of cream of tartar in a bowl.

Meanwhile, I boiled 2 cups of water with 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil and then added the liquid slowly to the dry ingredients.

I divided the dough up and coloured the portions using Morrisons natural food colourings. The colourings were quite wishy washy and it took quite a lot to get a decent amount of colour into the dough. But I quite like the earthy tones that were finally produced.

And all three kids, from age 2 - 10 years couldn't wait to get playing with it...

Honor and Henry got bored after about fifteen minutes, but little Hope needed coaxing away from it when it eventually became time for dinner and was not at all happy when I cleared it all away!

The Waldorf toddler group.

I think I mentioned before that I take Hope to a toddler group arranged by the local Waldorf Steiner private school. It really is a very nice, natural play experience for little ones and this time I took the liberty of taking a few pics of their gorgeous displays.
At the moment, a lady from the school brings all this stuff over to a village hall and sets it all up for us parents and toddlers to enjoy, but soon it shall run from the school itself.
Here is Hope playing in one of the many playstands - this one has been set up with this beautiful wooden kitchen set.

And this mobile, if you can see it clearly in the photo, was made there from natural materials (seeds, leaves, sheep's wool, feathers, etc) brought in by one of the teachers.

Little House outdoors.

With the warmer months here at last, the children spend more time playing outside. I've put a lot of their toys out in the gazebo along with a rug from the living room which has seen better days. Hope loves playing out here during the day, but so do the other two when they come home from school and I've set up a few 'home corner' props for their role play, like these scales and pebbles collected from the beach.
This old wash stand used to have plants in. Now it is being used to wash the doll's clothes...
before being hung up on the washing line.
Honor and Hope are building a fire to boil the kettle...

and now it is time for baby to go to bed...
and parents to chill!

Half term - day one.

By the time I had had my bath and got dressed this morning, the kids were already out in the garden and were busy making fairy houses. Hope couldn't wait to join them and run around with Henry chasing the ball...

and playing with the stones.
Henry found this train whistle lying at the bottom of the garden. Not sure where that came from.

When they tired of making fairy houses, they set about making a river! (And I cried one!!!) Never mind.

Tomorrow Honor is going on a Brownie outing to Build-a-bear and Pizza Hut. I don't know what the rest of us will do. I won't have a car as it has to go into the garage again. It's been playing up for a while but no-one seems able to figure out what is wrong with it. I think it's wanting some groovy new seat covers and a bloomin' good clean. I've been looking on the internet for nice seat covers but there's not much out there to my taste. I wonder if they are difficult to make?

Yesterday I made some reusable tumble drier sheets. I liked this job because it was so easy to do. I borrowed the idea from a site called Homemade Mamas.

I got an old towel, cut it into strips and left them soaking overnight in a bowl of diluted fabric softener. Then, this morning, I took out a couple of them, squeezed them out a bit and popped them in the drier with my laundry. When the drying has finished the towelling sheets go back into the bowl for next time.
Another project I've started is to make an outdoor playpen for little Hope.
I got a load of cheap decking tiles and painted them white. Then I've enclosed the area with trellis. It isn't all fixed so we can move them when we want to. But it is ok for her to play outside while I'm nearby sorting washing or busy in the kitchen. She got into this bowl of water that was meant for washing her hands with her boots on.
And then she sat down in it!

Secret plans.

Just getting prepared for the forthcoming half term holiday. The kids want to spend more time playing outside. Okay, okay. I want the kids to spend more time playing outside. Well, it's good for them!
They are really into spycraft at the moment. They got some cool spy handbooks and spykits for Christmas and I said I'd help them turn their shed (which is in an awful mess at the mo) into a really cool HQ. So when they came home from school on Friday they got their books out and got busy planning their new headquarters.
Especially Henry. They want CCTV and everything. Not sure about that but I think we can stretch to a swivel office chair, walkie talkies and a homemade alarm.
This was our Friday night supper. I borrowed the lentil recipe from Waldorf Mama. It's basically green lentils (I used tinned) and some finely chopped chard simmered for about 15 mins in a little water and sea salt. Very yummy. I also made some cheese scones with a pinch of cayenne pepper in the recipe to go with. Simple. HM asked if it could be our regular Friday night supper.

The play area.

Last week I started taking Hope to a Waldorf toddler group. It was very inspiring. There was a good range of natural and open-ended play materials for the small children to explore. Playdens were set up from wooden clothes horses with fabric draped over them, beautiful offcuts of wood were sanded and smoothed of rough edges to be used in building, pine cones, shells, felted woollen balls , soft fabric dolls and much more were there to be played with.

At home, we have already been influenced by the Waldorf approach to some degree but I'm now in the process of developing the play area in the corner of our living room a bit more in this style. At the moment we are using this wooden shoe rack as a shelf for the 'toys'. There is a basketful of wooden pegs which the kids use for anything their imagination decides. It is quite fascinating to watch what becomes of such simple materials. I put a small jam jar on the tray and Hope will spend ages putting the lid on it and taking it off again. I also put a wicker basket there with some blankets and cushions for den making, or whatever... but as the photo shows, Hope loves to get in the basket and make herself comfy.

My mother-in-law gave Honor some coconut shells which had been a bird feeder in another life, and the kids have fun with those. I shall be adding more to the area as the opportunities arise.

The knitted animals.

I love these. They deserve a post all to themselves.

Hope loves them too. We are going to have so much fun playing with them and possibly learning the signs for them too. I got them at the fete this afternoon, prices ranged from 50p for the little ones and £1.50 for the frog.

Just look at this mallard duck. Fabulous. Much better than anything you'd buy at Toys R Us!