Do the Monster Mash!

Ok, maybe a monster themed week would have been more appropriate for Halloween week, but we're doing happy monsters this week. Big Monkey is calling them "silly monsters." We had a good time this morning despite the fact that Baby Monkey was a crying mess the entire time (almost). And just as a reminder - even if you have ZERO interest in homeschooling (and I don't necessarily blame you), all these activities and printables are great for entertainment, take relatively little effort on your part (for most things), are fantastic for early skills development to prep for preschool/kindergarten, and they are fun!

My printables from this week come from 1+1+1=1 and 2teachingmommies.

We started off with our usual morning calendar and weather time. Reviewed today, tomorrow, and yesterday, and went over our name and address. He's rockin' the address this week.

Next we did a monster size sort. Big Monkey stacked littler monsters on top of big monsters. This was our first size sort of this type, so I had no idea how Big Monkey would do. Well, it only took him a few short minutes to stack up all the monsters in the right size order!

Yes, we are wearing our Christmas pajamas already. :) We then built sock monsters together! I didn't have fabric glue, so we just used white glue. I'll have to check tomorrow and see if it held. I sure hope so. That and I hope the pair of socks we used from Daddy Monkey's sock drawer was not a favorite. Giggle. Big Monkey's monster is on the right.

Meanwhile, Baby Monkey was stuck in the exersaucer happily playing with the "knock off unlicensed Donald Duck" chattering toy from China (brought back by family). He loves that thing. This was about the only time he was not crying at me this morning.

Our next activity was sort of didn't work out as planned. I had seen a craft where you use droppers to drop paint onto paper and then use straws to blow the paint out like a splat. Then you could draw on arms/legs/eyes and make monsters. I think our paint is too think. I helped Big Monkey drop the paint on the paper (couldn't really get it to drop from the dropper - it just kept filling up more and more and more. Who knows where the paint was going). Then when I showed him how to blow on the drops, I about passed out! I had to use that much force to get the paint to move. No way was Big Monkey going to be able to accomplish that one on his own. He tried and then proceeded to ask me to use the straw for all the other paint dots we had already put on the paper. Oye... In the end, it turned into finger panting and making handprints. I also sprinkled a little salt on the paper so he could feel the different texture. He thought that was funny and described it as "feeling like sand."

Baby Monkey spent this time pulling on my pajama pants making them fall down and crying. I carried him around most of the rest of the morning after we cleaned up the paint. He looks like he is smiling in the picture below, but it was really a break between the screaming pose. See we're real around here - it's not all glitter and stickers.

I then pulled out the sensory bin! This week I put together a make a monster bin (I need to find out which blog I pulled this idea from - I think Carisa at 1+1+1=1). Not sure if it was just the day or if the bin is not that popular, but Big Monkey was only interested for about 5-10 minutes. I think Baby Monkey would have played all morning in that bin. Of course he really just wanted to dump it...

Since I wouldn't let him dump it again, he decided to sit in it.

Our creation together

We filled other parts of the morning by reading about respect, going outside to play, coming in since it was soaking wet outside, doing a wood monster puzzle, and watching Monsters, Inc. All in all a good day.

Workboxes - Organizational Heaven

Our workboxes arrived on Thursday. Of course I put them together immediately, and am in love! The night before I can put all our activities for the day into the workboxes, and then label each box with a cute number. Then the next morning we are set to go, Big Monkey knows how many boxes we have to do, and how much he has left. That and he LOVES going to get his own activity now instead of waiting for me to get the next one. I see now though that 6 activities for one day is not enough for Big Monkey. Not that any one activity keeps his attention for long. We still only spent 47 minutes on "preschool" yesterday. 

So lets see if I can remember all 6 activities. The first was a scarecrow puzzle. Big Monkey had a hard time even though the pieces were numbered. So we talked about what number comes after 1, and then I helped him slide up the next piece. Then what comes after 2 and so on. We completed it together and he was excited to see what it was! 

Then I let him use M&Ms to "count" with our numbered pumpkins. If he could place M&Ms all the way up to number 7, then he could eat them. We started with 1-5 and he did that so quickly and easily that I thought I'd throw in 6 and 7. He struggled more with those. I think mainly because he wanted to eat the candy. Was this my brightest idea? Maybe not. It motivated him to count, but man, the after effects of the candy seemed to be a slightly cranky toddler that kept asking for more candy all the way until nap time. Might stick with cheerios or something healthier next time (raisins maybe?).

Big Monkey then tackled his first connect the dots page. He thought that was fun. The first time he just tried drawing all over the paper while counting to 10. I coached him to try again and follow the dots to see if it would make a picture. He did great! I had to show him on the first few to push a little harder with his pencil as he tends to use very, very light pressure. He couldn't quite figure out it was an acorn, but liked it anyway. 

Then he did a do a dot paper. He really loves these things. I got markers from Oriental Trading Company, and they don't say washable (not sure if the markers from Amazon are either) so I was a little nervous when he wiped the sleeve of his brand new shirt through the wet dots. Didn't seem to cause any harm thank goodness. Baby Monkey tried to get in on this action too, which Big Monkey was very unhappy about. 

Then we tried patterning again. I didn't get a photo of that as I was engaged with Big Monkey to help him understand the concept of patterns. He's getting there. We still just spent most of the time laughing about how a pumpkin does not look like a scarecrow. He kept telling me the pumpkin was next in the scarecrow, leaf, scarecrow, leaf pattern. He thought it was funny. Pill. 

I finished up our activity list with a bean bag toss. He takes our homemade "beanbags" (they are actually made of rice) and tosses them into my trashcan. Obviously, it's not being used as a trashcan anymore. I didn't get a photo of this either. I think I was tending to Baby Monkey, who was determined to get my attention the entire morning. He started by dirtying his diaper while I was trying to help Big Monkey with the puzzle. 

Doesn't Baby Monkey just look thrilled to be doing preschool on a Friday???