Fun with Toddlers!

[tiggerandpooh]

great thread mel. well done. loving these ideas too. Today we have read stories, built a zoo with the duplo, played with cars, and trainsl, aston loves to help me clean (!!!) so has helped out with that. played ghosts (where we have to go under his big muslin wrap and pretend to be ghosts). I sorted out all his toys today - which he thought was delightful, as I sorted, he "played" and spread them further about. lol But he helped me move around the big tubs that I put them in. Got rid of the baby type toys while he wasn't looking...

other things we do are thread cotton reels, blocks, shape sorter, cups of tea, chasey, hide and seek, colouring in, playdough, paint with water...

Aston loves it when his big brother and sister come home from school. he will drag them around to play with him - mummy gets dissed! loves jumping on the trampoline with them, kicking the ball, racing his drive on cars around with his brother...

[tiggerandpooh]

maz how do you do the coloured rice?

[Arimeh]

Thanks guys

I'm proud to say that even though DS is standing in front of the tv at the moment , I don't think he has watched it as much today as every other day.

We had visitors this afternoon, so of course he showed off for them, and we have been out the back twice today to play with the dogs, out the front twice to play with the chalk, painting the pavers/deck with water and watering the flowers (and pavers!!)

Plus colouring in, kicking a ball around the backyard with the dogs and riding one of his many bikes!!!

So thanks guys - I'm really going to try hard to be a "good, attentive" mummy, instead of the usual slacker I have seemed to get myself into

[Madissun]

I was at work today too, so sadly the only thing we did together was bath time and jami time! Just wanted to thank you though Mel ...Awesome thread!!

I hope the mods DO turn it into a sticky!

[peanutter]

I think I'll have to send this to my DH

[Charlotte91]

This has given me some great ideas, unfortunately DD is bored but too young for 99% of these activities.

[~Kim~]

You might be surprised Charlotte. I remember with DD I didn't think to try lots of stuff because she was too little, but then DS came along and he already had an inbuilt babysitter lol who was doing stuff. He tried paint, crayons, chalk, playdough etc far earlier than DD did and loved them.
The painting with water type stuff - great age.
Playing with rice/flour in a tub with some spoons and cups. Yes they make a mess, but it's summer and it washes off.
Empty mixing bowl/spoon/plastic utensils when you're cooking

[jackrose]

Charlotte, I remember both my DDs loved 'posting' activities at your DDs age. I used a tissue box, a peanut butter jar with a hole cut in the lid and a cereal box with a slit cut in the lid and used pictures I had cut out of magazines, photos of family members, pics from catalogues and milk bottle lids for posting. Both DDs loved them and often found other things to post too like blocks, animals, toys... They also loved me naming the images for them and then graduated onto naming the pictures themselves. Great for fine motor skills, spacial awareness (big things don't fit in small holes) language development and the development of self confidence - it is something they can do themselves, just like a big person.

DDs both loved pouring at that age too. Water, rice, dried beans, whatever is around, in a big plastic tub with kitchen implements, muffin trays, egg trays, scoops, funnels, cups, toilet rolls, string, dolls and animals, milk bottle tops... anything you can think of can be added. Just try to keep it simple to begin with and rotate the pouring material and the implements to keep it interesting.

[maz]

maz how do you do the coloured rice?

I got out one big bowl and 4 little ones and devided a 1kg bag or rice into the 5 containers.
I bought those food dye bottles (the little pack of 4) and squirted yelow into one container, red int eh other ect.
With a fork I mixed the colours around in the rice until the rice was all coloured and put them on a baking tray and in the oven for 5-10 mins at 150 degrees to cook the colour in.

The kids helped me colour it too...so much fun and a nice messy job without being to messy

[*Belle*]

I forgot too we do heaps of cooking! Julia loves cooking biscuits, muffins, cakes etc! and of course licking the bowls!!!

[Olive]

was wondering where this thread had gone!!

[Arimeh]

I feel proud - its 10am (here in Qld) and we've been up since 6am - no TV ALL MORNING!!! WOOOOT!!!

We have been out the front drawing with chalk, playing with cars, dancing, drawing - all whilst DH is outside doing the lawns - woohoo!!!

We found a feather outside yesterday and used it to draw on the concrete with water from the dogs bowl.. then we emptied the dogs bowl and stamped our feet in the water.

[MrsFabuloso]

YAAAY Mel, you're doing a great job!!
We still have the tv on early in the morning, it's just too early to function at 5am when I've been up 7 times in the night too!! But we have been turning it off at 9am and going from there...