Bring on the Culture

Week of the Young Child: Day five.

We're having a local festival here this weekend, complete with arts and crafts stalls and parades and all sorts of fun activities. Tomorrow night is a family camp out in our neighborhood. And next weekend is the annual "Touch a Truck" event. These events are my inspiration for today's post.

I know not everyone lives in a community like mine with family friendly events right in my back yard -- literally. But, you can find lots of fun cultural or educational events just about everywhere you look.

The local Police Stations and Fire Stations are a great first stop. They give free tours to kids of all ages. The Fire Station tours I've been on the Fire Fighters will dress up in full gear so the little kids get used to seeing a fire fighter with a mask and air tank on "just in case." And the kids get to climb all over the fire trucks. Of course if there is an emergency or fire, then you need to be flexible and let the firefighters get on with their job!

Just about every where you go, you can find free or inexpensive things to do with kids. When we were in London last summer, we even managed a visit to The Tate Modern museum as well as attending a local Medieval Fair.

If there is nothing free going on in your area, you can always check out the local botanic gardens, aquariums, aviaries, planetariums, zoos and other museums for special kid-related activities. Most have programs and activities for smaller children.

So, go get out and find some culture this weekend!

Week of the Young Child (Day 4): Take it Outside

Now that spring is here and the weather is starting to get warmer it the perfect time to get outside.

Some of the activities we enjoy almost daily are playing sports, going to the play ground, swimming (in the summer) and having picnics.

But if your family is anything like mine, and we love those activities, but sometimes we want to mix it up and make it a bit more fun for both grown ups and kids.

We have a State Park about a half an hour away from our house and love to go there for walks in the woods. We quickly found the kids needed something to do on these walks so I searched the internet and found all sorts of links for "Nature Scavenger Hunts."

The kids loved having something to do while we were on our walk. Now, every time we go, Scavenger Hunts are a must! And with the internet doing all the advanced planning for us, I just make a few adjustments to the lists and off we go!

The wonderful thing about the scavenger hunts is you can adapt them to all age groups and environments.

For little kids, print up a list with pictures instead of words. The kids can either check off the items as they find them, or draw pictures. If your kids are older, give them more cryptic clues such as "find something a deer would eat" or "find something that floats."

Live in a city? Take a walk around the block or your local park and look for different colored shutters or window boxes or count the number of blue cars you see. You could even adapt this to use in the grocery store with your shopping list if you wanted.

With Earth Day right around the corner, you can incorporate the Scavenger Hunt into the perfect Earth Day activity. Bring garbage bag and some gloves and pick up trash as you go or, you can use the opportunity to teach the kids about the different things you see -- we tested to see what items floated and what items sank.

We are lucky enough to live in a state where we can go outside most of the year so we do the scavenger hunts in the winter too. We just change what we need to look for to suit the season. Believe me, being able to get out of the house in the winter time helps to maintain our sanity!

We also like to bring a "treasure" for the kids to find after they get all items on their list. Usually one of us distracts the kids while the other one "hides" the treat (usually it's a few wrapped chocolate Kisses or similar). It's a nice treat at the end of the walk.

Happy Hunting!

Someone's in the Kitchen With Mommy (or Daddy)

Day Three in Week of the Young Child: Cooking with your kids.

Both my boys love to help me in the kitchen. I love cooking and want to pass that love on to my kids.

Cooking with your kids is a great way to keep them entertained, spend time with them and teach them healthy eating habits. And basic "help" can start as soon as they can stir a spoon. And as they grow, they can help more and more.

The boys will help me with whatever meal I'm making. Sometimes they like to make their own lunches and I generally try to let them do that with as little interference as possible. They also love to help me bake and make dinner.

We have several children's cookbooks; these are nothing special except the food is usually geared toward kids with pretty pictures and fun names for everyday things (like "Drizzled and Drenched Fries" which is nothing more than oven baked french fries), with healthy, easy to follow recipes.

Children's cookbooks are by no means necessary, but they do help get the kids excited about what they are making. The boys love looking through the books and picking out something special to make for one of their meals.

Obviously anything involving cutting, a hot oven, hot burner or open flame is Mommy's Job. But you can involve the kids depending on their current skill level.

Sam will help by carrying things from the refrigerator or cupboard to the counter and he helps to set the table. He can also put the pre-measured ingredients into a bowl, crack eggs (and yes I do have to fish out the egg shells) and mix up the ingredients. Since Josh is older, I can have him help read the recipe and measure out the ingredients.

At the very least, it's company and time we can spend together. And I find that (generally) they are more apt to try new foods if they have a hand in preparing it.

Getting the Sillies Out

Day two of "Week of the Young Child": Story Time

The local Parks and Recreation department in my town has free story times for toddler to preschool aged children twice a week at the community center.

Calling it "Story Time" is really a misnomer. Our story teller, Miss Mary, usually reads one or two books and then gets the kids get the sillies out through music and dancing.

She doesn't play the "usual" kids music but has fun, upbeat, music from artists like Laurie Berkner, Jim Gill, Ralph Covert and various other musicians. The music gives the kids a chance to run around -- they are toddler to preschool age after all -- sitting still is just not on the agenda!

There is usually a "theme" for each week and occasionally she has something special planned. For example, when she does the "Teddy Bear Picnic" theme all the kids bring their teddy bears and we have a Teddy Bear Parade. Sometimes she has children's authors come and read their books to the kids. On Halloween the kids come in costume and parade around the community center. Occasionally there is a craft of some type.

I know I'm very lucky to live in an area with a fantastic Parks and Recreation department and that they are able to provide free story times is wonderful!

However, if you don't have something like this offered in your area, you can find free story times through your local library and most of the major book store chains have them as well (that's how our story teller got her start). Some coffee shops have story times as well. Sometimes you can find story times advertised in local papers or community publications.

And Story Time is an activity that can span age groups as well. I started bringing Josh to Story Time when he was 2. Sam has been going his whole life. This was a great activity for the both kids to enjoy when Sam was a baby and Josh was not in school full time.

And story time isn't just for the kids. I've met most of my friends here through story time or they can be connected to story time some how. It's a great (free) social activity for parents and children alike.

Oh My Peas!

Did you know this is the Week of the Young Child?

In honor of this, I am going to use this week to blog about some activities we do in our house with our kids. Besides, I never want to miss an opportunity to exploit my kids!

The boys are 3 1/2 years apart so our activities need to range from pre-K level to 1st grade level or they need to be adaptable across the age range. Hopefully, I'll remember to share something every day!

Last weekend we had a new Home Depot open just about 2 miles from our house. And the weather was beautiful so we decided to get some stuff for our garden and lawn and get the spring season underway.

Sam spotted the seeds (to plant) and there was a whole bunch of VeggieTale branded vegetable seeds and wanted to buy some.

Now,who am I to say "no" to that?! VeggieTales? Who doesn't love the VeggieTales? And if it gets the kids to eat their veggies -- the marketing is genius!

He picked out the peas and I thought they would be nice and easy to plant and grow.

We got home and the boys planted the seeds.

And watered them.

We kept them on our kitchen window sill for the week and checked their progress daily.

This weekend, we decided they were big enough to replant.

The weather wasn't as nice so we replanted them in the garage.

We had to take them in over night because it got quite cold last night. We're expecting the weather to get warmer again tomorrow and will put them on our back deck -- lots of sunshine and easily visible so we remember to water them!

The boys love going out and checking their progress. This is one activity that you can certainly adapt to different skill levels. Afterall, it's just playing in the dirt, right?

So, fingers crossed that we'll get some actual peas!