January 29th, 2012

So excited to celebrate Groundhog Day in the dayhome this next week!  I spent yesterday cleaning up all "Winter" theme posters and replaced them with Valentine's Day hearts all pink, red and purple!  We are going to have a wonderful month.  I set up our "Groundhog burrow" aka Igloo Tent!  Complete with a tunnel to burrow into!  We will end the week finding out if Balzac Billy will see his shadow or not!  Lots of crafts are prepared and ready to go.  Also please ask your children to sing their Groundhog song!  Too cute:)  Have a super week everyone and enjoy this amazing weather:)

January 25th, 2012

I just wanted to also post the link for the year of the dragon poster,  http://www.dltk-holidays.com/t.asp?b=m&t=http://www.dltk-holidays.com/china/color/bposter-dragon2.gif  I just love this site, dltk.  I have been using it for years.  There is really something to said about these gals that run these wonderful FREE sites for us all to use!  I couldn't run my dayhome without them!  THANK YOU!!!

January 25th, 2012

http://www.tipjunkie.com/printable-color-book/

I'm not sure what happened to my post this evening everyone but it simply disappeared!  I am too tired to write another.  I will post again tomorrow!

January 23, 2012

Lots of concentration unwrapping the caramels for our cookies!

They did a fabulous job!  Fine motor skills at work!

I love the smile :)

These two don't see each other very often.  So cute when they do!

Lets all play together!  Love it:)

Happy Chinese New Year everyone!  We started this week off making Chinese lanterns to decorate our dayhome!  They look so cute hanging up downstairs.  I should have taken a picture so tomorrow, I will:)  We baked coconut cookies and had lots of free play!  Another great start to the week.  We are changing our Chinese food feast to Wednesday to accommodate all our kiddos!  I am pretty sure we are all here that day.  Should be lots of fun!  Tomorrow we will be heading outside so just a quick reminder to dress the children for the weather and some outside fun:)  Thanks everyone and hope you had a super start to your week!

January 22, 2012

Kiddos 2 and 3 enjoying some free playtime!

These two did so well with this puzzle!

Kiddo 1 is really a puzzle expert.  No help at all!

Proud of the finished result!

These two play so well together.  So fun to watch!

The youngest kiddo enjoying the new ride-in fire truck:)

We all enjoyed an ABC matching game at the end of the day!

We all took home a Penguin treat bag on Thursday.  I hope they enjoy them as much as I enjoyed putting them together!

Well, here I am FINALLY!  We had quite a busy week last week and unfortunately it was the blog that suffered.  We are getting back on track, right now!  Our theme last week was Penguins and we all learned so much.  We had lots of fun laughing about how they waddle around on the ice and slide into the ocean!  This week is Chinese New Year.  We will be doing lots of crafts and activities all centered around The Year of the Dragon!  We will talk about the Chinese calendar and find out what year we were all born in.  Because Chinese New Year is SO colourful, we will also be learning about Colours.  I really love this theme and teaching the kids about a  culture they may not know much about.  We will be finishing the week off with a Chinese food feast on Thursday.  Lots to look forward to to!  Thanks everyone for your patience this past week and we hope you enjoy the much warmer weather ahead!  We will be going outside as much as we can so please send your child in the appropriate clothing.  This includes: hat, mitts, scarves, winter jacket, snowpants and boots.  Have a great week!

January 17th, 2012

Oh my goodness, how could I not post the best information of the day..........Congratulations to Josh and his mom and dad, Rebecca and Stephen, on the birth of their second son this very cold Tuesday morning!  Both mom and baby are doing well and we hope to meet this new addition very soon<3

January 17th, 2012

We are painting our egg carton penguins :)

My oldest kiddo doing a fantastic job as usual!

My second oldest working very hard.  He takes painting serious!

My youngest Kiddo just about done with all this "crafting!!"

Bingo daubing is AWESOME!!

Our newest toy, The Ironing Board!!

The finished product of Egg Carton Penguin :)

I have to comment on the weather again today!  WOW!  is it ever cold!  We are so happy to have a nice, warm home to play in all day:)  We continued on with our Penguin theme today making little egg cup penguins from http://www.dltk-kids.com/animals/mcarton-penguin.htm and LOTS of bingo daubing of both penguins and our abc's!  We just had a great day!  Tomorrow we will be talking about what activities different penguins do throughout the day and at different times of the year.  We will learn a lot tomorrow.  I have also posted a picture of our "new" ironing board I purchased off Kijiji!  The kids think it's hilarious!  I think it's so cute.  Circa 1990 for sure.  Isabella thinks she remembers having one just like it!  Stay warm and have a great evening.

January 16th, 2012

My oldest dayhome kiddo!

My second oldest dayhome kiddo!

Happy Monday everyone!  And for those of you who live in Alberta like us.....Happy VERY COLD Monday!!  Hope you all kept warm today!  We sure did, learning about Penguins!  We did an action poem called, "The Penguins" this morning which was very cute.  We made a penguin puppet to do the actions for us.  This poem and puppet came from Mailbox Magazine, one of my all time favourite resources for everything Kid Like!!  We enjoyed Penguin crackers which, quite honestly, I think are the cutest crackers that have ever been made by Presidents Choice!  This afternoon we measured ourselves against the Penguin wall to see which penguin each of us was closest to in height.  My oldest kiddo measured in between the King Penguin and the Emperor Penguin.  My second oldest measured heights with the Megellanic Penguin and my youngest kiddo wouldn't stand still to be measured!!  Hahaha!  Tomorrow we are making an egg carton penguin that we will feed fish crackers too!  I know the kids will think that's pretty funny! This week we will be having a "Black and White" day on Thursday.  Please have the children dress in both black and white if you have it.  Thanks everyone!  Have a great day tomorrow and stay warm!

January 15th, 2012

Last week I said that I would post some pictures of the dayhome and what I consider a "print-rich" environment.  Here are some of the walls of the dayhome and some of the centers.  Please leave a comment and tell me what you think!  Thanks everyone:)

January 15th, 2012

What a busy weekend!  I apologize for not uploading Thursday's Hibernation Day pictures sooner!  We had lots of fun!  Hibernating in our "bear cave," playing games with our special bears we brought from home and eating Teddy Grahams for snack!  This week's theme is... Penguins!  This is always a favourite with the kids and myself!  We will play penguin games, make lots of penguin crafts and of course, learn all about penguins!  Should be a great week!  A lot colder than last week that's for sure.  Stay warm and check back often to find out what we've done and what we will be doing.  Have an awesome week!

January 11th, 2012

I was just downstairs getting ready for Hibernation Day tomorrow and I was thinking about a "print rich" environment.  I have to say when I am down there it truly makes me happy.  With all the cute posters on the wall ANNOUNCING our different themes of the month, it puts a smile on my face.  I hope the children feel the same!!  I will post some pictures this weekend so you can all have a look and maybe even leave a comment or two.  I would love to know what you think!  Today was a lovely day!  We even made it outside to hang up our bird feeders from yesterday.  The kids really love being out there.  We are going to make a bigger effort to enjoy the Winter.  Especially with the weather being so nice!  Today we finished up a What does Teddy Wear during the Winter? booklet made with painted paper plates, lots of colouring and cutting.  Pretty cute.  I won't post any pictures of this because quite honestly I don't remember where I got the idea from!  We are looking forward to tomorrow and spending some time in our "Bear Cave!"  Which is really just our castle covered with a big quilt!  The kids will like it!  Have a great evening everyone!
Bonnie:)