The Amazing Earth & Sock Snakes

I purchased a big inflatable globe a few weeks from the Tiger shop and well... its a permanent fixture in the lounge, kitchen and hallway! As large and annoying as it is, it is also brilliant. Everyday, we lob it at each other, kicking it around and just general silliness with it.

As always, I try to inject a bit of learning into the games so while we throw it about and at each other,  I point to the Continents and ask Archie what they are. Also, I ask him to 'point at Africa for me' etc. followed by lots of screaming and cheering and flinging the globe about. He thinks it is hilarious and has quickly picked it up. He has also learnt England and United Kingdom. 

I have just started to move on to the different oceans and throwing in a few countries. My process for this is; getting his lego characters to explore the Earth, walking through the countries, going for a swim across the oceans and also diving off the sofa and bouncing around the globe. Again, Archie finds it highly entertaining!

The game digressed today into the Hand Snake game, where one of us is sleeping and the other uses their hand to be a snake and catch the leg of other person or swipe a sock from their feet. I made my sock into a snake with some goggle eyes. It made the game much more fun and real for Archie he was squealing and very excited! 

PS... A messy home is a happy home : )

Elderflower Wine

We went elderflower picking with my Mum (Archie's Nana). Ofcourse I wasnt making the Eldeflower wine, but my mum was. We had a lovely time and Archie really enjoy helping put the flower-heads in the buckets. The flowers were just starting to drop so just a few days later and it would have been too late to collect them. I now have a store of them in my freezer ready for my Mum to make the next batch. The cordial is delicious and works well with, water, lemonade or soda water. My Mum will not share the recipe to make the elderflower wine, its top secret, ha ha!

I can't wait until the Autumn and we can take Archie blackberry picking and stock up the freezer for our daily smoothies. Blackberries are so expensive to buy in the supermarkets and yet they are abundantly available across the hedgerows for FREE! Everyone is into this fad about blueberries being a superfood at the moment but blackberries are actually are much more nutrient rich. They contain half the amount of sugar, and much more fibre, protein, vitman C, vitamin A, calcium, finer, potassium etc than blueberries. 

Baking with a toddler

I bravely (ha ha) attempted my first baking experience with Archie. It went really well and Archie was so proud of his creations, he was offering them to everyone and was asking to make more for days after. We made chocolate cornflake cakes. The recipe was really simple, I just found it on the internet.

3oz butter

7oz Milk cooking chocolate

2 tbsp Golden Syrup

5oz Cornflakes

small bowl of mini marshmallows

I thought Archie would be flinging chocolate all over the place and wanting to just eat it all but actually he was really reserved and just ate 2 squares of chocolate. He didn't want to lick the bowl or spoon so I helped him out with that! After heating it all up and mixing it, we portioned it out in the cupcake cases, sprinkled the marshmallows and put it in the fridge. Then Archie asked to check if it was ready about 50 times for the next couple of hours ha ha!

As soon as Daddy arrived home, Archie took him to the fridge to show him what he had made. And the next day, Archie waited longingly for his Nana, Nanny B, and Pops to come round and have some of his chocolate cake. Of course this meant Archie could have another one himself and share everyone else's ha ha!

A Fort of Books

A creative reading hour was spent on the lounge floor. My brother Mark and I used to do this all the time when we were little. We would build a fort out of books. Archie loved this and worked his way around the wall of books, reading bits, knocking them over, pretending the pages were doors and opening closing the 'doors'

Archie was very confused at what i was doing with his books to begin with but soon jumped inside and played and read his books.

A regular favourite book of Archie's, Peppa Pig and the dinosaur park. I am instructed to stomp like a dinosaur and sing the song, A LOT! ha ha.

I didn't capture the end of the reading Fort as we were too busy being giants, stomping around bashing the walls down. Lots of fun : )

Mk Gallery - Start the Art

On Tuesday we met our friends at Milton Keynes Gallery for the 'Start the Art' workshop. It's a FREE 1hr workshop for under 5's to take part in art based activities and learning. This is only the second time I have taken Archie and it is great. It's definitely something I will be making into a regular thing to do on a Tuesday morning. The activity themes change from week to week and today the theme was architecture.

During the hour Archie flittered between all the activities. We made houses from the boxes and he climbed inside them. We played 'knock knock, is anybody there?' for a while. Then who moved on to a table of crayon rubbing, using pattern plates and paper. 

Followed by a quick squiggle on the big sheets of shiny silver paper on the floor and walls. Then he made Nana a picture by glueing feathers and using coloured tape. Lastly he played with the foam shapes and made towers.

The session ended with a juice and biscuit for the kiddies and they all got to choose a sticker to take home. Well after that busy hour he was pretty worn out and fell fast asleep in the car, but still insisted on holding his picture to give to Nana later!

Happy Fathers Day

Happy Fathers Day to my gorgeous husband Peter. You are a fantastic Daddy to Archie and a truly wonderful role model for him. Archie adores your silliness, funny voices, tickles, cuddles, zooming, Super Cheese, coconuts, your stories, Thunderbirds and tons more ; )

We have had a lovely day, involving a cycling to a pub for a cooked breakfast, then more cycling round a lake, ice-lollies, zooming down hills, then a really lovely walk through a wood. Archie learnt to draw arrows on the ground with sticks, while we were walking. There was also a lot of hide and seek playing in the trees. I didn't capture many photos as I was so busy. But we did have time to stop on a bike ride and rest at the park. Archie had a sleep while we did a bit of cloud watching. 

Roller Painting

Here is a quick and fun painting activity. It is a bit more messy and I feel you need more space so I like to sit on the floor with Archie to use the rollers. Larger paper works best to allow for more scope to push the roller about. Archie likes the freedom to stand up and walk around the paper to roll sometimes. 

I just use my food/lap trays and pour the poster paint onto it to act as a paint palette. Of course, the oilcloth is down to protect the carpet! When I am feeling a bit more brave and that Archie can control the paint a bit more I plan on using the rollers for upright canvases and using acrylic paints. 

Archie's final masterpieces are below ha ha : )

Water Painting Fun in the Sun

Well the weather was gorgeous today and so I took the opportunity to take Archie outside to do some water painting. This game is brilliant for summer days and is mess free (well paint free at least, the kiddies and you might get a little wet but it dries quickly). We took a bowl of water, paintbrushes, a roller and finally some sponge numbers outside. Archie loved this activity and we had fun together sponging the floor and drawing lines. He commanded me to draw some smiley faces to! Then I suggested to paint some stones with the water too which he thought was even better. So we moved on to lining up stones and painting them. We then decided to paint the fence opposite the house which Archie thought was very funny. Well why not it's only water!

The sponge numbers and shapes came from the Range. They are perfect for stamping with paints as well, we have got through a lot of these sponge numbers. I also have shapes and letters. Archie likes to play with them in the bath too... Oh and to pour on each others head and have them explode out my tummy!

Archie and I had our first official water fight with the paint brushes, flicking water at each other. It makes me think now Archie is ready for water pistols and water bombs : ) Peter is going to be very happy with this news. It was such a lovely morning, I really recommend getting outside, forget the messy paints and try out painting with water!

We ended the game with a well deserved my homemade ice-lolly. The ice-lolly is 100% fruit and is made from puree'd apple, orange and pear. Its free of additives, artificial colour and counts as one of his 5 a day (I sound like an advert ha ha!). A delicious healthy treat for the summer. Archie is quite obsessed with them at the moment.