What can you do with a SPONGE?

We were in Briscoes the other day and spotted a packet of 6 large sponges for $4 and I couldn't resist! Sponges provide so many endless possibilities of fun! Here are a few of the possibilities we came up with.

1 - Build towers with the sponges and boof them down!

2 - Sit on the sponge tower and feel them go flat under your weight... then have them pop out the back! (Ashton thought that was hilarious!)

3 - Cut the sponges into different shapes. Play "spot the shape".

4 - Do sponge painting.

5 - Sponge water play. See how much water you can squeeze into one container.

6 - Sponge war! Throw the sponges at each other and have a good laugh!

This piece of art is amazing to me... cause Ashton doesn't like doing art! But I don't give up... and although this painting was done in a matter of minutes, it was minutes more than doing nothing... which he normally prefers to do!

He does on the other hand LOVE water play, so putting the sponges into the water was right up his alley! And this activity is fantastic for fine motor development, as they squeeze the sponge to empty out the water.

Productive Water Play

We still love to do dancing dishes on a regular basis, but for Ashton it has become more of a time for water play! He gets so fixated on pouring and filling, and as I clean a dish, he takes it for his water collection. I can now not do the dishes without him wanting to help out.

What I love most about Ashton's busy water play is, he can't help but have a little boogie while he tips and pours! Too cute!

I love this photo, you can really see how much water goes EVERYWHERE!

It's tough work cleaning or playing with dishes... got to stop for a drink!

The best play dough recipe EVER!

It was time for a new batch of play dough today so Ashton, Laela and I got to work mixing and stirring! We read our recipe out and found all of the ingredients. As I called out each item the two of them would repeat after me in a parrot like fashion and have a little giggle.

We had to take turns doing each step as they were both extremely eager to help out and get in on the action. Their ability to get the ingredients in the bowl on the first try is getting better each time we cook, its great to see their co-ordination and skills developing.

Our recipe goes a little something like this. . .

3 cups of flour

1 1/2 cups of salt

3 TBSP of oil

1 pot or bag of cream of tartar

(just don't spill it all over your child like I did! ) whops!

3 Cups of boiling water

Then mix it all together.

Once its all pretty much combined turn it out onto the table and knead it all together and add the food colouring you want.

To make our play dough a little more fancy we will often add some essential oils to the mix. If we can we relate the smell to the colour of the play dough. So, raspberry oil to pink, lemon to yellow etc. It adds a whole other dimension and greats points of discussion for playing with the play dough.

Not Just Blocks

I LOVE wooden toys. . . but I especially love wooden blocks! There is just something so awesome about them, and something so spectacular about a completed block construction. So when I found out we were having a boy when I was pregnant, I started hunting down the best set of wooden blocks I could find. Then when Ashton was 6 months old I made the purchase, even though he could barely crawl at that stage! ha ha.

So, needless to say I have been waiting a while to be able to play blocks with Ashton for quite some time. I bring them out on regular occasion to see if he is interested in them and he will play with them a bit, but loose interest pretty quickly. Each time though I will preserver in building at least one tower to show him the potential of the blocks, in the hope that one day it will just click and he will want to play with me.

Well, today was the day!!!!!!!!!! Oh my goodness, I was so excited! We played with his blocks for close to an hour and he didn't just build he added other objects and things to his build to make it even more interesting! His concentration and perseverance was great as he carefully tried to balance objects on top of the blocks, or drive his cars slowly amoungst them as though he had created a city for his cars to drive through.

At the moment Ashton is really into lining things up in rows or balancing objects, so you could see this throughout his construction. I just loved watching him in action, as he created a block city that just represented everything about him and where he is at with his development and interests right now. Seeing the animals scattered throughout it, the instruments balancing on the city scape. So cool! I am so excited to watch how his constructions continue to evolve.

A REALLY MASSIVE TOY MOBILE!

Today I might have just taken my "Polkadotty Mummy" status to another level by creating my craziest contraption ever! I had an idea in my head and I knew what I wanted to achieve. . . and in a way it came out better than expected, but when I look at it more and more, I just can't help but giggle! So, here it is...

Yes, it is very innovative... Its a really massive toy mobile, that doesn't break! and before you go laughing your head off at my amazing kiwi ingenuity !!! Let me just give you the story behind the concept.

Ashton loves watching the mobile going around while he is in his cot, but he loves it so much that often he gets a bit excited and starts to reach for it. With this enthusiasm he has now broken two mobiles! We have no more!!! So I wanted to channel this enthusiasm or desire to

catch the objects as they moved around as I think it is a great little activity to develop hand-eye co ordination, and lately Ashton has been very focused on developing that skill.

So the idea behind doing this home made, massive, toy mobile was to give Ashton something to play with that would have objects moving around him that he could track and try and catch! Of which he did... and enjoyed... so all I can say is... "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!" ;o)

PAPER FUN!

Art was on the days plan today! I love art so I have been trying to figure out art activities that I could do with Ashton. With the lack of sleep I had last night the best I could come up with was crayons drawings! Sad, I know... with 13 years+ early childhood experience, all I cam up with was crayon drawings! But we had never done it before so I thought we would give it a go.

I stuck a piece of paper down on Ashton's high chair tray and put the crayon down in front of him. We talked about what colour it was and when he seemed unsure what to do with it, (other than put it in his mouth) I placed it in his hand and showed him how it could make a picture.

I showed him how he could go round and round in circles, (he thought this was funny, he liked holding on to my hand while drew circles all over the page.) We also went up and down on the page, and from side to side as well. After I had demonstrated the possibilities I put the crayon down to let him explore.

This is where the activity took a turn . . . Ashton decided that the paper on his tray was more interesting that the crayons. In his efforts to eat the paper, he ended up ripping it off the tray, which created a lovely ripping noise that he seemed to rather enjoy the sound of. He grabbed the other corner of the paper and ripped it up again. Once he had all the paper ripped off the tray the activity then took on the focus of scrunching the paper up and throwing it around! He was having a great time!

So where I thought I was providing an art activity (all plain as it may have seemed). I actually ended up providing resources for Ashton to formulate his very own exploration of sound and the qualities of paper! ha ha. Unusual but fun and valuable none the less!

Once he had destroyed one piece of paper I placed a fresh new piece on and he went through the same process again, ripping, scrunching, throwing!