Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from our house to yours.  I hope see to you back next year...

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Christmas Ideas and Crafts (Advent Calendar)

Thanks to Sara for putting together this great list of ideas for the holidays. I'm a little late on taking advantage of it in an advent calendar but I will definitely be doing most of these crafts and activities and posting them in the next couple of weeks.   Guest post- From Sara.... When I grew up my family had an advent tree....ours was felt and had one pocket for each day of the month. I have one of those advent trees and I was trying to decide what to put in each pocket when I stumbled across a great idea on some websites. I will put an activity or craft in each pocket! I created a list of some activities I plan on using this Christmas and wanted to share. The attachment has the slips of paper I will be putting in the pockets and below are the worksheet and...

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Painting with Balls

Oh my kids had so much fun with this one!   Materials: Tray (pan, or foil pan)paint (we used finger paint)Paper (I like finger paint paper because it doesn't rip)balls or marbles I taped the paper to the tray to ensure that it wouldn't move around when the kids were rolling around the balls.   My son got the hang of the rolling but my daughter was more comfortable controlling all of her markings.   Results- Beautiful!!  These totally showed their personalities to...

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More Thanksgiving printables!

Okay, so you know how I totally said I was going to get on the ball and do some Thanksgiving crafts this week... Yeah, pregnancy sickness has set in and it is confirmed that that will not be happening. (I am 8 weeks along with my third bambeeno)  No since is wasting your week away though eh??   Confessions of a Homeschooler has some WONDERFUL printables that are free for you to download.  Enjoy and Happy Thanksgiving to you all!!  (I will be playing catch up while my hubby is home at the end of the week so stay tuned for tons of preschool and toddler activities that I just haven't gotten around to blogging abou...

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Thanksgiving crafts

I have been so lazy lately and haven't done a single thanksgiving craft with my kiddos yet and here it is.... the week of Thanksgiving!  So here are the things I would LIKE to do with them this week.   Golf tee turkeys Hand print turkey cookies  Apple Turkey  (this site has other holiday activities as well) TONS of Thanksgiving printables  If you have other activities that you would like to share, leave a comment with your link :...

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Toddler Time- Color sorting

One of my goals this month was to introduce colors to my daughter (21 months).  I started pointing out colors to her in everyday activities... red elmo, elmo is red! ect.. I thought that she was starting to pick up on green so that was one of the colors I choose to work with first.  With toddlers, I would only use two colors when beginning a color sorting activity.  Once they have mastered those two colors, add another and so on. Here is my sweet pea sorting green and purple.  (Note- make sure you use colors that are opposite of each other, blue and green are too similar as well as yellow and orange.) I started with colored cups and pompoms in the middle.  (If you don't have colored cups, use bowls or just...

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What does my preschooler need to know before kindergarten?

I get this question more than any other.  It really depends on the state, school, and let's get honest...the individual teacher as to what your child should know before entering kindergarten.  If you are homeschooling in kindergarten, you will have to go by the state standards for your child.  For example- In North Carolin follow this link (click the subject, then grade level).  Usually, public schools have quarterly goals that are from the standards list.   Below is a wonderful blog entry from Child Up  that lists the very basics that would be helpful to do at home with your child.  Like I've said before, in my opinion, fine motor skills (cutting, tracing, lacing, coloring, ect) is the main thing that takes lots of practice that can't be...

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Homeschool Material List

Preschool is all about fine motor skills.  Yes it is important for children to learn certain objects but they can't get enough practice strengthening those core hand muscles.  A good number of my activities are based on working those tinny hands.  If you are just getting started with homeschooling and are wondering what are some great materials to have on hand... here are a few of my staples that I try not to run out of.... please comment if you have other items that you always have on hand that I left off my list. Yarn- I try and do at least one lacing activity a week.  You can also use yarn for art projects to make hair! Beads- These are great for sorting colors as well as lacing Pom Poms- Wonderful for color...

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Letter H

Man was our H week a busy one!  The entire fridge was full of crafts and activities by Friday!  Below are the links from our week.  Please take a minute to visit these other wonderful preschool sites!   Click here for our H weekly schedule to get an idea of how we fit it all in! Hippo tracing page  H handwriting practice  Circle the items that begin with the H sound  Make a hippo. I cut this one our for my little guy but then showed him the finished hippo so he could figure out the steps to glue the hippo together himself.  (Like all things that will not be reused, I choose to print this in grayscale to save my colored ink) Hand print horses.  (This activity did require craft sticks and...

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