This week, we headed to Mummy C’s home for our weekly playdate, and she, like all the other mums in our playgroup, really inspired me with all the interesting things she prepared for the children. She has so many wonderful ideas, and I really admire how she is completely unfazed about letting the children create a huge mess.
Mummy C set up a wall painting station just outside her door, along the common corridor, so Noah and F joined R in creating a mess there, while waiting for E to arrive. I haven’t been painting much with Noah, so he was absolutely thrilled to be able to paint again, and ended up painting his legs, shirt and shorts too. Thankfully, Mummy C used washable paint, so I was able to get him cleaned up quickly.
Busy Little Painters
I was also impressed by Mummy L’s innovative way of introducing the farm animals, but I admit that I laughed when I saw her frantically piecing the jigsaw puzzle together, with all the little ones crowding around her. It was a beautiful puzzle of a farm scene, with 3-D cut-outs of some farm animals, and the children seemed to like it quite a bit.
Piecing the jigsaw puzzle together (I only started helping her after I took this photo. Heh.)
Talking about the farm animals
Next, I read Eric Carle’s From Head to Toe
and got the children to do all the actions as I read. R was especially enthusiastic, and could do all the actions so well that I just had to include the photos of him.
From Head to Toe
As a follow-up activity, I got the children to make their own movable lions for craft. The template and detailed instructions can be found in this post.
Busy colouring
With his lion
It was really tough getting a group shot of the kids, because they were all so busy playing with their lions!
Group shot
Mummy C then said Grace before the little ones were allowed to start on their snacks, and the mums enjoyed the tarts which Mummy L provided.
Saying Grace
Lemon tarts for the mums
The children were all a little crankier than usual for some strange reason, and we struggled to get them settled down again for Chinese after their snack. Maybe we’ll try shifting snack-time to after Chinese next week, to see if it’ll make any difference. Anyway, the original plan was for Mummy E to use the jigsaw puzzle that Mummy L used earlier, and to talk about the farm in Chinese. Unfortunately, all four kids decided to start taking the puzzle apart as she was talking, so we decided to shift them all away from the puzzle, and Mummy E used only the 3D cut-outs instead.
Before the chaos began
The result of the chaos: 3-D cut-outs only
For Practical Life Skills, Mummy C set up five very interesting stations for the children, and I think they all really enjoyed themselves. She first demonstrated how to pour water from a jug into some cups, and I think that was probably Noah’s favourite station. I’m already thinking of doing this at home with him, since he loves playing with water. I foresee him spending a lot more time playing and learning in our toilet. Haha.
Demonstration
Noah pouring carefully
Noah wasn’t too keen on matching the bears, and declared that he was “all done” after matching about three or four pairs. I’m planning to make some picture cards for him to match at home, so that he can get used to it.
Matching bears
I’ve seen some busy bag ideas on getting children to build Lego structures by following pattern cards, but thought that it would be too difficult for Noah. To my surprise, he was actually able to do it, with guidance of course. He lost interest after working on three, but that was good enough for me. Time to start doing this at home too!
Building Lego towers
Noah’s pincer grip is still very weak, so he needed a lot of help in hanging up the clothes. I bought some wooden pegs from Daiso, for him to practise with, but he usually pulls them apart instead.
Hanging up the clothes
Another station which all the kids enjoyed was the cutting station, where they used a knife (from the kids’ section at Ikea) to cut up some play-doh. Noah wasn’t particularly successful with this, and I had to help him quite a bit too.
Cutting
We wanted to let the children play at the playground for their Big Muscles activity, so we sang the action songs, as well as the Goodbye Song, in the house, before heading out. We sang ‘I’m in the Lord’s Army’, and ‘Five Little Ducks’, and got the children to do the actions as well. Noah preferred to dance around instead of doing the actions, as you can see from the photo below.
Quack, quack, quack
The children loved playing at the playground together, and I was kept busy cheering them on as they whizzed down the slide. Noah has come a long way since his days in Adelaide, where he absolutely refused to play on the slides, and it was such a pleasure watching all of them play together. I tried to take some photos, but they were running so fast that I couldn’t get a decent shot at all.
I thought this ladybird was really cute
Look at how sweaty he was!
Looking forward to more such playdates, before he starts school next year!
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