Childcare Chronicles

It’s been a bit since I’ve did a blog post about childcare.  I’ve had a sick bunch of kiddos around here and most of my time has been spent in a pattern that goes from the box of tissues, to the child and then to the garbage can.  That pattern has been on repeat.  We just can’t seem to get over the hump.  The kids who are here most of the day are all three and under.  We’ve just learning to sneeze into our elbow..to wash our hands after touching our noses, not to put toys in our mouths and the like so…it’s a battle.

In between all of that we do manage a few fun moments…here are some.

We were learning about small, medium, and large so I helped them trace circles.  It was my intention that they would be snowmen.  I gave the kids watercolors to make scraves, hats and faces….oh my, they painted everything-everywhere.  Hopefully the small, medium, and large concept at least sunk in.

My neighbor girl doesn’t go to the local school.  Her school was cancelled so she came over to play.  She adores Carver and is a wonderful help with the babies.

Check this out….this is how one of the little girls fell asleep one afternoon…foot in the air and blanket over her head.

I spend a lot of time feeding bottles to babies.  It’s gotten so I wear funky leggings most of the days.  They are the best for providing impromptu activities.  Here one little girl is looking for the first letter of her name.

We have been making good use of the little table I refinished.  Here they are playing play dough.  I make homemade.  This time is suppose to be imitating snow so I made white and added silver glitter to it.  My girl who was obsessed with the Disney movie Frozen calls it Frozen Playdough.  I’ve learned that they are less messy with it if they play while standing vs sitting.

Recently while at Wal-Mart I bought some buttons.

We strung a pipecleaner in the button and then strung pony beads.  It was a great success.  My little girls who love Disney princesses were so happy to have a princess bracelet.  The little boy in my group made a lady bug bracelet instead.  I’m going to buy more princess beads next time I go.  I want to have more on hand so we can do this again….they loved it and it is great hand eye coordination for them.

Here’s what a finished bracelet looked like.  If the kiddos are a little order when we do this again, I’ll introduce patterning so they can make a pattern with the beads…even a simple pattern like pink/purple.  See how cute they are?

Of course no childcare chronicle would be complete without a picture that includes Ruby….here she’s sleeping with the kiddos.  She sure loves them…I do too.

I am completely reorganzing all the childcare things.  It’s a great time to do it.  I have a little one potty training, one who out grew her bottle, and kids who are moving on to adult silverware.  I need to change with the kiddos and move things out that we don’t need anymore.  It’s so fun to see them hit milestones….If we could get to the “handle my own germs” milestone, I’d be elated!   One can hope…right?

Stay tuned for the next childcare chronicle.  They are some of my favorite to write.