Painting With Farm Animals

I decided to be brave and let Hunter have his first experience at painting.  So, one day before he turned 13 months he painted for the first time.

We used paint, card stock, a paper plate and some farm animals.  Also, not pictured is tape.
I taped the card stock to the table so it would stay in place for Hunter.  I put a tiny bit of paint on the paper plate and then rubbed the bottom of the animals in the paint and then showed Hunter how to use it to stamp the paint on the paper.

When Hunter realized what he was doing he was quite pleased.

He worked for a little while and then ripped the paper off the table 🙂

I re-secured the paper and then he painted some more.

He stopped to yell “Hay-Yee” which is how he says Hailey.  I think he wanted her to come and see what he was doing, but she was at school.

Of course he had to check out his hands and see what was on them.

Overall it was actually a lot of fun.  I only gave him a tiny bit of paint, so it didn’t really get messy at all.  He just had a little on his hands, but that was the only place he got it on himself.  The picture he made turned out adorable and is hanging on our refrigerator 🙂

Book About Feelings

Hailey and I made a book about emotions for Hunter, using an idea I found at No Time for Flashcards.

First, Hailey and I came up with 10 different emotions we could use for the book.  This was actually very beneficial to her as she really had to think once we got past the basic happy and sad.

Hailey picked out some scrapbook paper to use for our book.

We used a board book that we had a duplicate of and Hailey covered each page with a decorative piece of scrapbook paper.  Then we glued her pictures into the book.

Hailey added text to our book to describe the feelings in each picture.

I covered the pages with contact paper so that the book will hopefully last a nice long time.

Hunter loved the book!!  He looks at the pages and says “Hay-yee!”

Discovery Bottles

One of Hunter’s favorite things to play with is a water bottle.  I don’t know why babies love them so much, but the usually do.  So I thought it would be a good idea to take advantage of his interest in water bottles and make some discovery bottles.  First I made one with water and glitter.

Hunter loved it!

When Hailey got home from school I had her help make some more.

Hailey decided she wanted one too.  She put some sequence, water and oil in each bottle.

She added blue food coloring to one and pink to the other.  I would recommend only using a tiny bit of food coloring.  Ours ended up so dark we can hardly see the sequence inside, especially the blue one.  Hailey had fun making them though!

We also made one with just sequence in it, no liquid.  That one seems to be Hunter’s favorite, probably because it makes noise.

I used a hot glue gun to secure the tops of the water bottles.

Our completed discovery bottles.

Hunter’s First Week of Tot School

Hunter is 12.5 Months

This is Hunter’s first week of Tot School!  He turned 1 back in December and now that the holidays are over we are ready to settle into a nice routine.  Hailey starred in many Tot School posts but I didn’t start with her when she was this young.  So, I’ve been busy searching for ideas to use with a 12 month old.  Here is how our first week went:

The things I am focusing on this week (and for however long Hunter stays interested) are: body parts and farm animals.

I put this picture up for Hunter to look at so we can practice body parts.  He was trying to point to “eyes.”  Mostly he just wanted to pull it off the wall.

He gave himself a little hug and said, “awwww.”

Hunter LOVES this book about farm animals.  He points to an animal and then waits for me to make the animal noise.  When I ask him what noise an animal makes he smiles and either says “baaa” or “mooo” no matter which animal it is.

Hunter had fun playing with the animals in his barn.

This next activity was pretty simple. I put some shaving cream in a Ziploc bag, pushed most of the air out, and sealed it shut.

Hunter checked out the bag: he squeezed it, felt it, used it as a phone and held it up to his ear to talk, smelled it, etc. When he was done doing that, I added some farm animals.

I pushed the animals on to the bag to show Hunter how it left an indentation, so he did the same thing.

This kept Hunter busy for a while (well, a while for a 1 year old!) and he seemed to really enjoy it!

This was Hailey’s when she was younger and Hunter had never seen it before- he thought it was great!!

We also made some Discovery Bottles this week:

Hailey helped make the bottles, and decided she should make one for herself too.

The one on the left is water and glitter.  Next is water, vegetable oil, blue food coloring (we used too much, we probably only needed a few drops) and sequence.  The next one also has water, vegetable oil, and sequence, but Hailey added pink food coloring to this one.  The last one has just sequence in it- this one seems to be Hunter’s favorite, probably because it makes noise.

He loves the discovery bottles!

I think Hunter’s first week of Tot School was a success!  Stop by 1+1+1=1 to see some more Tot School Posts.