Water Transfer

I picked up these cute Halloween pails in the dollar section at target for sponging water from one pail to another. Cute idea, but the cheapy, tin pails leaked! So I switched to little cups instead. A did this one time and then wanted to play in the water.

Jars and Lids

I have been meaning to do this activity with A for a long time. Its really easy, just get several jars of varying sizes (I used some plastic and some glass) with lids and place in a basket. This kept A occupied for atleast 20 minutes! She would fit smaller jars, in bigger jars and try to stuff all the lids in 1 jar. Then she ended up stacking several jars on top of each other.

For older kids you could put a rock or small animal in each jar, have them pull the lid off, and even turn it into some sort of matching game (like each jar have a different habitat/food/etc on the lid.) Just some ideas. As is, it was fun for A, but adding more interest as she gets older would be a lot of fun too.

Blue's Clues

Anastasia really loves watching "Blue's Clues" on Netflix. I like everything I have read about the show and how it relates to the preschool psychology and how simple and intellegent it is. I don't like the cheesy animation but A doesn't really care, and gets completely involved in the show, shouting out answers and saying goodbye to the characters. So I made our own home-version of "Blue's Clues" using 3-hand drawn paw prints, a handy-dandy notebook and a little beanie baby Blue. The Blue toy is an added bonus I picked up on clearance at Big Lots, but works great with our little game.

For "Ask Mr. Bear" each day I have put out clues for a different "gift". Yesterday we played Blue's Clues to find out what Mommy wanted to drink. I put clues on a toy cow, a jar that our milk comes in, and the white-themed page of a color book. Today we went with the sheep's gift of a blanket in the book and so the clues were a sheep toy, a pile of wool and a bed. Tomorrow we will probably go with the egg and the clues will be a chicken toy, an egg carton and probably a whisk or a nest. Then we will have "pillow" with the clues, goose toy, a feather, and a bed. And last of all will be the "goat cheese" with a toy goat, some maceroni, and a knife and cutting board or something. After the child finds the clue, they are supposed to draw it in their "Handy-dandy notebook" and after they find all the clues they get to sit in their "thinking chair" to figure out the answer.

This game was a HUGE hit with A. You could easily play this without Blue or the "Blue's Clues" theme, and just have some special symbol (like a star) designate a clue and add more clues if you want. I just went the easy route and used someone else's idea. We will definately be playing this a lot!