A Shopping Experience

A month or so ago my daughter sent me this video.

It was a quiet time in that grocery store so the Little One had time and space to push her shopping cart around to help mom.

I suggested, to my daughter, that the next time they go she create a shopping list for the Little One to follow.

And this is how it went.

At just under the age of 2 she is learning the different departments in a grocery store.

 She is learning how to read a list,

and check it off when she finds an item.

She is learning how to care for each item.  That they can be fragile.

She is increasing her vocabulary, her knowledge and understanding of the world she lives in.

This experience takes just a bit of preparation before hand.  

It also takes patience and a bit longer time shopping for the parent.

But it offers your child so much....

 knowledge (building on what she knows about her food), 

structure (that it takes some planning to shop), 

responsibility (if we want to eat we have to gather our food), and 

understanding of belonging (we each have our roles)

to a family.

Discovering an Ocean

During the Canada Day long weekend our daughter, son in-law and grand daughter came home for a visit.

It was the first time we could take Our Little One to the beach. 

Not just a sandy beach but an ocean beach where we find crabs, fish, barnacles and more.

We found little crabs, hiding under rocks, as soon as we got closer to the water's edge.

Then we found the waves and the sandy shore.

These little waves were a challenge for her little legs.

Good thing she had help from mom and dad.

Time to explore the shore.

The sand is so much fun to grab with little fingers and transfer to the bucket.

And fun to splash it all off.

Dad found a little fish as he was combing the edge of the surf.

Opa found our Little One as she was running across the sand.

Back at the Little One's home I created an ocean discovery bin for her.

I started with real and toy shells, fish, snails, crabs and more.

I covered those with strips of blue and green, thin vinyl tablecloth.

I stuck in these little plastic trees, that look a bit like floating seaweed, and more shells, fish and shiny flat pebbles.

Time to explore.

Her favourite was the shiny flat pebbles.

The bin is fun but nothing compared to the real live ocean and tide pools.

April's Treasure Basket - Construction

The little one has been interested in vehicles lately,

especially the sounds.

So for her April Treasure basket I decided to make it 'construction' oriented.

The basket had blocks, road signs and construction vehicles.

When she got the basket she and her dad set up a road and played on the bed.

The next day I converted her sensory table by adding a piece of cardboard

and cut two holes in to it to sink pot holes.

I painted a quick background,

then set up some of the pieces from the basket.

All ready for her to see after her nap.

She took a bit of time exploring the different pieces

but what she liked most was discovering that the pot holes could pop out!

After Dad got home from work she showed him the set up.

A plastic bin was put underneath to hold more blocks

and she enjoyed pulling it out and adding more to the table.

We started to take more time to stop and watch big machines wherever we could.

She soon learned the sign for digger.

Back at the play table she started hauling some of her little animals in the truck.

She loves making the sounds of the truck.

Dad reads a great book that is all about the sounds that big machines make.

Ready for tomorrow's work.