The Fun Rundown Jan 12

 I had a few pictures lurking around that were cute, and showed us doing fun things, but none were enough for an entire post, so I am cheating and combining them.
Above is Quinn (6months) playing in a giant water table at a local science museum.

 She loves to splish and splash. 

 Kenna (35 months)  and I built and huddled in a fort (in another area of the museum).  The giant poles, attaching easily with velro, and the lightweight material made for some really fun toddler work. She was very specific about where everything should go. We could have done this for hours. She's been completely entralled with everything "fort" and so this addressed her high interest level perfectly!

 Quinn, playing dress up. She loves peek-a-boo and this hat was new and different than playsilks and blankets.

 Little Man is taking steps! (15 months) All of his therapists are beside themselves with happiness.  He loves walking and is really getting brave.  Of course, two days after he took his first steps we got an appointment to get him special shoes, inserts and braces, but that's a small price to pay to get to say my CP kid is WALKING!!  Here he is attempting to push a basket full of sisters. (notice Daddy has ahold of the other end with a belt, so Little Man feels like a rock star!)

Kenna showed immense joy in watching our 6 foot giant inflatable snowman inflate and collapse each day. Pure joy. I wish we could leave that thing up all year. (Don't worry, I've finally packed up the Christmas. Why is it that even when you think you've gotten all the decor packed up, you suddenly sit on the couch and notice a GIANT Santa bowl you missed. Um, how is that possible?)

Ice Texture Tub

 Ever have a leftover bag of ice from a long-gone party lurking in your freezer?

 Well, our bag was frozen into a giant iceberg, as most long-forgotten bags of ice are... so I set it on the deck, gave Kenna a hammer, and told her to break it apart for me. She gladly obliged. (no pics- you really do need both eyes trained on a toddler armed with a hammer.)

Showing me her very cold fingers!
After she banged the iceberg back into cubes, we scooped them up with a dustpan and put them in her water table. She played, scooped, threw, poured, and plunked the ice all afternoon.  The great thing about playing with ice in November is that it doesn't melt very fast!! Keep this fun and easy idea in mind next time you open your freezer to find a giant bag of leftover ice.  It was a ton of fun!

Purple Puddles

 Our sand/water table has seen a lot of action this summer (Gifted by Grammie and Poppy- an awesome $6 purchase at a yard sale. The table was in like new condition (retails for close to $70- and the accessories were still in their package!!)  Kenna plays with it almost every day. I try and mix it up now and then to keep it interesting.

 The water looks kind of murky- don't worry, it's just purple food coloring! I gave her an empty "puffies" container today, which she really liked playing with.

 See- light purple!  I also provided a bunch of bowls, a bulb syringe, and of course,
lots of purple water.

I also gave her a big bowl of ice. Kenna played happily for over an hour while I fed the littles and prepped dinner.  She was cooking, mixing, stirring, pouring and talking to herself the whole time. It was so sweet. 

Our Little River

One of our summer "bucket list" items was to make a tin foil river down our driveway. I started this adventure early in the week, when our good friend and favorite 11 year old, Brenna, came over for a few hours to play with Kenna. Kenna loves Brenna because she plays with her and is crafty, and I love Brenna because she makes Kenna so happy. I cut up some envelopes and asked the girls to paint them. While the envelope "sails" were drying, I cut up the egg carton I had begged Brenna to bring (being vegetarian occasionally limits our craft supplies). I sent Kenna into our yard to find some thin (great vocabulary) sticks, and we used a bunch of tape to create our little boats.

The next afternoon, we rushed through dinner and coaxed Daddy outside to help us make our river (aka help drag the hose to the front of the house for us). Kenna was watching me unroll tinfoil from the deck, shouting with glee and truly beside herself with excitement. She and I had talked about rivers all week, and how the water flows and can move things when it flows fast. (This picture is our trial run on the driveway- we decided we needed a gentler slope so that more water would puddle in our river- and moved to the grass. My husband declared me all-powerful. Next, I'll move a mountain...)As soon as the hose was in place, Kenna started sending her boats, bottle caps, and even some leaves down the river. It was such fun! I was surprised that it didn't hold her attention longer, but she was so intersted in the boats themselves, and then picking leaves, and then playing with the hose... she was distracted. I do have a confession. Our little sailboats didn't do great in the river. The bottlecaps and empty egg carton pieces floated more easily. Kenna didn't care, though- she thought that capsizing boats were hilarious!

As the sun went down and the mosquitoes swarmed in, we carefully rolled up our river, set our boats to dry, and dreamed of playing with our river another day.

Green Water Table

For G week, we've been doing a lot of green activities. I set this little plastic shoe box full of green water (two drops food coloring is all you need) and some fun tools out on the front sidewalk. Kenna found them after nap and was enthralled.

I taught her how to use her funnel to fill he squirt bottle full of green water. She did this soo carefully. She also filled the bottle with the turkey baster, which she mastered today. Green water inspired her!

She squirted our plants, my minivan, and then discovered the joy of squirting our sidewalk chalk outlines we drew yesterday. The chalk color ran beautifully, and she loved it.

I know most people provide much larger water tables, and sometimes I do too, but I wanted to show how much fun could be had with such a small amount of water!