Our First "Kid Review"!!!

A big thank you to Christian for his review of our "Muddle and Match" books!!!  Christian just turned three and has quite a collection of books!! How adorable is he?!?!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3xYw--5yZY

https://a4291.myubam.com/p/5141/muddle-and-match-complete-collection-4

A Little "Wintery" Fun!!

Being that the temperature is hovering right around zero, I felt it only appropriate to do a winter-themed craft today!! There are so many fun options for both books, and crafts!!  We have been cooped up inside, so I chose more of a sensory activity for my girls!!

First we chose two of our favorite Usborne titles!!  The first is one of our popular flashlight books, "Secrets of Winter."  If you are not familiar with our Shine-A-Light books, the are such fun and unique books for your kids!! You simply read the story, shine a light through the pages, and an image will appear!!  This particular version explores animals in winter!!

https://a4291.myubam.com/p/5005/shine-a-light-secrets-of-winter)

The next book we read is a "secret gem" of Usborne books.  This is one I did not know anything about for the first year and a half with the company.  Yet, it is now one I highly recommend.  It is called, "Waiting for Winter" and is absolutely adorable.  From the amazing illustrations, to the story, it is truly such a sweet book!!  It is about a squirrel trying to stay awake to see snow.  He is met by other friends who also try to stay awake to witness snow! 

 

 rhttps://a4291.myubam.com/p/895/waiting-for-winter

After we read both stories, we started on our craft, "snow dough".  This was such an easy activity, and kept my girls entertained for over 30 minutes.  That is always a winner in my book :) 

The only ingredients you need include:

Flour

Baby Oil

Measuring Cup

Some bowl/Casserole dish/etc to contain the dough

To make the snow, we combined 4 cups of flour with 3/4 a cup of baby oil. I let the kids measure and pour themselves.  Then I allowed the girls to mix by hand!  The consistency of the dough is soft and moldable.  It is fun to build with, cut and just play!!  I eventually gave them some cookie cutters to use as well!  For this purpose, as snow, we kept it white. Yet, with a little food coloring, you could make it any color you want!! Plus, you can keep this to use again, and again!!

 Their attempt at a snowman!

Laney made a little mess! :)

Yay for my first post!!!

Today we did a fun activity relating to one of our NEW favorite titles!!! The book is, "I'm a Hungry Dinosaur", and is the next new title after, "I'm a Dirty Dinosaur."  It is truly such a fun book that combines simple, yet adorable illustrations, with rhyme and rhythm.  I challenge you to read it a few times WITHOUT singing it in your head!

So a fun fact for all of you "Dinosaur" fans, the illustrator uses actual frosting and sprinkles for the illustrations! And yes, she uses actual mud for "Dirty Dinosaur"! If you look closely at the illustrations you will see the sprinkles!!  This made my first activity pretty easy to do!! Of course, we first read the book together.  It was a good excuse to discuss the job of the author versus the illustrator!! We then gathered up some easy supplies that we had around the house.  This included peppermint frosting (it was 80% off at Target after Christmas), sprinkles, food coloring, and cupcake liners.

Then I basically let the girls go to town!!  Laney was more interested in eating the frosting (which I am sure is a huge shocker to all who know her)!  Ellie was excited to draw her dinosaur and rainbow!!  It was so fun and SO EASY for the girls.  It also teaches them how to use different mediums for art!!

 Fortunately for me, the ground is frozen and we had to skip the "art with mud".  Maybe in the spring...

 Tomorrow we are going to extend the activity a bit more, and make some cake, just like the dinosaur.  Of course we will be using our Usborne Cupcake Kit for that too :)  Here are just a few pictures of the fun!!

Her new favorite "cheese" face! 

Hi everyone!!! Thanks so much for visiting my blog! I am by no means a "writer", but wanted to find a means to share some more of our books, activities and specials!  I will be posting videos to share an inside look at many of our books! I am going to share a weekly book and craft that I do with my kids!! I will also, occasionally, be posting some prizes and giveaways!!  Please feel free to share, comment or add anything you want to the blog! This is all so new to me, so bear with me as I learn!!