Pool Noodle Sword

This homemade toy was a huge hit in our house recently! We had thought about buying some foam swords for our Simple Summer Theme Castle Week, but were a little surprised to see them for $5 each. We knew we needed four: for the boys, Little Buddy, and Big Cousin.

Rather than spend $20, I spent less than $3 on putting together all 4 swords. 

Beach Small World Play

This past week we enjoyed exploring beach & ocean activities as part of our Simple Summer Theme series.

One thing I've recently been wanting to do more of with the kiddos is small world play. 

Using the sandbox was a natural idea for beach play, although we also could have set up a small sensory tub for this type of play. 

Pretend Play: Dandelion Soup

We've been having a lot of fun sharing images over on Instagram lately, so you may have already caught a preview of this activity earlier this week.

It's dandelion season, and despite my husband's best efforts, they are popping up all over our yard. I'd been waiting for a hot day to set up this pretend play invitation with a nature connection. It was also great water play for a hot afternoon on the deck.

I love finding simple ways to play with things we have on hand. Before we started playing I set up a bunch of kitchen materials that the boys could use to pretend to make soup with. I also had the boys pick a large container of dandelions, including stems and some leaves. 

Cardboard Airfield

Okay, so I'm not going to lie, I had a little too much fun putting together this cardboard airfield for the boys.

They've been really into airplanes lately, and I knew they would love it. But, I also just loved having a chance to be creative myself. And even though I could have let them help me put it together, I again have to admit I was having too much fun to let them help and decided to put it together all on my own.

Create Play Food Using Salt Dough

As we shared before, the kids love playing in their play kitchen especially when we have other kids over to visit. I remember when we first bought the kitchen though I was a little bummed to discover the cost of play food. We've been able to find some good deals over the years on a few pieces, but we've also discovered the fun of making our own.

We made a set a few years ago when Little Brother was still an infant, but it was definitely time to try it again. 

(Pretend Play) Homemade Menu

The kiddos love playing restaurant in their pretend kitchen when their cousins come over, which led to the inspiration of this homemade menu for pretend play.

When the two cousins are here it's not unusual to find all four kiddos pretending to run and own a restaurant. So one day when I knew Big Cousin was coming, I set up the materials for she and Big Brother to create their own pretend play menu.

Fast and Easy Fire Truck Play

The other week we had a friend over to play. With three little boys in the house, the play quickly turned to our extensive collection of vehicles. All three boys especially became focused on using our well loved fire trucks. (We have two fire trucks which were one of our favorite yard sale finds last year, two for $2!)

They kept trying to find things "to put out" which led to this fast and easy fire truck play set up. 

Cardboard Igloo and Ice Fishing Play

We love cardboard box play and take any opportunity we can get to grab a big box for really fun activities. So when we offered a freezer box around the holidays, of course we couldn't turn it down. With a little paint and imagination, we turned our box into an igloo!

Big Brother has been really enjoying some weekend ice fishing with Daddy, and liked the idea of extending it into play at home. This inspired us to turn our box into an igloo and add some fishing fun too. 

Vanilla Surprise Cake Playdough (Celebrating Our First Year)

Today is our one year blogiversary. One year of writing, posting, picture taking, and more. One year of sharing things we love to do often, are just trying for the first time, and things that become new favorites. One year of learning, for both me and the kiddos as we all explore new things (including how to make this whole page work.) What started out as something fun has blossomed into something I hope we stick with. There is still so much more to learn but still a lot more we want to share too.

Looking back over this year to date we have had 10,442 views, 127 posts, and found 134 fans on facebook. A few popular posts over the year have included our Love Bugs, "Swimmy" Sponge Painting, and our Seed Exploration. A few of our personal favorites include our Alphabet Adventures, Raspberry White Chocolate Muffins, Rockin' Robin Footprints, and our New Year's Bags for the Whole Family.

I can't wait to see where we go in this next year . . .

In honor of the one year blogiversary today we created Vanilla Surprise Cake Playdough. And although I didn't tell the boys why we were pretending to make cakes, they loved the theme of the play for the afternoon.

Letter Match Race Car Village

We love playing with race cars, they are a continuous favorite toy for both boys. We also love creating our own raceways using large paper on the kitchen floor.

We've made ones with different themes, including winter, summer, a candy village, and more. A while back we even made an ABC Raceway. This time we took some inspiration from some other ideas we've seen on the inernet and created a Letter Match Racecar Village.

Chocolate Playdough Valentine's Day Play

We couldn't resist making a new batch of our Chocolate Cake Playdough as we approach the Valentine's Day holiday. We love the super chocolate smell of this great playdough.

This time, we decided to pretend to make Valentine's Day chocolates and cookies. We used cookie cutters, heart sequins, beads, mini muffin liners, and sparkly pipe cleaners to decorate the creations.

Cardboard Post Office

So I'm pretty certain my Mom made me something like this when I was a kid as I have fragments of memories of playing Post Office in a large, cardboard box. I've always loved box play, even as I grew into an adult, and I've loved some of the ways Big Brother and I have used them so far. But with my fond memories in mind I couldn't wait to create a Post Office for him.

Our timing was perfect this week as Big Brother's been interested in the mail and regularly checking our mail box. And while we were cleaning our basement he found this unusual cookie tin and incorporated it into his daily play.

We also have our Big Niece visiting three days this week. At age 6 I knew she would be able to add another level of pretend play to the Post Office theme and make the experience more fun for both of them. 

We've been holding onto the box since December when we got a new oven, so it was already a little used and colored on. But I cut a new special window and slits for mail. I used colorful duck tape to create the signs and added in a few props. This included a small table, blank envelopes, markers & pencils, scissors, white paper, mailing labels, stickers, stamps & ink pad, and tape. I also put in a few containers and bags. 

The kids were pretty excited when they discovered the set up and played in the Post Office for big chunks of the day. They made mail, bought mail, gave mail, delivered mail, stamped mail, and sorted mail. 

They extended the play to involve more areas of the house and varied the scenarios for who, how, and why they were delivering mail. 

When they had to come eat lunch they "closed" the Post Office for a while. Check out my niece's great inventive spelling! 

The sign is meant to say, "Staff Only. No People. Out of Order." 

One great thing about box play is the theme can change with the inspiration of the child. My niece's plan for tomorrow is to bring her pretend cash register from home and turn it into a grocery store. The other great thing about box play, is that the play continues until the box is well loved and ready to go to recycling. I have a feeling ours will be well loved this week. 

Indoor Camp Out

We've been waiting for several weeks for a break in the forecast with the hope of camping out in our backyard. We've never taken Big Brother camping and he's been expressing an interest in trying it. We knew the backyard would be the perfect starting location . . . but unfortunately the few breaks we've had in the rainy weather have been few and far between. So today, as we were faced with yet another rainy day, we decided to put together an indoor camp out or camp in.

We set up Big Brother's play tent in the living room with his sleeping bag, pillow, and flashlight. We added our picnic blanket and firewood. 

Of course we needed a campfire too; which we created using orange poster board, 

markers, glue, and glitter. 

We "lit the fire" by placing the flames into the fire wood. 

We ate trail mix and read Curious George Goes Camping in front of the fire. 

Big Brother used the flashlight to search the area surrounding our campsite for skunks, deer, squirrels, and moose.

Big Brother was inspired to pull his pretend food out of his play kitchen. We cooked hot dogs and several different breakfasts over the fire. We used cotton balls and bamboo skewers for some pretend marshmallow play. 

We also enjoyed some real food at our indoor campsite, including a hot dog and veggie stick lunch and several snacks. The set-up kept Big Brother happily engaged most of the day. We even tried rest in the tent (which was unsuccessful and rest eventually moved to his room) but he played with it again when we woke up. Definitely a great rainy day diversion!

Chocolate Cake Playdough

Big Brother on his third birthday. 

One of the things I am loving about Big Brother being 3 years old is the more complex pretend play he's been engaged in lately. One of his favorite things to play is "birthday party." We've especially been doing a lot of birthday party play since his birthday last month. Whenever we play it is always a different family member's birthday, they always get some imaginary presents, and there is always a cake.

I wanted to further encourage this play by creating some kind of way for him to actually make the cake. We both love chocolate cake, and what we both request for our birthdays, so I decided to search the internet to see if there was a good recipe for chocolate scented playdough. I quickly came across this recipe at I Can Teach My Child. I wanted to make sure we liked it, so I decided to halve the recipe in case it wasn't a hit. It made plenty for the play we had in mind.