Parenting Pin it Party Jan 6th

If like me, today is the start of a new school term for your little one congratulations on surviving the school run! Put on the kettle, sit back and relax and enjoy the Monday Parenting Pin it Party.

My fav pick from last week is this yummy papier mache pizza. Recycling and imaginative play in one.

Fancy joining us at our party?

How does it work

• You link up you pins below
• We'd really love if if you could follow us on Pinterest. 
• It would be really nice if you visit a few other people who have linked up and leave a comment (it makes my day when I get blog comments - it shows someone's reading!)

We will

• Visit your post and pin it
• Choose our favourite post to feature next week (hosted over at Romanian Mum). If you are featured , you might want to 'grab a badge' 
  

  <div align="center"><a href="http://www.thefairyandthefrog.com/" title="The Fairy and The Frog" target="_blank"><img src="http://jbmumofone.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/featured-pinner.jpg" alt="The Fairy and The Frog" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

• You may also like to sign up for our Parenting Pin it Party news letters (we'll only mail you with relevant stuff *promise* )

Subscribe to our Pin it Party mailing list

The Parenting Pin it Party is brought to you by Romanian Mum, Kiddy Charts, Mum of One and Mamasaurus.

Best of 2013

As its New Year we thought we'd like to start the year by re sharing our favourite post from 2013. We've chosen our owl babies story sack. We love the owls as they so sweet and they get played with alot!

Below you'll find over 50 Kid Blogger Network members coming together for The KBN Best Of 2013 Blog Hop. We know you'll find tons of wonderful ideas to browse, pin and share. We'd love for you to join the blog hop and share your favorite activity of 2013 too, and make sure you're following the Kid Blogger Network on Pinterest. 

Happy New Year from the KBN Best of 2013 Blog Hop Co-Hosts! 

Powerful Mothering, The Good Long Road, All Done Monkey, Afterschool for Smarty Pants,B-Inspired Mama, Babble Dabble Do, Bits of Positivity, Boy Mama Teacher Mama, Caution! Twins at Play, Child Central Station, Creative Family Fun, Creative World of Varya, Cute and Peculiar, Dirt and Boogers, Edventures with Kids, The European Mama, The Eyes of a Boy, The Fairy and the Frog, Frogs and Snails and Puppy Dog Tails, Fun-A-Day!,  Glittering Muffins, , Growing Book by Book, Hands on: as we grow, Here Come The Girls, iGame Mom, I Heart Crafty Things, Inspiration Laboratories, Kid World Citizen, Kiddie Foodies, Kids Yoga Stories, Kitchen Counter Chronicles, Lalymom, Lemon Lime Adventures, Let's Play Music, Living Montessori Now, Makeovers & Motherhood, Mama Smiles, Multicultural Kids Blog, My Little 3 and Me, P is for Preschooler, Peakle Pie, Pennies of Time, Playdough to Plato, PlayDrMom, Preschool Powol Packets, Racheous - Lovable Learning, Still Playing School, Smiling Like Sunshine, Stir the Wonder, Teach Me Mommy,Teach Preschool, There's Just One Mommy, Toddler Approved, True Aim Education, Tutus and Tea Parties, Where Imagination Grows, and Wildflower Ramblings.

Christmas wrapping sensory play

This fun sensory table is a great way to have fun with things that you'll have have lying around the house at this time of year. It's a great way to keep kids entertained before they get their presents!

I set up  a table with some Christmassy bits and bobs. I used a snack tray to separate the items out and make them look more inviting. I tried to include a range of textures (all in Christmas colours). You could include what ever you have and are happy for your child to play with. All our decorations are potentially breakable but if you had some sturdy ones you could add them too.

I covered the table in wrapping paper added some sticky back plastic (contact paper) to the table sticky side up to hold the items in place (this is an optional extra you could still play with the items without this).

The Frog then arranged and re arranged the items for ages. It was lovely to see him concentrate on an activity for a prolonged period because like most 2 year olds his attention span can be short.

He loved putting similar items (e.g. pom poms together) and then rearranging them.

** as the items in this activity are not toys please only let you child play with what you think is appropriate for their age, please also ensure they are appropriately supervised **

Language Links:
Vocabulary: names of items, soft, shiny, bumpy
Other skills: developing concentration span (EYFS links- Communication and Language: Listening and attention), categorising objects according to property (EYFS- Mathematics: Shape, space and measure)

Homemade fingerprint Christmas cards

Have you got your Christmas cards yet ? We've made some handmade cards based on the nativity story.

The base of the card is really simple - a fingerprint. We're quite big fans of hand print / finger print art (as you can see from our autumn tree, spring tree and handprint birthday card).

After a finger print we added different details and embellishments to make the different characters in the story. 

For Mary and Joseph I added a brown and blue body as well as head scarf. Baby Jesus had a bed of straw made from cutting a fringe into a piece of yellow a.d a crib made from corrugated card.

The angel had silver wings (drawn on with one of these markers - which I love  http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pilot-Silver-Marker-extra-point/dp/B0017TMLAK) and a body made of glittery card.

The shepherds had bodies similar to Joseph and a white finger print which I turned into a sheep.

Finally the wise men had brightly coloured bodies, hand drawn crowns and stick on sequins for gifts.

If your after other ideas for homemade Christmas cards check out this rather cool hangout (see if you spot us!) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WntF78jdcXs

Its Monday again which means its Parenting Pin it party day and this week I'm hosting. If it's your first week welcome! We hope you'll find lots ideas for activities and parenting tips. If your a blogger we hope you'll join in and link up.

As I'm hosting I get to choose some of my favourite posts from last weeks entries. 

I love this post from Discovering breadcrumbs, talking about the importance of doodling

Regular readers of The Fairy and the Frog will know how much we love messy and sensory play. No surprise then that this post from princess and the grapie caught my eye.

If you are featured , you might want to 'grab a badge' 

<div align="center"><a href="http://www.thefairyandthefrog.com/" title="The Fairy and The Frog" target="_blank"><img src="http://jbmumofone.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/featured-pinner.jpg" alt="The Fairy and The Frog" style="border:none;" /></a></div>

How does it work?
1) Link up a blog post of yours below - we'll pin it
2) Make sure you follow The Monday Parenting Pin it Party pin board, it would be super lovely if you could follow The Fairy and The Frog on Pinterest too.
3) Try to visit two other people who have linked up (and maybe let them know)

Observational drawing with children

Exploring art is one way to tap into how your child sees the world and to encourage them to make observations of the world around them. 

I love the sweet little things that children say. Things that make you realise they don't always see the world the same way as you. The Fairy calls INSET days (UK teacher training days) 'Insect days' (I like to imagine she thinking her teachers are learning about invertebrates!) Or the Frog shouting 'ball' when ever he sees anything round in the vegetable aisle at the supermarket.

Drawing at the same time as the kids draw is really fun (it's a tip I have picked up from one of favourite bloggers Rachelle at Tinkerlab). I really enjoy the shared experience of creating together. The kids seem more engaged and want to take part for longer. It's also a great way to model that art doesn't have to 'be' a certain way or to be perfect to have value.

Earlier on this week the Fairy and I got out some chalk pastels and drew some squashes.

Before we started I encouraged her to hold and feel the squash- talk about the shape and colour. We talked about what other things were the same colour - oranges, sweets and her friend's hair.

We then got drawing each with our own sheet of paper. She drew 3 (very orange) squashes.

She loved smudging the pastel to mix colours.

Unfortunately The Frog wanted to join in with the arty action when he got up from his nap and drew over all of our finished art work. I need to remember to put things on a higher shelf!

Language Links: colours, shape and size concepts. Developing comparative language (same as, different, like).

Coffee filter leaves

These gorgeous leaves are super easy to make and make lovely homemade fall/ autumn decorations.  

First draw a leaf on a coffee filter paper

Then colour the leaf. We used autumnal (fall) colours to fit in with the season but you could use what ever colour you like.

The Fairy colouring.

The Frog colouring.

Next you spray (we used a well cleaned out bottle to hold the water). Using the spray is great for encouraging motor control in little hands. It helps if the leaf is on backing paper at this point as the link spreads(not kitchen roll as that will absorb all the colour).

The Fairy observed the leaf looked more like a leaf (and less like a blob of colour!) if she used less water.

The Fairy was fascinated to watch the colours blend and merge.

This activity was great fun as well as being a great learning opportunity. Not only could both the children (aged 2 and 5 years) do something together at the same time, they were developing fine motor control and making observations.

Language Links: wet, dry, spread, colours (red, yellow orange brown), autumn (fall)