Valentine's Fun

Valentine's day is always a good opportunity to have some themed fun and gives us something lovely to focus on as the winter drags on. Cold, wet and windy weather makes our usual outdoor adventures less appealing, but indoors we can be cosy and warm as we enjoy some Valentine's themed crafts and activities together. Here is a selection of what we have been getting up to this month, with plenty of other things that never got photographed. It has been so lovely!

A simple Valentine's pre-writing sensory set up for Alex. It is just table salt coloured pink with copious amounts of pink, purple and gold glitter to make it really sparkly. Spread in a tray with various bits and pieces to make marks with (not pictured are the straw, fork and spoon he also played with. 

Making heart shapes with a cookie cutter

He played with this for ages, first drawing and making marks with objects, then drawing in it  with his fingers and then completely burying his hands and pouring and playing with it like sand. It ended up with Playmobil figures in it too! So much fun from such a simple set up.

I bought some water beads in Valentine's colours and put them in a bowl with some pink foam heart shapes. I have never bought water beads before, so this was a first for the Podlings and it went down a treat. Alex and Emma in particular played with them for ages and, naturally, Alex had to add some cars in too!

The water beads were a huge hit with all four Podlings.

Emma loved the water beads

The Valentine's sensory box before I added in all the extras. The Podlings really enjoyed mixing the colours together!

I loved putting this Valentine's sensory box together. I coloured rice red and pink and added in shiny heart-shaped confetti, red glass pebbles and red ribbon roses. I finished it off with the little Valentine's peg people which I painted myself. It looked so pretty!

Fun in the Valentine's sensory box

Painting cardboard heart wreaths and little heart-shaped boxes

I really loved the wreath that Lily made. She is so creative.

A snowy Valentine's photoshoot with the dolls

Emma (Bridgewater)

Emma's class are learning about local history for their project this term and today is their project launch day where they get to go to school dressed up and have lots of themed activities during the day. Emma wanted to go as the ceramics designer Emma Bridgewater as they share a first name and, of course, her factory is in The Potteries. She spent time last night happily drawing multi-coloured spots on a paper plate and the name badge we made and we teamed it with a spotty party dress. She looked so sweet!

Nesting

As part of our family membership of the The Woodland Trust, the Podlings each receive a 'Nature Detectives' pack each quarter filled with ideas for seasonal crafts and activities. Inspired by their Spring pack, the girls, particularly Emma,  wanted to head to the woods to build a giant bird's nest. Fair enough! We duly hopped in the car and drove to Alderley Edge. The children had a little play and then we had some tea and biscuits before starting on the nest. Emma and I did most of the groundwork and then Lily came and helped to finish it off. Alex was fascinated, but I wouldn't say he was particularly helpful! It was a fun way to pass a Sunday afternoon..

Gingerbread House Fun

The Podlings' after school festive treat today was to build and decorate a gingerbread house whilst eating gingerbread men.

Decorating a gingerbread house has become something of an annual Christmas tradition now. The Podlings all work together on it and it is a real joint effort and something they all enjoy. Even Alex had a go this year. He sat and watched the others for a while, before stretching up on to the table and sticking sweets on to the house. Obviously all of four of them ate at least as many sweets as they put on the house, but that is part of the fun! It gives me so much pleasure to watch the four of them co-operating on a task (believe me, it doesn't happen often!). 

The children had been to see Peter Pan in pantomime with the school this morning, so Emma naturally came home and dressed up as Tinkerbell. She also wanted to wear roller skates just like the Tinkerbell on stage did, but I suggested that perhaps this wasn't a good idea!

Alex joins in

Naturally, many sweets were consumed!

Feed the Birds

Today's after school festive activity was to give a Christmas present to the birds. Yesterday afternoon we made fat baubles (a somewhat messy and very smelly activity) and today we hung them from the Rowan tree in our front garden along with gingerbread men and apple stars. It looked so pretty with the fairy lights twinkling at dusk. 

Festive Treats

I love December! It is a busy month, full of excitement and anticipation and I like to try and make special family moments amidst the busyness. I love to welcome the Podlings home from school with a plate of festive treats and maybe a new picture book or Christmas craft. Today after school the Podlings came home to homemade krispie cakes, a new Christmas story ('Lucy and Tom at Christmas' by Shirley Hughes) and paper chain kits so we could make paper chains like Lucy and Tom do in the story. We read the story together and then the girls had a lovely time making the chains whilst we sang along to Christmas songs. A very simple, but pleasurable way to spend some quality time together in a busy month.

Alex was perfectly content just to sit and watch whilst enjoying his chocolate treat. He is such a happy boy!

Pumpkin Carving

Tom, Lily, Emma and Alex's pumpkins for Halloween 2015

I was pleased with the car I carved for Alex. It had to be a car for my car-obsessed little boy.

Emma wanted hearts on her pumpkin

Lily drew her design on her pumpkin and I carved it following her pencil lines. I still do all the carving as I am not yet ready to let the kids loose with sharp knives!

Tom wanted a traditional Jack O' Lantern face

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