Tot School (Thanksgiving Week)

**J is 30 months old**

I love doing Tot School with J! We are very laid back and so far I don't really plan anything. I keep a lot of things visible to J and let him lead when it's time to do some focused learning-play. Thanks for stopping by!

We haven't done Do A Dot Paints in a long time. L had a friend over to watch football and he brought his daughter who played with us. We all made our own pictures. J was really into making rainbows.




















This is another thing we haven't done in a while, play with J's instruments. The three of us played while I sang different songs like The Little Drummer Boy. My son LOVED the little drummer song. He said, "Mommy, sing the rum pum pum song again."





















We have been watching more of Mr. Roger's lately. We went to PBS online and saw a few of the videos they had posted like How They Make Crayons, Fire Truck and How People Make Balls.
































J got a tool puzzle that was made by his high-school aged cousin, Dylan. Dylan spent time at Grandpa Bernie's this summer learning to do woodworking and this was one of the things he made. J took out the puzzle and now he can pretty easily fit the pieces in. He played with this a couple times, but one of the times he was having trouble getting it in exactly and he started saying "Noooooooo! I can't do it!" and got a bit frustrated so I helped out.















































This week J was playing a lot with his Mr. Potato Head and Spud guy. He is getting better about putting the pieces in the right places. He wanted me to take the pieces out and after that he said, "Trace them mommy!" I have started teaching him about tracing his hand and so this was a new idea. I traced the arms, face, baseball hat, mustache and he had fun coloring them in with a pen. He wanted me to color them too.


















I finally found a way to interest J in eating hard boiled eggs. Helping me cut them with the egg slicer! He loves doing this. It is such a small thing, but once they are cut he just starts eating them.


















Daddy took a picture during one of our reading sessions of the weeks. I was able to get a lot of Thanksgiving books that were fun to read before going to our relatives for the holiday.
































I goofed up recently and bought crayon erasers thinking they were jumbo crayons. I'm glad J is putting them to good use. He spent a lot of time trying to balance them on the arm of the chair. He liked lining up the different colors and seeing how many he could get lined up in a row.

Books
Countdown to Thanksgiving, Jodi Huelin
Thanksgiving is for Giving Thanks, Margaret Sutherland
The Berenstain Bears' Big Bedtime Book
Yuck! That's Not a Monster! Angela McAllister
Humpty Dumpty and Other Nursery Rhymes

Movies
Berenstain Bears - Bears Mind Their Manners
Little People - Discovering Things That Go
Mr. Rogers - How Crayons are Made
The Land Before Time - Invasion of the Tinysauruses


Music
GiggleBellies on You Tube


Thanksgiving Fun (Chicago)

See the fun things other moms are doing at the Weekly Wrap Up, another place I link up.