A festival of Christmas activities!

We've rounded off a brilliant year with some lovely Christmassy activities. I've not got round to blogging much as we've been so busy, so here's a quick run down:

We've made christmassy cupcakes:

 Saltdough decorations:

 Mincepies:

 We've partied!

 We've played with snowy sensory trays:

 And peppermint christmas tree playdough:

 We've decorated the Christmas tree:

 And exlpored a Christmassy discovery box:

 Done Christmassy colouring in:

 Made snowmen:

And gingerbread Christmas trees:

 Explored the oaty, pepperminty Christmas sensory tray:

 Gone on a trip to Winter Wonderland:

 Made Christmas cards:

 Been to see the Coca Cola lorry:

 And finished off with Christmas dinner:

It's been so much fun - hope Father Christmas brings something lovely for all these good little boys and girls!

Making an Advent Wreath

There are so many lovely Christmassy craft ideas out there, we just have to try them out over the next few weeks. We started with an Advent Wreath, the finished article didn't look that spectacular if I'm honest, but the kids really enjoyed the process which is the main thing!

First we painted the wreath (made out of paper plates!) red

Then we glued green hand prints made out of tissue paper onto the wreath

This bit was FUN! The babies rolled cut up tissue rolls in white paint before adding glitter. We'll use this method again, they loved it!

The finished article; an advent wreath - kind of!

Treasure Rocks

Last week the 3 year old I look after really enjoyed the dinosaur part of our letter D activities. So I decided to do something with dinosaurs again this week. I made treasure rocks (recipe here) and hid dinosaurs in them. The kids had great fun bashing them open to discover what was inside:

It turned into a really brilliant activity, the kids played with them for ages, exploring the texture as the rocks crumbled:

They used the crumbled up rocks to make 'cakes' and even made a dinosaur land out of them - hours of fun!

Diwali Inspired Footprints

It was Diwali this week and I wanted to do something age-approrpriate for the 1 and 2 year olds I was looking after. The story of Rama and Sita went over the heads (not surprisingly!) but in my research I found that some homes put out footprints to guide the Goddess Lakshmi along with the lamps. So we decided to make some footprints of our own:

My 2 year old particularly enjoyed this and we decided to add a bit of glitter - more inspired by Holi the festival of colours than Diwali I admit!

Friday starts with a 'D'

We're slowly working our way through the alphabet, working on letter recognition and crafting letters to decorate the walls of the playroom. This week we got to D! We made a D for dog and a d for dinosaur:

We looked at lots of Dinosaur books - this one is great, it has magnetic dinosaurs so you can make your own dinosaur scenes:

 Then I buried some Dinosaurs and Dragons in our 'Cloud Dough' - these had to be Dug out!

Lunch was Hot Dogs of course!

Black playdoh x 3

I made some black playdoh for Halloween so the children could make spooky spiders and monsters and bats:

I brought it out for bonfire night to make fireworks too using pom poms and cotton buds dyed with food colouring!

Then I thought of another use for it - road building. Here one of my mindees is enjoying 'delivering' more of the playdoh in a dumper truck!

Half Term Halloween Fun

It's a bit late, but just in case anyone needs inspiration for next week, here are some of the events on in Swansea during half term:


Glyn Vivian Half Term Holiday Workshops:
29 October 2012 11am - 4pm
01 November 2012 11am - 4pm
Free admission
Tel: 01792 516900
Email: glynn.vivian.gallery@swansea.gov.uk
Website: http://www.glynnviviangallery.org
Create a work of art in fun workshops for children and families at the YMCA, Swansea. No booking required, spend an hour or stay all day.With artist Sheree Murphy.Contact the Gallery Information line on 01792 516900. All children under 10 must be accompanied by an adult.

Halloween Ghost Train
30 - 31 October 2012From Southend: 4.45pm; 5.30pm; 6.15pm and 7.00pm
£5.00 per person (children will receive a free goodie bag)
Tel: 01792 635411
Website: http://www.swansea.gov.uk/ghosttrain
Hop aboard the Ghost Train this Halloween! The Halloween Ghost Train will be making its spooky way down Swansea Prom two nights this Halloween. Ghosts, goblins and witches of any age can enjoy the popular return journey from Southend Gardens to Blackpill Lido. Places get booked up early, so parents are urged to book early to avoid disappointment. Part of the Swansea Bay Festival autumn programme.

Spook Night
30 - 31 October 20125.30pm - 7.00pm
Children and adults £4.50 each
Tel: 01792 474555
Website: http://www.plantasia.org
This Halloween Plantasia will once again be opening their doors after dark and inviting all you ghouls, goblins and witches to join in the fun. Follow the ghost trail, enjoy spooky activities and come dressed up in your scariest costume. Pre-booking essential due to popularity. Part of the Swansea Bay Festival autumn programme.



Bush Tucker Trial @ Plantasia
1, 2 and 3 November
Come and experience our very own Bush Tucker Trial on 1, 2 and 3 November.  Dare to try some tasty critter treats from Honey locust, nutroasted mealworms, garlic flavoured crickets and see how close you can get to Big Beastly Bugs?  Come and have a go – if you're brave enough!
4 shows a day: 10.30, 12pm, 2pm and 3.15pm
Due to popularity pre booking is essentialPrices (price includes a visit of the hot house)
Book online via Ticketsource (small booking fee applies) or contact us on on 01792 474555
Child: £3.95
Adult: £4.95


Waterfront Museum
Flick books – 27 Oct – 2 November 11.30, 12.30, 2, 3. Free. Booking Required


Clydach Library
Dear Zoo 30^th Birthday celebration 10.30 – 11.30. Tuesday 30^th
Halloween Mask Making Wednesday 31st: 2:30 pm – 3:30 pm

Halloween Story Time and Activity at Swansea Central Library
Tuesday 30th: 1:00 pm – 2:00 pm
Listen to some of our favourite Halloween tales and then make a spooky craft to take home!

Sami Sgwar (Sammy Square!)

Today we learnt about squares. We did a hunt for squares in the garden:

I chalked a load of them around the garden but was very impressed when the little boy I look after kept finding other squares in the brick wall and the roof of the playhouse. Clever boy! Of course we had crackers for a snack:

And we made some squares to put on the wall alongside the circles we did last time. I found some square beads to glue on and also cut out squares in different materials (card, foam, tissue paper):

Sinking and floating

It was a lovely afternoon so we spent it out in the garden, our bulb planting lead to watering..

Which lead to filling buckets with water. Which lead to a sink or float experiment. The 3 year old I was looking after wanted to know why a toy frog was staying on top of the water so we talked about how and why some things float and some things sink and found lots of things around the garden to experiment with: 

A big pine cone:

A toy car:

And lots more. Lots of fun and lots of learning!

Discovery Boxes - Fabric

Every week I make up a different Discovery Box for the younger children I look after. So far we've had one filled with different shape, size and texture balls, another filled with blocks of different description. This week is fabric. The one year old I look after loves opening and closing lids so I always use a box with a lid and give him a 'spare' empty one so he can move the fabrics around, opening and closing lids to his heart's content!

As ever, when the older children came home from school they wanted to get stuck in too. So I dug out some larger fabrics which they laid out, explored thoroughly and made into costumes:

Carly, Carly, Carly Cylch

Yesterday was sponsored by the humble circle or, in Welsh, 'cylch'. We did some glueing and sticking, colour matching as we did it:

 Snack time was crumpets of course:

And we made and decorated some fairy cakes. Even our daffodil bulb planting helped with the circle recognition:

Autumn Art Gallery

We've been doing lots of Autumn Arts & Crafts over the last few weeks. All were as simple as possible to suit the 1 and 2 year olds in my setting:

These were done in a salad spinner! Put a leaf cut out in and a couple of blobs of paint, get the kids to spin like crazy:

A hedgehog done by Elin at our fantastic playgroup:

Here's an Autumn tree, just some tissue paper and glue:

And this is what we did with the sensory tray stuff - glued it onto card with some PVA glue, very abstract but it's nice to just let the kids get on with it without guiding them too much:

Some autumn leaf stained glass windows, I've posted about this before (contact paper and tissue paper basically!):

And last of all, using leaves, pine cones and other autumny bits collected from the park to make prints:

I think I may have to rename Hobbsy's House, 'Tate Clydach'!