This week was warmer, but with rain each evening and the sun coming out during the day. The "mud kitchen" received a little "kitchen renovation" and with the surplus of mud, interest in this part of our play yard was rekindled. The children also enjoyed washing all the dishes and shelves by hauling over more water in watering cans, which meant...more mud!
Another addition to our play yard this week was a mini see-saw or balancing board. It is wonderful for children to walk across the board, feeling it tip under their weight when they reach a certain point. They also like to just stand in the middle and try to keep it even and level. This is good exercise for their gross motor skills. We also added in some big, sturdy dump trucks which were rolled and hauled all over the yard. With so many puddles, car washes became a renewed interest, with brushes and watering cans pulled out to do cleaning duty.
Inside this week, we worked on a new batch of playdough. The children helped mix the ingredients and took turns stirring it on the stove. We added in some pine essential oil for winter scent and yellow and blue drops of food coloring. After kneading the warm dough, a new color appeared! Building tunnels and ramps with the blocks was a favorite this week, and always train play. I told the story of "The Magic Porridge Pot" using hand puppets. It is a fun story of a porridge pot that boils sweet porridge whenever you want it, but only stops if you say "Stop, little pot, stop". The mother in the story though, forgets these words when her daughter goes to visit a friend, and the porridge runs all over town and the whole village must come to eat it up after the daughter stops the pot with her words. Hopefully, kids just brush over the forgetfulness of the mother in this story (because that's just bad pr for moms!), and what sticks with them is the handiness of "magic words". They loved seeing the silk cloth "bubbling" out of the porridge pot and "flowing" through the village.
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