Hand skeletons

This project turned out so cute, we were super happy with it when we were done.

You know how sometimes you think something is going to go over really well, and when you do it with the kids, they just really have no interest in it?  Yeah, well this was definitely NOT one of those!

We were studying X...but I'm thinking this would also be fun to do as a Halloween project, or as a basic unit on bones.

The best part is that we all have black construction paper and q-tips in our house.  

Depending on the ages of the kids you are doing this with, you can either trace their hand on a black sheet of paper or let them do this step.  I'm thinking it could be fun to use a foot, or draw a basic outline of a body on a paper and do the foot bones or a whole body skeleton.

Then use glue to put the q-tips on to look like the bones.

It's not super anatomically correct ;), but IS super cute.

End of School Party...BASEBALL THEME!

On the last day of school, we throw a fun outdoor and baseball themed party.  

We have a large water slide bounce house set up and the kids wear their swimsuits and we spend most of the day playing outside.

At the end of the day, parents come back and we show off a few of the things we've learned during the year, sing "Take me out tot he Ballgame"...then have hot dogs and popcorn...

But my favorite part of the day was this t-shirt...as all-American as baseball!!  It would also be a fun 4th of July craft to do with  your kids!

We gave each of the kids a bag with Big League Chew and peanuts and their t-shirt as party favors.

LOVE!  See you next fall!

Mother's Day Handprint Memory Book...and brunch!

We have an annual Mother's Day Brunch where we invite the moms to come for a little breakfast at the beginning of the school day.  We have breakfast casserole and sweet treats, but the best part, next to the kids singing a Mother's Day song to them, is the handprint memory book we work on all year and present to them.

We put the pages in page protectors and then in 3-ring binders:

LOVE the question-answer page.  It's so funny to hear the things kids say!!

We also scatter pictures of the kids with their friends and doing activities at school throughout the book...but I wanted to show you the handprints we did...one for each month.

SEPTEMBER:  a box of crayons

OCTOBER:   a spider, complete with web, and a memory of their costume.

NOVEMBER:  a turkey, and their favorite Thanksgiving food.

DECEMBER:  Rudolf, and their favorite Christmas gift.

JANUARY:  a penguin

FEBRUARY:  a heart-felt handprint

MARCH:  an Easter chick

APRIL:  a rainstorm

MAY:  flowers...(of course!  May flowers always follow the rain!!)

And an end of year reminder that your sweet kiddos are the gold at the end of your rainbow!

A few of the brunch pictures from this year:

Happy Mother's Day!!

Rrrrrr, Rrrrrr, Rrrrrrrrrrrr!! Race car!!

Fun little race car...we used it for the "R" unit, but would be fun for a transportation unit, too.

OK...this craft takes a ton of prep...you first have to paint the toilet paper roll.  We painted them all blue.  Red would be a fun race car, too...

After they are dry, cut a rectangle flap in each car.  The easiest way for me to explain is going to be through pictures...so here they are:

After you have the flaps cut out, bend the flap in half and put a dollup of hot glue on one end and fold it in half.  This is the windshield.

Next...cut out the circles.  Black and white ones.  

You'll need for each car:

4 large black wheels

4 medium white wheels 

a black circle for the steering wheel

a large white circle with to put a number on

other decorations:  stars and sequins

After they were done, the hardest part was getting the kids to stop playing with them long enough to let the glue dry!!  

They were kind of time consuming, but the kids loved them!

Rainbows...

Here is a fun Rainbow craft that can be used for the weather unit or the "R" unit.  We showed the kids some pictures of a few different crafts and let them choose a couple, and they LOVED this one.

You're going to need to cut out some white clouds out of white construction paper or just out of print paper.  

Cut red, orange, yellow blue, green, and purple strips out of construction paper.

Gather a bunch of cotton balls!!!!

First...glue the strips to the back of the cloud:

After they get the strips glued on and their names written...turn the cloud over and let them glue the cotton balls onto the front of the cloud:

I think this is one of the cutest crafts we've done...and it was easy.  AND...the kids loved it.  BONUS!

"R" is for rabbit

For our unit on the letter "R" we thought it would be fun to create rabbits out of "r's."

This one takes a little prep...you're going to need:

Pink construction paper

cut outs of the letter "R"

white pipe cleaner for the whiskers

cotton balls for the tail

pink circles for the nose

White outer ears

pink inner ears

Googly eyes

Voila!!

Paper Plate Watermelon Craft

Finishing up our unit of the letter W this week...with a darling and fun watermelon craft that also works on those fine motor skills that are so important in PreK age kids.  

We just use our paper cutter to cut squares (big ones) out of green and red construction paper, and much smaller black squares for the seeds.  

And cut your paper plates in half...

First step...glue the green rind on the outer edge of the plate...

...then the red in the middle.  When done, they can glue random black seeds over the red paper.

Voila.  Really one of the cutest paper plate crafts.