Milkshake Bath

To make a milkshake bath, pour 1 ½ c skim milk ice cubes, ½ c skim milk, 1 T cocoa powder, 1+ T sugar, and a pinch of salt into a blender and puree until smooth.  This is enough milkshake for both itty bitty and for Mom!  Secure the milkshake in a cup with a lid, add a straw, and drink the cold icy deliciousness while soaking in the bath water.  Ta da!  Most enthusiastically anticipated bath to date.  

Exploring India

All yesterday Aurora talked about India.  When were she and her friends going to India?  After snack?  After the library?    She was about to pop.

She and her two buddies gathered at our neighbors while I set up.  Folktales to be read.  Saris decorating the room.  Sitar music on the stereo.

It was time.  We boarded our imaginary train, chugged across the sidewalk and opened the door to India!   We identified it on the globe to be certain we were in the right place. 

The girls costumed up and enjoyed a dance lesson in traditional Indian movement from the same neighbor who loaned me all the beautiful garments.  The girls jangled in the ghungroos tied round their ankles. 

We stretched our bodies with yoga.  The girls mooed as cows, meowed as cats with arched backs, and hissed as cobras being charmed by a pungi.

As we sat to enjoy our fresh mango, which the girls collectively declared that as of that moment they no longer liked eating, we read about camels and monks and coconut drinks and elephant crossing and fluttering saris and other fun things that might be seen on the way to a monkey wedding in The Road to Mumbai (Jeyaveeran, 2004). 

Finally, the girls decorated elephant masks.  Only, the girls were not ready to be finished and requested one last go at dancing before they de-robed.   They giggled and swirled and spun and stomped. 

Today when Aurora woke up she asked, “Which country are we going to visit today, Mom?”  

Ball Bath

To make a ball bath, place a dozen-ish balls into the tub.  Ta da! 

This might have been the most excited I have ever seen Aurora to take a bath.  In fact, so great was her enthusiasm that she crawled into the water with her shirt still on!  Oops!

She had a ball throwing our collection of old racket and tennis balls into the bathtub.  She  chased the “doots,” as they were renamed, around the water and herded them into a big bowl, but doots are tricky and  often tried to escape. 

Adeline benefited from the escapees.  

Camping

Adeline’s first night in the woods.  She took to camping like a rock star.  That’s my girl!  

Dyed Rice

Aurora stars in the musical of her everyday life.  She sings and sings and sings about everything.  We call it “Aurora Radio.”  So the other day when I told her we were going to dye rice, she erupted into song about “oh, it will be so much fun to dye rice” and “dying rice is my favorite” and “I love dying rice.” 

Carefully, she poured ¼ c of vinegar into a small jar. 

Meticulously, she squeezed several drops of food coloring into the vinegar.

Enthusiastically, she poured the 1 c rice into the jars.

The jars were topped with lids and given a good shake-a-shake.

Then Aurora poured the damp colored rice onto paper bag lined cookie sheets to dry.  It took them two hours, but Aurora tested them every ten minutes of so, just in case.

At this point Dad asked, “What are you going to do with dyed rice?”

Geez, I did not really know.  A substitute for glitter in a craft.  Pour it into a shaker to make a toy for Adeline.  Practice pouring, weighting, mixing.  There were so many things we could to do with the dyed rice!

But we did not do any of those things.  Aurora asked me to pour it into bowls and she spent the better part of half and hour stirring the bowls round and round with her hands.  She pat it into “cookie” and “cakes.”  She pretended it was porridge.  She asked me not to put it away because she wanted to come back to it through out the evening to do more cooking.  She returned to it often, singing as she played.  

Number Chart

To celebrate post # 100, Aurora showed off her number chart.  Each night as part of her elaborate coucher, she reads the accending number and then places a sticker on that number.  It has been a simple but amazingly effective way to teach numbers.

Actually, getting this picture took Aurora, sorry – Queen Victoria, some doing as the chart was “being crazy” (i.e. wiggling around all over the place.)  

Buttermilk

Buttermilk from Andrea Southgate on Vimeo.

Verona Library

Everyone talks about Dream Park.  I would like to introduce the title Dream Library to describe the Verona Library (No.12), because it is equally as awesome!   I feel like when they built the new library in 2006, they give the children’s librarians a blank check and said “oh, just make a list of everything that would make a kid’s program spectacular.”

They have a train table, mountains of puzzles, and even a slide!   There are blocks for building, gears for connections, and a magnetic sand table for shifting around metal cars.  Aurora has spent hours and hours pretending to shop, prepare, and eat their giant collection of plastic food.  Adeline enjoys playing with/smashing together their Sesame Street figurines and loves their wooden baby toy. 

Their book collection is enormous, as is their kid’s music collection.  Their computers are set up with fun children’s games that only allow for fifteen-minute sessions to encourage kids to do other things while simultaneously expediting sharing.  They have a terrific themed box selection of kits they have compiled with books, movies & toys centered around a theme.  This is the library that allowed us to check out a parachute! 

We have played with rocks and minerals and learned animal tracks in their rotating science corner. It is currently stocked with binoculars and field guides to encourage birding from their windows, which overlook the beautiful tall grass prairie of neighboring Badger Prairie Park.

Their activity room is clean and modern.  Their story times are well blended with songs, dancing, crafts, short films, and lots and lots of books.  Storytimes are diversely themed; this spring we went to one promoting good money practices and the following week we enjoyed one about pickles!    For their really big events, they move into the community room.  Here Aurora has seen magicians, danced with the Verona ballet, and discovered she does like eating ham thanks to their Green Eggs and Ham party! 

Best of all, in the center of their rows and rows of books, they have a castle.  A castle!  In the middle of the library!  Each corner is cushioned creating four delightful reading nooks - perfect places to devour piles of books to fill your 1000 Books Before Kindergarten or summer reading book journal. 

I feel like I am forgetting to rave about something.  Their iPad full of educational apps. Their family bathroom complete with toddler potty located right in the kid’s section.  The fact that Aurora and Adeline never want to leave and beg to stay at the library longer.  Anyway, like I was saying earlier – Dream Library!