M is Marvelous

I think we're all experiencing a little cabin fever.  The kids were very happy to be together and playing today!

I had many grad plans for the letter M - mailbox, money, mitten, moose, muffin, m&m's, mice, movement, muscles, mirror, mables....wow, the list goes on.  But here is what we got to today.

We read The Mitten, a story about a boy that loses his mitten in the snow and many animals keep snuggling into it.  Finally too many of them sqeeze in and the mitten pops off and and the boy finds it flying in the air.  I put two blankets together and then re-told the story while the kids acted like the animals crawling and snuggling in.

We talked about money, mostly coins.  We discussed the different sizes, colors, values, and names of the coins - quarter, dime, nickle, penny.  We had a worksheet where we matched up the actual coin to the picture.  They did really well at this!

We read If You Give A Moose A Muffin and then made muffins.  The kids loved helping make muffins.  Lolee helped put muffin cups in the pan, Truman cracked the egg, Cole filled up the water, Samantha poured in the water, I can't remember who poured in the batter...then we all took turns stirring the mix.  Lolee and Truman were the most interested in continuing on and they helped by scooping the batter into the muffin cups and by licking the spoons and bowl afterwards. =)  They all loved the muffins and Lolee and Samantha even had seconds.

We decorated our little mailboxes.  They turned out so cute.  The kids had fun decorating them and I got them to make just one or two little postcards to put in their friend's mailboxes.  Some of them got the concept of putting them in the other person's mailbox, but others just wanted to put it in their own.  It was fun to watch.

We talked about mice a little.  I had some cute little mice they loved...the ones that were on wheels and rolled around the kitchen.  To continue with the mouse theme we made a little paper mouse that can fit on their finger.

The biggest hit of the day was probably the marble run game.  Of course the thing I just pulled out at last minute and thought we could do if there was some down time.  They saw it from the beginning so I went with it.  Maybe I should have waited a little longer to set it up though.  They seemed to be distracted with it nearly the whole time.  What great entertainment though.  I'll have to remember that next time the kids are bored or have a friend over!