New Activities from Santa

That sneaky old Santa managed to stuff a lot of new activities into L's stocking this year.

Walking the line

No not L but these adorable little lady bugs. I'd gotten these ages ago for L's stocking and then was lucky enough to find this great activity over at Making of a Montessori Mum!

I think for the moment these have taken over from our beloved frogs. In this one L balances them on golf tees or "trees" and then flies them back to their dish.

I've been wanting to start L on using tongs for ages but haven't been able to find ones small enough. Finally while looking on the Ikea web page I saw a tiny baking set with these small tongs. They are perfect for her hands and she has a great time transferring these bugs into their pool for a dip.

This next activity definitely wins the prize for the best find. It is a foam Continents puzzle from the dollar store. That's right folks it only cost a dollar!! L and I can't get enough of it and I actually went out after Christmas and bought another one just in case this one gets worn out.

My mom and I were talking about how L knows some of the continents but really has no context to learn them in. To her at the moment they are just colored blobs so I decided to have her place one animal on each continent. Now I can ask "where does the Koala bear live?" and she will point to and say Australia. This is such a fun way of learning the continents. (I'm hoping to get better animals for South America and Antarctica soon)

I also thought I'd outdone myself with brilliance by taping colored circles on the bottom of the animals so she could self check. Ha ha I should have quit while I was ahead as first of all some continents are the same color and all she wanted to do is pick them off!