Rainbow Birthday meal

Friday was L's third birthday.  I've been sooo busy the last couple of weeks preparing for everything and now it's finally all over.  We had a fantastic weekend and I think L totally enjoyed herself.

I was lucky enough to time our final rainbow meal for her actual birthday.

We had pesto pasta (L's favorite) for our main course and rainbow veggie and fruit platters.

L and Daddy set the table with candles for each color of the rainbow.

The poor little sausage was sooo tired from all of her birthday celebrations that she barely made it through dinner!

This whole rainbow eating adventure has been such great fun and has given us something to look forward to every Friday.

I would totally recommend tying it out with your little one!

Indigo and Violet...phew!

Things seem to have been pretty hectic around here lately.  I've been busy preparing for L's birthday and birthday party next weekend as well as making her Halloween costume.

I also started teaching two music classes this week and have been looking for other work.

I really wanted to fit in our last rainbow meal this week so we could celebrate L's birthday with a complete rainbow meal with all of the colors.

I decided to combine indigo and violet since really we had a hard enough time with blue to try and do indigo as a whole meal on it's own.

So here we go.  It was actually very successful.  We had blue corn chips with hummus and red(which is actually totally purple!!)cabbage coleslaw with raisins and cashew nuts.  We also tried a Chinese eggplant which I fried up with some garlic, onions, mushrooms and green pepper.  It was totally yum!

L also had to have olives which are her favorite!

 We had blackberry and elderberry juice to drink and plums for dessert!

So there you have it.  Indigo and Violet.  We have  now managed to eat all the colors of the rainbow!! Woohoo!

I'm so looking forward to next week when we will eat all of the colors of the rainbow in one meal!

Stay tuned for that plus tons of upcoming posts on birthday preparations and celebrations!

October Nature Table

Here is our October/Autumn nature table.

I used my mom's sparkly black and gold stole over top of some orange silk placemats.  I love the effect and it seems so Halloweeny.

I've also used lots of leaves preserved in beeswax and some tiny gourds.

 Here it is again without the flash.  (Dear Santa, I've been a really good girl this year could you please bring me a better camera : )

 We made the cute little ghosts by dipping some white felt in a glue and water mixture and molding them over some peg people.  I found the idea and tutorial over at WeeFolkArt.

This is one of my favorite nature tables so far.  Every time I look over at it I get excited for Halloween!

L has been able to sound out cvc words for a while now but this past month she has completely exploded in her interest and ability to read and also to sound out words.

She is really interested in what letter sounds are in words and is constantly breaking up words to figure out the sounds.

This is the first word she spelled out after one of our walks.

Something that has been immensely helpful has been these word family game cards.  I saw this brilliant idea on The Snail's Trail using paint chips ages ago and bookmarked it for when we were ready.  I couldn't find the right kind of paint chips so I just used colorful paper. 

These totally helped L to hear and see how different words can change just by changing one letter.  After using these cards she is constantly thinking up different groups of words that rhyme.

 Usually after school when we are sitting down for lunch our conversation(lead by L)consists of sounding out different words and her friends names and figuring out who has L's in their names.  She is bored of sounding out cvc words and wants to do things like watermelon!  How do you tell a kid that we need to walk before we can run!!

I made up this activity for her where she picks an object out of the mystery bag and then she finds the letters to spell it.  She sometimes needs help putting them in the correct order as she likes to find the beginning and ending sounds first.

We also did an activity that I thought would be ages away where I wrote action words like "jump", "clap", "run" and "sit".  I would show them to L and she had to read them and then do the action.  She ripped them off no problem and loves them.

She is totally in a self led sensitive period for reading and sounding out words and I'm trying to keep up with her.  In a way it's difficult doing phonics because most of the words she tries to read in everyday life aren't phonetic!  Very frustrating for her and me.

I ordered the first series of the Bob Books and L really enjoys these. 

A warning to parents who teach their children the letter sounds at an early age.  They might just want to use them!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

It's Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada.  I thought I'd share some of the decorations we made to celebrate.

The weather up until this weekend has been glorious so L and I were able to pick some leaves for preserving in beeswax.  I am now addicted to dipping leaves in beeswax! They just turn out so beautifully and smell divine!

Some of them I strung on clear thread to hang from our light fixture and others I put on our nature table.  For a tutorial on how to do this visit The Magic Onions.

L and I also made paper lanterns with a balloon, tissue paper and glue.  I cut out some leaf shapes ahead of time.  This is a great project for little ones.  L did this lantern herself using a paintbrush to apply the glue and tissue paper.  I can't wait to light it with an electric candle for our Thanksgiving meal.

 We bought some mini gourds and corn and I just had to try to make some of the pinecone fairies from Twig and Toadstool.  The mother is on the mantel with the gourds...

and here are her two little sons.  These are so easy to make and are sooo adorable.

We are also planning on making the Gratitude Leaf Mobile from Twig and Toadstool(I love their ideas!)

Happy Thanksgiving fellow Canadians!

Tiny Talk Tuesday

I just wanted to get down a few things L said this week so I can remember them later!

When she was looking at one of her wooden doll puppets from Hungary. "This doll is similar to Mary Poppins.  They both have rosy cheeks!"   My question is when did she start saying "similar"??

After a friend had come over to look after L for an hour while mommy and daddy were out
Me "How did things go with MJ?"
L "Well...it's complicated"

Last night while I was reading a book to L before bed and I had an attack of about five sneezes in a row.  L said "Mommy, cough away from the book!"

Check out what other littles are saying at Not Before 7!