Baby and toddler Montessori activity idea #2

I almost wasn't going to do this activity, thinking it was to basic, but I'm glad I did. Addie laughed histerically when she saw the clothespin disappear down the tube of paper towels. Baby humor I guess. Idea taken from here.

Pancakes on Sunday



I have been motivated to make pancakes every Sunday morning, just like Almanzo's mother. Addie loves them and makes a huge mess trying to mix the flour and taste the batter. She sometimes cries out for pancakes the next day at breakfast... but once a week is enough for me.



 

"When Almanzo trudged into the kitchen next morning with two brimming milk-pails, Mother was making stacked pancakes because this was Sunday.

The big blue platter on the stove's hearth was full of plump sausage cakes; Eliza Jane was cutting apple pies and Alice was dishing up the oatmeal, as usual. But the little blue platter stood hot on the back of the stove, and ten stacks of pancakes rose in tall towers on it.

Ten pancakes cooked on the smoking griddle, and as fast as they were done Mother added another cake to each stack and buttered it lavishly and covered it with maple sugar. Butter and sugar melted together and soaked the fluffy pancakes and dripped all down their crisp edges.

That was stacked pancakes. Almanzo liked them better than any other kind of pancakes. Mother kept on frying them till the others had eaten their oatmeal. She could never make too many stacked pancakes. They all ate pile after pile of them, and Almanzo was still eating when Mother pushed back her chair and said:

'Mercy on us! Eight o'clock! I must fly!'"

 

 - From the "Sunday" chapter in Laura Ingalls Wilder's Farmer Boy

Peanut butter chocolate cake

Happy (St.) Valentine's Day!

I made this spectacular cake from Pioneer Woman here in a heart shape. It's peanut butter cake with chocolate icing and it's every bit as good as it sounds. Next time I won't make it in a heart pan though, but in a longer sheet pan as she suggests to get a better ratio of chocolate to peanut butter. Every dessert recipe I make of hers... if I can pull it off (some are hard!)... turn out to be the best ___(chocolate cake/pie/etc)___ people have tasted.

I am so thankful to have time and mainly peace of mind to make a heart-shaped cake this year. A year ago I remember I was not only teaching part-time, but I had a private tutoring student at home who asked me "what are all these hearts for?". I was trying to do it all and really stressed out. I still try to do it all, but not so stressed out. And super thankful for our family and home.

Montessori

Ever since we came back from California, we've been doing 30-60 min of a more formal "preschool" everyday. Well, we try for everyday. We were super inspired by our friends we stayed with who have a boy the same age as Addie. It has been incredibly rewarding for both of us.

We sing and dance to a song or two to begin, and then we play with Addie's toys together. We've practiced colors, legos, the shape sorter. We color. Her favorite right now is puzzles. I even went out and bought her more puzzles because she is so obsessed.

Then I decided to look up and do more Montessori activities, too. I think it would be helpful to have pictures and a compilation of simple activities (for me!), so I will post them here.

Here is one she liked. You just find two small balls, but them in a big bowl and give them things to scoop with. And pass from one utensil to another. Idea taken from here.

Happy Lent!

Did you know the word Lent means springtime?
I am excited to start Lent simply and without big expectations or projects (except the million I try to keep finishing... photo albums stop stressing me out!).
Yesterday we made a Lenten prayer box with our homeschooling friends, with forty intentions composed by us. We take out one a day and all four families are praying for the same things.  

"Lent should be a time of beneficial “pruning away” of falsehood, worldliness, indifference: in order not to think that everything is ok as long as I’m ok; to understand that what counts is not the approval of others, or search for success or consensus, but cleanness in one’s heart and in one’s life; in order to rediscover the Christian identity – that is, the love that serves, not the selfishness that is served. Let us set out on this journey together, as the Church, receiving the Ashes and keeping our gaze fixed on the Crucified One. Loving us, He invites us to be reconciled with God and to return to Him, in order to rediscover ourselves." - Pope Francis's Ash Wednesday homily