Friday Fun

I almost forgot that today was Friday, and that I wanted to at least post these weekly "fun posts." I completely believe that free play is important for children, but as I think I mentioned last Friday, I also want to add in some structured play. Since I currently plan on doing preschool at home, I've been working on a list of skills I want to help him develop before he starts Kindergarten. Since he's only 18 months, I'm not at all concerned about a school structure right now. I just want to do activities here and there that will help him learn!

The first thing I want to mention is that we took a little family trip to the aquarium today. It was so much fun! E loves fish, so it was a perfect outing for him.

^ This is my favorite picture from the trip. If only that darned fish hadn't left the picture. I hope to do more fun outings as it warms up. I am definitely getting cabin fever this winter, and I'm sure that E is too.

I saw this activity on Pinterest. E isn't really into sorting things yet, but I thought I'd give it a try. He was more interested in stealing the objects and running off with them than placing them on the matching paper, but he did sort of get the idea and placed a few items down. I think this is great for both color recognition and sorting, so I'm going to keep up with it in the hopes that he eventually gets the hang of it.

This next fun thing we discovered was a complete accident. Plastic cup + lid + straw = several minutes of fun. He sat for quite some time just taking the straw out and putting it back in, and then he started removing the lid and putting it back on as well. Accidental or not, this activity turned out to be a keeper, since it kept him busy for several minutes.

As you can see, he wasn't so thrilled with my picture-taking, and kept giving me the stink-eye. "Leave me alone mom!"

I don't have any pictures of my next activity, but I have to say it was fantastic. Why? Because it kept him busy for nearly 45 minutes of church. Yes, that's right. I said 45 minutes. At church. Sitting still. All I did was punch some holes in a piece of card stock and give him that along with some pipe cleaners. He was fascinated, and I was thrilled because I was actually able to sit through Sacrament Meeting without having to wrestle a toddler or scramble in my bag for the next toy or activity.