I Love Baby Sign Language!

We starting teaching sign language to Adam when he was about 6 months old and by 12 months he recognized a lot and could make just a few. By 15 months he consistently used about 25 signs, although he started dropping them as he learned to actually say the word. But he began understanding the signs much earlier than he could make the sign and it made life so much easier (from what I've heard from other parents anyway) because we knew if he wanted a bottle, wanted to to eat, wanted to sleep, etc. rather than him just crying at us.

I started signing with Abby a couple of months ago (just doing 'milk', 'diaper change', 'eat', and 'drink') and she definitely recognizes the sign for 'milk'! Here's the proof....

I have seen her squeeze her fists in reaction to me signing it or while she's drinking her bottle so I think that might be her first attempts at signing back! She also seems to recognize the sign for 'eat' sometimes. I want to add in 'sleep', 'more', and 'bath time'. It's just so much harder to remember to do the signs than it was with Adam. I just need to make it second nature again...I'm out of practice!

Halloween 2010

This year for Halloween Adam was his favorite character Buzz Lightyear!  And Abby was a cute little flower.  I love baby costumes, they are so soft and warm!Our ward’s Trunk-or-Treat was on Friday.  This was our first year doing a Trunk-or-Treat and it was a lot of fun!   Adam was thrilled to find his pal Woody!
Sharing suckers

Cute little flower

On Saturday night we went down to my parents’ house to Trick-or-Treat in their neighborhood.  Their neighborhood is a really active one so nearly every house is open for business!

“Impressive wingspan”

Comparing lasers with a “big Buzz”
Adam could’ve stayed out for another hour….he loved trick-or-treating!
This is how Abby spent the night….warm in Daddy’s arms   
It’s so much fun having 2 kids, even if Abby is oblivious to most of life. :)
Happy First Halloween Abigail!

Tot School – Halloween Week!

- Adam is 35 months old -

Last week was our Halloween/Pumpkin theme week and it was fun. I especially liked the art projects we did. Again, I got lots of ideas from the Fall Fun webpage from 1+1+1=1.

We sang songs including “Ring Around the Pumpkin” and read lots of Halloween books from the library.

I found some great pumpkin math activities from a fellow Tot School Mom’s blog, Life With My Giggly Girls. And I just realized I don’t even know her name even though we comment on each other’s posts almost every week!
Thanks Kayleigh’s Mom! :)

Pumpkin Size Sorting

Candy Corn Patterns
Patterns are hard for Adam. Something to work on in the future!

Candy Corn Patterns

Of course the candy was a hit….kind of hard to keep him focused on counting or sorting, but oh well!
Counting candy into his pumpkin

I made this Jack-O-Lantern Math Mat. The eyes and nose are glued on (and the whole thing is laminated) and then the black squares are loose so Adam placed as many squares as the number at the top in order to make the mouth. He lasted all of 2 minutes doing this.

Pumpkin Patterns….can’t remember where I got this

Glow in the dark Halloween stickers from the Target dollar section

Halloween coloring book for .97 at Wal-MartNotice how the plastic pumpkin is never far away….I’m not sure when I’ll be able to discreetly get rid of it!


We did two art projects this week. The first was making ghosts with hand and foot prints. I think they turned out so cute!

The second project was making a Jack-0-Lantern out of a paper plate

Of course we also carved pumpkins as a family
And for lunch one day we made Jack-O-Lantern pizzas

And throw in some ABC matching using Leap Frog magnet letters and a printable from Confessions of a Homeschooler for good measure
It was a fun week!
Here’s my little Buzz Lightyear!

Carving Pumpkins

Nat has had to work late the past few nights so we finally had a chance to carve our pumpkins last night.  This is the very first time we have ever carved pumpkins as a family and it was fun!  Adam loved it (although he wasn’t a huge fan of touching the “guts”) and the first he thing he wanted to do this morning was check on his pumpkins.

Tomorrow night is our ward’s Trunk-or-Treat so we’ll get to officially light them tomorrow (in our trunk that is).  Adam cannot wait until tomorrow night!
This is Adam’s “scary” pumpkin that Daddy made.  I guess the scary part are the fangs.  I think he kind of looks like Mater the Tow Truck from Cars. :)
It’s very hard to get a good jack-o-lantern picture with my not-so-great camera but here is our family of pumpkins out on the porch.

This proves just how excited Adam is about the whole Halloween thing.  He was bouncing up and down while I was trying to get his picture!      
We’ll do the Trunk or Treat tomorrow and then go Trick or Treating in my parents’ neighborhood on Saturday and I can’t wait! 
Just for kicks….

Adam the Lion – 2008
Adam the Alligator (or dinosaur…I never could figure it out) - 2009(Dang it he’s cute!)

Stay tuned for this year’s costumes!  I swore I’d never do what I did, but it makes my kid SO happy…..so I did it.  And he will still be dang cute!

Tot School – Autumn Leaves Theme

- Adam is 34 months old -

For Tot School this week we focused on autumn and leaves and had a lot of fun! Well, I did. I’m really looking forward to the day where he appreciates the fun, theme-y things I plan.

We read a bunch of books about leaves and autumn from the library, and sang some fun songs that I got from Carisa at 1+1+1=1 on her Fall Fun webpage. The songs all required using fake leaves to fall and blow and Adam loved singing them!

We also used the leaves to work on patterns. Adam had a hard time with this but I think it was because the leaves weren’t cut-and-dry different/the same so finding the next leaf to complete the pattern was a little confusing for him.

He blew through these leaf matching cards I also downloaded from the Fall Fun webpage. I thought it would be a little more advanced because they were all black and white so he had to focus on the details.
I had these leaves from my days of teaching singing for my church’s children’s primary so I wrote the letters of his name and we practiced putting them in the correct order. I think I’ll pull this out several more times in the next few weeks.

Adam reluctantly agreed to color these pictures I got from the Crayola website. He’s just not into coloring these days. I hear it’s quite common for boys to be less interested than girls.
I got this fun “Falling Leaves” craft from Carisa’s Fall Fun webpage (again). This is the first piece of children’s artwork that has graced our home (aside from being stuck to the fridge) and I love it!

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We went on a nature walk to collect leaves.

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We used our leaves to make sun catchers. I really hate contact paper but I am thrilled with the result! The sun really glows through the leaves and we were blessed with one beautifully sunny day before the clouds and rain set in. Hopefully we’ll get more sun so we can enjoy our pretty sun catchers!

Together we made our favorite fall treat….Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread. So yummy!
Some of the things in Adam’s “Tot Boxes” this week were his foam alphabet puzzle (he really loves to pop the letters out when he’s done)

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Color Matching Wheel
He did so much better than he did about a month ago. Last time he had a really hard time pinching the clothespins but this time, he just needed me to hold the wheel up for him.
As always, a favorite was his beads. This time I suggested he use a measuring spoon to transfer the beads to the ice cube tray.

Check out the Tot School links over at 1+1+1=1 for more ideas of what you can do with your tot! Also, Carisa has some really great printables and ideas for just about any theme you could want to do with your kids. And they are all free!