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I turn to Busy Toddler for all the guidance on this. Love her activities and instagram account. Here’s a list of supplies she has on hand: https://busytoddler.com/supplies/
Also, Homegrown Traditions has a great “Summer of Fun” calendar with very simple daily activities you can pick and choose from. We did this last summer and everyone loved it. https://homegrowntraditions.com/shop/summer-of-fun-bucket-list-calendar/
We spend a good chunk of time in the car, too! My 4 and 3 year olds are currently LOVING the Maestro Classic cds, specifically Peter and the Wolf. It’s a story set to classical music, where each character is an instrument. Sounds boring, but I promise it’s an instant hit. They have other versions, too, like Mike Mulligan and the Steam Shovel, The Tortoise and the Hare, and some other fairy tales. They’re all available on Amazon and sometimes you can get it on YouTube.
Fort Wayne, IN!
If anyone wants to meet up for summer playtime, my littles are 7,5,3, and 2! We love the outdoors, Charlotte Mason/Classical, Jesus, and connecting on a regular basis with real
live friends!We have not been participating like I would like to. But summer vacation has started here, and I’m looking forward to jumping aboard again. I was so excited to see paper airplanes on the listing this week! How fun is that, it’s one of the things to do on our summer bucket list of fun!!
In Palm Springs area right now but moving to greater Sacramento/ Placer County in the fall. 2.5 y/o twins if anyone wants to connect.
My 4-year-old loves the Magic Treehouse series by Mary Pope Osborne. There’s adventure and cultivating a learning through books built right into the stories. We’re on book 9 and there’s still 19 more to go in the series, so plenty to enjoy!
Our screen time limit came less out of worry about disconnection and more from noticing that our preschooler had more meltdowns when he was allowed to watch more shows. Even GOOD shows, GENTLE shows. Mr. Rogers, Daniel Tiger, Winnie the Pooh etc.
He wasn’t even melting down about the shows themselves; he’d walk away from the screen on his own when the show was over. But for an hour or two after that, he would be on edge. So now our screen rule is that he’s allowed one 20ish minute show after his rest time, while I nurse the baby in the afternoon. And only if he remembers to ask for it himself. I won’t interrupt his tower building or coloring to offer a show.
This rule goes out the window if he’s sick, and then he gets a full 90 minute Winnie the Pooh or Disney Robin Hood — or BOTH — while absentmindedly sipping fluids and eating clementines. He still melts down when it’s over, but at least he’s hydrated.
BY THE WAY, if you think, “Oh, I remember liking Robin Hood, it’s all cute animals, I can get some chores done while he watches this,” maybe you, like me, have totally forgotten the plot of this movie. My kid got obsessed with it when we all had the flu this winter. I got to field questions about gallows, and taxes, and why some people like taxes and some people don’t, and now he shouts “DEATH TO TYRANTS” sometimes. A pox on the phony king of England!
We’re big Playful Parenting fans in our house. It dovetails nicely with How To Talk and Simplicity Parenting, but scratches my theater kid itch.
Thanks, y’all!
We tried a handful of things, and here’s what’s working best:
We raised the 3 year old’s bed. That’s … kinda it. It’s the same mattress, but instead of on the ground (he has an Ikea Kura bed, the reversible kind that we can turn into a bunk someday), we added slats and put the mattress on top of those. You know, the way it was designed.
We did this on Easter, after a sunrise church service and a skipped nap and LOTS of outside running around, so he was already out of his normal routine. We kept him running from 5am to 7:30pm without stopping, then showed him how big his “new bed” was, and he was too exhausted to wake up in the middle of the night.
We let him overhear us tell each other and anyone who would listen how proud we were of how he stayed in his bed until it was light outside, so he got proud of himself about it, too.
He’s been waiting until 6ish in the morning to come crawl into our bed and ask me when he can hunt tigers in the (midwestern) forest (preserve), and I can live with that.
A week in, it’s mostly stuck. If he has to go to the bathroom in the night, he needs a back rub to fall asleep again, but he doesn’t scream and wake up his sister now. Something about changing his sleeping environment a little jolted him out of that habit. If the bed hadn’t been adjustable, switching out his bedding or rearranging the furniture might have accomplished the same thing. I think a day of all our routines being different helped out with a hard reset, too.
Every week or two I make a gigantic batch of these in the blender. Both the 11 month old and the 3.5 year old love them. They feel like they’re eating cake, but the sweetness is all from fruit. I like them, too, with a little cream cheese or maple syrup.
It’s a forgiving enough recipe that if you want to swap out some carrot with zucchini or banana with applesauce, it still comes out fine. I eyeball most of the measurements with the markings on the blender so that I have fewer dishes afterward.
2 cups whole wheat flour (I usually replace at least half of this with almond meal or quinoa flour, for a variety of protein)
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sunflower or coconut oil
1/2 cup dried dates, seeded and finely chopped into a paste (unless you have a serious blender, then you can skip the chopping)
3 ripe bananas (1 1/4 cups)
1 1/2 cups grated carrots (about 3 medium) (again, if you’ve got a Vitamix or something, you can just roughly chop instead of grating them)
1/2 cup yogurt (Greek is ideal, but whatever you have is fine)
2 eggs
splash of vanillaPreheat oven to 350F. Line a muffin tin. This will make about 15 regular muffins, but I usually stretch it to 12 muffins and 24 mini muffins.
Sift together the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt.
In Vitamix, combine the bananas and carrots, dates, and oil. Add in the yogurt and the eggs. Add the flour mixture and stir until everything just comes together. Spoon into the prepared muffin tins.
Bake for about 25-30 minutes (or 15ish minutes for mini muffins) or until a toothpick tests clean in the center of the cake.
They only keep for a couple of days on the counter, but they’ll keep for a week in the fridge.
My favorite parenting podcast is ‘Unruffled’ by Janet Lansbury – she answers listener’s question so the episodes are short and sweet. Her voice is so calming and her advice helps to remind me of the parent I strive to be.
Also, NPR’s ‘How I Built This’ is really interesting if you love Shark Tank… its kind of the reverse of Shark Tank. It’s so fun to see how some of your favorite brands and stores got their start. (My fav’s are Dyson, Kate Spade, Sara Blakely (Spanx), and Kendra Scott)
I’m going to have to follow this thread closely because I imagine we will be in the same boat very soon. We also have a 3.5 year old that thinks our bed is the place to be. She actually told me that our bed is a “10” comfortable and her’s is only a “1” comfortable. She almost won me over with her logic and reasoning, but we’d prefer she sleeps in her own bed. We also have 5.5 month old twins who I’m sure will be teething within the next couple of months. Good luck to you mamas in the trenches right now!
