Playing in the Rain

We've been having summer showers all week. Tonight, Nathan couldn't resist playing in the rain.

Swimming Lesons

For the past two weeks, Nathan has been taking swimming lessons at the Rosemeade Rainforest Pool. He really enjoyed taking this class. I will have to sign him up every year.

Playing Ring Around the Rosy in the baby pool. They started each class in the baby pool for 5 minutes to let the kids get use to the water.

Then, they would move over to the big pool. Here he is swimming with the aid of a noodle.

While his instructor was working with the other kids in his class, Nathan would stand on a platform with bars around it. He would hold on to the bar and bounce up and down. He always had a smile on his face the whole lesson. He is standing next to the girl with the pink hat.

Here he is first in line for his turn on the diving board.

On the diving board with his instructor encouraging him to jump off. He didn't jump by himself. His instructor had to lift him up and drop him in. But, don't worry. He loved it! And, couldn't wait to do it again. This diving pool is 12 and 1/2 feet deep.

This video is from his last day of lessons. The kids showed the parents what they had learned during their lessons. Nathan received a Certificate of Participation and an American Red Cross card stating that he completed the requirements for the Preschool Aquatics Level 1 of the Learn-to-Swim program.

Summer 2010 - Summer/Beach Week

This week's theme is Summer/Beach.

We had fun this week celebrating summer. Nathan loves this time of year. He loves to be outside in the bright sunshine playing outside or swimming.

We started summer week with a craft that we got from our playgroup activity swap. It's a great opportunity to get some crafts that I wouldn't think of to do from the other members of our playgroup.

We received this mini bucket, shovel, rack and scooper. The bag was filled with foam stickers and a marker to decorate the bucket.

This activity is right up Nathan's alley. He loves stickers. Pulling the backing off the stickers is a good fine motor workout. Fine motor skills helps to coordinate hand muscle movements like eating with silverware and holding a pencil, which Nathan needs help with.

Here's his finished bucket. He even decorated his shovel with stickers. He asked that I write Summer Time and his name on his bucket with the marker.

We also started our Cousins Camp this week. We get together with Nathan's cousins at least once a week during the summer. We don't get to see our cousins as much as we would like to during the school year, so we make up for it during summer. We go on lots of fun field trips to keep the kids busy like visits to the library, swimming pools and this week we went to the beach.

About a 30 minute drive from our house is this great beach on Lewisville Lake. The sand is very soft and great for sand castles.

We met the cousins there after swimming lessons, so Nathan was a bit tired. He enjoyed playing in the sand and filling his bucket full of water and dumping it out near our feet. Here he is just kicking back and eating some lunch. Shortly after lunch he was exhausted and begged me to take him home. He quickly fell sound asleep in the car. Once we got home, I just put him right in his bed, sand and all.

Nathan and I made a new sensory box this week. For our beach week, we added some shell shaped pasta, sea shells. starfish, his mini bucket and shovel and foam letters and numbers.

Can you tell that Nathan loves playing in the sensory box? He likes to feel the different textures of each item. Sometimes he likes to take items out of the box and examine them on his blanket. He really enjoyed the foam letters and numbers and putting them together like puzzle pieces.

Since it has been so hot lately, we decided to make a cool summer treat. We made yogurt popsicles.

We mixed vanilla yogurt, strawberries and bananas in the blender.

Nathan pouring the yogurt in the blender.

After mixing and pouring the smoothie in the molds, Nathan put the lids on top. Then, we had to wait for them to freeze. It was hard to be patient.

Nathan enjoying the yummy cold popsicle. It was a nice cold treat on a very hot summer day.

Here's a list of our favorite books we read this week about summer and the beach:

Pig Little by Mike Thaler

All Summer's Fun by Daniel Skalak

Sand Castle by Brenda Shannon Yee

Mouse's First Summer by Lauren Thompson

Duck Dunks by Lynne Berry

Bats at the Beach by Brian Lies

Summer 2010 - Zoo Week

This week's theme is the ZOO.

This week was a short week due to the Memorial Day holiday so we didn't have enough time to fit in all the activities that I had planned. If we come across a day later in the summer with nothing to do, I'll just get out some of the crafts that we didn't get to this week.

Zoo week started with a trip to where else . . . The Dallas Zoo. We were very excited because the new Giants of the Savanna exhibit had just opened. Check out our entire zoo visit here.

Here's the big 3D sign as you go in the tunnel.

Our favorite part of the new exhibit were the giraffes. You can get up close and personal with them. You can feed them lettuce leaves and even pet them.

Nathan loved the butterfly house. There were many caterpillars all over the plants and the ground. You had to be careful where you stepped.

Nathan's favorite part was the children's petting zoo area. He was allowed in the goat barn to pet the goats and he also petted a white fluffy bunny. He was wishing that he had brought his fishing pole.

The children's zoo also has a lazy creek where the kids can wade in the water. We always forget to bring Nathan's swimsuit when we visit the zoo. It was our last stop before leaving the zoo so we just let him get his clothes all wet. It was really hot and he had a blast.

We have spent a lot of time this week in the pool. It has been very hot and the pool feels great. Nathan is a little fish. Once he is in the water, he never wants to get out. It's a good thing that Mommy loves to swim, too. We sure do love our pool during the summer!

Nathan is sporting his new sun shade hat and sunglasses. You will see him wearing these a lot this summer.

This marshmallow activity is not really related to the zoo, but it sure was fun. We built structures using marshmallows and toothpicks. I built the zoo animal cage on the right. See . . . I did relate it to the zoo. Come on . . . work with me.

Then, Nathan did one better. He built our house and then added a square shaped pool in the backyard. What a smart kid!!

This activity worked on his fine motor skills. He later built a three car garage and then a large fence around the house and garage. He called it his marshmallow city. We left them on the table over night and the marshmallows hardened. Nathan has played with it all week. I will be keeping these tiny marshmallows in stock. It's easy to pull them out when I need to occupy his time for awhile.

I had a couple of zoo animal crafts planned this week but we only got to do one. I let Nathan decide which one he wanted to do and he chose to make an elephant.

Here he is painting a paper plate for the elephant's head. We made the gray paint by mixing white, brown and blue together. Nathan loved mixing the paints to see what color they would make in the end.

He also painted two ears and a trunk that Mommy cut out. After the paint dried, which was a while because Nathan glops it on, he glued eyes and stripes down the trunk. Squeezing the glue is also great for his fine motor skills because he has to squeeze the glue really hard which works out his hand muscles.

Here is the finished elephant. I tried to get Nathan to hold it up but he was just not in the mood to have his picture taken. That is happening a lot lately.

While the paint on the elephant was drying, Nathan and I went outside to play with some parachutes. We had four little zoo animals each attached to a parachute. I thought this would a great outdoor activity but the parachutes didn't work as I wanted them to. I wanted to throw them up in the air and have them float down so Nathan could try to catch them. They just plummeted to the ground too quickly for even me to catch them. This activity only lasted about 10 minutes before we both gave up and went inside to the cool house.

To go along with the zoo theme, Nathan and I made Monkey Bread. This recipe is very easy and I had Nathan help as much as he could. We used biscuits in a tube and I cut them into fourths. Then, Nathan shook them in a zip lock bag with sugar and cinnamon and placed them in the bread pan. I cooked the carmel topping and poured it on top. Then, we popped it in the oven.

Here's the finished monkey bread. It was delicious! Nathan lost interest once it went in the oven and didn't even want to try any of it. He is currently in a peanut butter and jelly sandwich phase and is not very interested in eating much else. Well . . . I gave it a try. I have some more snacks to try out in the coming weeks. I'm hoping one of them will peak the interest of Nathan's taste buds.

Here's a list of our favorite books we read this week about the zoo.

Sam Who Never Forgets by Eve Rice

Monkey and Me by Emily Gravett

Two at the Zoo A Counting Book by Danna Smith

'Twas the Day Before Zoo Day by Catherine Ipcizade

Edward the Emu by Sheena Knowles

Dallas Zoo - Giants of the Savanna

We visited the Dallas Zoo today to see the new Giants of the Savanna exhibit that just opened Memorial Day weekend. Plus, school has not been let out yet, so we hoped there would be no crowds and we were right. Besides the heat, it was a perfect day at the zoo.

Mommy and Nathan entering the tunnel to the new Giants of the Savanna area.

Nathan loves zebras and was thrilled to see this giant poster of one. You can only see the zebras at the Dallas Zoo if you ride the monorail. We choose not to ride it this visit. It was a very hot day and didn't want to be stuck on the monorail for 40 very hot minutes. When Nathan asked where the Zoo Train was . . . we told him there wasn't a train at the zoo today. Shhhhh! We'll just ride it next time.

We made sure to visit Nathan's other favorite animals. First up . . . the Penguins. They are so cute. We would really love to have one for our backyard. It could swim in our pool.

Nathan is at the entrance of the Giants of the Savanna. Where there is a heard of bronze elephants and Nathan liked the little baby one.

This is the elephant section. The elephant keeper was outside by the exhibit and told us that this is Jenny. She is the elephant that everyone was concerned about. She seems very happy in her new home and with her new elephant friends. The trees in the background have hidden pockets in them where the keeper hides fruit. Jenny was using her trunk to search for the fruit and was finding every one with no problem.

My favorite part of the new exhibit is the giraffe area. I think the zoo use to have two giraffes. Now, they have seven and they are beautiful.

What makes the giraffe area so special is that you can get very close to them. There are three overlooks into the giraffe area. You can get almost eye to eye with them.

The zoo sells a handful of lettuce leaves for $5 if you wish to feed the giraffes. I recommend coming early and heading straight for the giraffes if you want to feed them. I'm sure they don't get to eat all day long. There are buckets of feed hanging from the overlooks, so the giraffes come right up to you. Nathan was in awe for getting a chance to be so close to them.

The cheetahs were exciting to watch. They would slowly walk by the glass and then take off chasing each other. Half of this Range Rover is in the exhibit and the other half is outside. I tried to get this cheetah to jump in the back so I could give him a ride but he wasn't interested.

We stopped a second time to visit the penguins as we left the Wilds of Africa section and headed to Zoo North. We stopped and ate our picnic lunch before we toured the older section of the zoo. The zoo is getting so large that we were not able to see everything this trip. We skipped around the exhibits in the older section because it was very hot and Nathan was getting really tired.

Randy mentioned the butterfly house and Nathan perked up. We happened to be the only people in the house at that time. The monarch butterfly caterpillars were all over the place. They were on the plants and the ground. We were told to be very careful where we stepped. Nathan liked pointing out all the caterpillars he saw.

Nathan in the middle of the butterfly house standing on the butterfly bench. See . . . nobody was in there but us. Pretty cool to have it all to ourselves.

There's a caterpillar on the ground. Watch your step! Or did Nathan did squash it?

After the butterfly house, we headed over to see the tigers. I can't remember ever seeing the tigers in this exhibit. Every time we have come before the tigers weren't out or were hiding in the tall grasses. But, today, we saw one tiger . . . finally!

We saved the Children's Petting Zoo for our last stop of the day. Nathan had waited patiently all day to get to the children's section.

Hello, giant fish!

We all enjoyed watching the giant fish swim around the tank. It's nice to take a rest and watch the fish through the windows on the sides.

This was the first time we had ever been allowed to enter the goat barn to pet the goats. Nathan wasn't afraid and walked around petting them as if they were dogs. You have to watch out when you are around goats. One goat nibbled on Randy's shorts and another one untied his shoes. Randy was too busy taking photos of Nathan and couldn't keep an eye on the goats.

Nathan is walking on the bridge that goes over the duck pond.

Last but not least . . . the lazy creek. We saved this for our very last activity at the zoo. We always forget to bring Nathan's swimsuit when we visit the zoo.

But it was so hot outside, we just decided to let him go in with his clothes on.

This section, of course, was the most crowded of the children's zoo. I'm surprised that Randy got these photos of only Nathan because there were kids everywhere.

Nathan loved cooling off in the cold water. After getting splashed from a few of the other kids, he had had enough. Thankfully only his shorts were wet. We just took them off and headed home.

We loved the new Giants of the Savanna. The whole area is very beautiful and is all about getting us closer to the animals. They even have a restaurant with a wall of windows where you can dine right next to the lions. The only bad thing is that the zoo is getting too large to see everything in one visit with a toddler. We are looking forward to our next visit. And I promise, we'll ride the zoo train next time.