We are off to the pediatrician! Little Q is the patient. Up all night. Poor appetite. Poor nursing. Pain. Arching back. Spitting up A LOT. My easy breezy baby boy is upset! So got any guesses as to what’s bothering sweet Quinn?
We’ll be back tomorrow… up and running with a post that will have you screaming SHARK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Have a great day!
Anna
The letter ‘W’ is a toughie. Especially for a 3-year-old. You can look at that letter all you want and still come up with the same conclusion… it’s an upside down ‘M’ and that’s all there is to it! What better way to help Crowley conquer ‘W’ than spending a morning learning about whales?
We start with a story. The Snail and the Whale by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler. It’s a great children’s book. Check out my review of it here.
Out next step is to actually look at some REAL whales LIVE. So we head to he computer to explore some whale web cams like this one of the Beluga Whales. Spend time with world-famous Killer Whale, Shamu. We also found endless videos of Shamu performances on YouTube. And then for the most majestic of them all… the Blue Whale, there is this video shot for National Geographic which includes their incredible songs. Amazing!
Now that we have seen a variety of whales, it’s time to head outside to find out just how big a Blue Whale really is.
I take a ball of twine that is exactly 100 feet long, and hold one end.
And yes, to do this properly, your shirt must be on backwards, too!
Crowley and his grandfather, G.G. pick up the other end and start walking! Finally, with a few HOUSES between us, we get a very real picture of how amazing that animal must be.
Now, back to our adventure room to make a whale.
With our web cams LIVE in the background. We get started. I found this project idea here and only made a couple of modifications.
Follow this link for directions. Then consider the following. Cut flippers and tail out of a foam sheet in a coordinating color.
When cutting out the tail, cut two identical tail shapes. One piece is the topside of your tail. The other is the underside of your tail. Place them over the rubber band and attach with tape.
Then take a sticky hand full of painter’s tape and place it in between the two tail pieces. Press.
Also, we decided to draw our eyes instead of using googly eyes. I find googly eyes are always falling off of projects. And we have a crawler in the house, so the drawn eyes are safest for us!
Now you can attach your whale to your mural. We found that a hot glue gun worked the best. Take a look at how very busy our ocean is becoming!
With all this crafting and reading, a toddler can get hungry. And just like the lions and bears at the zoo, you NEVER ABSOLUTELY NEVER let your toddler get hungry! So we are taking our month-long Ocean Adventure straight to the kitchen.
When we cook, Crowley truly helps. I am often surprised (not to be a horrible mom) at how many things he can actually do. That said this recovering Type-A has to have a little talk with herself before we begin, “Thou shalt not freak out when flour covers the kitchen. Thou shalt not become exasperated, frustrated or bitchy that this dish will never grace the pages of Gourmet. Thou shalt not take over project.”
With that out of the way, we are ready to make homemade pasta marinara… topped with fresh clams! And for dessert… a surfing bear catches a wave on homemade frozen Creme de Yogurt! (Wow? That fancy name really oversells it – just like so many news teases I’ve written. I’ve still got it!)
Step One – The Sauce
Start with the sauce so it can simmer while you are making the pasta.
Here’s what you need:
Simmering marinara…
24 oz.Crushed or strained tomatoes (we use an entire bottle of Organic Strained Tomatoes from BioNaturae – easily found in places like Earthfare, Whole Foods and your local co-op)
3 cloves of garlic (crushed) or a TBS of jarred garlic.
Basil to taste
1 TSP Balsamic
A pinch of salt (avoid adding too much salt since your clams will add plenty)
Let this simmer on low to medium heat, stirring occasionally. Add a splash of red wine a few minutes before mixing sauce into pasta.
Step Two – The Pasta
Making the pasta…
Your child will love helping with this.
You need:
3/4 Cup regular flour
3/4 Semolina flour
2 Eggs (or 3 egg whites) – Don’t cheat here – I only know because I have and it -FAILED
2 TBS water
2 TBS olive oil
Pinch of salt
Ta da!
Now you are ready to send it through a pasta machine. Two kinds here – either the pasta attachment for your Kitchen Aid Mixer (my favorite tool) or an old-fashioned pasta maker with hand crank. Both types have instructions for making fettucine. Follow accordingly. NO PASTA MAKER? NO PROBLEM! When I was a teenager living in Italy (another story for another time) we learned to make a favorite of Italian children called Pici (pronounced Pee-chee). This is a hand rolled pasta. Remember when you made snakes out of play-doh as a child, rolling a pinch of pasta back and forth with your palms and fingers. Same concept. There are plenty of YOU TUBE videos like this one to show you how!
Once your pasta is made and laid out on your kitchen towels, boil the water.
While water is boiling, it’s time to saute the clams in their shells. THIS is Crowley’s favorite part. If you have a pot or pan with a glass top, use that, so your children can watch the clams open.
YUM!
Add Pasta to boiling water. NOTE: It does not take nearly as long to cook homemade pasta so stay close and test your noodles until they are al dente!
Drain pasta. Pile atop a plate. Ladle your sauce on top and add clams, right in their shells. Enjoy!
Many have asked if Crowley actually ate the clams. Yes. I find that when he’s invested in our food by helping to make it, he eats it!
Now for some dessert!
Creme de Yogurt
What you need:
2 containers of single serve blueberry yogurt
Blue food coloring
1 pint of heavy whipping cream (or one container of Cool Whip – though the ingredients list freaked me out so I went with heavy cream)
3 TBS sugar (omit if using Cool Whip)
1 Graham Cracker Pie Crust
Crushed granola (enough to make a beach – at least 1 cup)
1 Milano Cookie (or any wafer like cookie that would make a great surf board)
1 Gummy bear (more if you wish to have some sunbathe on the beach)
If you want to take this a step further, buy those little drink umbrellas and have additional bears sit under them on the beach!
We’ve got the ocean! The beach! The Submarine! And a reading Sea Snake! What’s next?
Lots and lots of handprints! This school of fish is an easy and fun way to populate your sea.
School of hands…
I chose to print these golden fish onto construction paper so that they would show up better when placed in our ocean.
Here’s an easy Octopus. Two handprints. Palm on top of palm. For those of you as sleep deprived as me, don’t forget to only paint your child’s fingers. No thumbs! Adding numbers after the fact was a great way for Crowley and I to work on his counting.
When the opportunity is right in front of me, I use numbering as part of the adventure…
I just LOVE this lobster. We placed him on the beach to add some color to the sand. Two hand prints and a footprint and voila! We used a black marker to add eyes and segments.
Looking for a great way to incorporate reading? Try this one!
Happy Hand Printing!
Anna
Reading is a big part of our summer schedule. In fact it’s how we are starting our daily adventure. Each morning, we gather in the Adventure room (that’s the new name for our ‘bonus’ room). Crowley grabs his beach towel and puts it right by the beach or ocean and we start reading .
What better way to display our progress than by making our favorite titles into a slithery sea snake!
Since Crowley can’t actually read yet, this offers an instant visual reminder of his reading accomplishment. After each new book is read (and thoroughly examined for the letter of the week) C proudly attaches another segment to our reading snake!
Want to do this for your kids? Simply head to the computer. All you have to do is open a Word document. Locate the book on the Internet. Drag the cover art over to your Word document, resize it and print! I cut the snakes head out of green construction paper. C. helped me place the forked tongue!
Freckles is one of our favorites!
Another way to make this project special is to get your family involved. I created a reading wish list on Amazon. Prices for our books range from $3 to $20. My goal was not to solicit presents, but participation in Crowley’s special ocean project. Crowley is enjoying a unique feeling of family being close and involved even though they all live far away.
Check out the list below and please let me know if you have a favorite we need to check out!
Our Ocean Reading List:
The Magic School Bus on The Ocean Floor by Joanna Cole and Bruce Degen
My take: I love this book. It has a lot going on. I stick to the main story for C at his age, but older children will love the whimsical way the author and illustrator pack the pages with factoids about the sea!
Mister Seahorse by Eric Carle
My Take: This is a great story about the sea and all the different ways sea creatures carry their precious eggs. Crowley loved this one!
Pig Kahuna by Jennifer Sattler
My Take: Good fun! Beautifully illustrated, this brings home the fun of collecting treasure at the water’s edge.
One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish by Dr. Seuss
My Take: It’s a classic. Classic. But very looooooooooooooong. Sadly C’s attention span couldn’t hang on. Might be better as a bed time story read in parts over several nights.
Freckles and The Great Beach Rescue by Ellen Bryant Lloyd and Carol Schwartz
My Take: This is one of our favorites. This is a great story about friendship, bravery and being nice to others. The personification (wow that was the biggest word I’ve used all day…maybe all week) of the sea creatures offers an additional bonus of educating your little one as they read a sweet story. I also love the collaboration between author and illustrator in making many of the words a part of the illustration. That touch is fun to look at and great when teaching the munchkins how to read.
The Coral Reef Tunnel Book by Joan Summers
My Take: This book actually creates a photographic tunnel for you to look through to give you the sense you are looking into the depths of a coral reef. But the best part is the brochure like guide found in the back. Using that guide, we went on a visual treasure hunt to match the images in the guide with the images in the tunnel reef. I am surprised by how much of that information C. actually retained!
Discovery KIDS Incredible Sharks
My Take: comes with 3-D glasses which my 3-year-old doesn’t quite yet get. But he will later on. Great for an older adventurer.
Over in the Ocean: On a Coral Reef by Marianne Berkes, Jeanette Canyon
Very cool book that uses photographs of clay models of sea creatures. Very well done and captured Crowley’s imagination and attention.
Stella Star of the Sea by Marie-Louise Gay
My Take – This is a sweet tale of overcoming your fear of the water by learning about all of the amazing things in the ocean (you know, until you watch JAWS)
Night of the MoonJellies by Mark Shasha
My Take: A fantastic glimpse into what makes summer in New England so very special. A favorite!
Commotion in The Ocean by Giles Andreae, David Wojtowycz
My Take: Fun rhymes and a great overview of the amazing animals living in the ocean.
How I Became a Pirate by Melinda Long and David Shannon
Very cute story. Crowley loves this one.
Shiver Me Letters by June Sobel and Henry Cole
Cleverly written and a great opportunity to talk more about each letter.
The Pirate Cruncher by Jonny Duddle
The illustrations are so masterful and intense in this story. We really enjoyed it!
The Little Island by Margaret Wise and Leonard Weisgard
My Take: This is so different than Children’s books offered today. Gave us a fresh look at the Ocean through the words of a classic. Love it.
The Pout Pout Fish by Deborah Diesen and Dan Hanna
My Take: LOVE this book! This is about spreading your “Dreary-Rearies” all over the place. I great book for all toddlers learning how to be in this world. The fun rhyming is just a blast and makes such a good point while having fun doing so!
Clam-I-Am! All about the Beach (From PBS series “The Cat in the Hat Knows a lot about That!) by Tish Rabe
My Take: Based a beloved character, the pages are teeming with tons of facts about Ocean life, teaching both of us some new things about the sea.
Curious George Goes to the Beach Houghton Mifflin Company
My Take: Simple fun! We love Curious George
The Snail and The Whale by Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler
My Take: This is an imaginative tail of adventure with a tiny creature and the largest there is! I will never look at another snail trail the same again.
Ocean and Sea (A Scholastic discover more book) by Steve Parker
My Take: We’ve used this as our “text book” offering educational support to our reading. Great photography and interesting tidbits.
“So we have an ocean that we plan to fill with LOTS of sea life. And it looks like we’re going to need a way to motor 
around and see it all. Let’s make a submarine!” There it is. What it’s like to be a thought in my brain. One thing leads to another and of the many, many voices in my head, not a single one ever yells, “Stop! Go to bed! Enough already!” Not a single one. So here goes. A yellow submarine with the world’s most awesome portholes.
You need a large cardboard box. We move so often that we have plenty. (But I’m not bitter.)
Here are some of the other supplies you’ll need:
STEP ONE:
Freehand the submarine shape. Keep it simple and easy. Oval for the body. Semi-oval for look out glass up top. And you need a rather well-rounded rectangle for the propeller. My motto when making kid’s stuff applies: it doesn’t have to be perfect, it just has to get done.
STEP TWO:
Paint the submarine. Our son wanted to paint it red. Until we played him The Beatles, “Yellow Submarine.” Yellow it is! (He’s still singing it.) White for lookout bubble. Metallic for propeller.
STEP THREE:
Attach dry submarine to the ocean mural. We found a hot glue gun works best.
STEP FOUR:
Now you are ready to make your portholes. I followed the easy instructions from this site.
What’s great about making the portholes, is if your 3-year-old, like mine, becomes a little over zealous in adding fish and Cheerios (not on list… don’t ask, just go with it), the porthole still looks awesome. He is very proud of himself and so am I.
The more fish and chaos in your underwater sea scape the better!
LAST STEP:
Once your portholes are complete, simply attach them to the submarine, using painter’s tape or a hot glue gun. Sit back and enjoy the view! Remember: we all live in a yellow submarine! Live it, Anna
Playing The Beatles hit while making this submersible is essential.
If you are are going to spend a month learning about the ocean, you need the mighty sea in your house!!!! 
So we are making a 15 foot mural that will set the mood and create a natural home for our crafts and adventures.
I will hang the mural on the rather short and mostly useless wall in the bonus room. (Not only are we learning about the sea… we are creating a world where bad architecture makes sense – bonus… so to speak.)
To do this, you’ll need a roll of paper. We used brown resin paper because it’s a little weightier than the paper roll for C’s art easel but I do think that type of paper could work as well. You also need:
STEP ONE:
UNLEASH that toddler. Get out the measuring tape and measure how much wall you are devoting to ocean.
STEP TWO:
Take your paper roll and measuring tape outside and roll the paper out alongside your measuring tape. Once you’ve reached the desired length, tape your paper down to the driveway or whatever surface you are painting on.
STEP THREE:
Have toddler squeeze as many colors and as much paint as he/she wants onto the paper plate.
The Palette
STEP FOUR:
Cover the entire paper surface with paint. There is no right way to paint the ocean, imaginations can run free here!
TIP: the painting sponges create a frothier looking sea. Let the kids go crazy with this. You can really set them loose with this one : )
STEP FIVE:
After the mural is dry, take your sponge dip it into white paint and ever so lightly, dab the top of your mural, to create white sea foam.
Don’t worry if edges curl as the mural dries. They will flatten out easily when you attach the mural to your wall.
STEP SIX:
Parents ONLY. Take scissors and trim the top of the mural lengthwise to create a wavy border.
OPTIONAL STEP:
SAND – repeat above steps with sand colors if you want to add a beach to your mural. or use the brown resin paper in its present form.
Now you are ready to hang the mural. We used blue painter’s tape to attach it to the wall. This tape should come off the wall easily without damaging the paint on your walls.
I taped the side and bottom edges to the wall and made sticky bunches of blue tape for the back of the mural. Now that your mural is in place, you are ready to make a month’s worth of crafts to place in your sea or on your beach!
See you TOMORROW… when we make a yellow submarine fit for the seas!
: )
Anna
I’ll never forget the conflicted and horrible sensations of leaving C. at preschool for the very first time. Even though it was only three measly hours, one day a week (all I could stomach at first), it was as confusing as dating boys was in junior high. Mommyhood has this way of quickly throwing you back into a foggy what-am-I-supposed-to-be doing place. Emotion mixed with hormones… makes for a toxic little cocktail splashing around one’s head.
Thoughts like…
Will he be okay with out me? What if something happens to him? What if he thinks I’m gone forever? Does he feel abandoned? Should I turn around and pick him up and take him home? You come here right now! Mommy will never leave you again!
Are mixed with…
What’s that heavenly sound? Is that… is that silence? Wait a second! Let me double-check… but I think it’s possible that NO ONE is touching me right now! OR talking to me!
And before you know it you’ve actually accomplished one entire task. Even if it’s simply sweeping the kitchen… it feels like getting a law passed through congress most days. Sure, I used to be proud of producing a news investigation, but now.. in my new world, I want to open the front door and scream, “I JUST CLEANED A TOILET! And now I’m having a cappuccino!”
And at exactly 20 minutes before pick up time… it happens. Butterflies dance in my stomach, then a flip-flop of the heart. It’s time to pick up C. and I can’t wait to see his sweet little face!
So it was after a few months of learning this dance, that it happened. A splash of cold water to the face! His teachers tucked a reminder note into C’s backpack about something called “Summer Break.” What the? He’s 2! He doesn’t need a break? How can his teachers need a break? I know I don’t need a break. We are all happy here with the system. NO ONE NEEDS A BREAK!
It happened anyway. And after several road trips, swimming lessons, crafts, baking projects and spontaneous adventures… when the first day of preschool arrived, I reeeeally missed him. I wasn’t ready to send him back to school at all.
And so another summer arrives… and I’m working overtime to make it HUGE. My goal is to feed C’s ever curious brain with knowledge wrapped in adventure. Our first stop? The Ocean! (Not the real one. The one we’re making.) A month-long journey that includes lots of new books, crafts, cooking, field trips, science and more. I’m blogging it every step of the way and pinning it too!
Please join us!
Here we go…
Anna
Pattern Me Mommy 