* Words of Wisdom *
Have your child do exercise videos with you. This makes it more fun for you, and you also don’t feel as conspicuous!
—Amy, Savannah, Georgia
200
Parachutes
Age Range: 24 months and up
Materials
Cloth napkin or handkerchief
String or ribbon
Paper clip or small toy
Attach a twelve-inch long piece of string or ribbon to each corner of the piece of cloth. Bring the string together and tie a knot at about the nineinch mark. Attach a paper clip or light plastic toy figure to the string. You may have to experiment with the weight of the attached figure and the size of the cloth to make sure the parachute drifts slowly to the ground instead of falling too quickly and landing with a bang. Wad the parachute up and toss it into the air, or drop it from above. Watch the excitement on your child’s face as it floats to the ground.
201
Seesaw
Age Range: 24 months and up
Materials
Book
Paper tube
Newspaper
Small toys or stuffed animals
Take the tube and stuff it full of newspaper. Lay the tube horizontally on the floor. Put the book on top of the tube, balanced in the middle like a seesaw. Collect a basket of small toys and stuffed animals and put one at a time on the down side of the seesaw. Push the up side of the seesaw down, and watch the toy fly in the air. After all animals have had a chance to fly, pick them up and start again.
* Words of Wisdom *
Carry a plastic spray bottle of water in your diaper bag so if your child drops a cup or toy you can spray it off.
—David E., Houston, Texas
202
Follow That Noise
Age Range: 30 months and up
Teach your child how to follow a noise by hiding a musical wind-up toy in a room somewhere in the house. Help her learn to find it before the music runs out, or you might use a portable radio so there is no time crunch. Later you might try to hide somewhere in the house and see if your child can find you. You will need to make lots of noise so she can follow the sound.
* Words of Wisdom *
My son’s favorite game is to have me hide somewhere in the house and make pig sounds. He thinks they sound so funny, so the whole time he’s looking for me he laughs. So, of course, I start laughing and he finds me right away.
—Ginger, Huntington Beach, California
203
Mini-Golf
Age Range: 30 to 36 months
Materials
Wrapping-paper tube
Toilet-paper tube
Aluminum foil
Containers, boxes, or cans
Make a golf club out of a wrapping-paper tube taped to a toilet-paper tube. Cut a slot at the bottom of the wrapping-paper tube about two inches long and insert the end of a flattened toilet paper tube into it. Make a ball out of rolled up aluminum foil. You can use almost anything for the holes on your golf course: containers, boxes, or cans. If it’s a warm day, go outside to play golf, and if your yard allows, make some real holes in the ground.
204
Sound Walk
Age Range: 30 months and up
Gather a variety of drumsticks—metal spoons, wooden spoons, chopsticks, unsharpened pencils with eraser ends, or a small baby sock stuffed with cotton balls and securely fastened to the end of a wooden dowel. Take a walk around the house and try them out gently on different surfaces—on the floor, the wall, your legs, your belly, the chair, the table, the couch, a window, a hollow box, or a can. Try copying any rhythm your child taps out, and then see if she can copy a simple rhythm of yours.
205
Wheel Hunting
Age Range: 30 months and up
While singing the song “The Wheels on the Bus Go Round and Round,” pretend to drive each other around the house looking for wheels—anything round you find among your furnishings, toys, food, dishes, and closets should be tested. Try out the way the wheels or circular objects work by pushing a truck or car across the floor or sticking a pencil through a loose toy tire to watch it spin in a circle. Roll a plastic cup on its side, or spin a circular tray. Go outside for a walk and look for circular objects or wheels in the world around you.
Around the House
206
Toy Spinner
Age Range: 15 months and up
Next time you’re preparing a meal, organizing a drawer, making phone calls, or cleaning, create some spinning entertainment for your child. Put a lazy Susan or some kind of spinning tray on the floor. Place various small toys or nonbreakable household objects on the tray. Spin the tray and see what happens. Does the object fly off or stay put as it goes around and around? Is there a difference if the object is placed close to the center versus near the edge? If your child likes to watch the object spinning around without falling off, you may want to tape it to the tray with masking tape.
207
Cabinet Play
Age Range: 15 months and up
Cabinets are tempting, especially in the kitchen where they are at eye level for your child. Clear out one lower cabinet and fill it with unbreakable kitchen tools your toddler is allowed to play with. To surprise your child with new items, hide toys or other interesting objects in cookie tins. Change or rotate the items in the cabinet regularly to keep it interesting. If you are making a special dish for dinner, put some of the needed equipment in her cabinet so she can help organize the meal.
* Words of Wisdom *
My daughter’s favorite kitchen activity is to sort the silverware for me. Of course, I take any sharp objects out first. Then I put the silverware basket and silverware tray on the kitchen table and let her put them away.
—May, St. Paul, Minnesota
208
Put In, Take Out
Age Range: 15 months and up
Materials
Empty boxes with dividers
Paper tubes, plastic bottles, toys
Next time you’re out grocery shopping, stop by the liquor department of the store and ask for a few boxes that have the bottle dividers still in them. When you are home unloading the groceries, give your child a bunch of paper tubes, toys, or plastic bottles for him to put into the box. If you have more than one box, your child can pretend to be packing the boxes for shipping, or he might enjoy moving the items from one box to the other. Putting objects into things and then taking them out again is fun for toddlers.
* Words of Wisdom *
My daughter is always entertained playing with magnets I’ve put on the bottom half of the refrigerator. I get so much of my kitchen work done while she’s perfectly happy entertaining herself.
—Cathy, Bloomington, Minnesota
209
Sock Duster Games
Age Range: 24 months and up
Little hands make good dusters. Save your mismatched socks and keep them in the cleaning box. Have your child put a sock on each hand and get ready to play the following dusting games:
Decide where you are going to dust; then draw a line down the middle and have a race to see which one of you gets your side dusted first.
Let your child spray a design on the furniture with dusting spray, then erase the design as he dusts the table.
Let your child do the time-consuming dusting of small, nonbreakable objects. Ask him to lift the item off the shelf with socks on his hands and then rub his hands all over the dusty object before putting it back on the shelf.
* Words of Wisdom *
I give my son a soft, thick-bristled paintbrush to help me when I dust.
—Barb, Ventura, California
210
Oops! Day
Age Range: 18 months and up
Kids love everything goofy and unexpected, so make a point today to make them laugh at the silly things you do. Make a big production of putting your shoes on your hands instead of your feet, putting your coat on b
ackwards, looking for milk in the silverware drawer, calling the cat by the wrong name. Then give an exaggerated, “Ooooops!” and watch your child howl with laughter. Let him “catch” you fouling things up before you “notice” your mistake, and he’ll laugh even harder!
* Words of Wisdom *
I buy my toilet paper wrapped as individual roles so my daughter can stack it like blocks. They are light, stack easily, and are still wrapped up when we need to use them.
—John, Apple Valley, Minnesota
211
Place Mats
Age Range: 18 months and up
Toddlers love to see their artwork turned into place mats for the whole family to enjoy and admire. Place mat construction can be as easy as taking a painting or drawing to be laminated or covering it with contact paper. Try decorating a piece of colored paper with a bunch of shapes, or create a scene from a coloring book. It’s also fun to make up a place mat showing the proper placement of plate, silverware, napkin, and cup so she can practice. Go to the library and make copies of pictures of the birds or animals you might find in your area. Glue them onto construction paper and include the bird’s name so your child can point out the birds at the feeder while she eats breakfast.
212
Grocery Shopping
Age Range: 21 months and up
Make a habit of saving empty food boxes, yogurt containers, plastic ketchup bottles, or other packaging that your child might be interested in shopping for at his make-believe home grocery store. Make sure to tape or secure any paper labels that are peeling, glue the lids or tops on, and store them in a cardboard box. On grocery day, take the box out and place the items around the house. Let your child use a grocery bag or a toy grocery cart to do her shopping. Once she fills her bag or cart, help her to put the groceries away in the make-believe kitchen.
* Words of Wisdom *
There are lots of games to play while grocery shopping. My son’s favorite is to call out the name of the food or the food group of each grocery item as I put it in the basket.
—Jen, Omaha, Nebraska
213
Bath Book
Age Range: 21 months and up
Take a sequence of bathtime photos: shots with bubbles all around, fishlip faces, and funny wet hairdos. Gather several Ziploc baggies and cut construction paper pieces to fit into them. Then help your child select which bathtime photos she’d like to glue onto the construction paper—both front and back. Then help her seal them inside the bags and order them however she likes (maybe have her make a personalized cover page). Sew the bags together outside the zipper part (so the pages will remain sealed and waterproof) with needle and thread or with a hole punch and yarn.
* Words of Wisdom *
Try using a turkey baster to rinse your child’s hair in the bath. My son is now tearless when I wash his hair since no soap gets in his eyes.
—Deborah, Orient, Ohio
214
Getting It Done
Age Range: 24 months and up
Take note of the places where you spend daily chunks of time, like the bedroom getting ready, the home office working on the computer, the garage puttering, or the kitchen cooking. Make sure there is a stool, bench, or chair available for your child at each location so he always feels welcome to sit and chat while you’re accomplishing something. The goal is to communicate interactively, involving and teaching your child about what you are doing. Here’s his chance to be a mini-you—give him an old checkbook when you are paying the bills or part of the newspaper while you are reading it. You’ll be amazed at all the daily tasks you can accomplish when you know you’re both working and spending time with your child.
215
Reading Nook
Age Range: 24 months and up
Create a reading nook somewhere in the house—a place that’s quiet, cozy, and well lit, with lots of cushions and a blanket. Rotate a basket of books so that there are always fresh ones, or perhaps this can be the place you keep borrowed library books. Make a point of spending daily time in the nook sharing books with your child.
* Words of Wisdom *
I pretend that I’m going to “eat” toys with the vacuum unless they’re in the right place. The kids scramble to pick everything up out of my path, giggling the whole time.
—Heather, Washington, Utah
216
Help Wanted
Age Range: 24 months and up
Toddlers love to be of help. Get your child involved in simple chores, like feeding the cat, setting the table, holding the dust pan, using a push vacuum, wiping out the bathroom sink, helping collect laundry, lining up shoes, or matching socks. Decorate a coffee jar or shoebox and write “Help Wanted” on it. Write the jobs on slips of paper or, for younger children, draw pictures of the activity. Whenever your child seems bored or wants to do exactly what you are doing, let her pick a job from the jar. Believe it or not, with practice she’ll soon be more of a help than a hindrance! Give lots of positive reinforcement for whatever effort is made.
* Words of Wisdom *
When our son had been walking for a year, we decided to install a handrail on our stairway about ten inches below the handrail the adults use. He now walks up and down the stairs safely with great confidence.
—Mike, Seattle, Washington
217
Tent Fun
Age Range: 30 to 36 months
Here’s a way to make laundry day fun for your toddler. Take all the dirty sheets off the beds and let your toddler play with them. He can make a fort, tent, stage curtain, cape, magic carpet, river, or whatever he can imagine. When your child tires of playing with the sheets, wash them and put them back on the beds together.
* Words of Wisdom *
My daughter wanted to climb the stairs so badly. To make it safe, I put the baby gate three steps off the bottom of the staircase so she could practice and have fun climbing without getting hurt.
—Mary Jane, Boston, Massachusetts
218
Window Art
Age Range: 30 months and up
Large outdoor windows make an ideal painting surface for poster or finger paint and can be easily sprayed clean when the artist has finished enjoying his work. Make it a family tradition to paint the outside windows before you do the spring window cleaning. Let your child create a design on the patio doors or other reachable window space. This is also fun to do for various holidays: paint a ghost or pumpkins at Halloween or a snowman in the winter. Once the paint is dry, it will stay on the window until washed off with soap and water.
* Words of Wisdom *
Every time I have to clean the bathroom, I give my daughter a new box of Kleenex. She absolutely loves pulling them out one at a time. I then use those tissues to stick in my purse, in the car, or in our travel bag.
—Margi, Salt Lake City, Utah
219
How Does Your Garden Grow?
Age Range: 30 months and up
Help your toddler learn to nurture life and appreciate nature through the tending of a garden. Together, select plants from local nurseries and seed catalogs, plant them, water them, weed them, and watch them grow. Kids love digging in wet earth, playing with earthworms, and pouring water from a watering can. Plant a row of fast-growing sunflowers for immediate success. It’s a messy endeavor, so wear garden clothes! Plus, if you try a vegetable garden (cherry tomatoes, carrots, and potatoes are all very satisfying for child gardeners), you’ll have the added benefit of getting her to eat more vegetables! Avoid pesticides or sharp gardening tools.
Section Three:
Out and About
Traveling with Toddlers
220
Count Together
Age Range: 15 months and up
Kids love to count everything and will soon get used to counting from one to ten if you do it often enough. You can count stairs, bites of cereal, pillows on the couch, cars on the road, chairs at a table, trees on a hike, waves at the ocean, or rocks on the wa
lkway. Wherever you are, make counting a part of your life. Sing, clap, or make up rhymes as you practice your numbers.
* Words of Wisdom *
We are friends with another couple with young children. Occasionally we travel together—short, inexpensive, nearby getaways that are fun for the whole family. We go for at least two nights each time so we can swap child-sitting services. Then each couple can get a special, kid-free evening knowing the kids are safe and happy with familiar friends.
Sheila Ellison Page 12