Back to School Giveaway and Shaving Cream Fun

I don't often do product endorsements on the blog, but when I recommend something, do know that it's a great product. Today I want to share an alphabet product with you that I'm using to help Little One learn how to read and write. 

Created by none other than my Mom, there are in my opinion, no other local alphabet products on the market that can compare to the quality and versatility of this one. Why is it so great? Oooh many reasons... for starters the letters are made from a very durable material; they don't easily bend and cannot break and I must add they have a nice feel to them. The fonts used are correct for the South African Curriculum and the alphabet comes in black or white (not multicoloured as many others do). One of the best things about the alphabet is that a child can touch and feel each letter, giving them a three-dimensional experience of what each letter is about. Needless to say, the letters can be used in a variety of games that make letter recognition and word building fun both in the classroom and at home. And that's not all (hehe, I sound like one of those infomercials), there is a magnetic and non-magnetic version available, as well as a variety of different sets, including a numeracy set, and alphabet "bottle top" stickers.

There are so many ways to incorporate this product into alphabet teaching, but today I'm sharing a shaving cream activity Little One and I did about a month ago. If you haven't given your little person shaving cream to play with yet, do give it a go. My little guy lights up when he knows shaving cream is involved!

To play, I placed the letters in a random order on our bricks outside. I gave Little One the shaving cream and I called out letters one at a time. He had to correctly identify them and when he had, he was allowed to cream them... his favourite part. After he had creamed all the letters, I gave him a squirt bottle with water in and once again called out the letters and he could squirt them clean. This activity took much longer than expected and in the end I got quite tired (not him) before all the cleaning up was done. :)

An additional idea is to ask your child to think of a word starting with the letter, when they correctly identify the letter.   

 

 

So now the best part, would you like to win a 26 piece Learners Alphabet (non-magnetic)? The set used above is an 83 piece and is perfect for word building, but with a 26 piece many games can be played. The prize will also include two sheets of alphabet "bottle top" stickers.

Here's how you can win: Visit the  Little People's Products website and come back here and tell me what your favourite product is in the comments section OR pop on over to my Love and Lollipops Facebook Page and share the competition via the link there. Leave a comment there saying that you shared it. If you do both, you will get two entries.

The competition is open to all South African residents. (Apologies to my other readers.) Entries will close on Sunday the 27th of July and a winner will be announced on Monday the 28th. Good luck!

Till next time.  

(And the winner is... Loandi Kok. Congratulations! I will be in touch with you via the Love and Lollipops Facebook Page.)

How to raise a Genius

Today I'm sharing this (fun) infographic with you.  It nicely summarizes some of the latest and key research in raising "smarter" children.

Of particular interest to me is the way in which we praise our children and how we can often over-focus on vague character traits (such as "you are so nice/smart/creative"), rather than on their specific efforts. To read an extensive article in this regard, go here.

This infographic was provided by onlinepsychologydegree.net.

Reading this summary reminds me that I have some work to do in a few departments. And you? What are your thoughts on this information? Does it change the way you are currently thinking about raising smart children? I'd love to hear your opinion.

Great reads that discuss some of this research:

NurtureShock: New Thinking About Children (by Po Bronsan and Ashley Merryman) - I absolutely loved this book, but then again it's right up my Psychologist alley :). There's a whole chapter written on the inverse power of praise, as mentioned above. 

How the Brain Learns (by David Sousa) - I couldn't put this down and I think it should be prescribed material for all educators - seriously. 

Till next time, happy reading. 

makedo {A Giveaway}

I was so excited when I recently discovered a new product, called makedo. I immediately went and checked out the website and after seeing all the wonderful possibilities, I couldn't resist getting it for the boys. 

What is it? Essentially, as they so aptly put it, it is "a set of connectors for creating things from the stuff around you". 

I particularly like that they offer both free-play kits, as well as find-and-make kits. In the free-play kit, you have a set of connectors and using the recycled objects you have at your disposal, as well as your imagination, you can make anything you want to. The find-and-make kit is a project-based kit, in which you make a specific thing, for example, flowers. These kits tell you which recycled objects you need for the project and it gives you the required connectors and instructions - cool hey?

In the Easter holidays we had some friends over and I gave the kids some recycled items as well as our free-play kit. Here's what they came up with...can you spot the tiny toilet roll character?

According to the website, this product is suitable for ages 5 and over. I think this depends on the child's fine motor dexterity and finger strength. The children who made these items in the picture were aged 10 and 12.

I really knew I had made a smart purchase when shortly after getting our kit, Big One had to go dressed up to school for "Crazy Day". He created a mask from a box and using the connectors, he attached items to the box to make it interesting. I was so thrilled, because it was far easier and quicker than using glue - no drying time required!

And now for the best part, Annelize, our local agent for this super product, has very kindly given me a 33 piece free-play kit to give away to you! 

How do you enter? It's really easy. 

• For one entry, leave a comment and tell me what one of your favourite posts has been here at Love and Lollipops.
• For a second entry, tell a friend about this competition. 
• And, for a third entry, "like" my Love and Lollipops Facebook page. 
• You need to leave separate comments for each entry and please make sure that I have your contact (email) info.
• The competition closes on Sunday the 13th of May and is open world wide.

:)

Can't wait and want to buy some in the mean time? If you are local, you can contact Annelize via her Facebook page or send her an email at preta(at)mweb(dot)co(dot)za

Annelize will also be exhibiting at the next My Favourite Things market, being held in Paarl on the 12th of May. 

Good Luck! 

Mom's Big Book of Things to Make

Author and creator, Melanie Bosman, kindly sent me a copy of her book Mom's Big Book of Things to Make to check out. I'm such a fan of books like these...books with art and crafts that inspire you to get creative with your kiddo's. The book offers over fifty fairly easy projects with clear photographs and good instructions.

I decided to try the coffee filter project with the children and both enjoyed the process of colouring the filters (with cokies) and then spraying them with water. The effects achieved were very pretty  and in the spirit of Christmas I decided to cut them out and make some trees.

To order a copy of the book or to see other titles, you can visit the website here.

Thank you again Melanie!

PS. Sharing at 
Show and Tell @ ABC and 123

Truth in the Tinsel

I am so excited to share this awesome e-book just released by Amanda at impress your kids. I love the idea of celebrating Advent, the four weeks (Sundays) leading up to Christmas. This year I really want to impress the true meaning of Christmas on my children, as I feel it is so easily lost in the commercialism and busyness of the season. Celebrating Advent provides a special opportunity to stop and focus on the importance of this time of year. 

In this book you have a daily plan...a Bible reading, a craft activity and a few extra ideas...all prepared for you to simply put into action. The whole idea is very much up my alley , but yes, I realize that many of my readers may not be as crafty as me :). What I can say, is that all the activities are so easy to duplicate and one really doesn't have to do a craft everyday...in fact, that would pretty much be impossible in my book.

I have a copy and I'm all set to start on December the first. Hop on over to the Truth in the Tinsel (the website) to read more and to buy it at the wonderful price of only $4.99 (That's less that R40 for my South African readers).

Till next time...

Honey Bunny Studio

Earlier this year I entered a giveaway from Honey Bunny Studio to win a print from their Etsy shop and was thrilled to have won. It was so much fun choosing and then to wait to receive this special print all the way from New York! 

I haven't posted about this sooner, because I only framed the print recently and I wanted to post a picture of it framed. 

Thank you so much Nelvis for sending this across the seas. It has a special place on Little One's bookshelf as you can see!

Fingerprint Fun

                                                                                  

 I remember seeing an Ed Emberley Fingerprint Drawing Book a number of years ago and it immediately piqued my interest. I looked high and low for these locally, but couldn't find any in stores or at the library. So I was very excited to find out that Ed has a terrific website and that I could easily order his books (at great prices too) online.

In the spirit of our Doctor Doctor fun and checking out the human skeleton, I was tickled to find a cute fingerprint tutorial of  
Mr. Boney Parts on the website.

Big One's version...

Using the super Melissa and Doug Ink Pad, Big one and I spent some time creating fingerprint art. I won't tell you who made what, but I will say this -  my creations are definitely "cute", whereas Big One's are "cool".

 

Could you tell who made who?..I'm sure you could :)
 

Shape Matching Fun

Today's post is a continuation of the Doctor Doctor fun we've been up to here. I love the simplicity of the red medical cross, so today I'm sharing some shape matching fun inspired by it.

Do your children have this kind of shape sorter...or something similar? I made these discs and Little One started off by matching up the plastic shapes to the discs...easy peasy. 

We then put the plastic shapes aside and asked him to find matching discs - for example, 

find another yellow shape or find another hexagon? 

I then packed them out in rows and asked him to count each row.
He did this very nicely :).

We didn't do this, but another possibility would be to put three in a row and ask which is the odd one out or which one doesn't match the others.

After playing with the discs for awhile, I put those aside and we had some fun with the shape sorter. As we played , it struck me that this is such a versatile toy. I have always thought of it as a baby toy, perhaps because my earliest association of it is the Tupperware shape sorter ball (remember that one?). But this is really far more than a simple baby posting game, with many playful and educational possibilities. I might just do a whole post about it sometime...

 Building shape towers...and the best part...knocking them down!

Till next time, Happy playing!

PS. I was really curious about the origin and meaning of the red cross medical symbol. You can read more about it here.

Let's Build It! {Books and Toys}

Continuing with our "Let's Build It!" theme, there are two construction related toys that I would like to share with you - Moon Sand and Junior Tradesman. 

This was our first experience with Moon Sand and we're sold! It's a fantastic product. Little One has simply loved playing with it and has enjoyed it as an alternative to the lentils in his sensory construction site box. It's texture is quite different to sand and I haven't minded him playing with it in the house, as it cleans up quite easily.

It's a fairly pricey product, so I have been on the lookout for a good homemade recipe. I found a few, but have not tried any of these, so cannot guarantee the final outcome. The first recipe I found is at Skip to my Lou, and the next slightly different combination of the same ingredients is at irresistible ideas for play based learning. It seems really easy to make.

The set I purchased came with a mold to create a sidewalk and bricks. Little One is too young to use these, so big brother tested these out and they work really well.

Our next construction toy... Junior Tradesman Bricks. Little One absolutely loved playing with the cement mixture and wanted to put it into the back of his concrete mixer, which I thought was very appropriate and sweet :). He would have been equally happy with sand and water mixed together as pretend cement. Big One used the toy appropriately and created a wall, which dried overnight into a nice solid structure. When water is added, the cement dissolves and the bricks can be used again. This is a nice product, but definitely more suited to an older child, aged 6 plus.

With regard to books, we have been so lucky to have two fantastic titles on our shelf. Jerry Pallotta's The Construction Alphabet Book is amazing. Even though it is written for an older child, my little guy LOVES it! The art work is fantastic and Little One's knowledge (and mine) of different construction vehicles has soared. B is for Builder by June Sobel is another super book. The text is simple and it is perfectly suited for construction loving children aged two and up.

Some more "Let's Build It!" fun coming up. 
Till then...happy playing.

Serviette Holder

If you are a South African reader and enjoy crafts, you may have noticed the Hooked On Crafts range at your local craft store. There is a wide range of fun kits available and they are all very reasonably priced - most kits are R20 or less.

For Mother's day, I decided that we would make the serviette holder and give it to one of the Grannies. I had spotted this kit awhile back and was drawn to the pretty picket fence and the nice embellishments. The packet comes with a lovely clear photograph on the front, so I was expecting it to be fairly straightforward. But, it was not to be so. I could just not figure out how to glue it all together to make an upright holder. Hee hee...I think visual spatial reasoning has never really been a strength of mine. Anyway, I was not to be deterred and came up with a plan to use a Lipton tea box - I always keep these boxes in recycling. I covered it with some wrapping paper and stuck the completed picket fences on to it. Voilà!

If you are an international reader and cannot get these kits, this craft could very easily be duplicated with craft sticks and other bits and pieces from a craft shop.

Picket fences - thicker and thinner craft sticks
Flowers - wooden cut-outs glued together
Butterfly - two pipe cleaners
Ladybird - pom poms, black stickers, pipe cleaner , googly eyes

All in all, I think that the kit is great value for money and would certainly keep the kids busy for awhile. I must mention that there is lots of gluing involved and I found the gluing to be quite tricky. I would recommend this craft for older kids (7 years plus) and adult assistance would probably still be required. What is fun, is that there are lots of different things to make, so a few children could each do a part of the project.

If you are interested in seeing the range and live in the Northern Suburbs (Cape Region), you should definitely contact Isabel. She's a lovely lady who sells the most wonderful selection of toys, including almost all of the Hooked On Crafts kits. You can chat to her at play2learn(at)mweb(dot)co(dot)za.

By the way, did you spot the rather strange cut up card in the top picture? That was Little One's Mother's Day card for his Granny :).

Till next time - Happy crafting!

PS. I'm linking this to Fun for Kids Friday

Felt Car Play Mat

So one day I was surfing and I found this! It's an amazing car mat from Kimbo at her blog called A girl and a glue gun. Don't you just love the name of her blog? I do, 'cause I'm also crazy about my glue gun. After seeing Kimbo's mat, I was very inspired to make my own version for Little One. Mine is not nearly as elaborate as hers, but I was happy with the way it turned out.

Now you would think that I have a very happy little boy who loves playing with his car mat... well, not really. Every time I put it out to play, he crumples it up within minutes. I quickly realised that he doesn't like that the felt sometimes moves when he drives his cars on it. I have played with it too and found it to be fine, but I suppose when you are only 2 years old, these things can be a bit more frustrating :). If you have any good suggestions for keeping the mat flat and steady, please feel free to comment.

On another topic for a moment...can you spot some very cool toys on our mat. There are a variety of brands being played with here, but some of them are from the "WOW" range of toys and have been loved and played with by both my boys. If you don't know the range, they have an awesome website that you can visit here. They are really great quality and tough toys that can take a beating.

For more amazing play mat inspiration be sure to visit these blogs too:

Arctic and Jungle mats at Shady Tree Diary

Dinosaur play mat at Serving Pink Lemonade

Bob the Builder and Thomas the Train mats at My Delicious Ambiguity

Car and Animal play mats at lovely little sweetpeas

Happy playing.

PS. I'm linking this to:
Get Your Craft On @ TODAY'S creative Blog 

MADE BY LITTLE HANDS MONDAY @ delicate CONSTRUCTION

We Play @ childhood101  
Making the World Cuter Monday  
HIGH PAW @ the best toys for toddlers 

The Heartfelt Project

 

I'm very excited to share some special South African products with you from
The Heartfelt Project.

The Heartfelt Project was born out of a very tragic event, but today is empowering a number of woman and impacting a community.

I am sharing just a few of many lovely products available. Magnets, brooches, hair clips, baby mobiles, Christmas decorations (love these!!), wedding favours and much more, are available to purchase.

Aren't these bunny brooches so sweet? They would make such a lovely Easter gift for the little ladies in your lives (or even the big ladies).

Or what about a dozen or so Easter egg magnets.

Love these Robot-Schmobots!

These are beautiful!

To read more about the Heartfelt story and do some shopping, please visit their website. You can know that your purchase will be making a difference in the lives of a community. Heartfelt also exports worldwide and with the exchange rate being strongly in the overseas buyer's favour, those of you across the seas will be smiling all the way :).

Go get 'em

 

Where are all the educational toys packed in your home? All those puzzles and games that require you to sit down with your kiddos to play. Up somewhere, out of reach (to avoid little one's mixing up puzzle pieces and ruining nice cards)? I'll admit, that's where ours have always been packed...out of reach of little hands! Many of the boxes are still in great condition and the pieces all there and intact, but I ask myself, have these really been played with? The truth is, these toys have been packed too far away. I have the best of intentions, but somehow they just stay up there, packed away nicely in the top cupboards.

So recently I decided to pack all the age appropriate educational toys at the very bottom of the cupboard...in easy reach for both me and my toddler. I'm really hoping to not go into his room and find all the boxes emptied out onto the floor!:) What I'm hoping for, is that by being more accessible, we will use these toys more often.

One such wonderful educational toy that I want to share with you, is made by a very well-known South African brand, Smile Toys. It's called Quartet and pictured here is the colour matching puzzle. The box also includes shape matching, animal homes and missing parts - all two-piece puzzles. I have been doing the colour matching puzzle with Little One since our recent focus on learning colours and also included these puzzle pieces in our buckets of colour. (In case you are new here, I recently did ten Colour Fun posts. To see all colour posts, click here.)

So if you haven't done it yet, go get those toys down, close at hand and ready to play!

Fun with Felt

I have fallen for FELT! I just love this versatile material that can so easily be transformed into FUN. There are so many wonderful felt ideas on the many different blogs that I follow, so there is plenty of inspiration around. How fancy one gets, is also entirely up to your skill level and time available. Now I don't sew much, as I have previously mentioned (see here for another no-sew creation), so my felt creations will definitely be of the simple and easy kind for now.

I started with this very easy project (see top photo), inspired by this little puzzle, that for some reason just makes me happy.

Little One loves this puzzle, so I thought that he might be fascinated if I recreated it in felt. Well, he wasn't as excited as I was. Perhaps his interest in felt play is yet to come. I certainly hope so, or I'll be playing with it all by myself! (At 23 months he is probably a little young for felt play, so I'll be storing my felt projects for a later date.)

Now here is another easy felt idea. This super picture of two felt characters playing tennis was created by Big One. The set he used is from the Succezz Toy range and I really like it because of the black lines printed onto the felt pieces. This set however, can easily  be duplicated with ordinary felt. Simply cut out lots of different shapes and sizes from a variety of different felt colours and let your child's imagination take over.

If you don't have a felt board, you can make this quite easily too. To make a very simple and inexpensive board, lay a piece of felt onto a hard piece of cardboard (with enough felt to go over the edges) and glue at the back. An A3 size is a nice size. For a more long-lasting and durable board, use a piece of hardboard.

Have fun :).

PS. Sharing this at Show and Tell @ ABC and 123

Kinderwerf

Over the years I have often heard my Afrikaans friends mention that they struggle to find good quality Afrikaans books and educational products. So today I am happy to tell you a little bit about Kinderwerf products. Kinderwerf offers the Loebi Book Club, recommended from 0 to 8 years of age; educational flashcards; terrific posters and some more. I think the posters are particularly nice for school classrooms. There are also a few English products available.

The Kinderwerf  website offers free activity pages to download and there is also a newsletter that you can subscribe to. So pop over and visit www.kinderwerf.co.za

If you have any questions or would like to order these products, please email Trudie at trudie(dot)vandyk(at)technovolve(dot)co(dot)za