Letter of the Week: B

~ Peeper is 27 months old ~

Sunday
Once again, I couldn't wait to get started, so we did a letter craft Sunday night. I based this Bumble Bee on one from No Time for Flashcards. I used pipecleaners to make the stripes because, well, because we have a bunch of pipe cleaners, but also because I figured it would add a bristly texture - just like a bee!

It was kind of a less-toddler-appropriate "b-word" to get them to stick to the paper, but we eventually got it.

Peeper sort of got the idea of the yellow-black-yellow-black pattern, but wasn't really feeling my "now give me a yellow, now give me a black" plan.

She did glue and pat-pat-pat my precut bee and (preassembled) flowers, and then sort of helped with pipecleaners.

When it was all done, I asked her "Do you want me to write "B is for Bumble Bee?" and she said, "No, Peeper!" and grabbed the black crayon from me.

I must admit that my first thought was "Oh no! She's going to scribble all over my picture!"

Yeah, I'm working on that.

Monday
Another No Time for Flashcards-inspired craft - this time a lowercase b, made out of bananas. We painted the bananas this evening and cut them out and assembled the b on Tuesday. The original craft called for freehanding a couple of bananas, but I knew that wasn't going to go well, so I found some clip art and squished it around in photoshop to get the right shapes.

Look, Ma! My first printable!

Tuesday
On Tuesday, I really didn't have anything specific planned, but we did end up painting with some bright colors. Including on her body.

Wednesday
This evening, we spent way too much time bake brownie bites for our big MOMS Club charity yard sale.

When Peeper helps me cook, she mostly just grabs handsful of ingredients out of the bowl and shoves them in her mouth (flour, cocoa, yummy things like that) but I also tell her everything that I'm doing, and talk about the measurements and let her "help" me with measuring and pouring and mixing. And cracking eggs. She really likes that.

Thursday

More baking. This time it was banana bites.

Friday & Saturday

I suppose I'll claim that "B is for benefit" because these two days were mostly about preparing for and then helping with the yard sale. We raise a little over $1000 for a local family who has two seriously ill children.

So, that's a great lesson for Peeper, right there. Without going into specifics about the kids illness (they both have a hereditary disease; one is not expected to survive), I explained that we were selling things to get money for "a family with two sick kids, who have to pay the doctors a lot of money, and have to pay for a lot of other things, so they need help."

In addition to the more "formal" activities above, at some point this week, we played with bubbles, balls, blocks and babies and also took a few baths. We also did some "matching" with her "puffies" (pipecleaners) and played with letters and numbers, and did lots and lots and lots of reading, as usual. 

I tried to remember to point out B words when we came across them.

I'm not totally sure she's "getting it" though. At first, I was impressed because every time we asked her "What does b____ start with?" she would say "B!"

Then, to check, I asked her what a not-B word starts with, and she still said "B." Evidently, she'd caught on that it's "B Week."

Also, she was sounding them out thusly: "Ah - ah - ah - B!"

Hmmmm. Maybe a bit of work yet to do here.