A few months before Brianna was born, I was in like UBER organization and schedule mode. I wanted to have EVERYTHING pulled together and perfect. I started my quest for things to do with toddlers.
Now I have to confess that I am NOT a good toddler mother. Why? Cuz I haven't gotten over my I-can't-deal-with-messes-and-my-fear-that-you-are-going-to-paint-on-the-walls-and-it-won't-come-off-and-we're-just-renting factor. Particularly with my two. One I can keep an eye on and work through things with and even stop before things get too out of control. HOWEVER, my two tend to gang up on me. I don't know if it's intentional or not (I read online that two-year-olds engage in parallel play, so them ganging up on me would be incredibly out of character for a typical two-year-old; and I'm going to ignore the fact that they do it all the time and even got my two-year-old niece to engage and play off of their antics while we were visiting her; yes, I'm going to ignore all of that because the "experts" say that they aren't aware of each other and are only interested in parallel play right now).
Anyway, I read on my friend's blogs that they have art time with their kids, and creativity time. And I am totally jealous of that and aspiring to be the BEST mommy with the BEST, most well-rounded kids out there. So I naturally have to figure out how to do this with MY kids, in spite of my fear of destructive messes (or even messes that take longer to clean up after five seconds of effort on my children's part than I may have to clean them in an entire day).
There are a few books I got in my quest: First Art, The Playskool Toddlers Busy Play Book, and the Toddlers Busy Book. I don't love the Playskool one, just FYI. But the other two have great ideas, some more or less age appropriate (or maybe just this parent appropriate) than others. But otherwise GREAT ideas. Particularly if you're trying to preschool your own children or do a preschool co-op with other moms. I'm excited for those days!!! Only two more years to go!!!
But to make a long story short, despite my best efforts, I really haven't done anything they suggested. Life got crazy. And even meal planning is NOT my forte right now, let alone activity time planning.
So between me being super mom and my current me, I did make a great purchase in the midst of all of this. I bought a two-sided easel on sale at Michaels, one for each of course because when you have twins you HAVE to have one for each - particularly when they hit the mine stage. It's called damage control, putting out fires before they start. And this particular easel has a chalkboard side and a dry-erase side. I found a 48-pack of Crayola colored chalk in the clearance aisle for $1.50. And my awesome mom, who knew about my quest to be the PERFECT mom and have art time with my kids, got my children an art bag for their birthday. In that bag, she included some washable dry-erase board crayons. WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT?!?!?!?!? They MUST have had two-year-old twins at some point.
I have gotten the chalk out quite a few times (what's easier to clean up than dust-it-off-and-go chalk?). We've used that as our starting point for teaching them to ONLY write on the chalkboard. Because THAT is where you color and draw with chalk. It has gone pretty well. We've had some short art times (because repeated drawing on other things - like walls and doors and your sister and skin - meant we had to stop for that day and try again to learn to listen and obey and JUST write on the chalkboard). And we've had some long art times. Mostly with Abby. Isaac seems to get bored with it - probably because it's too structured for him to JUST draw on the chalkboard? I don't know. But Abby LOVES to color!!!
And today I looked at my bored little man and got brave and pulled out the crayons. Abby LOVED them!!! I like them better than the chalk because the colors are more vibrant, so when we're working on identifying colors, there is more contrast and they can see the differences better. They don't come off of our dry-erase board very easily, meaning with lots of elbow grease and almost as long to clean it completely off as it took the kids to fill it up with color. But that's minimal, as long as they stick with the dry-erase board! Overall, though, I'm a fan!
And our easels have a clip with them, for clipping things on the easel. So my next venture, once we master listening and obeying with crayons, is to pull out the finger paint, spread some newspaper on the floor, clip on some paper, and let them go! But I think that will have to wait a while, not gonna lie!
7 years ago
4 comments:
Oh...BE BRAVE....BE VERY VERY BRAVE! lol
I'm with you here. I was SO hesitant to start crafts because even when Nelly is on her best behavior she makes a mess. I can't handle it. But overcoming that has been a blessing. Our latest venture has been homemade play dough. It's easier to clean out of the carpet. I don't mind if it dries or the colors mix (I always had anxiety about that with the store bought Play Doh). If someone eats a little, no biggie. And in a few months (or weeks) if it's all destroyed we can just make another batch. Nelly will play with the play dough for literally HOURS, especially if she can incorporate her play dishes. And most shocking to me, my 15-month-old Hammy will sit and play with it for 10-20 minutes at a time, too. I know it's not quite as craft, but it's my newest contained mess.
Melinda,
I have so many of those same fears. I hate messes, I just wish my kids would learn to take one toy at a time and remember to put it back before they get another one out. I wish that I was more involved with them but I have to be honest I rely on them playing with each other too much and use that time (which seems like almost all day) to get stuff done that I need to. I would like to have my girls in dance or singing. I would like to have craft time, cooking time, start them on chores, not have to still help them get dressed and have them going to the potty and wiping all by themselves but I don't. We do have nap time/ quiet time and I always read them three stories before it. We go to the library and I let them sit on the counter while I cook and sometimes they get to help. Everyone once in a while we do a craft (when I get brave or feel creative) but being the perfect mom is far from my reach and if I tried too hard I'll go insane and cause myself serious damage. Take it one day at a time. I think you are so great and will be and are the best mommy!
I completely understand. Cameron is old enough now that he does pretty good but I had a mini panic attack the other day when I realized the little craft kit I bought that I though came with markers actually came with paints. We tackled it though and had very little mess and I made it without too much stres :). Playdough is a big hit at my house and we make it ourselves. He will play with it for hours. Sidewalk chalk is also popular. Have you checked out the Color Wonder products by Crayola? They are mess-free because they are made to only work on certain paper, etc. They are pretty cool for entertainment when you can't hover over them every second.
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