Toddler Coloring Pages - Part 2

Color, color, color kids sure love to color. Well, I know mine do!

Below are more links that will take you right to some great coloring pages of characters loved by many children.

• Coloring is an excellent and fun way for children to exercise their fine motor skills.
• Small children have better control with thick crayons.
• Never expect your child to color better than they can - everyone is different!
• Remember to always compliment your child on their artwork, even if it is just scribbles!
• Ask your child to describe the pictures they draw - this helps to build their imagination.
• When coloring with your child don't forget to color a bit out of the lines - By your coloring perfectly could discourage your child from wanting to color.

Print and color these great coloring pages found at www.nickjr.com and treehousetv.com:

Ni Hao Kai Lan Coloring Pages
Toopy & Binoo Coloring Pages
Max & Ruby Coloring Pages
Caillou Coloring Pages
Miss Spider's Coloring Pages
In the Night Garden Coloring Pages

Valentine/Spring Hand Flower

This is what my children had made for their Grandmother for Valentine's Day but it would also make for a nice Spring time craft.



Needed
Paper
Crayons, pencil crayons and/or markers
Scissors
Glue
Anything else you would like to add

Directions
I will discribe the way my kids and I made this but it can be made many different ways......

1. Take paper and trace out your child's hands. Depending on age the child can do this themselves. There are three kids in our family so we traced out both hand of each child once - making 6 hand traces.

2. Have children color their own hands that were traced. I had each child use one color for both the hands but different colors for each child.

3. After they are done coloring cut out each hand. Again, depending on age the child can do this themselves.

4. Glue hands together to make a flower. (see above picture)

5. draw out a stem with its leaves, color and cut

6. Glue flower to stem

7. Your flower is done unless you would like to add anything else to it. Seeing that my kids made this as a Valentine's gift they decided to use glitter glue to make a heart in the middle of it. (Red and Gold)

This is a fun family activity so enjoy and be creative!

In Spirit Of The Olympics

I don't know about you but I love the Winter Olympics!

Here is an activity for schools to have their students participate in. My daughter's school is doing this in spirit of the beloved winter games and I just had to share this idea....

The school she goes to is grades K-5 so what the school has asked is that each grade level freeze a block of colored water and bring in on a certain day. Block of ice can be made from an ice cream container or anything that size.

Now each of those grade levels has a certain color they are to freeze - Blue, Black, Red, Yellow and Green. My daughters grade color is Blue for the first ring in the Olympic rings.

You have probably already guessed what they are going to do with these blocks of ice by now.... Yes, they are going to make the olympic rings down in the lower field of the school yard.

Here are some pictures of the great job the kids did!!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Here are some great activities for the kids to keep them busy on Valentine's Day. Just click the link to take you to it:
Hearts Dominoes Game
Fix The Hearts
Valentine Crosswords
Valentine Word Search

Valentine Heart Message Tree

Here is a great Valentine craft from the Monday Moms:

Valentine Crafts Ideas

Here are some great Valentine crafts I found at Kaboose. Click the links to take you to the directions:

Paper Love Bug - What a cute little craft for ages 4 and up made with a toilet paper roll, paper and pipecleaners.

Stained Glass Heart - ages 3 and up with help from an adult.

Foam Heart Bear - States ages 5 and up but I think a 3 and 4 year old can do this with assistance......

Tissue Paper Carnations - Such a cute little flower project for ages 4 and up.

Pom Pom Valentine Critter - for ages 6 and up made with pom poms, foam hearts and wiggle eyes. Younger ages can do this with help from an adult.

1st Birthday Craft Ideas

Lets face it, most first year birthday parties consist of babies and adults. So chances are the kids at the party are not going to be doing much besides playing and drooling. We might as well make the party more exciting for the adult guests; so why not plan activities that involve them?

Here are a few great ideas that are wonderful keepsakes....

Collage
Make a collage of pictures of babies first year and leave it out for all the guests to sign and leave a personal message for the birthday boy/girl.

Mixture Picture
This one is a fun one - everyone will have a great laugh and so will the baby when you show the pictures to them at an older age!

• What you want to do is have all older guests sit at the table while you hold the birthday boy/girl so that everyone can see him/her.


• Make sure everyone has a pen and paper in front of them.


• Everyone is to draw a picture of the birthday girl/boy while you are timing them.


• After 30 seconds everyone is to stop and pass their picture to the person to their left.


• Now time them for another 30 seconds while they draw adding on to the picture they have now.


• After the 30 seconds is up get them to pass that picture to the person to their left.


• Repeat this until the birthday girl/boy doesn't want to be held anymore.

Picture The Future
Here is another great keepsake for the birthday boy/girl...

Have guests draw a picture of what they think the birthday girl/boy will look like when they are 18 years old.

Another variation to this would be to have all the guests write down answers to a few questions you ask about what they think the birthday boy/girl will be like in the future.

A few good questions would be:

• What will be their career?


• Will they get married?


• Will they have any children if so how many?


• What color will their hair be when they read this?


• Etc.....

make sure the guests put their names on the picture or sheet with questions and put all of them away as a time capsule that can not be opened until the birthday girl/boy turns 18.