Books - Baby's Favorites

The books my toddler likes sometimes surprises me. They are catchy in a certain way and that's why I am sure she likes them, but they are not always my favorites...although sometimes we both enjoy them equally.

Cleaning Activity

Sweeping / Mopping
Our toddler loves to help clean up. She wants to be the one to sweep and mop, which is kind of tricky. I have to quickly do the work first and tell her that she can have a turn when I finish. Then I give her the broom or mop. I have her stand on a dry towel when I hand her the mop so she doesn't slip on the wet floor.

Putting Clothes Away
When I put clothes away I try to get our toddler involved. I give her socks or something she can put away, then we walk into her room together and I show her where the items go that she is holding. I give her a lot of praise after she helps and she seems to really enjoy helping.

Washing
Sometimes when I'm cleaning up in the kitchen, I will hand our toddler a dry rag and ask her if she would like to wash something specific. She really enjoys helping out in this way.

Putting Dishes Away
Lately, I have been putting the silverware organizer on the door of our dish washer so that our toddler can unload the silverware and put it away easily. She isn't able to put the utensils in the right direction or even in the right spot within our organizer, but I let her unload the utensils the best that she can. Then I put the organizer back in our drawer and quickly move things around into the correct place. This has been fun for her. I unload the rest of the dishes.

Toys
I sing a song when we put toys away that goes "toys away, toys away, lets put all the toys away." Sometimes I'll sing another song that goes "clean up, clean up, everybody everywhere, clean up, cleanup, everybody do your share."

Kitchen Activity

I was really wanting a kitchen play area for our toddler, but we just don't have the space for it right now. So, one day I decided to get our some of our pots, pans and cooking utensils and let our toddler play with them in our front room. It was a lot of fun and I realized that we don't need to get a baby kitchen just yet.

Library

The library is great for a number of reasons.

1.) Books
This is the biggest reason we use the library. You can put up to 25 books on hold and we often have our limit maxed out. Our toddler loves books, but it's hard for them to sit still through reading time. So, I usually read to them while they eat lunch in their high chair.

2.) Summer Reading Program
For our toddler, we just had to read to them for 10 hours and they were able to go to a carnival at the end of the summer. There were other optional activities that we did to that allowed them to be eligible for winning other prizes.

3.) Story time
A volunteer will read and sing songs with the kids. They get to shake these musical toys for one of the songs. I like how it brings kids of certain ages together too.

4.) Discovery Room
There is a large room in the library that has toys and activities for kids to play. The theme changes. The theme for this summer was the "discovery/science" room theme. There was this water play area that was fun.

They also had a tent full of plastic balls and other play areas.

5.) Toys / Puppets
The libraries usually have puppets and other toys to play with inside in the main areas too.

Hair Curlers Activity

A few weeks ago our toddler dumped my hair curlers out onto the bathroom floor. I asked her if she could help me clean them up, and thats when I discovered that putting the hair curlers away was a fun game for her.

So, I started to use it as an infrequent activity to sharpen her fine motor skills.