Holiday Food Scavenger Hunt for Kids - service acts for kids

This Holiday season get the kids excited about giving with a Food Scavenger Hunt at the grocery store.  After finding all the items on the Holiday Food Scavenger Hunt donate them to your local food bank!  A fun way to get the kids involved in service acts. This is also great for multi-aged kids.

Pretend Play Medical Office with Printables

Excited to be working with b. toys to bring you this post.

Pretend play is not only fun but a great way for kids to learn about the world around them.  We recently got a new Wee Medical Kit from B. Toys (thanks B. Toys).  I knew exactly how I could put it to use for some  learning through play.  A pretend play medical office would be a great learning activity for the kids.  I set out to get them all setup for an afternoon of fun.

Sticky Paper Turkey Activity for Kids

We have been having lots of Halloween fun but now I am starting to think about the next holiday.  What better way to start thinking about Thanksgiving than with a Sticky Paper Turkey for the kids to decorate over and over again.  This easy activity was great for all 3 of my kids ages 2-6yr.  I love when they all can enjoy the same things.

Sand playdough recipe with construction play theme

Recently there has been a lot of sand playdough posts on pinterest... It looked like so much fun.  My 3 yr loves sand and playdough.  So this play recipe should be a hit with him.  I can not wait to see what he thinks about it.

10 Ways to Play With Stackadoos Blocks

Excited to work with B. Toys to bring you this post.

So, if you follow along with us here, you know we love B. Toys!  I recently set out to put together a list of activities just for their Stackadoos.  So many fun ways to play with just one toy.  I hope you can find an idea or two to also enjoy.

Halloween Sensory Noodles Play Activity

This is our first Halloween Sensory Play Activity.  We have not done a lot of Halloween play or crafts in the past.  My oldest is just now in preschool (2012).  Now that the kids are getting older I thought I would set them up a Halloween play activity.  Colored noodles can be so much fun.  We have done holiday themed noodles before and my boys loved them!  I decided to do them again with a Halloween twist.  Halloween Sensory Noodles Play Activity is what I came up with.

Halloween Count and Drop- fine motor and math for kids

My oldest 5.5yr has become very interested in counting everything! He seems to have a love for numbers.  While shopping a few weeks ago I bought some Halloween bat erasers for him. I set up a Count and Drop Activity for him.  This was also great for fine motor skills and hand eye coordination.

Letter H Hide and Seek Game and Craft for Kids

So exciting to be taking part in All Done Monkeys 31 Days of ABCs again this year.  Last year we chose the letter L for Legos.This year we chose the letter H.  I had no idea what I wanted to do at first.  Then the idea of a Letter H Hide and Seek Game came to mind.  We also did a simple Letter H craft.  Head over to the  Landing Page  for the series to see more information and keep up with all the posts shared for each letter!  I can not wait to see all the great ideas this year.

Create Fun Faces with Magna-Tiles

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone.

Have you heard about Targets new Toy Emporium online only! The Toy Emporium online is focused on quality toy brands available at Target. Visit the Target Toy Emporium (found only online) for details regarding specific brands and the six themes designed to engage children in these areas: Explore, Discover, Active, Imagine, Create, and Build. Some brands that are part of the emporium are available in-store, though there are many that are only available online. My kids already loved their toy department and I know they will love it even more now with the new additions. We could not wait to check out the new toys in the create and build section. This department now has the best brands for us to choose from.

Fine Motor Skills Toothpick Drop

My kids love to drop items in bottles and containers.  It is great for their fine motor skills and hand eye coordination.  There are so many fun and easy ways for them to do this.  While out shopping at a store little brother noticed these bright colored toothpicks and requested to bring one home.  My mind went quickly to what will he do with it?  Fine motor skills practice would be perfect for this. The other great thing was it was a dollar! So the toothpicks came home with us.

Invisible Sight Word Watercolor Paintings

I have done some simple review of Sight Words before with big brother.  I introduced him to sight words 2 summers ago to help him get used to the idea of them.  However, this year he has to learn a few each week at school.  I am brainstorming new ideas to help him learn them each week.  He is a hands on learner like I am so I am being challenged to find ways to help him learn his list each week.  Simply sitting down with him and going over an index card is not working for him.  He got really excited for this Invisible Sight Word Watercolor Painting.  This may be one sight word learning activity we try again. 

Tablecloth Painting ~ process art

My kids love paint.  They love paint even more when it is messy. One morning I set them up with a large invitation to paint. Tablecloth painting was a hit with both of my older boys!  This is a fun process art project for kids of multiple ages (my kids are 5.5yr and 3yr).  I can see us doing this again.

Humpty Dumpty "Egg"periment

Excited to be a part of Sugar Aunts Nursery Rhyme Series.  Make sure to head over to Sugar Aunts to see the list of all the wonderful ideas shared in this series.  We are posting at the end so many great ideas have already been shared.

Growing up I had one favorite must have comfort item and it was my Humpty Dumpty Pillow my Great Tia(or aunt) made for me.  I took that pillow everywhere and had to have it to sleep.  When invited to take part in this nursery rhyme series I did not have to think twice which rhythm we would focus on.  Humpty Dumpty is would be!  What better way to have fun with the kids then to try our own Humpty Dumpty "EGG"periment to test out gravity.  This was a big hit at my house.

The Color Orange Play Actvities for Kids

September is Hunger Awareness Month.  The color orange also represents hunger.  So this month we have gone orange to help raise awareness.  I enjoy teaching my kids to give to others.  Giving food donations to our local food pantry is something we do often.   Even if it is just a small bag of can goods it is still helping someone.  To that someone it is huge.  In honor of this month, I have compiled a list of ORANGE Play Activities for kids.  

Sunflower Scented Rice Invitation to Play

We made Sunflower Playdough in the spring and I had hoped to set up a few more activities for the kids with the same scent.  Time got away from me and we never got around to it.  However, this day was the day to make it happen.  I made them some Sunflower Scented Rice and set them up an invitation to play.  

Apple Scented Bubbles for Outside Fall Play

Be sure to head over to All Things Kids today to see my post on DIY Scented Bubbles and Bubble Wands!!!  It is part of ATK bloggers Fall Series this month.  Do not miss out on all the other fun post shared in the series!

                                                   

Q-Tip Shape Paintings

We did q-tip or cotton swab paintings a few years ago for Valentine's Day.  The kids really enjoyed it but we have yet to try it again.  No better time than now, right.  I decided to set them up with some Q-tip Shape Paintings.  A fun way to go over our shapes and have fun painting too.  The kids really enjoyed getting the q-tips out again.

Ramp Science for Kids and a Little Blast Giveaway

This post is brought to you by Little Blast but all opinions are 100% mine.

We were so excited to receive our Little Blast Science Kit in the mail! Little Blast, what is this you might ask?  Little Blast is a monthly themed science kit you can have sent directly to your house.  It is geared toward kids ages 3yr- 7yr. Everything you need for multiple experiments on one topic. Little Blast was founded by moms Jen and Victoria, a teacher and an engineer.  They love introducing their kids to simple science just as much as we do here on FSPDT.

This month's Little Blast Kit theme is all about RAMPS! We could not wait to dive in and see what fun we would have with our kit.

10 Language-Building Activities Kids Love

Super excited to have Katie and Stephanie here today to share with us.  I love this post and the views they share as  speech-language pathologists.  Thanks for sharing with us today! 


Hello, friends! We’re Katie of Let’s Grow Speech and Stephanie of Twodaloo, and we are so excited to be part of the 10 Things Kids Love Series here at Frogs & Snails & Puppy Dog Tails. As speech-language pathologists and mothers of young children, we are always thinking about ways to turn our kids’ activities into more language-rich experiences. We were thrilled to be able to put our heads together and come up with a list of 10 Language-Building Activities Kids Love just for you! We’ll each share our top five activities below along with how you can use easily use them to build speech and language skills at home.

 

DIY Sand and Rock Box

Several years ago we made a Rock Box- A Construction Theme Sensory Bin.  My oldest just loves playing in this rock box.  We had to put it up for a while when little brother was younger but he is now old enough to play in it too.  Baby brother has to be watched closely if he plays with the older boys.  We also turned our crabby sand box into a ball pit a few years ago because of the younger boys.  Since we are still using the sand box as a ball pit I wanted to make a smaller sand bin the older boys could play in now.  I decided to make them a Sand and Rock box for playtime.  It was a big hit with both my 5yr and 3yr.