Monkey See, Monkey Do!

This week was filled with loads of new experiences for my little tot! Her enthusiasm for all the new things I present to her is heart warming and the best encouragement! I am finding too that a lot of what I am doing with Piper are things that Taitum can now attempt too! Not only is this nice in terms of reducing my planning time but I so love these times when they are learning side by side, sharing the same experiences and teaching one another! Often I watch them copy each others actions during a particular activity and the giggles and laughter that ensues makes me so glad they get to take this learning journey together!

While Piper was painting her rectangle this week, I decided to give Taitum another try with fingerpainting. Times before this mostly meant sitting and eating handfuls of paint! For this reason, I have hesitated from attempting this with her very often. But this time, I think she got it! She spread the paint around with her fingers and then seeing that her sister was using a paintbrush she insisted on using one too! Did she put the paint in her mouth? You bet! But at least there was more painting than eating going on this time around!

Later that day, Tait joined in with the shaving cream play.She enjoyed this as well! This was made obvious by the fact that she was covered in the stuff by the end of our playtime! Nothing a trip to the kitchen sink couldn't fix though! :)

Taitum played some hockey with Daddy and Piper...

Clothed herself in all kinds of winter gear from the winter dress up basket....

And played with playdough for the first time ever! She was majorly excited about this endevour! This was one morning when Piper was away so the babe and I had some wonderful one-on-one time. After reading a post at The Artful Parent: Playdough - With Tools or Without?, I decided to just give her the playdough to explore. This proved very successful! She squished her fingers in it, pulled it apart, flattened in with her hand and was overjoyed when I made her balls or 'worms'!

I later pulled out a heart shaped cookie cutter to show her but she was much more interested in putting little pieces of playdough in it than using it to cut out shapes! Oh how I love the ingenuity of this little girl!

Taitum and I have also been spending a lot of time doing puzzles like this one. Not only is she learning to put the pieces in the right spot but she has also been working on learning the animal sounds. She still insists that a dog says, "Meow!" but she will tell me what a cow, duck and sheep says! We've also been reading the book Moo, Baa, La La La! which both girls love and is a fun way to work on animal sounds!

Outdoors she watched us use the cookie cutters in the snow but wasn't very capable of manipulating them herself with her mittened hands! She watched and sucked on a hockey stick instead!

She was very pleased to sit and relax in her snowfort!

And was thrilled with this little slope in our driveway! The girls would take turns getting in the sled and I'd pull them down! It went pretty fast but these 2 seem to have need for speed!

The only problem was the turn taking. Taitum didn't see any need for Piper to have a turn and so would wail as she waited for Pipe to get done! This is the difficult part of learning but an important lesson! I stayed cheerful and kept repeating the words, "Piper's turn! Oh! Now its Tait's turn!"

Taitum's newest accomplishment this week was trying to get herself dressed when it was time to go outside! Obviously, she didn't quite succeed but the attempt was adorable nonetheless! If anything, I have to say the fact that she hears and understands what I ask of them and trys to obey is a huge success in itself! She is also responding when I ask them to clean up.  It amazes me what she is able to understand and do already!

This weeks challenge - Taitum now wants to do EVERYTHING that Piper is doing! You may have noticed from Piper's Preschool Corner post that there are 2 of each craft...Tait now recognizes when we are getting ready to do a craft and will not be left out! Yup, its definitely a bad case of 'monkey see, monkey do'! I really don't mind but this week it has meant scrambling to pull things together so she can join us! Also, it means a lot of assistance from me since, as I've said before, she wants to taste it all and some of these crafts are a bit too advanced for her age! I'm thinking I may have to come up with corresponding crafts for Tait that are a bit more toddler friendly so she can easily join us from now on!

Thats all for this week! Be sure and check out all the Tot School ideas from other parents out there by clicking on the button below!