This week on our Alphabet Advebtures we traveled through the letter “b” ! It’s kind of crazy how many of our normal activities line up with the letter of the week if you think about it!

For this week we focused on: birds, bugs, balls, and bears!

Fun fact- some of Logan’s favorite words to say start with the letter “b”- ball, bird, book, and Bodie.

During Alphabet Adventures, every week needs to include these things:

1. Craft

2. Food

3. Outing

4. Books/Activites

5. Sensory activity

I also decided that every week we are going to do a handprint craft that we will eventually turn into an “ABC” book!

Here is our two options for our second page of the book

Craft

For our art projects this week, we painted a box blue, made handprint butterfly & bird banner, painted a bird house, and made a bottle bubble blower!

Blue Box

Why did we paint a box blue you may ask….. well, why not?! We had an Amazon box, and all colors to Logan are “blue” right now. He is also very into painting at the moment. So I gave him a variety of different shades of blue, and let him go crazy.

With toddlers, art is more about the process than the outcome.

Butterfly & Bird Banner

I’m a sucker for any sort of handprint or footprint craft, as I’m sure most parents are. Their little hands and feet just grow so fast! For this project I just had Logan paint sheets of cardstock and then cut the butterflies out! For the birds, they are just extra practice birds for the alphabet book page. Then glued them on some twine.

It is important to showcase their artwork in your home (fridge, walls, etc) because it shows them that you take pride in their work! This in turn makes them feel pride in themselves. I can’t tell you how many times Logan has run into his playroom and seen some of his art on the wall and point to it and go “ ooooohhhhhh!!!!” Before shouting “dadaaaaa!!!!” And running off to make sure James comes and looks at it too for the millionth time.

Birdhouse

The bird house we painted turned out really well! I was surprised how quickly Logan took to painting an item instead of paper! This was his first “non paper” item he painted. He was a little confused at first but quickly got the hang of it!

Again, I just gave him a couple different colors to choose from and let him go crazy. I mainly offered the primary colors so he could subconsciously play with color mixing as well 😉 yay, learning!

Bottle Bubble Blower

Like many toddlers, Logan loves bubbles. We have a bubble maker in the bath that we lovingly call “Mr. Bubbles” that was the inspiration for this project. Took an old water bottle and cut the bottom off, attached a sock to the end, dipped it in soap and water and blow!

Pro tip- don’t let them suck in too much or they will eat bubbles. Ask Logan how they taste….

Food

Like many toddlers, Logan loves bananas. So this week, we made banana bread!

We try not to do added sugar in the food we give Logan, so I found a recipe that made banana bread with honey instead of normal sugar! But then I added chocolate chips because #balance.

Logan’s rating- 10/10. Took his first bite and immediately started doing a little happy dance. Tried to scrape crumbs off his plate to eat before asking for more

After this, we made some more bread for our sweet neighbor. This time we made zucchini bread!

Outing

Once again, the outing was one of my favorite parts of the week! Dad was home on a Monday so we took advantage and brought him along on our “b” outing!

We started by going to the park where Logan practiced his balancing! This was not part of the plan but it started with a “b” so we went with it!

I wanted to start off by going to one of our favorite bookstores. However Logan had other plans. He accidentally ripped a page in a library book so we had to take it in to the library to pay for it.

I have never had to pay for a library book before so I didn’t know what to expect. I was hoping we’d get the “thank you for being honest, we will let this one slide!” Or “it’s your first time, no worries!”

But instead we got, “ thank you so much for letting us know! That will be $16.95”

For a book that looked very well loved and about 30 years old.

I’m not complaining, you know how much we love the library, I was just surprised.

Anyways….. After buying that book I just decided to go to the library’s used book store to take a look around. Since it was Monday, they had just put out all the new books from the weekend and we scored!! I think we got 10 books, in almost new condition, for 6$! Done deal

Bookstore ✔️

On to the second part of our outing- the bakery for some baked goods & breakfast sandwiches! It’s hard to walk out of there without buying one of everything! Logan devoured it.

Bakery ✔️

We then went to Dicks Sporting Goods where Logan got to pick out a new ball!

Ball ✔️

Books/Activites

It’s crazy how many things actually start with the letter of the week when you actually pay attention and look for them!

For example, some things we did this week that had to do with the letter B that were not intentionally planned were: birdwatching on our new feeder, balancing at the park and on the balance beam during our first gymnastics class, playing in our ball pit , Bluey, basketball with dad, bubbles outside, baby lizards on moms Birkenstocks, bubble baths and our “bok boks” (chickens) just to name a few!

From the library this week we rented

• “Birds from Head to Tail”- Roderick
• “Birds”- World Book Inc.
• “Bear Snores On”-Wilson

Toy Rotation

Starting off with our magnetic board, I wanted to do something based off the book “Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?” So I made these magnets that we used this week to retell the story! I had an old copy of the book from when I was a kid, cut the pictures out, laminated them and attached a magnet sticker to the back.

Farm Bingo- target dollar spot. We definitely did not use this as a typical bingo game. We would take out one playing card and lay out a couple of different pieces and have Logan find one of the pieces to cover up the spots! So kind of like an “I spy” game.

Blocks- did you know Fischer Price now makes wooden toys! They’re so pretty. This block set came from them. I am a big block fan because they are open-ended toys!

Box- this lock box came from Logan’s grandparents. Pretty sure James used to play with it when he was little!

Bugs- these bugs came from Amazon and are real bugs (yuck) in resin. It came with a magnifying glass and Logan loved this!

James had a half day on Friday so I decided to set up a special surprise activity for him and Logan to do for “b” week! James is a big basketball fan, and Logan is slowly becoming one too, so this was a fitting activity for them. The hardest part was moving everything out of Logan’s play room!

This idea came together while Logan was napping. I’m trying to get better at being “ok” with last minute activities that are not “perfect”. When it comes down to it, Logan doesn’t care how aesthetically pleasing it is, or that I had to use two different color tape to make the court lines….. all he cared about was that he got to play basketball with dada!

Logan LOVED this activity! He was sprinting all over, happy screeching. then he proceeded to drop some threes and slam dunks. Logan definitely beat dada.

I left the tape under the carpet, so there will be a rematch in the future

Sensory Activity

Another win in the sensory bin department this week!

Sensory bin filler- beans

Bugs- Amazon

Sticks/rocks/leaves- outside

Bug catcher- Melissa and Doug

Planting pot- our garage

Scoops- from old sensory bins

Bug lab for kids- library

Bug Block- Costco

Backyard Bugs- Amazon