It’s been a frazzly couple of weeks around here. I wrote a post a couple of days ago that was a huge downer, and talked about how I couldn’t get motivated to do anything productive.
Luckily, I couldn’t even motivate myself to actually get that one posted. It really was a bummer.
Yep. The last couple weeks of school around here have been stressful, the house has been a mess, and tempers have been short. There’s not much that can be done about it other than trying to stay positive. SO, I thought it would be a better idea to share an activity that kept Charlie occupied for almost an hour and a half. I got all the dishes washed, and both the kitchen and living room cleaned. It was awesome.
I used a pair of scissors to punch out some holes in the bottom of an egg carton. And then I gave Charlie some marbles.
He totally dug it. He’d set all of the marbles on each hole, and then punch them through. Then he would get them out and do it all over again. And over and over and over. This is what we in the Mom business call a pretty huge success.
Then a couple marbles got loose. This is how we both discovered that our kitchen floor is uneven. Charlie loved watching the marbles roll to the end of the table. I decided to try to add another 15 or 20 minutes on to this and built a little retaining wall.
Once I could tell he was starting to get bored again, I went and grabbed his little race track thing. This added another 25 minutes onto this glorious, glorious playtime.
I’ve learned that playtime is more successful when elements are gradually entered into the equation. If I would have given him all of that stuff at once, he would have had fun for about 15 minutes and then started throwing marbles into the ceiling fan.
And with my luck the marble would have gotten knocked my direction and lodged next to my eardrum.
Also, quickly, I learned that finger painting only looks horrible and stressful. Charlie had a great time and the clean-up was surprisingly quick and easy. I just picked him up by the armpits and put him in the tub. Overall, I’d say it was quite the success.
How’s your week going? Stressful? Awesome? Do you have other awesome toddler ideas to share? Do you know of any toddler activities that come automatically with a chocolate bar and a foot rub?