How Does Your Infant Learn?

We love our infant program! Our infant team is incredibly dedicated and highly knowledgeable about infant and toddler development. An infant's first form of communication is by crying. When an infant cries, he/she is only communicating their needs and interests. Parents and caregivers are the infant's first teacher and it is vital that we do our best to provide opportunities for our infants to explore what's around him/her.  So how do we give opportunities to our infants so that they can explore? Our curriculum coordinator, Nicole Chisolm recommends spending lots of "face time" with your infant. Talk to your infant as you would to an older child or adult. By talking to your infant, you are promoting language.  Be sure to point out objects and people to your infant within your environment as this will help your infant to associate the object with the name.

Infants love to put objects in their mouth. This is commonly known as mouthing. Mouthing helps your infant to feed a need to better know the world around them. By mouthing, infants are able to determine textures, shapes, sounds, and tastes.

By providing your infant opportunities to see, hear, taste, and touch, you are helping your infant to build his/her motor development as well as social and emotional development.

Sensory Play Ideas for Toddlers

We are always looking for ways to encourage sensory play for our toddlers.  Our toddler teachers, Ms. Sue and Ms. Beth incorporated our toddlers' love and curiosity of animals into sensory play. These sensory bags are very clever and super simple to make for your toddler.


Here is what you are going to need:

• Your toddler's favorite tempera paint color! 
• Animals. The CCOA teachers used animal shaped erasers. You could also use small pictures of animals too!
• Ziploc bags
• Clear packing tape

The teachers poured in just enough paint to coat the Ziploc bag and tossed a few animals in.  They sealed the bag and taped the bag down on to the table.  The children loved touching and squishing the bags. Ms. Sue and Ms. Beth encouraged the children to find and identify the animals.  The children had so much fun with the sensory bags. What I loved most about this activity was that there was no mess to clean up.

Ms. Sue used a light blue hair gel and placed a few penguin erasers in the bag. The sensory bag resembled water and ice. Ms. Sue explained to the children that penguins live in a cold and icy environment and that it looked similar to the sensory bag. 

Homemade Bubble Bath

Bubble Bath Recipes

Children's bubble bath can be expensive and sometimes have ingredients that we are unsure of or just plain don't want on our baby's skin. Here are some recipes for natural bubble baths that are not too expensive to make. Check the list of ingredients used for allergies first!

Cherry Berry Bubble Bath
By Pioneer Thinking
Ingredients:

1/2 cup unscented shampoo
3/4 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt (regular table salt is fine)
15 drops cherry fragrance oil
Directions: Pour shampoo into a bowl and add water.
Stir gently until well mixed. Add salt, and stir until mixture thickens.
Add cherry fragrance and place in decorative bottle.

Lilac Bubble Bath
By Valerie Gladstone

Ingredients:

1 quart (4 cups) distilled water
1 cup unscented shampoo
4 ounces liquid glycerin (skin moisturizer)
5 drops lilac fragrant oil
2 ounces coconut oil
Directions: Mix together and store in a container.
Pour a tablespoon or more in running water for your bath.

Raspberry/Vanilla Bubble Bath
By timethief

Ingredients:

8 oz. unscented liquid soap
2 oz. distilled water
8 drops vanilla fragrance oil
6 drops raspberry fragrance oil
Directions: Mix all and pour into a container.
Pour a tablespoon or more in running water for your bath.

Love Potion Bubble Bath
By Abigail Beal
This bubble bath will put you in a romantic mood.
All of the ingredients are considered aphrodisiacs
– so look out! ;)

Ingredients:

6 drops jasmine oil
3 drops rose oil
3 drops vanilla oil
6 drops ylang ylang oil
1 quart of distilled water
1 bar of castille soap (4 oz. bar melted in microwave)
4 ounces liquid glycerin
Directions: Mix the water, soap and glycerin together and stir. Now add your essential oils to the mixture.



Ingredients

• Castille soap is used to soften and moisturize the skin, its made from 100% Olive Oil.  Liquid glycerin, a by-product of soap making, is another skin moisturizer. Also note that if you can’t find unscented shampoo, you can use a mild baby shampoo in its place.
• Coconut oil has a nutty and floral fragrance and almond oil is virtually unscented. Adding a half cup of either one to your bubble bath will soften your skin.
• Essential oils are stored in special cells, ducts, or glandular hairs that are distributed among the roots, leaves, bark, stems, and flowers of the plant. Some sort of an essential fragrance oil is one of the main ingredients in a homemade bubble bath.
• Some essential oils are relaxing and soothing. They include lavender, sandalwood, marjoram, frankincense, myrrh, rosewood and chamomile. They will help relaxing you and help you drop off to sleep. Other essential oils uplift and energize. They include peppermint, spearmint, eucalyptus and lemon oil. Some essential oils have therapeutic effects. For example, eucalyptus oil will break up congestion if you have a cold.

Strawberry Shortcake in a Jar

Strawberry Shortcake in a Jar

Keep your picnic treats away from the ants! This cute jar recipe travels well and looks adorable...can also be made gluten free with gluten free cake mix.

Strawberry Shortcake in a Jar

• 1 boxed Yellow Cake Mix, baked according to package directions
• 1 can vanilla frosting
• 1 (8 ounce) whipped topping
• 1 quart fresh strawberries mixed with 1/4 cup sugar

Crumble the yellow cake mix into large chunks. Press a small amount of the crumbled cake mix into the bottom of four small canning jars.  In a small bowl, mix together the frosting and whipped topping. Spoon a small amount on top of the cake layer. Spoon a few strawberries on top of the frosting layer, add another layer of cake, frosting, and strawberries.

Top each jar with a lid and ring. Store in the fridge up to 12 hours before serving.

Smoothie Recipes for Kids

Smoothies for Kids

We all know kiddos need those fruits and vegetables but sometimes convincing them that they do is an entirely different story.

Smoothies are a super way to get more veggies in your kids' diets simply because the sweetness of the fruit masks the taste of the veggies! Here are a few delicious and nutritious recipes to try at home!

Berry-Cado Smoothie
vegan, makes 2 servings

1 1/4 cups orange juice
1/2 avocado
3/4 cup frozen blueberries
1/2 cup frozen raspberries (or strawberries)
1 kiwi, peeled
1/2 – 1 banana, frozen pref’d
1/2 cup ice

garnish: avocado slice

Blend. Pour. Sip. Smile.

Easy Energy Almond Shake
vegan, serves 2

2 cups almond milk or soymilk, vanilla flavor or cow's milk
2 large frozen bananas, ripe
2 Tbsp almond butter
1/2 cup ice
1/4 tsp cinnamon
garnish: roasted almonds

Directions:

1. Place all ingredients in a high power blender. Blend on high until smooth and thick.

2. Pour into glasses and garnish with roasted almonds.

Green Smoothies

1 cup plain or vanilla almond milk (go with vanilla if you have more of a sweet tooth) or cow's milk
1-2 handfuls fresh spinach leaves
1/2 ripe frozen banana (if your banana is not frozen, add 2-3 ice cubes)
tiny bit of honey or agave, optional
1-2 tablespoons ground flaxmeal, optional

Combine ingredients in blender and blend for 1 minute.

Serve in a fun glass and enjoy.

Sunflower Playhouse

Sunflower Play House for Spring!

Spring is right around the corner and here is a neat project for backyard play that lasts all summer long! A sunflower playhouse can be an awesome, eco-friendly addition to any backyard!

Sunflower Playhouse:  

You will need:

Tall sunflowers seeds (the taller the better-read the package)

Morning Glory seeds (the taller the better)

Black plastic or mulching fabric (optional)

Mark out an area for your playhouse, square or rectangle

Plant a sunflower and morning glory seed together.  Leave an opening for a door.  Keep well watered.  Weed around your plants being careful to not pull up the new plants.  If you have some seeds that don’t come up, you can just put more seeds in that place.

As the plants grow the morning glories will climb up the sunflowers.  When they are reaching near the tops of the sunflowers, run a string back and forth from one side to the other and from corner to corner.  The morning glories will continue to grow along the strings and form a roof.

If you want a grassy floor in your playhouse you can choose an area on the lawn.  You will need to lay down strips of black plastic or fabric mulch around the perimeter of your playhouse so the grass doesn't over take the baby sunflower and morning glory plants.  Secure the plastic or mulch to the ground.  Plant directly into the plastic or mulch by cutting holes in it and plant your seeds in the dirt.

When everything is blooming and your playhouse is complete, you can put a small table and chairs in the playhouse for summer tea parties!

Handwashing for Healthy Kids!

Easiest Way to Stay Healthy This Winter!

With the worst flu season in ten years upon us, and cold and viruses around every corner, it seems like there is a new product on the market every few days that guarantees to keep you cold and flu free this season.

But, the easiest and simplest way to stay healthy is already, literally, in the palm of your hands.

Handwashing is the simplest and quickest way to rid your little one's bodies of all the germs they pick up at the playground, grocery store, preschool...the list goes on and on. And there actually is a process to proper handwashing that can be learned by even the smallest toddler. Adults counting to twenty while little guys scrub is also a quick learning moment too!