Biscuits and ducks!

Yesterday the children made some biscuits.  They used the electric mixer (with support!) to blend the ingredients together.  They made lots of lovely star-shaped biscuits to take home. 

This morning Chris took some of the children to the duck pond to feed the ducks and to check on the cygnets.  There were 2 of them there again today. 

Facebook page

We have just set up a facebook page so if anyone has facebook it would be great if you 'liked' the page!

Its: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Home-from-Home-Childminding/301520343194803#!/pages/Home-from-Home-Childminding/301520343194803?sk=wall

I have also added it to the link list on the right.

Thanks.

Its week 1 this week

Parents evening Tuesday

Just to let you all know that we have parents evening for William at 5.05pm on Tuesday this week, so please could you all try to be on time that day.  Thank you :)

Operation Christmas Child

We have decided to collect items to send a few shoe boxes for the above charity.  I have requested some leaflets from the charity which will hopefully be sent over the next few days.  It would  be fantastic if you would all donate some items for this worthwhile cause.  Please see the following link for what items to include: http://www.operationchristmaschild.org.uk/what-to-pack

More details to follow when we get it. 

Thanks very much. 

Week beginning 10th October is week 3

Apple crumble

The children made a delicious apple crumble today.  They peeled and chopped the apples, added a little bit of sugar and then cooked them until soft.  They then sprinkled crumble mixture on top and cooked the crumbles in the oven.  They had them with ice cream for pudding.  Yum!

Apples

We picked a lot of apples from our tree today.  We planted a pip when Charlotte and Alice were young and are now getting apples from the tree that grew.  There were some that were very high up, so Chris had to help!

We collected them all in the trolley.

Afterwards, Joel had the important job of counting them all.  There were 14!

Later this week we are going to peel and chop them and then make an apple pie or crumble.

Autumn leaves

We have been talking about the trees in our garden and the colours of the leaves.  We talked about how they change colour and then will eventually fall off.

We then made our own beautiful autumn pictures using sticky foam leaves.

This week is week 2 of our menu

Enjoy the weekend everyone!

Water play

We are making the most of this beautiful weather and have had the water in the garden this morning. 

Spare clothes

Please send spare clothes for your child that still fit them in case they do have to change into them.  :-)

Walk to the prom

We had a walk to the promenade this morning to have a look at the illuminations.  The children had a good run/walk alongside them, stopping to get a better look every now and then!

Safeguarding - next steps

Siobhan is on a 6 hour training course over 2 evenings this week - Tuesday and Thursday.  It will cover aspects of safeguarding children and detail what happens once social services become involved. 

This week is week 1 of our menu

Fairhaven Lake

We visited Fairhaven Lake today.  We took some bread to feed the ducks and we visited the RSPB centre, where we listened to different bird songs and saw lots of different sorts of birds.  We had a lovely walk around the lake before going out for lunch.

After lunch, we visited Pets at Home to look at all the animals.  We saw rabbits, guinea pigs, hamsters and lots of fish.  We bought some wild bird food and came home to feed the birds in our garden. 

Stammering awareness training

I am attending a course on Monday evening at the City Learning Centre which will provide information about stammering.  If anyone has any questions about this subject please don't hesitate to speak to me.

Week beginning 19th September is week 3

Sunflowers

The children painted some beautiful pictures of the sunflowers on our table.  We talked about the colours we would need and how to make the yellow darker and lighter. 

:-)

Elmer at our zoo!

The children made Elmers today, using coloured paper squares.  All of the Elmers are now on our zoo wall and look fantastic! 

After we'd finished, we read 'Elmer' together and all agreed that Elmer is a very colourful elephant!

~Don't they look great?

New play area

Over the bank holiday weekend we redesigned the play area, laying some more artificial grass and rearranging the play equipment. 

New sandpit area, with blackboards and mirrors

A more inviting surface on which to play



Chalking



The bark was getting very muddy even at this time of year (we're not even into autumn!) and it seemed to make the bottom of the garden really dank and dark.  We cut back some of the trees to let in more light (when I say 'we' I actually mean Chris ;) ) and covered most of the area with the fake grass.  The children seem to love the new surface and keep rolling on it! 

Giraffes and crocodiles

We made some more animals for our zoo wall today.  We painted them all one colour and then used our fingers to make darker splodges over the top.  They look great!

GCSEs

We are very proud of Alice who got her GCSE results today.  She got 9 A*s, 5 As (1 from last year) and 1 C.  :-)

this week

We went to Stanley Park on Monday and had lots of fun.

On Tuesday we went to Happy Mount Park in Morecambe.  It was great!




We rode on the tractors and played in the park



We got very wet and had fun in the splash area

We had a ride on the train

I will post some other photos on the private blog for you to have a look at :-)

Proud parent moment!

Just to let you know that Charlotte got her AS results today.  She got a C in general studies, a B in biology, an A in psychology and a double distinction star in Sports and Exercise Science Btec.  We are very proud of her :). 

Weaving butterflies and dragonflies

We have used some of the Tesco vouchers to purchase some butterflies and dragonflies which can be used for weaving.  The children have used coloured ribbon to create pretty patterns on the wings. 

There's a snake in my boots!

What we made today.........

Our 'Dear Zoo' display so far......

Holidays

Just to remind you, as if you didn't already know, that we are on holiday for 2 weeks after today. 

When we get back (August 8th) it will be week 3 of our menus. 

Happy holidays everyone xx

The Role of Language in Early Child Development

I have been emailed a report today, which details the links between language at 24 months, and readiness for school. 

I've only had a quick look as it's quite long-winded (!) but it seems quite interesting. 

The link is as follows:
https://www.education.gov.uk/publications/RSG/AllPublications/Page1/DFE-RR134

You then click the 'download' box on the left of the screen. 

Thank you so much for the bags!

Dolls house

Just a photo, taken this morning, to show you how well all of the children play together.  Such a lovely photo!

carrier bags or nappy sacks

Please could you send a couple of carrier bags with your child's belongings for artwork, dirty shoes, clothes etc etc.  Also, if your child wears nappies, please could you send either nappy sacks or carrier bags for disposal of nappies.  We keep running out of carrier bags so this would be a big help. 

Thank you :)

A couple of photos for you

Duck pond visit

See-saw.......

Holidays

Please remember that we finish on Friday for 2 weeks. 

Hope that, if you are on holiday too, you have a fantastic time! 

Its week 2 this week!

New website that may be of interest

http://foundationyears.org.uk/

I will also put it into our links on the right of the page. 

We are on week 1 of our menu this week.

Last week..........

We had lots of fun with the new water-play table.

Made some monkey faces out of paper plates, to start us off with our 'Dear Zoo' theme.

We coloured in some numbers which we then laminated and put outside on a washing line.

We had fun ordering the numbers.

We painted some butterflies which we laminated and stuck outside.  We also laminated some bird pictures to help us identify what birds we see in the garden.

We saw loads and loads of baby frogs at the duck pond and fed the swans and cygnets. 

It was Alice's prom on Friday night.  She looked lovely and she had a fantastic time!

This week.......

We had great fun with water!

Visited the new park near Moor Park swimming pool. 

Played with the zoo animals.

Enjoyed playing with the planks of wood, foam tubes and tools. 

Explored something special that William's grandad has made for us.  It includes a letter box, handles, switches, hooks and bolts. 

Hope you all have a lovely weekend - we'll see some of you at Adam's party on Sunday!