On this day in 1882 the creator of Winne The Pooh, A. A. Milne, was born. Here’s what you could do to commemorate:

Read Pooh Bear stories at bedtime.

Make honey cakes - we are making some from Stephanie Alexander’s Kitchen Garden - Cooking with Kids.

Find a creek with a bridge and playing Pooh sticks.

Download and print out the Pooh Party info PDF and play games, make delicious smakerels (including honey cake) and entertain one and all with Pooh puppets.

And if you live in New York, why not pay the real Winnie the Pooh a visit at the New York Public Library?

Tags: special days, Winnie the Pooh

From the Australian Women’s Weekly. Published by ACP Magazines Ltd.

Kath here from whipup doing some Kiddley stuff.

I was really excited to see that this classic has been reprinted. The Best of Children’s Art & Crafts is a fabulous collection of craft activities for kids aged 2-8 - parents too. Step by step instructions designed to stimulate imagination and confidence assist with coordination, concentration and problem solving and to encourage experimentation. Good instructions with easy recipes and hints on cleaning up, excellent photos of real kids making these projects.

The projects themselves really range from fun, messy and sensory to the more complex creative projects. But the really good thing is that even the more difficult projects have different levels suitable for younger ones and the easy projects can be taken to higher levels if needed.

For example this finger painting recipe and instructions which is also available online on the women’s weekly website.

Some other projects that will be keeping our family busy during the upcoming holiday season include:
- fingerprint drawings (turning finger prints into animals, people and other characters)

- blot painting (fold a piece of paper in half, open in up and blob on some paint, then fold the paper back together and press it around, then open it to discover the painting)

- marbling (trays of water with coloured ink gently swirled around on the surface, lay a piece of paper on top and then lift it up again and see the marbled design)

- play dough printing (make shapes from playdough, press them into paint and then use them to make a design)

- printing from other objects such as leaves, fish and old kitchen utensils

- paper dyeing (using absorbant paper folded a few times, dip the corners into food colouring mixed with water and open it to see the design it makes)

- box sculptures (using tissue boxes, toilet paper rolls etc paint and glue and tape them together to make all sort of things)

- peg people and rock creatures (paint and decorated pegs and river stones to make fun creatures and characters)

- nature weaving (make a frame from sticks and string and then thread leaves and flowers in and out of the strings).

I think we should definitely make some slime and some goop for some messy outdoor play, and when it rains we will try our hand at leaf rubbings and some sock hand puppets. There are tons more ideas in here, most of which involve recycled materials or household objects and DIY materials such as making your own non toxic paints and glue. An excellent book with projects for years to come.

You can find Kathreen over at her glorious group blog whipup. Thanks Kath!

Tags: 5 7yrs, guest post, preschoolers, review, toddlers

At the moment we’re reading bits of the Moomintroll stories before bed, and they are quickly becoming family favourites. I thought I’d share some of the other books which have been bedtime reading hits with AJ over the last couple of years.

Shout Daisy Shout is a board book that we started reading to AJ when she was just 3 months old. She responded to the dramatic moments in the story right away and she still loved it well into her first year.

I Like It When by Mary Murphy is another really lovely book for very little ones; it’s got lots of repetition and bright pictures.

The Pear in the Pear Tree by Pamela Allen is a wonderful rhyming story about 2 kids trying to get a pear out of a pear tree. Plenty of Pamela Allen’s other books are available internationally, but this one only seems to be available in Australia and New Zealand.

The Milly-Molly-Mandy books by Joyce Lankester Brisley are from the 1920s and they are quaintly simple stories about a girl and her friends and the adventures they have in a country town. The copies of the books that we have are from the 1970s and feature adorable minimal illustrations.

Little Lit is a hip collection of stories edited by Art Spiegelman and featuring stories written and illustrated by the likes of Daniel Clowes and William Joyce. Little Lit has stories about witches, ogres and magic spells and is definitely for slightly older kids.

What are your favourites?

Tags: 5 7yrs, babies, comics, preschoolers, reading, review, toddlers

Kids in the Kitchen is a brand new title from the test kitchens of the Australian Women’s Weekly - which proudly purports to triple test all its recipes and has a fabulous reputation for producing trustworthy, no-nonsense food for ordinary homes for decades. The book is filled with immediately appealing recipes and tips designed for (older) kids to be able to navigate their way through single handedly.

AJ, who is way too young to read, let alone cook anything single handedly, very eagerly sat down at the kitchen table with this book and flicked through the pages with her handy stack of Post-it bookmarks finding oodles of things that she wanted me to help her create. It’s not surprising really, in a book of 175 pages, the sweet things start at page 96. The “Dessert” chapter is closely followed by the “Baking” chapter, followed by “Sweet Treats” and then lastly “Special Occasions” which includes an amazing looking Chocolate easter cake which AJ has marked with three bookmarks incase I miss it. The mouth watering photo shows a dense chocolate cake covered in thick chocolate icing, decorated generously with little chocolate eggs.

The book has lovely photography, clear, uncomplicated instructions and easy to gather ingredients. I am sure most kids will be able to find something here to entice them into the kitchen. This is not a great book for teaching kids about the joys of healthy eating (even the seemingly nutritious chicken noodle soup requires a sachet of chicken flavour), but one which can perhaps be brought out on one of those desperate rainy afternoons that seem to go on and on forever. While I endeavour to keep our waist-lines and sugar levels in check, I will continue to plot and plan for an occasion which requires white chocolate and honeycomb mousse, coconut truffles or the blackberry souffles.

Kids in the Kitchen is available online (including to international destinations) here, but seems to be available in most bookshops and large newsagents here in Australia.

** As a side note, I had a quick flick through the older AWW book Kids Cooking in the supermarket this morning and found that many of the recipes (and the accompanying photos) found in it have been republished in this newer book so tread carefully if you are thinking about purchasing this new one, and already own the older one.

Tags: cookbook, cooking, recipes

“We’re going on a bear hunt. We’re going to catch a big one. What a beautiful day! We’re not scared.”

One of the most fabulous children’s books we have is Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury’s “We’re Going on a Bear Hunt“. I know many children who become slightly obsessed with this book and need to have it read to them every night. Next time you take your toddlers or preschoolers to the zoo read this book to them before hand and then take along a note pad and pen and have a bear hunt through the zoo, listing the different bears that you come across. For slightly older children, talk about where the bears have come from, what they eat and how they live in the wild compared to how they are displayed at the zoo.

You might need to explore your local zoo’s website before hand to find out what species of bear you will find, or speak to a zoo keeper when you get there before setting out on you bear hunt.

Some other bear resources include:
Bear content from the Animal Planet website.
Bears.org has a list of species, bear myths, and further links.

Tags: 5 7yrs, bears, preschoolers, reading, toddlers, zoo

I was a huge fan of Ed Emberley’s drawing books when I was about 6 or 7. I would borrow them out from the library time and again and spend hours copying out the details of his step-by-step instructions. I recently rediscovered his books at a big chain store - 4 books compiled into one big compendium (a special printing for the store it seems as I can’t find them this way anywhere online) and I let AJ have a look. While they were probably slightly beyond her years she was entranced and produced a couple of liberal interpretations of her own.

Another fond childhood book memory I have is of a title called “Fingerprint Owls and Other Fantasies ” by Marjorie P. Katz published in 1972 which now seems to be well and truly out of print. It was a kind of grungy old black and white book with handwritten pages and a sloppy layout (extract below) but it was so inspiring when it came to creating images with fingerprints when we were small.

When I discovered that Ed Emberley had released his own version of a drawing with fingerprints book I couldn’t think of anything more engaging so I ordered it straight away.

Fingerprint Drawing Book is quite charming, far more sophisticated in it’s production than Marjorie P Katz’s, and has very easy to follow step-by-step instructions which Emberley does so well. We had a little experiment with finger printing last week which turned out to be pretty much disastrous due to our materials. Emberley suggests finding some non-toxic, water based ink-pads which we really should have heeded before heading into the deep end with waterproof inks. Yesterday I went out and invested in some slightly more expensive craft ink pads which not only come in beautiful colours in loads of shades, but seemed to have washed off after 24 hours. Emberley also has suggestions for experimenting with making your own inks using food colouring, poster paint or watercolour and cloth or paper towel.

While the book will be great fun for an older child (5+) for a 3.5 year old I would say it has limited appeal. She made one frog (above) and then spun off into freeform fingerprint expression. This was perfectly ok with me, as I do sometimes worry that the Emberley books are way too prescriptive for kids, limiting their own creative expression etc. etc., but as a springboard for building confidence, skills and ideas you couldn’t ask for anything more. If a child can take away the lasting impression that it’s actually very easy to create an expressive face or a funny camel or a complicated transit system with a few simple techniques then these books are totally invaluable. Hopefully they will go forth and create even more amazing things, or if not they are sure to have loads of fun and find great satisfaction in the meantime. The last message in Emberley’s book is about creating “something very special” and unique. He encourages his readers not to worry if the images they produce is not exactly as they appear in the book - “Much has been left to explore and discover”.

Tags: 11yrs+, 5 7yrs, 8 10yrs, Ed Emberley, fingerprints, ink pads, recommendations, review

The Independant online has published the “The Ten Best: Books to read aloud” compiled by children’s author Jacqueline Wilson. This is a list based on her personal childhood favourites and the books which she enjoyed reading most to her own daughter - which might explain why almost all ten books have female protagonists and related themes. Perhaps I should have titled this post: “a good, girly read.” as Wilson describes one of her selection. However, it’s a good list, but one which I think lacks a little in gender balance and might not suit every family.

For our family it’s a list I will print off and keep - Several of my all-time favourites have made the list including Bread and Jam for Frances by Russell Hoban and Five Children and It by Edith Nesbit. Where The Wild Things Are is an obvious choice and one we relish reading when AJ chooses it for story time (and looky! A boy!). I also want to make sure we get a copy of Nancy and Plum by B Macdonald which sounds exciting for 6 years plus - “It’s a story about two sisters who run away from an orphanage and for young girls, it has everything going for it. There are wonderful descriptions of clothes, dolls and girls’ friendships and an adventure.”
(via Read Alert)

Tags: links, lists, reading