So day three was chef day. We had a tasting time where we brought in various foods for the kids to taste, here are the responses to some of our foods:

Radishes: most children : Gross, crunchy; one 2 year old: * eats radish, takes radish off neighbor’s plate, licks plate, begins gnawing on plate*

Cucumbers: “My mom eats these, they are green”

Bread and butter pickles: “pickles shouldn’t be sweet, these are sweet though, can’t be pickles” ” MORE PICKLES, I LOVE PICKLES, *next hour begs for more pickles*”

Fresh Pear:”This is barely edible, its hard, crunchy with no taste, why did we eat this?” “this is an apple, are you sure its not an apple, its gotta be a green apple”

Pear preserves: “Its slimy, this is not the same as the other pear!” “Why is this orange? Pears aren’t orange”

Limes: “Can I have another *eats entire slice rind and all*” MORE

Lavender Earl Gray Tea: “this is unsweetened tea, where is the sugar?” “it looks like gross water”

Thank you future food critics.

Oh yeah you can add radishes and cucumbers to the list of things that make Kleenex boy cry….

Day 2 of theme week: Prince and princess…this is a dangerous one because I know if I was a parent this week my child would come in dressed as the singer Prince, unfortunately no parents share my sense of humor and there were just kids dressed in the traditional prince and princess outfits.

We had a little boy whose older sister decided he needed to dress up as well as he did not come in costume. So she went into our dress up and got a pink silk skirt and a purple cape.

Me: Awe you are dressed like such a royal prince

Boy: IM A PRINCESS

Me: well normally a princess is a girl and a prince is a boy. Why would you rather be a princess?

Boy: They get movies and I am prettier then them all. *Stands in front of large cardboard box he is converted into a castle to exclaim ” I AM the PRINCESS and I need a KING.”

Sometimes where I work we have themed weeks, we change up the room and center our activities around the theme. So here goes:

We decided that the large wooden loft area in our room needed a make over for the explorer themed first day of the week. We (my co teacher and I) taped bamboo beach mats all over the outside of the loft to make it have a “tree house” feeling.One of the mats covered an exit from the under part of the loft (no worries there was another exit that was the main exit, no trapping kids inside…) but we thought nothing of it.

Our first child of the day arrived yelling that THE SLIDE IS DIFFERENT! No surprise, children notice changes in a very loud manner. So we paid no mind and let the child start to explore the room. We look back about 10 minutes later to him leaded against the bamboo wall rubbing it up and down, so we initiate the conversation on how it feels different then it normally does and so on. I step away from a second to help another child but it seems that every time I turn around this child is trying to “sneak” a rub of the wall whether he is standing around the corner with only his hand showing running it up and down the wall, and at one point i even turned around to him licking and rubbing his face down the bamboo….I guess that’s one way to explore.

At another point in the day I hear sobbing from underneath the loft, as I walk toward the loft to see what inevitable problem I need to resolve a 4 year old child comes bursting through the bamboo covered door, busting through the mat to create a door way. I ask ” why did you bust through this way, there was an open door right behind you?” The child’s response ” oh….I thought I was trapped FOREVER, but I guess I see the door now” Me: “didn’t you get into the loft through that door?” Child: “Yes but I didn’t know I could go OUT that door too!” Me: Yes the door does work two ways” Child: *busts back through hole previously made but him, and exits out the existing door* IT DOES WORK BOTH WAYS!

Sorry for the lack of Friday post, rushed out of town after work so I hope this makes up for it. 

One of my two year olds was standing in the “comfy” corner just standing there when all of a sudden you see him sway, fall to his knee and then face first into a pillow. Being a concerned teacher I rushed over to see if he was ok, and low and behold he is laying there face in a pillow, butt in the air and is fast asleep. The fall did not even wake him up. Now THAT is a tired kid. 

The same child woke up in time to help my co teacher and I to attempt to build a patio chair….None of us are very handy and we try to use “household” items to teach basic and home skills. So we let the eager two year old pick up the screwdriver to help. He immediately poked himself in the forehead with it, threw it and said “YOUR FAULT, OW, NO HITTING”. Yeah you evil screwdriver, don’t be a bully. 

Moral of the stories: Sleep wins all wars, and screw drivers are bullies. 

Today I was arranging our snack counter, taking things out of their boxes and placing them in large ziploc bags for freshness and visual appeal for the kids. When I was doing this the kids were at free play and I was just kind of tossing the boxes to the side in a big pile so we could save them for a later project. I was also tossing the interior packaging bags onto the floor. This erupted into a day long project.

After explaining to about three children that the bags were not space helmets but rather really terrible things to put on our heads….

I see a two year old start to kind of play with the boxes, so I stepped back to watch this unfold.

*two year old is playing banging boxes together (because they can make noise with ANYTHING)*

*four year old joins him and puts the boxes on her hands* “THEY ARE ROBOT HANDS”

*five year old who feels the intense need to be in the action runs over and places the large goldfish box on her head*”I am a ROBOT… *runs immediately into the wall*

My co teacher and I help the kids to cover the boxes with brown paper and the key element, cut out eye holes in the large box. My co teacher dawned the costume and began playing with the kids. The kids named the robot “inside voice” because it seemed that the robot kept saying “inside voices please!”

And that is the birth of the inside voice robot.

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Today you get two wonderful stories:

*Five year old after discovering a girls toy at his BOY best friends house* Why do they even have this? OOOHH I bet his parents decided to have a girl.

Me: I don’t think they are getting a baby sister, his mom isn’t even pregnant

Him: Well they could just decide to have one

Me: If they decided to have a baby I’m sure that they wouldn’t be buying toys yet

Him: Why?

Me: it takes 9 months before you can have a baby

Him: What do you mean, why would it take them nine months to decide they want a baby, it might not take them that long.

Me: the baby has to grow in their mom’s tummy for 9 months from when you decide to have a baby, it isn’t really a choice

Him: oh, and what if it comes early?

Me: then its premature and might not be all healthy and grown enough

Him: oh I would send that back and decide to have another one and tell them to wait the whole nine months.

List of things that makes this baby cry:

• doors opening
• doors closing
• people entering the room
• people leaving the room
• not being allowed to chew on chairs
• food
• water
• milk
• not having food
• not having milk
• not having water
• not being allowed to throw water on the teachers
• people touching the toy he is playing with
• people not playing with him with his toy
• red things
• taking naps
• not taking naps
• other children crying
• windows
• other children

Things that do not make this baby cry:

• Kleenex boxes…………..