Almost Weekly Science and Crafts

Before the holiday weekend the kiddos opted to do some crafts and activities instead of a new science project. First up, Sharpie Tie Dye.

We used several patriotic colors and the kiddos drew "fireworks" on the front of their shirts. We stuck a piece of cardboard inside so the colors wouldn't run through. We quickly learned that lots of small dots work better than large colors splotches. I sprayed/dropped rubbing alcohol on them to make them bleed, and then ironed over with a cloth to help set the colors. F had so much blue on his that it did bleed a little, but not enough to blur the designs. I washed them once in warm water with vinegar to make sure they wouldn't bleed too much and the kids wore them almost immediately.

One of the things I loved as a kid was building forts out of blankets, sheets, and couch cushions. My mother frowned upon this practice, I think because we tore apart beds and couches to make the forts. FFM hasn't really gotten into the whole fort thing yet, so to spur his creative juices T and I put together a fort kit and gave it to him for his birthday. I made a medium sized drawstring fabric bag and put: 2 full + sheets, small clamps, clothespins, rope, stretchy rope, flashlights, and a string of LED lights. It took about 7.2 seconds for the kids to figure out what I was doing before they took over and I was relegated to reaching things too high for them.

View from outside, the light blue thing on the lower right is tunnel fort access.

 FFM hauled floor pillows from his bedroom and they read by flashlight and twinkly star light.

Addiction

It was just a matter of time.
FFM has become addicted to books. He hauls one around most places we go and finds a cozy corner to read everywhere. The coup  de gras came a couple of nights ago when we caught him waaaay after bedtime with a flashlight under the covers. My mother will appreciate the parenting irony, many a night I snuck a flashlight or insisted my closet light stay on do I could read late into the night. We compromised with a set amount of time to read in bed (with flashlight or book light) before final lights out. Last night I set his timer incorrectly and promptly forgot about it. A little after 9pm Travis walked by F's room and he was still reading away, struggling to keep his head up and his eyes open. We are one little guy,  I totally understand!

The Best Thing About Summer Reading

The best thing, sharing a book and a comfy chair with your best friend.

Cool Book Lists for Kids

I love books.  Our whole family loves books. We are certifiable bibliophiles.  One of my most favorite things about being a parent is sharing books with my child.  Now that he's reading on his own it's even more exciting, we read together, he reads to me, and now I catch him curled up in random places with a book of his own.  The back seat of our car is littered with paperback early readers and when he's not listening to a book on his headphones F reads a book to me or any other passenger in the car.

This is a habit I want to feed.  I have this longstanding underlying fear of running out of books.  If you are a reader you understand this.  You have to have a good backlog or you just don't feel right.  Now this stretches to my child and I want to make sure he's got plenty of books, too.  We're avid library patrons and many of the librarians know us both by name, even more by sight.  Sometimes, however, I get in a slump and can't think of any good books.  Right now we're in the space between picture books and chapter books and I'm navigating the waters of "readers" (early reader, middle reader, advanced reader etc) and there are so, so many of these books and a lot of them are just awful.

I found a few lists that have been inspiring.  They are all over the place, shoot the library is a great place to find booklists, but here are a few of my current favorites.  Please shout out your own favorites, I'd love to hear what you've found, too.

PBS Parents Bookfinder
A great search engine that allows you to type in age, theme, reader level, and keywords.

PBS Parents Best Books for Boys
OK, so you don't HAVE to be a boy to read these books but I've found that like clothes there are far more books aimed towards girls than boys once you hit a certain age.  This list breaks it down by reading level making searching for that novel for your nephew or picture book for you new grandson a piece 'o cake.

67 Books Every Geek Should Read to Their Kids Before Age 10
This list is so much fun. It was written by a Dad and I found it when F started choosing chapter books in lieu of pictures books at bedtime every night. Chapter books at bedtime created an interesting shift in our routine. Travis and I went from rushing through bedtime stories and secretly hoping the other would get picked, to hoping we'd get picked to do bedtime and secretly reading the chapters we'd missed when the other got to do the nightly read.  I admit I've had to pay some library fine so I could finish reading a book that Travis and F got to read.

Teacher's First 100 Best Books
Trying to remember those classic books you loved as a child? Nothing groundbreaking here, when you're in the mood for the oldies but goodies try this list.  The link above goes to the 1999 list which is neatly organized by age, if you are interested in the updated list from 2007 click HERE but be prepared to sift through as it's not organized into any categories.

Common Sense Media
I discovered Common Sense Media when F started school and got his own computer. I wanted to make sure he wasn't stumbling into unsafe or inappropriate places online and stumbled upon their website when doing research.  Their forte is age appropriateness of media - so if you're wondering how soon before you can crack out Harry Potter without scaring the pants off your kiddo, they'll give you some suggestions.

Oprah's Book List for Kids
I'm going to lay this out there, I'm not always a fan of Oprah's book choices.  But she makes them and sometimes they are very good books.  Mainstream with a hint of cultural awareness, this list is decent and includes our favorite early reader characters, Elephant and Piggie by Mo Willems.  It's a flash slideshow, so bring your patience.

Book Awards
Don't forget kids books win awards too!
Caldecott - Awarded to the artist of picture books
Geisel - Distinguished books for beginning readers
Children's Notable Books - Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) chooses the best of the best kid books