I’m going on two months of being home with Hudson, as I am sure most of you mamas are as well. Typically Hudson is in preschool from Monday – Thursday, so it’s felt like a lot of pressure to educate him while having him at home with us 24/7. I absolutely love getting this time to spend with my children, but I am not going to lie and also say it does not cause me a great deal of guilt and anxiety. I feel really guilty on days that we do not have tasks setup for Hudson, especially since he was doing so so much at school. I try to give myself grace, and realize that there is no possible way I can continue to work, take care of my newborn, and educate my 3-year-old, but we do try to do SOMETHING with Hudson each morning, whether it be setting up a craft, tracing, playing a board game, just something that involves us playing with him. We save the afternoon after naps for iPad games and screen time, so we can have time to cook dinner. The two big things we try to accomplish every day with Hudson are 1 craft or learning task and outdoor time, whether it just be in our backyard on the trampoline, for a walk around the block or on his scooter. We also try to read as many books as we can. Survival mode, amiright? I wanted to share some things I’ve picked up that we have been using a lot and loving during this time!
1. Doctors Kit: Hudson loves pretend play right now, and he gets so much use out of this kit!
2. Letter tracing activity book: I really love this book. It goes through every letter of the alphabet, and gives them space to trace both the Uppercase and lowercase letters. After that, it moves on to tracing words, which I think has helped Hudson to realize that letters eventually form words. On days he is not motivated to trace a specific letter, he will always be open to tracing a word that he likes, like boat or car!
3. Letters book: This book has gone a long way!! I am not sure why, but sometimes Hudson will boycott tracing in the activity book, but he is always open to working in this book! I think it is the novelty of writing in a book. haha. It comes with a marker that you can just wipe up, so you can get endless uses out of it. It really was such an amazing buy.
4. Magnetic Blocks: If you don’t own magnatiles yet, you’ve got to get on board. They offer endless entertainment, and the pieces aren’t SOOO small, so they aren’t a huge pain in the ass to clean up. I love storing them in a cute bin, and I leave it in a spot where he can easily grab them.
5. Color coding label dots: If you look on Pinterest, there’s endless ways to use these stickers. For us, I set up construction paper on a wall that spelled Hudson’s name, and drew the letters to his name on different colored labels. I had him match the letters on the labels to the ones on the wall. These are also great for color recognition if your child is a bit younger!
6. Translucent blocks: Hudson plays with these at school on a light box, and he mentioned that he liked the toy, so I picked these up along with a light box for him to play with.
7. Light box: This one is SO affordable, and great for so many different reasons. It’s wonderful for tracing, but also fun to play with the translucent toys above on!
