Beautiful Monday!

We started off our Monday right, enjoying the beautiful weather, and greeting our friends! We sang songs and talked about our weekend! Jasper shared his "swimming fun" and jumped into the sandbox as if it was the pool! Annabelle shared piggy with us, and answered "yes" when asked if her and piggy had a nice weekend! :) alanna quickly found a hula hoop, and Teo chilled with dad, as they observed the clouds, birds, and objects in the sky! As more friends showed up, we started talkin about the weather and how nice and "cool" it is this morning, that they had to wear a light jacket! Alanna really liked having her jacket and hood on as she hula hooped! We had a quick "yo gabba gabba" dance party, before we had AM snack and circle time. We gobbled up our AM snack outside, as the weather was to perfect to not have a picnic then went in, to the rug to sit for circle time. Their attention was quickly drawn to their family collages. Everyone enjoyed pointing out their mommy and daddy and their friends mommy and daddy, we pointed out our "dogs", "cats" and they especially enjoyed pointing out themselves. Once everyone was clean and ready we headed back outside for exploration. Outside, The Pre-tots were exploring BIG Leaves, and our friends Teo, Ben, Wren, and Alanna all liked the sound the leaves made when they crunched and crinkled them.  We could tell most friends wanted to dance and jump up and down, so we busted into song! Jasper first, he showed off his jumping skills and had a blast running around the playground bouncing on everything, Joey, Teo, Paislie, Wren and Theo all took turns jumping and spinning around, they thought it was so funny to spin and fall to the ground! After we named all of our friends, including our Pre-tot friends, we decided it was time to clean up and transition inside, for hand wash, lunch, and nap. 

After nap, we started our normal routine of cuddles, books, milk, and sitting on the potty.  As we wrapped up post-nap routine we brought out a new gross motor material, a fun and colorful, tunnel! They had so much fun crawling through the tunnel, and even took turns so everyone could go! Jasper, Joey, Koichi, and Wren all had fun zooming through the tunnel, while Teo, Paislie, Theo, Alanna and Asher waited for the traffic to die down, and took their time crawling through. We started a clean-up, with Ben leading us in song and all sat down for some Potatoes and Steamed Carrots. Everyone gobbled them up, and asked nicely for "more please". We started another dance party, and dimmed the lights for some strobe light action, Wren and Annabelle each took turns holding the light and focusing on the colors.  We listened to all of Alanna's Mix before heading to different stations. Asher found the dramatic play vacuum, and was busy at work, moving the chairs and "vacuuming" under the tables :) such a great helper! Koichi, Wren, Ben, and Asher made their way to the construction area where they found a new material to use when building tracks and roads. They worked hard to put the pieces together and drive their cars on it. While Paislie, Alanna, and Teo took care of the dramatic play babies, making sure they were "asleep". We soon after started the process for outside, we put on shoes and sunblock. But before we made it out, we had a small visitor, a CRICKET! Koichi was the one to discover the cricket and screamed of both excitement and worry as the cricket jumped around him and Jasper, and that was all our friends needed to go on a Cricket chase in the classroom! Joey took lead and was quick to follow until the cricket jumped somewhere that noone could see nor reach. We bid our farewell to the cricket and made our way out. Everyone was very interested in the half pipe, a steel bucket, and the log. We propped the half pipe onto the log and bucket and they ended their Monday rolling balls, cars, and trucks down the pipe til it was time to go bye bye! What a great day to start the week! 

Love 
Dom and Jackie