Category: 3-Year-Old

Tuna Boats

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There was a very cute recipe in our summer issue of Ranger Rick Jr., for a sandwich in the form of a sail boat. The recipe called for tuna salad, and happily there are multiple choices on the market for vegan tuna these days. Using a can of Loma Linda Blue fishless tuna, we were ready to set sail!

First we mixed up a batch of basic tuna salad: 1 can of vegan tuna, 1/4 cup Earth Balance mayonnaise, and 1 chopped celery stalk.

Divide the tuna salad evenly among 2 hot dog buns (or 1 sub roll cut in half).

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Cut carrot sticks that are about 5 inches tall and stand upright in the tuna salad. Tear off two leaves of romaine lettuce and poke two slits in each lettuce leaf; slide onto the sails.

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Sail away!

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Mini Pinatas

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Do your kids have extra energy to burn off at the end of a summer day? Whack out those summer crazies with homemade mini piñatas – no birthday party required!

To make the piñatas we first had fun decorating old party hats. Any cone-shaped vessel will work well, such as paper cups used for sno-cones in the summer.

Travis preferred using markers and playing with the leftover crepe paper.

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Meanwhile, I added strands of crepe paper around all the hats.

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Fill half of the cones with candy or other treats. Travis opted for Annie’s fruity bunnies!

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Originally I snipped the top off of the remaining cones, intending to thread a string through, but found it was easier to make a hole punch and tie the string through that.

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The next step is a bit tricky: Hot glue two cones together to make one piñata. It was hard to line the edges up exactly… but that said, the more tenuously your two halves hold together, the easier it will be for your tykes to break them open.

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Ideally, we would have hung these outside from a tree branch. But lacking a backyard, we tied them up inside.

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That didn’t stop Travis’s fun one bit. He loved having permission to swing with the baseball bat as hard as he could.

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Come out candy!

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Fun for everyone!

Wishing Well Game

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Kids love throwing pennies into wishing wells, as was evident when Travis and I recently visited a garden with fountains and he needed to use up every penny in my wallet before he was satisfied!

We took the fun home with this simple game. If you have a water table or empty sandbox, fill that with water for bigger fun! I filled a simple craft bin with a layer of water, and then added small plastic containers to be our targets.

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Before we could begin our wishing, we had to break open the piggy bank to sort out all the pennies – extra fun!

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Encourage your kids to stand back and aim at the containers (the water will make the containers float around a little, for moving target practice). Travis preferred standing right up close.

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But grown ups and bigger kids can take aim from far away. If your penny lands in the container, your wish comes true!

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Mini Blueberry Pies

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What is it about miniature foods that just makes them taste so much better? Kids will love getting hands-on with this mini pie recipe from High Five magazine.

We had to do an extra step since there aren’t any mini vegan graham cracker pie crusts on the market (that I know of). You could purchase the graham cracker crust from Wholly Wholesome and make one big blueberry pie, but that defeats the whole point, now doesn’t it?

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To make our crusts, we combined the following in a large bowl:

1 and 1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs (such as Kinnikinnick S’moreables)

1/3 cup sugar

6 tablespoons melted Earth Balance butter

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Press the mixture into muffin cups and bake at 375 degrees for 5 minutes, until set. Set aside.

To prepare the filling, we turned back to our High Five. First, we measured together the following:

1 teaspoon flour

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1 tablespoon fresh-squeezed orange juice

1 cup fresh blueberries

Squeezing the orange juice was especially fun!

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Spoon the blueberry filling over the crusts.

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To prepare the topping, combine the following:

2 tablespoons old-fashioned oats

2 tablespoons flour

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1 tablespoon melted Earth Balance butter

Sprinkle the topping evenly over the blueberry filling. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20 minutes. Let cool for about 10 minutes before serving.

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Scoop out your mini pies and transfer to plates to serve. Or – why not! – just dig in with a big spoon and have a snack right out of the pan!

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Frozen Grapes

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Are frozen grapes the perfect summer snack? Pretty much. But my preschooler found a way to make them even better – read on!

To prepare, slice purple grapes in half and place in zip-top plastic bags in the freezer for at least 1 hour.

Let stand for a few minutes at room temperature before serving, and then just enjoy!

When I told Travis that he would be having grapes that were as cold as a popsicle, he was initially disappointed to learn it wasn’t an actual grape popsicle. Before I even had time to spin the delicious summer treat, he suggested eating them straight out of a popsicle mold. Genius!

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Want even more summer fun with grapes? Try turning grapes into raisins by leaving them out on a hot patio in the sun.

Dinosaur Hat

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We’ve had so much fun with dinosaur projects lately that it was time to turn Travis into a dinosaur himself! Look for blank hats at the craft store, in whatever color your child prefers as the background. All you need is sheets of felt to complete the look. I recommend sticky-back felt for the easiest time putting this hat together, otherwise you’ll need to use hot glue or tacky glue.

First our dinosaur needed eyes. I cut two circles, as well as two smaller ones to be the irises.

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Next up was circles to make dots on the dinosaur’s head, two teardrop shapes for the nostrils, and fangs glued on to the brim.

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For the spikes, you’ll need to cut two pieces of felt for each size spike desired. Attach the pieces back to back, and then adhere the bottoms along the crown of the cap.

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Roar! What a ferocious dinosaur.

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Dinosaurs Were HOW Big?!

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We’ve been having dinosaur fun lately, which led to the question: How big were these giant reptiles, really? It’s hard for kids to have any sort of scale, since most dino toys are tot-sized. So we armed ourselves with a library book, yard stick, masking tape, and a marker, and set outside to find out.

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We started with a fairly mid-sized dinosaur, the Plateosaurus, who came in at a respectable 26 feet long. Already this was quite big!

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Next up was Stegosaurus, measuring a full 30 feet long. Travis couldn’t believe it and loved helping me press the tape down onto the sidewalk.

We added a Travis-sized piece of masking tape for a true comparison. Impressive!

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Now for the real mind-blower: Argentinosaurus was a whopping 100 feet. I was almost too tired to contemplate putting down that much tape. But we did it. Here’s Travis at the far end to show how big the dino was – look how far away he is!

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We labeled each piece of tape with the dinosaur’s name and size. Travis loved scribbling along his archaeological “notes” on the tape as well.

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Our neighbors thought we were adorable, and this was a blast!

Blowing in the Wind Experiment

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This activity is a great way to discover what’s happening right outside in your own backyard. Kids get messy and learn too? A double win.

You’ll need two to three pieces of thin cardboard for the experiment (pieces of old cereal boxes work well). The night before, I painted them yellow so that we’d be able to see anything that clung onto them better than against the brown.

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When I told Travis we were going to smear vaseline onto the cardboard, he couldn’t believe his luck. (For a non-petroleum option, try Alba). Goopy!

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I punched a hole in each piece of cardboard and we hung them around our grassy patio area. You can hang just one, or hang several in different sections of your yard if you want to note differences between the pieces.

Now we wait! As we waited, we wrote down guesses of what the wind might blow our way. Travis suggested paper airplanes, so I wrote down “paper” – not too far-fetched as paper from the mail kiosk sometimes blows our way on a very windy day.

After an hour or so, go check it out! Truthfully, we didn’t find much. The most we got was a bit of dirt and what might have been a tiny bug (oops!).

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But Travis proudly scribbled our “results.”

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Be a Play Dough Detective

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This is one of those neat ways to surprise your kids, a game you can set up while they are otherwise occupied, then greet them with a big mystery… Dinosaurs were in the house! But which ones?

I made circles from our play dough and flattened into discs. You’ll note that play dough colors don’t stay separate around this house!

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Next I took various examples of Travis’s toy dinosaurs – both little and big – and made tracks in the play dough. I called him over and exclaimed that we’d had a visit from dinosaurs!

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He was skeptical at first, but soon was peering eagerly with the magnifying glass I provided.

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Encourage your child to place the dinos over the separate play dough tracks and figure out who made which print; this turns the game into a neat puzzle.

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Travis loved pretending the dinosaurs were stuck and he was a real archaeologist having to cut them out.

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You can also flip the dinosaurs over and make prints of their backs and sides. This led to some interesting observations, like the bumps on ankylosaurs’ back.

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Then he loved the idea of making one big play dough surface that his dinos could stomp across. This went on for quite some time.

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If you don’t have plastic dinosaurs, any plastic bug or animal figurines would work great in this game.

Footprint Tec (3)One hour of a summer morning occupied? Mommy, for the win!

Summer Bucket List Part I

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Back in the fall, we embarked upon a bucket list of adventures before the season was through. It seemed only right to continue the tradition for the summer! Technically it’s not even summer yet, but this is meant to be more of a Memorial Day to Labor Day list. As with back in the fall, I’m posting the list now so you can follow along, and will post a follow-up once our adventures are complete.

I found a template in Parents magazine but adapted it slightly to include activities more suitable to Travis’s age and our local area. I typed the list up on the computer and printed in black and white so Travis could color in the various activities in bright colors.

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Stay tuned for a complete run-down of all our activities!