Tag: penguins

Little Passports: Antarctica

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Travis’s package this month from Little Passports was a bit different, in that it featured a whole continent (Antarctica!) instead of a country. We knew we were in for an icy good time.

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Needless to say, this one was easy to spot on the map! The booklet included information on the southern lights, Edward Shackleton’s failed venture to the South Pole, and more, making for a nice mix of STEM and historical information. All of the activities were at the right skill level for my 6 year old.

Souvenir:

It’s not Antarctica without penguins, and that’s precisely what the kit included: a little stuffed penguin that immediately needed to be hugged and cuddled. Little sister Veronika was smitten, too!

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Further Activities:

Unfortunately, there weren’t any other suggested activities, either online or in the booklet. So we decided to make a cute sensory tray for plastic penguins and orca whales with salt and ice.

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I thought it might be fun to “learn” more about Antarctica through penguin movies, too, though given the choice of Happy Feet and Penguins of Madagascar, it’s unclear how much learning happened. Still, rain outside was a good excuse for a cozy movie day!

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Recipe:

Finally, we ate just like explorers, thanks to the provided recipe for Sledging (sledding) Biscuits.

Sledging Biscuit (2)Ingredients:

  • 1 cup flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 tablespoons Earth Balance butter
  • 1/4 cup cold water
  1. Combine the flour, baking soda, and salt in a bowl. Add the butter and use your fingers to mix until the mixture is like coarse crumbs.
  2. Slowly add the cold water, then knead with your hands until the dough comes together. It’s soft and springy, and wonderfully workable!
  3. Roll the dough out into a 1/4-inch thick rectangle, then cut into 6 smaller pieces. Place on a baking sheet and prick each cracker several times with a fork. Bake at 375 degrees F for 15 minutes.

You can serve these plain, but the kids loved them with extra Earth Balance butter on top! To finish our make-believe trek as arctic explorers, we noshed on some vegan jerky with the biscuits, too.

Dance Like a Penguin

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If a cold winter day means your kids have extra energy to burn in the house, chances are you need some movement play. To wit, today we invented this arctic animal dancing game!

Veronika has a toy penguin that she currently loves, so I’ve been showing her how to “waddle” like a penguin. The silly movement is always good fun for toddlers. And heck, it’s fun and silly for moms and dads, too.

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Then it was just a matter of cranking up the music and doing our best waddle along to the tunes!

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Veronika, of course, didn’t always stick with a waddle, but that didn’t matter now that she was getting in her movement play. Soon she was marching or twirling or knee-high stepping to the beat.

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She loved making her little penguin bounce along, too!

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This gave us the idea to think of how other winter animals would move to the beat. Could we lumber along like a polar bear? Clap like a seal? Jump like an arctic hare?

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No matter what we were pretending to be, there were big smiles and lots of movement.

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Egg Carton Penguins

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We don’t buy eggs, but I do confess that egg cartons from my in-laws’ house make for fantastic up-cycled crafts. We got the idea to make these cute figures after a feature on penguins in our first issue of Ranger Rick Jr. We quickly decided we needed some adorable toy penguins around the house!

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Cut an egg carton into indiviaul compartments and paint with black tempera paint. Since the carton was originally pink Styrofoam, it took two coats of paint before we hid the color underneath.

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Next we made sure to gave them white bellies!

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I cut out orange hearts to be the feet and orange triangles to be the beaks from a sheet of orange felt, and Travis helped glue these on.

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Googly eyes were the finishing touch!

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Now we have adorable penguins to march around and bring our magazine story about the animals to life!

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Snow Crate

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Just in time for the first winter storm of the season, we received our snow-themed crate from Koala Crate. Travis enjoyed some projects more than others, but overall I found this crate to be nicely educational, a timely prompt for talking about weather and winter, and featuring a diversity of projects.

To my surprise, Travis was not interested in the first craft, a clay snowman to place inside a homemade “snow globe.” He normally loves clay, and the project was very toddler-friendly, with a plastic container instead of glass, paper confetti for the whirling snow, and convenient air-dry clay.

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But Travis insisted that I make the snowman, so I put the craft together while he played, including cardboard decorations pressed into the clay. He only briefly helped shake the provided confetti into the snow globe, after the snowman had dried overnight.

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But once complete, he loved shaking the globe to make our “snow” fall down.

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The second craft was a much bigger hit – ice painting! First we had to mix the paints, and Travis enjoyed using the provided spoon to measure powdered paint into molds. We let the paint freeze overnight.

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The next morning I laid out the provided “mess mat” and postcards, and Travis and I unmolded the paints – give them a few minutes to thaw or you’ll have trouble! Travis was intrigued with the way the paints popped in and out of the mold, and would re-cap each one in between uses.

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He scribbled a few paintings, liking the way the colors melted.

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I showed him examples of color mixing while we were at it – the red paint + blue paint = purple, for example.

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When the postcards dried, we had fun writing make-believe postcards… but you could also really send these to a friend or relative!

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The final craft was cute and silly – penguin bowling! We slipped the provided cardboard penguins into the provided stands to make “bowling pins.” Travis loved the stands… or is that a hat?

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He wasn’t as in to decorating them with the provided stickers and marker as I thought he would be; after a few scribbles, he lost interest.

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But since the stickers are reusable, I imagine he’ll have fun decking out his penguins down the line.

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Much more fun was using the small “snowball” to knock the penguins down!

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On further prompts from the kit, we also watched a video of the aurora borealis online, talked about igloos, and told silly snow jokes. Ready for my favorite?

Q: What do you call a snowman in the summer?

A: A puddle!

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Wishing you a winter full of happy snow days!

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Puppet Fun!

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There are dozens of ways to make puppets at home, many requiring only simple items you likely already have on hand. To wit, below are three kinds of puppets that we tried out this past week. Don’t forget to have a puppet show at the end!

Perhaps the easiest puppets ever, snip the fingers from rubber gloves, and let your child decorate with markers. Travis told me this was a girl and her smile!

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I added animal faces to a few of the other fingers to spark his imaginative play. He was equally delighted by the glove that I left intact, which became a puppet and toy all of its own, no decoration required!

Next, we made “walking finger puppets.” Draw the head and torso of people or animals on poster board, then cut two slits near the bottom big enough for your child’s fingers to fit through.

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The fingers become the “legs” to walk about. Travis was initially hesitant at this new idea, but once he got the hang of it, he loved walking his puppets everywhere.

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Finally, we made a paper bag penguin puppet (how’s that for alliteration!). I mostly put the craft together myself, but Travis and I discussed the shapes as I cut them out: white ovals for body and face, an orange triangle for the beak, orange rectangle strips for the hair, and two black triangles for the feet.

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Next, he helped glue on two googly eyes. Once the glue dried, we colored over the brown bag with black marker.

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Although he was least interested in the preparation of this puppet, it was far and away his favorite to play with. He loved “talking” with the penguin while it was on my hand, telling it stories and asking for more.

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I’d love to hear about any other easy puppets you’ve made at home in the comments!