Down on the Farm

Rachel here. So Reese has been showing that she needs more to keep her attention lately. She's all about magnets, her umbrella, sidewalk chalk, coloring, painting, etc. You can only run around the house with an umbrella for so long. The fact of the matter is... I'm getting bored. and I was hoping to broaden her horizons a little bit by adding some themes to our daily schedule. Our first adventure... Farm animals. She's been doing really well with learning farm animals and their sounds, so I figured this would be a great jumping off point for us.

Last night I copied a bunch of pictures of farm animals with the intention of gluing different things into each shape. We had cotton balls for our sheep, straw for our horse, feathers for our chicken, fake black fur for the cow's spots, and pink marshmallows for our pig. Here I am thinking this is a fantastic activity... Reese has never used glue before, so that's new... plus the animals... I'm a genius! Well about 2 seconds into the activity I learn Reese hates glue. HATES glue. HATES glue. She especially HATES glue when you pair it with cotton balls that tend to rip apart and stick to said glue all over her fingers. DRAMA! There were immediately tears. Did I let her stop? Nope... sadly I made her sit there and glue down every single cotton ball until the entire sheep was covered. She eventually simmered herself down a little bit, and ended up doing a great job.

She had no desire to put more than 3 or 4 feathers on her chicken. We didn't even attempt the straw on the horse. The cow received all of 4 spots. The big winner... the pig. She loved gluing the giant marshmallows to the pig. And then she realized she could eat the marshmallows and the gluing was over. :)

I thought I'd cut them all out and hang them in her playroom for a while. We're also working on a mural. I drew a big picture of a farm and tons of little farm animals. Reese is working on coloring the animals and hopefully we'll get that all put together with a little less drama. We had a couple of bumps... some frustrations... but I refuse to give up. What kind of kid doesn't like glue????? :)