Every Day Begins New

Practical Life work at home, helping around the house, preparing a snack or pouring a drink is something that my children just love. My daughter (4.5 years) at this stage loves to cook and bake with me or help me to prepare meals or work in the garden the most, whereas my son (2.5 years) loves to prepare his own snack, hang washing on the line, do window washing and help to wash dishes as well as watering our plants and checking the mail box each day. It has been so beautiful to watch my children’s interests change and Independence grow.

Our at home environment is set up for both of my children to prepare a healthy snack when they are hungry or a drink when they are thirsty. Although it hasn’t always been easy, especially when they were younger, I have tried my best to encourage and support independence in our home whatever way I can.

Funny enough citrus (lemon and lime) squeezing has been a favourite. Once my children have finished juicing the peels, I then use them to make citrus infused (citrus peel plus vinegar) all purpose spray. I will keep the peels in a glass jar (with a lid) of vinegar on my window sill for approx 2-4 weeks. I will then transfer a portion of it into a stainless steel spray bottle with a bit of water and use. I find the citrus helps hide the strong smell of vinegar. You can also use other citrus such as orange or mandarin peel. Lemon is my favourite. Spreading a home made dip onto some crackers. Those little glass jars are re-purposed jam jars that were part of a gift hamper. These jars are the same ones they they use in my son’s Montessori Toddler class. They keep approx four jars in the fridge for the children to use. Three of the jars contain a small amount of cream cheese and the other jar contains jam. We were lucky that all of the little glass jars and white sauce bowls and the melamine serving tray were given to us. It’s amazing what people want to get rid of when clearing out their kitchen (moving house).

I think it is so lovely to see siblings working together. Here my children wanted to make a fruit plate for themselves and a visitor. I did help prep the orange by removing the outer skin, but they did the rest. The blue container is an enamel compost bucket. I am never short of helpers when I need to hang washing on the line to dry. I am sure you can tell that I set up this for them to work beside me. I am hanging some large towels on the outdoors clothes line, but I set up a clothes airer for my daughter to use and our toddler’s clothes rack that my daughter also used so we can work together. My daughter likes to hang the children’s sized shorts, pants and socks etc. She is happy to hang up her items or her brothers as they are a manageable size. My toddler son can happily manage small handkerchiefs, face clothes or cloth napkins (serviettes) but struggles with larger items. He also still uses the pegs upside down, but I don’t correct him. My eldest did the same and she figured it out on her own.

Tomorrow I will write a post on some toddler matching work and puzzles.