{Sight Words~~Easter Egg Edition}

 

 I discovered a fun way to help my Kindergardener learn his sight words!  He loves to play with the plastic Easter eggs so I combined the eggs with his sight words.  I choose to focus on 6 words at a time and used 12 eggs so that each word appeared twice.  I cut small pieces of paper and wrote his words on them to put in each egg.  Ideally I would have liked to use 12 of the same color eggs bust since each package has only 2 of each color that would have made for a whole lot of extra eggs so I settled on 6 each of two different colors.  I placed the eggs in basket for Milo to choose eggs from and a basket for him to put them in when he correctly read the word in each egg.  If he missed the word it would go back in the egg and into my basket to try again.  Origionally I used the left over eggs from last year but my son is pretty sneaky.  If he missed a word and the egg went back into my basket he would pick it again right away remembering what the word was without even looking at the written word.  This is why I wanted all the same color eggs.  Using two colors I figured out that he would choose all the green eggs and then all the orange eggs so I made sure one set of each word was in the green eggs and one was in the orange eggs.  I felt this way he was learning the words more effectively rather than guessing at them.

 

When I feel he has mastered a word I remove that word from the eggs and add in another word from his list.  So far he has been learning and retaining at least one word a day.  The best part is this last week he achieved reading at grade level for the first time this year.  Quite an accomplishment for my guy, I am so proud of him!

sorry for the bad cell phone pic

{Bicycle Boy}

In Januray I made a reversable jacket as the last challange in the Sewing For Boys Sew Along.  I had planned on making matching pants and shirt it just took me longer than I expected.  I finally finished them!

 

The t-shirt is based on Rae's Flashback Skinny Tee with short sleeves.  I added a band of fabric across the shoulder seams which matches the jacket.  I saw this detail on a men's shirt and loved it.  Next time I will use a smaller print though.  I also freezer paper stenciled a large bicycle on the front of the shirt.

The pants are based on Dana's Kid Pants with a few modifications.  I added re-inforced knees, front pockets, back pockets and an adjustable waistband.  My fabric was about 3 inches too short to cut out the back pants pieces so I added an extra section to each back leg piece and I really like how it turned out.  I used a black denim from Jo-Ann's as well as a back checked cotton for the pocket linings and waistband facing.  The top-stitching was done in a medium gray and I added two gray snaps on the front of the waistband too. 

 I just love how the whole outfit turned out.  The pants and jacket are about a 4/5 and the shirt is a 5 so he has room to grow into them.  The pants are too long right now but by next fall they should be perfect.

{Bunny Tail}

A bunny costume for my imaginative kiddo.

 

 

Milo loves to pretend to be different characters and animals. As soon as Valentine's Day was over he was asking for his bunny ears. A few days later I did get them out for him, you can find the same ears at Target or Michael's. Sitting on my sewing table was a skein of yarn I used for decorating Christmas presents and knew it would make a fabulously fluffy bunny tail.

 

 

The yarn line is called Buttercup by Red Heart.  It comes in several baby colors.  I found it at Jo-Ann's and used a coupon to make it more cost effective for crafting.

 

Pom-poms are pretty easy to make, here's a tutorial for making pom-poms if you have never made one.  I made my pom-pom about 4 inches across.  If you use this same yarn I did you will need to find a stronger string to tie the center knot tightly.  Remember to leave the tails long so you can attach the mitten clip with a simple knot.

 

 

If one has a tail and ears, a bunny face t-shirt is a must!  I used a black fabric marker to draw a simple bunny face.  After the face was drawn a quick heat set with an iron and it was finished in about 5 minutes.

 

My little Easter Bunny is ready for some Easter Egg fun.  He loves to hide them for me to find, he's getting pretty creative with hiding spots too.  Only 4 more weeks before the big day...

 

 

Tip: make sure you remove the bunny tail from jeans before washing.  The original tail made it's way into the washing machine.  It ended up full of lint and the yarn matted a little bit.