Teaching your child about symmetry doesn’t need to be a daunting prospect.
I made this fun game for Hamish to help him understand the concept of symmetrical objects using a few hand drawn cards and a small mirror.
Hand drawn cards and mirror
How to make your symmetrical game
To make your own you will need:
Cardboard
Scissors
Markers
Small mirror
To make your own:
Cut your cardboard into several smaller cards.
Onto these cards draw half of an object that is symmetrical. Items like faces, flowers,bodies, animals, house, kite, etc work best.
How to play
Showing symmetry
Once your cards are drawn, show your child how to hold the card right next to the mirror and explain that the mirror will reflect the image, completing the other half of the symmetrical object.
Extended activities
Let them explore on their own with the cards and you can extend this activity by having your child point out other symmetrical objects in the home for you to draw.
You can also introduce a few asymmetrical objects to help to differentiate to your child how to telling an object is symmetrical or asymmetrical .
Using your cards containing both symmetrical and asymmetrical objects, let your child try each card and classify the objects accordingly.
This unicorn fine motor activity is easy to make, great as a quiet time activity and can be brought out on a rainy day to keep the kids entertained.
Unicorn
I’ve also added a few ideas on how to extend the activity for older children.
Make your unicorn
Some of our best moments of play are with ordinary home made games we make.
This morning I drew a unicorn on some old card, Hamish coloured the horn with crayon and then he exercised those fine motor and co-ordination skills as he decorated the unicorns mane with pegs.
Let your child use coloured pegs to create a fun unicorn mane
To make your own you will need:
Cardboard
Scissors
Black marker
Crayons,markers or paint
Colourful pegs
How to make your unicorn
To make your unicorn start by drawing a unicorn head shape onto a thick piece of card with the black marker. Add details like eyes, etc.
Cut your shape out.
Let your child colour the eyes, horn and ears with crayon, marker or if you prefer paint.
When the unicorn head has been coloured, give your child a small container with coloured pegs and show them how to peg them onto the unicorn shape to form a mane.
Hamish designing his unicorn mane
Extended activities
Another great way to use this would be to help your child learn to make patterns by pegging the coloured pegs into a colour sequence.
You could also number the pegs, label them with the alphabet or with your child’s name to enhance the activity for older children.
We spent yesterday doing some salt painting. This is a really easy activity and nice to use for several ages.
It also looks so pretty when the colour runs along the salt.
To make your own you need:
Paper
Glue
Salt
Water colours or food colouring
Method:
First draw your image onto the paper.
Next trace over the image with glue.
Pour salt over the glue.
Use the water colours ( be sure to wet them quite a lot) and drip the colour onto the salt. You should notice how the colour spreads making the salt look like coloured crystals.
Have you tried this activity ? Did your children enjoy it?
I would love to share your children’s beautiful artworks so tag me on social media with the hashtag #FMmakeitmonday
Pizza is a staple in our home and there are very few memorial occasions that do not include a slice or two.
In fact our wedding buffet was a pizza spread, that is how seriously we take our live of the delicious triangle slices.
Naturally
Hamish has developed a huge love of pizza and at around 18 months old he started to call sandwiches and toasted cheese slices his pizza.
One day I simply put tomato sauce and cheese on a piece of bread, popped it into the microwave and our own simple version of cheat pizza was born.
A supper for super stars
Recently, Hamish had his friend over for supper and asked for cheat supper for supper.
I paired their super star shaped cheat pizza with a cup of corn and dome yoghurt and banana for desert and just like that we had the perfect supper for 2 busy little boys.
Normally I would top the bread with any extras, just as I would pizza crust and some of Hamish’s favourites include :
Ham
Bacon
Vienna sausages sliced
Chicken
Peppers
Pineapple
Mushrooms sliced
Tomatoes
Feta
To make you own you need:
Bread
Tomato sauce
Toppings ( from the list above)
Cheese
How to make your cheat pizza in 3 steps
Step 1
Cut your bread into the desired shape using a cookie cutter
Step 2
Smear with tomato sauce and add toppings. Cover in cheese.
Step 3
Place in microwave on high for 1-2 minutes, depending on how many slices and how many toppings you have added.
Note
Always precooked any meat you want to add onto the pizza, as the microwave will heat most of the ingredients and not cook them thoroughly.
This is also a great recipe for kids to make themselves.
As a mom I am always buying frozen fries but I do worry about how healthy it is to constantly feed Hamish potatoes fries at almost every meal.
Now, with the new McCain rosemary and garlic sweet potato fries I can not only add a little variety to his love of fries with anything, but I also feel he is getting a healthier, more balanced diet by eating them.
To try them out, I made him a sunny plate of fries with his chicken pops.
To make your own:
You will need:
Rosemary and garlic sweet potato fries from McCain. These cook from frozen so simply open your packet and remove as many as you need
Olive oil
Chicken pops
Tomato sauce
Method:
Heat the olive oil in a frying pan on high
Add your McCain’s rosemary and garlic sweet potato fries . Fry until crispy
Drain on a piece of kitchen towel
Whilst these drain fry your chicken pops
Remove from heat once cooked.
Place the chicken pops in a circle.
Fill the inner circle with tomato sauce.
Use your fries to form sun Ray’s around the chicken pops.
These rosemary and garlic sweet potato fries are delicious with any meal and have become one of my favourite go to sides.
The last few weeks I’ve been using the new McCain products to deliver some yummolicious sides to our meals.
Have you tried any of them?
There are diced potatoes, diced beetroot and rosemary and garlic sweet potato fries.
My favourite has to be the diced beetroot.
Christmas gifts of love
Today I decided to share the love by whipping up some early gifts for our family for Christmas….I made and bottled my first ever pickled beetroot.
Ea h year my grandmother always made sure we had several bottles of pickled beetroot over the Christmas period and I have always envied her ability to pickle anything.
Whilst I’ve made pickles before the preparation in peeling and cutting the beetroot has put me off ever attempting to make my own.
McCain diced beetroot is already cleaned, skinned and diced therefore taking much of the preparation time away and honestly this left me less intimidated to try a new recipe.
I’m also excited to gift some of my favourite products to some of my favourite people this year. ( Any guess what my family are recueving this year?)
All they need are some lables and ribbons on the jar.
To make your own :
You need :
1 bag of McCain diced beetroot
Half a cup of white vinegar
Half a cup of white sugar
2 Bay leaves
Peppercorns
Method:
Bring your McCain’s diced beetroot to boil straight from the freezer for 10 minutes in a pot of water. They need to still be tender when you remove them from the heat.
In a separate pot pour in your vinegar, sugar, bay leaves and pepper corns and bring to boil.
Remove from heat.
Wash the jars you are going to use and microwave on high for 5 minutes to sterilize your jars.
Scoop your cooked beetroot into the jar, three quarter full.
Now pour the vinegar to cover the beetroot.
Fasten the lid tightly and leave to cool completely before placing in the freezer.
If your beetroot is stored in a cupboard it can last 12 to 18 months and if opened in the fridge will keep for 1 -3 months. ( not that ours ever lasts that long)
Method:
