DIY - Truffula Trees- Dr. Seuss The Lorax

FUN WITH BOOKS

DIY -Truffula Trees - From Dr. Seuss The Lorax 

Dr. Seuss was Born on March 2, 1904- and since it is March- and almost Spring- we decided to celebrate both by reading one of our favorite books and make a special craft- I got the idea from Vanessa over at Tot School Tuesday. They were so cute! We added our own touches here and there as we went along, and also made a little forest with the Barbaloot bears too! 

We of course Read the Book - The Lorax , talked about trees and how they are important. How God created trees to help us breathe clean air... etc. Then we talked about the Quote from the book and what it means and how it related to the story and how we can relate it to Jesus and God- and how God loved soooo much, a whole awful lot to send Jesus, his only Son- to save us! I also tried to teach them, (the best that I could on a 4 and 1 year old level) how if we are passionate about something- and want a change, it only takes 1 person, and that we may be that 1 God calls to make a difference, so we should always be listening to our heart...(spirit) for what God is calling us to do.

  

Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. 

Cowboy also watched the youtube of the short film the Lorax from 1972. Its only about 25 minutes :P You can see it HERE.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN TRUFFULA TREES CRAFT

We Used:

Craft Pom Poms

Pipe Cleaners

Hot Glue Gun

Heart Beads

Pony Beads

Colored Smoothie Straws

Foam-Paper

Styrofoam 

Before we started, I hot glued the pom poms on to Colored Straws and Pipe Cleaners for the little ones to avoid any burns or messes :P 

I simply took out our Box of Pony Beads and they started pushing the beads right on :) I just knew it would be a little hard for Butter to do it - BUT WOW- he totally shocked me by using those Fine Motor Skills and doing just as good as the Big Kids!! He did not need me to help him, nor did he want me to ! He was Mr. Independent. He did a great job and had a blast doing it! 

Lou and I did the Straws because they were a little harder. Depending on the size of your beads, and or straws, you will need to bend them in the middle to get the beads to go on. 

Butter was so proud of himself and felt SOOO Big like his Brother and Sister ! 

Such Concentration.... 

Cowboy shouted, " Look Mommy, I doin a pattern, which it looks like he started too... but...who cares right?!?! I said, Oh WOW!! Look at you! Such a Smart boy to do a pattern all by yourself! 

They all did such a great job working together, and helping one another. I would almost venture to rename them PEACE trees :P It was an excellent activity to do with them for so many reasons, but my favorite was how QUIET it was as they worked... AHHH....

The Finished Product ! ! Aren't they so pretty!! 

We used foam paper glued on top of a piece of Styrofoam for the grass. We cut little tiny holes in the foam paper so that the pipe cleaners and straws would go in easily. We used a few small brown pom poms to represent the Barbaloot Bears scattered about, and an orange one to represent the Lorax in the Forrest. 

Then, so that they could be like a homemade playset- we stuck them in some plastic totes Blue to represent the sky, and green for the bottom for grass :P 

Very Fun and Easy DIY Project! The kids really enjoyed this family activity !! 

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S is for SuperHero- Tot School

Tot School- Cowboy is Currently 47.5 Months Old 

LETTER S- IS FOR SUPERHERO!!

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This blog does include affiliate links. Which means, if you click on certain links on my site, it will bring you to the site showing you where you can purchase the item. If you choose to purchase I do make a VERY small commission, which is greatly appreciated.  Please do not feel obligated to purchase anything. I just want my readers to have easy reference to the tools that I use. I do not blog to make money, I do it for my kids and to hopefully help or be a blessing to other moms. Thanks :}

This Weeks Trays

Trays Include (Below are the Links): 

Foam Wood Building Blocks

Melissa & Doug Wooden Tool Box

Spiderman Potato Head

Melissa & Doug Shape Sequence Sorting Set

Chutes and Ladders

Imaginext Super Friends Set Heroes 

Imaginext DC Super Friends Set Villains

Coupon Madness (Wordgirl) 

Stellaluna

My "s" Book

Alpha Tales (Letter S: Seal¹s Silly Sandwich) 

Spider-Man Versus Doc Ock

God Rocks, Be Strong in the Lord and God Rocks! Bibletoons: Be Strong in the Lord [DVD]

Bats - Zoobooks 

Your big Backyard Ground Squirrel

Batman Batjet 

Spiderman Zoom n Go Quad Cruiser 

Spider Man Web Blaster 

Spiderman Sprinkler 

Web Shooter 

Spider Man Hero Mask

Batman Mask 

ZOOBS 

Jumbo Magneatos

We used SO MANY things this week, I am pretty sure I didn't include every single item but the links above and the widgets at the end of post should include the majority :) This was SUCH a fun week. I knew that I needed to spice things up a little bit, Cowboy loves school, but I wanted to catch his attention with something besides just an animal this week- So he used to be obsessed with Spider-man  that's why we have soooo much Spiderman stuff... he is now going through a Batman phase- I don't really understand how he knows either one of them, since we do not watch either ... its so amazing to me how little kids pick up on things wherever they are... he came to me one day recently and said, mommy I am over spiderman- I like Batman now... I'm thinking Son... how do you even know who Batman is!? So we did do a little on Squirrels, But our entire week and half was dedicated to the number one Super Hero- Jesus! I tried my best to incorporate Jesus as being this themes focal point because yeah, to boys ... Superheros are like... Soooo Awesome... But I thought it was a great opportunity to teach him how Jesus is the Ultimate Hero. Then we could talk about the other "So Called" Superheros.

Chart Setup 

(Our chart setup this week was a little different. I still used S with Squirrels, but I didn't worry about numbers this week and I used superheroes inside the shapes, and I made my own letter S with Superheroes Just like the Squirrel One ) 

Bible Verse Letter S

Seek first his Kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. 

-Matt 6:33

So we have been doing an animal every week for what seems like, FOREVER- So we needed a little break from animals. I went with Superhero- BUT , I still threw in Squirrel :) So we looked over our discussion sheet, and read a little about Squirrels in a Magazine called Your Big Back yard, which talks about all kinds of animals but that particular issue- featured Ground Squirrels. 

 The following Widget contains some Book Ideas and what we used this week:

 

After that it was time to kick off SuperHero Week =}

SuperHero Printables I Used:  

(special THANKS to all these Moms who make these Printable Resources for FREE !! What a Blessing they are!! ) 

SuperHero PreK Pack- from Royal Baloo 

Batman Pack - from 1+1+1=1 

Avengers SH theme Prek Pack- from Over the Big Moon

Cowboy quickly spotted his new Batman Mask I had on his shelf. He rotated between Batman and Spider Man Hero Mask  throughout the week. 

Gem Magnets and Upper and Lower Case S Hunt with Spiderman which I printed from Over the Big Moon  HERE.

He had to put Gems on Little s first then find all of the Big S. 

Tiny Tot Butter- Currently 21 Months Old 

Butter worked on Sorting, Shapes, and Colors with Melissa & Doug Shape Sequence Sorting Set and Melissa & Doug Stack and Sort Board .  

11 Piece Little Heroes Magnet Puzzle I printed from Royal Baloo HERE. 

I made these little SuperHero Books using some pictures I found online, from Batman Pack by 1Plus Here and SuperHero Pack from Royal Baloo Here. I made Jesus the most important in the book and talked about how he "Saved" us (John 3:16) and was a true Hero! Cowboy really liked seeing his sister, and himself as a GOOD GUY in the Superhero Books! 

Here are a few Pictures from each book including the pictures with my favorite SuperHeroes! 

So I finally caved and decided to let Cowboy have and Own "Bad Guys" - I guess I realized it would really help with him understanding Good and Bad especially after reading about Heroes and Villains, and he would have something to save the day against! I just didn't want him to not like the Good Guys- and want to be a bad guy haha- I'm over it. Especially hearing him play and when he was telling all the bad guys about Jesus. I felt really comfortable in my mommy shoes and realized- I can not control everything. God is God, and I need to let the Holy Spirit do what it needs too because obviously- he is already at work! Cowboy needs a sense of God in him not Mommy in his head saying NO NO. So I may be wrong but I think most of the bad guys got saved by Spidermans Speech about how God is the Ultimate Hero!
Here is Cowboy Playing with Imaginext Super Friends Set Heroes , Imaginext DC Super Friends Set Villains and Jumbo Magneatos . He LOVED his new collection of little figures. This was a favorite this week! 

We did a few youtube videos this week to work on phonics. Here he is pointing to Letter S as we listen to the phonics song. 

We played a few rounds of Chutes and Ladders . 

Putting together some 4 piece puzzles included in Over the Big Moons Pack found HERE. He put together Thor, Iron Man, Captain America and the Hulk. 

Size sequence while Batman Assisted him  :) 

We made Captain America Homemade Jello Fruit Snacks !! You can click HERE to find out how we did it! It was so fun and they were YUMMY! Way better than Store bought kind. 

Separating Villains and Heroes. From Batman Pack. Batman also assisted in this activity too. I also cut out mini pictures of Cowboy to make sure he was included on the HEROES side :) 

Batman helped find all the words that start with S in Alpha Tales (Letter S: Seal¹s Silly Sandwich)    book. 

Tracing Letter S in the Dry Erase Center  

Good Night Moon is probably both of my boys FAVORITE Book! There is an app for that ! It happened to be on sale this week, so I bought it and they love it. Butter tried out a new App that was FREE this week called Learning with Transportation. He liked hearing what different means of Transportation sounded like. 

Sensory Play 

OH NO! Spidey had a Web Malfunction!! Good thing Imaginext Super Friends Set Heroes and Cowboy are on the Scene to Rescue Him!! I used some Silly string in Cowboys Spider Man Web Blaster along with Spiderman Zoom n Go Quad Cruiser  and  Imaginext DC Super Friends Set Villains. It was a pretty day so he sat on the deck and played for a LONG time rescuing the Good Guys, Spiderman even gave a speech on how AWESOME God is to all the others. :) That was an amazing moment for this mommy to hear :) 

Catching the Bad Guys Activity from Batman Pack. 

Which one is Different and Get the Little Superheroes back to their others. 

Tracing the Letter S is for Spiderman in his Tot Book. 

Do a Dot Captain America from Over the Big Moon Pack - He decided he wanted to Glue on Pompoms instead of Dot paint. 

Here I am multi-tasking- and as Superman Supervises,  Lou and I are doing some Social Studies and Geography while Cowboy makes patterns with Batman and Robin. 

I made my very First File Folder Game from some printables out of the different Superhero Packs listed above. It includes, letter S sort with Captain America, Shadow Matching Avengers, and Shape Matching Little SuperHeroes. I really enjoyed making the File Folder Game, and plan on making a lot more. I would like to get a few more to put in our Travel Tote- in the car for long trips :) Just to be something different other than a DVD or Gadget! They are secure with Velcro dots so I wouldn't have to worry about pieces sliding all around my Van- unless of course he just drops one ;) Good thing he sits next to Sissy while we are traveling!

 Matching Upper and Lower Case Letters from Little Superheroes Pack. He liked this pack but thought all of the heroes, instead of being a younger version of them, he thought they were girls. So he called them things like Wolverina, Aqua Girl, Spider Girl, Miss America and etc... HAHA that was sooo cute!

We did do our Letter S is for Squirrel Craft ! He used Paint Markers to Decorate :) 

A few years back Lou danced to a song for Dance Class- Jesus your my Superhero- So I searched for it on youtube- and found a great Visual for the Song - Cowboy really liked it... and another plus was that the video says things like Better than Spiderman and Batman etc... It was good for him to hear someone other than myself saying that and for him to see Batman when they say Better than Batman! We watched it a few times... and I have heard him sing it a few times since watching it :) here is the link for the Video- JESUS YOUR MY SUPERHERO 

Butter Learning Colors and Stacking with Fisher Price Mailbox. 

   Cowboy playing with all the Potato Heads including  Spiderman Potato Head

Free Play with Foam Wood Building Blocks . They really like these because they look like real colored wood but are foam :) Cowboy is starting to actually get creative with building toys now.. he used to not be a fan of any kind of Blocks. 

                                

He tried to make Butter a house but.... that lasted a very short moment and he knocked all of Cowboys  hard work apart :( 

Here is Butter playing with Jumbo Magneatos This picture is HYSTERICAL .... He just so happens to be in a SuperHero Stance... and his face is priceless.... I will name this picture....Butter Ball :)

Cowboy and Butter Playing with ZOOBS

Cowboy also got to touch and take a picture with a REAL Monster Truck this week... Nothing to do with SuperHeroes... Just an awesome Memory for this little Guy Who LOVES TRUCKS!!!

I had so many more things planned for this week that we did not even get to... there was just not enough time :( We did SuperHeroes for a week and a half... I cant wait to do this again soon! It was so much fun !!! Thanks for stopping by!! We would love for you to follow our Blog or Comment :) 

Jesus you are the ULTIMATE SuperHero! 

This Widget Contains some of the SuperHero things we used:

   

The following Widget contains Some of this weeks Free Play Tools :

 

Linking Up With : 

LINK HERE