Favorite things

Favorite games:

Playing with her animal figurines, playdough, this Pengoloo game pictured above or a memory game with the pieces, being an imaginary animal, being a boat or truck, being someone who drives or works with boats or trucks, using chalk as an ingredient for pretend soups, smoothies, lotions, etc., pretend cooking at her outdoor kitchen (which is a large stump behind the house that's breaking down), play based on the Laura Ingalls-Wilder book series. "Cat training"

Favorite foods: 

Just about anything we make. Sandwiches, pastas, fresh fruits, berries, vegetables. Homemade fruit popsicles, and banana "icecream", frozen peas and corn, or anything else she can grab from my prep area such as carrot slices or raw diced sweet potato. Cheeses cheeses and more cheeses. Seafood; fish, lobster, scallops, sushi. Anything sweet. 

Favorite places: 

The deck, her dirt kitchen, or anywhere in the yard. Streams at the park, the woods behind our home, Depew/Blue mountain area, Sunnyside playground, anywhere she can go in water or dirt or mud, her friend Ada's home. 

Favorite things: 

'Things that go', her animal toys, things to climb or hang from, books and story time, chase games, foraging, meeting or catching bugs and animals, snacks, sweets, samples, nature, birdwatching, treasures, flowers, building.

All work and all play makes Emma a happy girl

Emma is obsessed with Catrick's food. She has observed me fill his dish numerous times, heard the clinking of kibbles falling into the ceramic dish, seen Cat come running over. Finally it was her turn. I brought the materials down to the floor and showed her how it was done. Armed with a large spoon and a measuring cup she went right to work. 

It was messy but a good activity for Emma. This one has purpose: feeding Cat. She worked on holding the spoon steady and level to not spill out the kibbles. She realized she couldn't just drive the cup down into the kibbles and lift it out by the bottom, she would have to scoop and bring the cup out right side up. And when she slowly brought the cup full of kibs over the dish and dumped (most of) the kibbles into the dish, Cat came running over. How rewarding! He put his face in the bowl to eat but Emma wanted to pet him. Catrick then waited on the coffee table for Emma to be done with his food. 

Together Emma and I picked up kibbles that had fallen on the floor and added them to the bowl which I then placed in our window nook where Cat eats. I think next time I will fill a larger bowl with kibbles and provide that with the empty food dish and scoops, rather than the large container she has to reach down into to get kibbles. I think I'll even set up a similar activity with dry beans that she can practice with. Emma is eager to scoop and transfer, and I need to give her opportunities to do so.

Later, after a trip to the playground with friends we brought home a play stove that belonged to Emma's friend Millie. What a treat it was receiving this, Emma adores it! She played with it for an hour straight before I was finally able to coax her into a nap.

She boiled some rice..

And baked a cat!

Wait, you're not done!