Hello September

It's hard to believe that it is September already!  Where did the summer go?  We had a wonderful and quite hot season so it's nice to welcome the cooler temperatures and all the great things that September brings.  Eva got to have her first bonfire last night.  She loved it but got a little upset that we couldn't just "turn it off" when she was done sitting by it.  September also brings the beginning of the new school year in our neck of the woods so we've started doing some school-like things here in the lounge.  The main thing we have begun is learning about calendars.  There is so much that can be incorporated into calendar time- counting, days of the week, months of the year, patterns, letter recognition and so on.  I made our calendar using another big frame (the same kind I used for the felt board).  I drew the calendar right on the glass using paint markers and then stuck velcro in each square to hold the numbers.

For September we have apples and I will change out the numbers each month.  I can put different colored papers in the frame to change the background too.  Eva loves it and is so excited to add a new number each day.  Patterns have been tricky for her but seeing the color pattern grow as we add to the month has been helping a lot.
I also decided to do a monthly sensory tub instead of weekly ones (they were getting hard to maintain and a month gives Eva more time to really delve into them).  Our September one has lots of fun fall items- pinecones, acorns, various silk leaves (I bought a bag of 100 plus a garland that I broke apart at the dollar store) and some fall colored pom poms.

There is also a rake (one of Eva's garden tools) for her to rake the leaves with.

If you want to see a really awesome fall sensory tub, go check out Mari-Ann's at Counting Coconuts- she went all out!  I definitely plan on getting some apples to add to Eva's later in the month.