Exploring The National Maritime Museum

Posted on April 14, 2013 by Ness

We love visiting art galleries and museums. They are such a great way to spark kids’ curiosity and open them up to new interests. They are also a great way to offer some playful, hands on learning. Here’s five tips for making a visit to the museum fun:

1. Visit an exhibition that is about a subject your child is already interested in. This might be space, animals, cars, dinosaurs etc and then while you’re there visit other galleries in the museum that might spark a new interest and offer new experiences.

2. Talk about the exhibit before you go, ask your child what they think they might see, go the library and borrow some books about the subject of the exhibition, play games, draw pictures.

3. Find a museum that has hands on experiences and kid friendly activities. Most museums and galleries have activities for kids and exhibits that are hands-on and playful.

4. Take it slow. Follow your child’s lead. If they are interested in a particular exhibit, let them spend as long as they like focusing on that one thing. They are learning while they are so engaged! Don’t rush them through and it’s fine if you don’t look at every single thing that is on display. The important thing is that your child is interested and having fun.

5. Follow up your visit to the museum by talking about what you saw, ask your child what they enjoyed most and then pursue that interest with some books on the subject or find other places to visit that offer activities on the same topic.

We recently visited The National Maritime Museum and their latest exhibit “Rescue“. There is so much hands-on fun at the National Maritime Museum and all three of us had a fantastic day. It’s pretty good when the parents can come away from a day having had has much fun as the kids! R (4yrs) spent the entire day running from exhibit to exhibit, his eyes wide and the biggest smile on his face. It was as though we’d taken him to the best playground he’d ever seen.

There’s nothing better (or mure fun!) than hands-on learning. R was so proud when he managed to make this rocking boat balance by distributing the weighted blocks correctly. This was part of the “Ships at Sea” exhibition which runs until April 28. The activity pictured below was definitely one of the favourites of the day! Three remote controlled submarines that kids (and in our case parents!!) have to navigate into the docks. We may or may not have had some family competitions more than once at this one!

R learned about wind force at this exhibit. He moved the large fan to help move the sail boat across the table. He went back to this one many times.

After having fun at the Ships at Sea exhibit we moved downstairs to the Rescue exhibit. The exhibit teaches kids about search and rescue services on land, sea and air. So. Much. Fun! This interactive display teaches kids about the different types of fire extinguishers that are use for different types of fires. R was in his element. He has always loved fire engines and fire fighting and when we were ready to leave the museum that day we had to go back for another turn at this one before we could go home! (There were quite a few grown ups giving this one a try too!)

Rescue time! The race was on to rescue someone from the water. The wonderful thing about all of these exhibits was how suitable they were for different ages. The exhibition is recommended for ages 5 to 12 and there really is something for everyone. I saw many kids under 5 (and R was one of them) who were having a fantastic time and my hubby and I had just as much fun as R.

This is a blurry pic, sorry but I just had to show you because this was by R’s favourite of the day. Kids can put themselves on the news with this interactive video. They can sit at a newsdesk and read the news before putting themselves at the scene of a rescue mission. Lots and lots of dramatic acting and silly antics at this one!

Taking control of a full-sized helicopter simulator…..

Playing dress ups to look like a real rescue worker….

There was balancing for the little ones…..

And climbing for the bigger ones….. haha yes, that’s me scaling a rock climbing wall! Just call me spiderwoman. OK, so it’s not that high but the aim is to scale the circumference of a “mountain” and it was exhausting! It’s tougher than it looks but a tonne of fun!

A very special part of our days was the museum’s “Cabinet of Curiosities” . This is free with your entry during school holidays and is on display at 2pm daily. Kids can explore wonderful and curious objects from the museum’s education collection.

As if all of that wasn’t already enough, we then explored the museum’s vessels including HM Bark Endeavour replica, a fabulous tall ship and replica of James Cook’s famous ship, HMAS Vampire a 1956 daring class destroyer and HMAS Onslow, a 1969 oberon class submarine. There are many more vessels in the museum’s collection, just click here to seem them all.

There is so much happening at the museum these school holidays and throughout the year. For full details of their school holiday events just visit their website. We visited with a “Big Ticket” which allows a family of two adults and up to three kids to visit all of the museum’s galleries and exhibits, all their vessels and the kids on deck activities for just $65 for the entire family. There are lots of kids activities held throughout the year including Kids on Deck and Mini Mariners where kids can explore the galleries, sing and dance with costumed guides. We had such a fabulous day and can’t wait to go back to explore some more!

What are your plans these school holidays?

If this is your first time visiting One Perfect Day – welcome! If you like what you have found, please join us on Facebook or follow us on Pinterest or Twitter where you will find lots of ideas for fun kids activities, thoughts on parenting, family recipes and more.

*We received a complimentary family big ticket from The National Maritime Museum. The words and opinions expressed in this post are entirely my own.

Now to this week’s linky. As always, THANK YOU to everyone for linking up last week. Here are a few of my favourites. Thank you all for sharing.

Making it up to my son – Ghostwritermummy

This Time Around – Dirt and Boogers

Things I’ve Learned – Plain Vanilla Mom

If you’ve been featured, please help yourself to an “I’ve been featured at The Sunday Parenting Party” button from my sidebar. Thanks again for linking up!

Quick, Simple and Healthy Pasta Sauce (or how to get your kids to eat vegetables without them even knowing it)

Posted on April 9, 2013 by Ness

Do you have a fussy eater in your family? When R (4 yrs) was just starting out on solids, he would eat anything I served him. I felt so lucky to have such a good eater. As he has grown, he has become increasingly picky with his eating. There are days when he will just flat out refuse to try something new or eat any vegetables. Those are the days I turn to my secret weapon – my healthy pasta sauce that contains up to SIX vegetables! It’s quick and simple to make. It makes up to six child servings, and it can be adapted to suit your tastes or the ingredients you happen to have on hand. The best part? R LOVES it and will often ask for seconds. Hooray to that!

I first came across a similar pasta sauce recipe at Multiple Mummy last year and right away I knew R would enjoy it. I changed several ingredients to suit our tastes and voila! R has been devouring vegetables ever since. I will always be grateful to Kerry for turning R’s diet around!

Look at all those vegetables! It just makes me feel so much better knowing that R is eating all of those when he’d usually flat out refuse to even taste them. So here’s what I usually put in my sauce, but as I mentioned, the beauty of this recipe is that it can be personalised so just add what you enjoy eating or what you have on hand.

INGREDIENTS
1 medium brown onion
1 – 2 cloves of garlic
2 – 3 sticks celery
1 large carrot
1 large or 2 small zucchini (courgettes)
half a small capsicum. Green or red is fine. (This is a pepper for my US readers)
1 bottle store-bought passata sauce (see notes below).
olive oil for cooking

All of the ingredients above are optional. Your kids don’t like garlic? Leave it out. If you only have a white onion on hand, not a brown one, that’s fine. If you don’t have any celery, it doesn’t matter, leave it out. These just happen to be vegetables that we regularly have on hand. I add the capsicum for sweetness but if I don’t have one in the fridge, I just leave it out. Pumpkin and cauliflower would also work well in this sauce.

Passata sauce is a fresh tomato puree, seasoned with basil. I don’t use canned tomatoes in any of my cooking (just personal preference) and I don’t have time to make my own fresh tomato puree so I buy bottled Passata. It is readily available in Australian supermarkets but if you can’t find it in your area, simply substitute canned tomatoes.

HOW TO MAKE HEALTHY PASTA SAUCE FOR KIDS: Begin by chopping all of the vegetables. The great thing about this sauce is that it is blended after being cooked so your veges don’t have to be cut too perfectly or evenly. It makes the preparation very fast. Once they are chopped, heat the oil in a pan and fry the vegetables for 5 – 6 minutes over a medium heat until they being to soften. Usually when cooking with onions, I would fry them first before adding the other vegetables but I never bother with this recipe. I just throw it all in at once and it turns out just fine.

When the vegetables have softened slightly, add the jar of Passata sauce (or the canned tomatoes if that’s what you are using). Stir everything together, reduce the heat to low and simmer for ten minutes, or until the vegetables are cooked through and soft. Stir occasionally while simmering.

When the sauce has cooked, remove it from the pan and transfer it to a heat proof bowl. Use a hand held stick blender to make a smooth sauce. A regular blender would work as well, of course. Sometimes the sauce may be a little thick (depending on how many vegetables you added. If this happens, simply add a small amount of hot water to thin it out a little.

Add the sauce to some cooked pasta, top with some grated cheese and watch those vegetables disappear! R would eat this every night if he had his way. The recipe makes enough for 6 – 8 child sized servings. It freezes well so I portion it out, pour it into zip lick bags and freeze them. Using zip lock bags means I can store them flat in the freezer and they take up barely any room at all. It’s great when I know R hasn’t been eating too well. I can just grab one of these from the freezer and in minutes I have a healthy lunch or dinner that I know he’ll devour!

Every Monday I share a kid friendly recipe, healthy snack ideas, and fun ways to prepare kids meals. To see earlier posts in my Little Bites of Fun series, click on the photo below.

The Week That Was and The Sunday Parenting Party

Posted on April 7, 2013 by Ness

We’ve been enjoying a quiet week here after all the festivities of Easter last weekend. Autumn has well and truly arrived and we have been enjoying the rainy weather with some puddle jumping. There’s nothing quite as lovely as splashing about in the rain, then coming inside, getting dry, and snuggling on the sofa with some books and a warm drink, don’t you think?

All of this rain has brought us some special visitors to our garden. R loves snails. When this one found his way inside our home, R decided to adopt him. “Mr Snail” as he has been christened, has been settling in beautifully, happily munching on carrots and strawberries and basking in the attention of a very thrilled four year old. R is so excited to have a pet to take care of, and it has been such a great learning experience for him.

That really is it for this week. Told you it had been a quiet one! Aren’t they the best kind sometimes?

Now to this week’s linky. As always, THANK YOU to everyone for linking up last week. Here are a few of my favourites. Thank you all for sharing.

Everything I wish I’d known about breastfeeding – Mums Make Lists

Every girl is a princess: Teaching self-esteem and Inner Beauty – The Educator’s Spin On It

Traveling with kids without the car – Mums Make Lists

If you’ve been featured, please help yourself to an “I’ve been featured at The Sunday Parenting Party” button from my sidebar. Thanks again for linking up and I can’t wait to read this week’s posts.

Learning with Lego

Posted on April 5, 2013 by Ness

Lego and play dough are two of R’s (4 yrs) favourite ways to play. What could be more fun than combining the two? Lego bricks provide a fun and creative way to explore play dough. This activity began as a sensorial activity, then quickly moved into imaginative play and story telling and even included some sight word practise. Just like our recent Lego math game, this activity was another fun way to learn with Lego.

Lego play dough invitation to create

I set up a very simple invitation to play with some play dough that was left over from our recent Easter play dough activity, a wooden rolling pin and some Lego bricks. This was a completely open-ended play invitation. R was free to explore and take it in whichever direction he chose.

Sensory play. He was thrilled to see the Lego on the table and began pushing it into the play dough. He kneaded the dough and hid the pieces of Lego inside declaring them to be hidden pirate’s treasure.

Imaginative play. When all the pieces of Lego had been hidden, he began pulling the play dough apart as he searched for the buried “treasure”, making up stories of pirates as he played.

Literacy play. He eventually rolled the play dough out flat and pushed Lego bricks into it to make an impression. After adding the two red bricks shown above he declared “Look Mummy, I made a V!” This led to him wanting to make other letter imprints in the play dough and he had fun determining which pieces would work best.

R has been learning sight words recently and he used Lego bricks to make the word “you”. The square Lego brick was a perfect “o”!

This activity was great for fine motor skills, literacy and spacial awareness but best of all, he was having fun!

After making a few more letters with his Lego bricks, R brought in some of his Lego Star Wars characters and the play became about imaginative story telling as he re-created a scene from one of the movies. Everything ends up being about Star Wars around here lately!

Click on the image below to see our fun Lego Math Game.

The Moon and Stars for Afternoon Tea

Posted on April 2, 2013 by Ness

Yummy, smooth, and healthy, hummus, hommus, houmous or however you choose to spell it, is one of R’s (4 yrs) favourite snacks. He has enjoyed it since he was a toddler and would happily eat bowls full of the stuff when he was two.

Hummus is one of those foods that I call a double win – he loves eating it and I don’t have any Mummy guilt in serving it to him because it’s so nutritious. Hummus is high in iron, Vitamin C, Vitamin B6 and folate and the chickpeas are high in protein. It also tastes fantastic! What’s not to love about that?

R is into all things space, and he is always excited when I make our “moon and stars” afternoon snack. Our “moons” are rice crackers, our “stars” are sliced cheese cut into stars using a cookie cutter, and the hummus in the centre of the plate? I’m not sure what that is. A swirling galaxy of stars perhaps? Work with me here! The great thing about this little snack is that it shows it doesn’t take much effort at all to serve something that’s fun, tastes great and is healthy as well. Between the protein, iron, and vitamins in the hummus, the snack also includes calcium via the cheese. R sees it as a treat and I’m happy to see him eating something that’s so good for him.

Hummus is great for school lunches as well. Last year when R was attending day care two days a week, I’d often include some hummus and crackers in his lunch box. It keeps well with an ice brick in a cooler bag. For an even healthier snack, try carrot or celery sticks instead of crackers for dipping into the hummus.

What are some of your children’s favourite snacks? Let’s swap some ideas in the comments!

If you would like to see other posts in my Little Bites of Fun series, click on the photo below.

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Happy Easter and The Sunday Parenting Party

Posted on March 31, 2013 by Ness

HAPPY EASTER everyone!! I hope you have all had a wonderful weekend with lots of time spent with family and friends. We’ve had a very relaxed few days with plenty of chocolate, a visit to the Easter Show, chocolate, family visits, more chocolate, egg hunts, chocolate, street fairs, chocolate, and afternoons at the beach (and, you guessed it, more chocolate!). Here are some snaps from our weekend, as shared on Instagram (find me at @NessOnePerfectDay )

Outside the Easter Show, R (4 yrs) came face to face with a Storm Trooper and many other characters from Star Wars – quite possibly the most exciting moment in his life so far.

At the top of R’s to-do list at the show, was to have his very first taste of fairy floss (cotton candy for my Northern Hemisphere readers). It was e-n-o-r-m-o-u-s! When the lady at the stand was preparing it R couldn’t believe his eyes and kept yelling “Stop! That’s enough! Stop!” and giggling his head off. Now before you send me an email telling me what a terrible mother I am for allowing my son to consume this much sugar, he barely ate any at all before handing it over to me and I was the one who ended up with a belly ache! I momentarily forgot the gastronomer’s golden rule – never eat anything bigger than your own head.

There were only three things R wanted to do at the show. Ride the dodgem cars, try fairy floss and visit the farmyard petting zoo. He loves visiting the animals there every year.

On Easter eve the Easter Bunny left us some magic jelly beans, and, as we do every year as part of our Easter tradition, R planted the magic beans in the garden, gave them a good watering and then waited to see what they would grow into on Easter morning.

Don’t you just love it when you head out for the day, with no particular plan in mind, and you happen upon something wonderful? We drove down to a local beach for an afternoon wander when we came across a street fair. There were rides and face painting, and a fabulous “circus training” area where kids could try walking on stilts, juggling batons, and spinning plates on sticks. R also painted a bamboo parasol in the colours of the ocean.

After leaving the street fair, we wandered down to the beach for a bite to eat and to play chase with the tide. A blissfully relaxed weekend.

What did you get up to this weekend? I’m sharing this post at the everyday moment challenge at The Parenting Files. Pop over to see what others are sharing and share your own everyday moments.

Now to this week’s linky. As always, THANK YOU to everyone for linking up last week. Here are a few of my favourites. Thank you all for sharing.

In Her Own Time: Learning to Use The Toilet – An Everyday Story. Kate at An Everyday Story shared a post about Toilet “learning” rather than toilet “training”. This is a subject about which I am extremely passionate and I have had a post about this in the works for a while now. Forget the “how to potty train your child in three days” regimes. It will happen naturally and without stress if you follow your child’s cues. Kate’s post describes this respectful and peaceful approach beautifully.

Ignoring The Signs – Taming The Goblin A beautiful post from The Monko at Taming The Goblin about listening to the cues our children give us every day.

The Best Five Minutes in a Day – The Golden Gleam. Rebekah at The Golden Gleam shares a tip for avoiding those rushed mornings and how to start the day in a loving way.

Lego Math Game {Greater Than or Less Than}

Posted on March 27, 2013 by Ness

We are definitely a Lego loving family. On any given day our dining table is covered from end to end with R’s (4 yrs) latest creations. There are so many ways to play with Lego and we’ve been using it for lots of math and literacy games as well. When I created this Lego math game for R, I knew it would be a hit. R is a visual learner so this Lego game was perfect for his learning style.

To set up our Lego math game I printed out the numbers 1 through 20 and cut them into individual pieces. I also wrote a greater than/less than symbol on a piece of paper. I put the numbers into a bowl, along with twenty blue Lego bricks and twenty red Lego bricks. I added a Lego base board to the game and it was done.

R chose two numbers from the bowl. He placed one number on the left of the Lego base board and the second number to the right.

Next, he thought about which number was greater than the other, and positioned the greater than symbol appropriately.

After he had made his prediction about which number was larger, R began building his Lego towers to see if he was correct. He built a tower of blue bricks on the left, using the same number of bricks as was written on the number he had selected earlier. He then built a tower of red bricks, with the same number of bricks as the second number that he had selected earlier.

This gave him a clear visual representation of the mathematical equation, and he was easily able to see whether he had made the correct prediction.

R enjoyed this so much. He loves to learn about numbers, but adding Lego to the mix just made this even more fun for him. It was also quick and simple to put together – always a plus! We recently combined Lego with play dough to learn spatial awareness and letter recognition. I’ll share those activities in an upcoming post.

Easter Basket Craft

Posted on March 26, 2013 by Ness

Today I am thrilled to welcome Krissy of B-Inspired Mama to the blog. Krissy’s site is full of creative kids activities, fun family recipes and the hugely popular “Mouths of Moms” series where Moms share their real-life experiences and chat about everyday parenting issues. Today Krissy is sharing a fun Easter basket craft that incorporates fine motor skills practice with ribbon weaving. Thank you Krissy!

Easter Basket Craft

Are your kids ready for the big bunny to come? Why not let them make their own special Easter basket for the big day? Even the littlest can practice their fine motor skills and enjoy the sensory experience of this Easter basket craft. Here’s what we did…

Kids Ribbon Weaving Easter Basket Craft

Supplies:

open weave metal or wicker basket (We found ours at Dollar Tree.)
a variety of ribbon, string, and twine

Steps:

1. Cut the ribbon and string into various lengths about 2 feet long or so.

2. Leaving a few inch “tail” inside the basket, weave the ribbon/string in and out of the holes in the basket, working your way around the basket. When you come to an end, tie another ribbon/string on and keep weaving.

3. Secure any “tail” ends by tying or even with a dab of glue if necessary.

4. Set it out the Easter eve and wait for some treats!

We did this Easter basket craft when we had friends over for a long afternoon. Every kiddo, ages 4 through 10, loved it and was able to make a beautiful basket all their own.

Have you done any Easter crafts yet? Check out B-Inspired Mama if you’re looking for some Easter inspiration!

Krissy is a former art teacher turned full time mama of 3. Blogging at B-Inspired Mama allows her to connect other moms with simple ideas for kid-friendly crafts, easy recipes, learning fun, and creative parenting tips. Follow along through Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter.

Looking for more Easter activities and crafts? Here are a few of our other fun Easter posts.

Easter Themed Lunch for Kids

Posted on March 25, 2013 by Ness

Easter is almost here! I know I’ve been posting lots of Easter crafts and activities this past week but I couldn’t resist sharing one more Easter themed post. Before I get to our Easter bento though, I would like to invite you to share your own pics of creative food for kids on Instagram. Simply tag your photos with #funlittlebites to join in the fun. It doesn’t have to be bento lunches either. Any kids food ideas are welcome! You can find me on Instagram as @NessOnePerfectDay .

This Easter themed bento which I made for R (4 yrs) was certainly well received! It is pretty simple as far as bentos go (I did mention last week that I was going to keep things fairly simple with this series). If you want to see what a REAL Easter bento looks like, then check out this one from Beneficial Bento. How completely adorable is that little rice bunny? Alas, I have neither the skills nor the time for such works of art and so my little sandwich bunny hopping through the carrot flowers will have to do.

I made the bunny sandwich with a bunny shaped cookie cutter. I used whole grain bread and I just love that a couple of the grains just happened to be perfectly placed for the bunny’s eye and nose. The whiskers are bits of cheese, and his ears are accentuated with little pieces of ham. His tail is a pink chocolate candy (It’s a “smartie” for myAussie and UK readers). A mini marshmallow would have been cute, but we didn’t have any on hand. The Easter egg sandwich was also made using a cookie cutter. I decorated it with cheese and carrot sticks.

To add to the Spring and Easter theme, I uses a flower shaped cookie cutter for the slices of cheese and cut the carrot slices into flower shapes as well. Should I post a quick tutorial on making carrot flowers in a future post? Would that be of interest to you? They’re very simple to make. I brightened things up with a couple of pink cupcake liners and some red grapes and that was it. A quick lunch that was a lot less work than it looks and R was thrilled with it.

If you would like to see other posts in my Little Bites of Fun series, click on the photo below.

Weekly Reflections and The Sunday Parenting Party

Posted on March 24, 2013 by Ness

Here were are at the end (or is it the beginning?) of another week. Another week that just flew by! We’ve been having fun with Easter crafts this week, busy making Easter play dough, cute bunny hats, and candy bags.

This week I’ll be preparing some “magic jelly beans”. It’s a cute little Easter tradition we began a couple of years ago. Click through to the full post to see what these magic beans grow into after we plant them in our garden!

I was also honoured this week to write a post for Marnie at Carrots Are Orange, one of my favourite Montessori and parenting sites. Pop over to read my post about a fun preschool science activity that teach kids about surface tension.

Saving the best for last (!!), there’s one more thing I want to share with you all before we move on to this week’s linky. We were in a bit of a slump on Saturday, so what did we do? Baked an enormous chocolate cake of course! Cake makes everything better, don’t you think? This was a new recipe for us – it calls for an entire cup of cocoa!! So rich, but oh so good! It is aptly named the Utterly Awesome Chocolate Cake and it is shared at a new-to-me blog called Inner Pickle. I think this might just be our new family favourite cake recipe.

Now to this week’s linky. As always, THANK YOU to everyone for linking up last week. Here are just a few of my favourites. It was another week of amazing posts, thank you all for sharing.

20 Tips for Finding and Nurturing Mom Friends – B-Inspired Mama

10 Things You Can Do Every Day to Make Parenting Awesome – Positive Parenting Connection

March’s 10 Easy and Inexpensive Ways to Show Your Kids You Love Them – Little Wonders’ Days