{Grandma School} The month of July

I'm having a bit of difficulty keeping up with Grandma School lately. Our activities are usually spontaneous so some days we get a long stretches of reading and just reading with barely any new activities, and other times, it's packed full of new and fun things. 

July started off exciting with a trip to the Singapore Art Museum for a second visit to the Imaginariun exhibit. The it went a little slow and by mid-July, we have more fun activities because of extended Grandma School hours -- we stayed over for a couple of nights while Daddy works late.

For posterity's sake (that's always the case, isn't it?), here's a round-up of what we did in July. Better late than never! 

Imaginarium at SAM@8Q

We visited the exhibit twice. Once when J was 18 months old, and once when J was 21 months old. My mum wanted to see how she responded to the activities when she's older so we dropped by again a few days before the exhibit ended. It was fun to see how differently she played at the various exhibits during the two visits. 

Changi Airport

Yiyi came by and we went to the airport to fetch her uncle. J finally satisfied her desires to "draw draw".

We managed to check out some of the home spots too! And as usual, I didn't realise that those are the home spots until much much later.

Cloud dough

Grandma approves of sensory play. In fact, she encourages them despite the mess J would leave behind. For that, I'm very thankful.

Saw 'cloud dough' on Instagram and suggestrd to my mum that we could have a go. The very next day, we saved some dinosaurs from the "sand".

It was the first time J played with cloud dough so she approached it cautiously.  She didn't want to touch it initially because it will get her hands "dirty", so she scooped them up with the dinosaur's wings instead. Pterodactyl? It was the first time we had clean tables after a sensory play. But by the second time, she has already gotten used to the texture so the cloud dough ended up everywhere.

The pool

We also managed to hit the pool a couple of times and J's favourite activity was to jump into the water and attempt to swim. She refused to have any of us holding on to her (but we did anyway) and insisted that she managed to swim on her own. 

Bubble Fun

Favourite aunt got her a bubble set. So of course, we couldn't wait and had some bubble fun!

Dropper paint art

This was an yet another "accidental activity" - we ran out of ideas. 

We added in cornstarch in attempt to thicken the 'paint', which is just food colouring with water. J doesn't use the dropper the way it should, but used it like a paintbrush instead.

I mixed in blue and red to get purple but it's interesting to note that once the cornstarch is added, the red got into the cornstarch and only blue was left in the liquid.

Playground after market

Stayovers at Grandma's mean a trip to the market the following morning. We were lucky to bump into a group of children from the nearby childcare at the playgroup so J got some company.

The first time a boy approached and said something rather loudly, something along the line of "hey! You are not from my class!" He meant no hostility but it was the first time J encountered a situation like this so she was a little taken aback. I didn't want to interfere because it's such good learning opportunity. J stood for a while, then decided to climb up and sit on the bench at the side of the playground. She looked a little down so I asked if she's okay. She nodded. "You just wanna sit and watch?" She nodded. It was after two minutes or so when I asked her, once again, if she wanted to play at the playground. I assured her that it's alright if she wants to because it's a public playground. So she went.

The second time, the children were friendlier and J played with a few of them. We were also lucky to see this butterfly, which was flying very low and really slow.

Watering the plants

Stayovers also meant that J gets to help Grandpa water the plants. It's actually a scooping exercise in disguise. Or should we say, practical life?

Play with cousins at granduncle's house

We also got to visit my cousins' boys and J is happy to have company. I love that we have family just a block away.

My favourite part of Grandma School and stayovers? This...

Nature walk

We do evening walks when we stay a night over at Grandma's.

We take walks... J jogs...

And we caught the sunset...

...spotted birds...

... And observed seeds and leaves.

I know that I say this too many times, but I really love Grandma/ Grandparents school. And I'm extremely grateful to my parents for making these possible.