Letter a Week Project - Day #1 Letter Aa

My RL is almost 3-1/2. She can sing her ABC's, she recognizes that letters make words, but she can't recognize letters by name. So, I decided that I am going to make each of the next 26 weeks a letter week!! I am using things that I already have at home -- because we are saving to buy our first home and I don't want to spend a lot of $! Plus, it's fun coming up with ideas of what to do and what I can use!!

Feel free to use my ideas if you are interested in doing this with me... please though... if you blog about it, I would like to be given credit.

We started out morning by watching Alice in Wonderland. I made sure to point out how Alice starts with the letter A.

[**I know not everyone likes to have their kids watch tv, but as a SAHM and WAHM I find that if I let me kids watch 1 movie each day I am able to get my work done during the movie and be able to spend the rest of the day with my kids!]

For lunch we had ham and cheese sandwiches. I cut the sandwich in the shape of the letter A. We also ate apples. Again, reinforcing that Alice starts with A and apple starts with A. I also asked her where she saw this shape before. My smart cookie said "on the Alice movie".

Once I put my son down for his afternoon nap it was time to work on our A projects!!! I created this sign using Microsoft Publisher and printed it out on cardstock. I enlarged the letter so that they took up most of the space on the paper.

Then it was time to bring out the supply bucket. RL decided she wanted to paint her letters to decorate them. So, we put on her apron and she painted away...


I showed her how both the A and the a have a space in the middle that didn't need to be painted. This helps her to practice "staying in the lines" too. Plus, the process of painting with a small paint brush helps her in preparation for writing and development of her fine motor skills!

Once she was done painting, we set it aside to dry. Then we took out her "homework". [That is what she calls her little workbook -- I have been going to school since she was born, so she is very familiar with what homework is!] We turned to the letter A and a pages and she practiced writing her letters. For being only 3 I think she did a pretty good job!

Then we attempted to make an alligator card. I found the instructions on Enchanted Learning's website here. Didn't quite turn out like the illustration, but RL had a great time covering it with stickers!

After cleaning up the craft projects we set out to prep dessert for the night -- apple crisp!

I peeled and sliced 2 granny smith apples. My assistant put them all in a big mixing bowl. To the apples I added a tiny bit of lemon juice, about 1 tsp of cinnamon, and 1/4 c gran. sugar. My assistant dilligently stirred the apple mixture while I prepped the baking dishes.

I used three 4 inch diameter baking dishes [that I bought at Joann's a while back], and one 6 inch cake pan. Spray each pan with non-stick spray, or grease with crisco. Sprinkle some yellow cake mix in the bottom of each pan and top with small slices of butter.

[For those of you with dairy and egg allergies, Duncan Hines Butter Yellow Cake Mix is dairy free. I also used Nucoa a dairy free "butter" found at my local grocery store.]

Here are my mixed apples.

My wonderful assistant helped to spoon the apple mixture over the cake mix and butter in the bottom of each dish.

Then top with a little more cake mix and butter. I also chose to add some oats to the top of mine... delish!!!

The finished product... just the right size for one person!!!
When daddy got home, RL was so excited to show him all the letter A things that she did today!!! I hope her enthusiasm is still there when we get to q!!

Next week is B. Stay tuned to see what B things I came up with!!!