Autumn Activities 5- Make your own bird feeder

Today we are doing another craft activity, Bird feeders.
Now you could go and buy a bird feeder and the bird seed but I was looking on Pinterest and saw so many ideas on how to make your own in a creative way so may do a Pinterest board tagging different ideas.

You will need;

• Small plastic bottle
• 2 cheap wooden spoons
• Something to punch holes in bottle
• String to tie bottle to tree
• Bird feed

Recipe for bird feed;

• 1 cup of lard
• 1/2 cup of sunflower seeds
• 1/2 cup of unsalted peanuts
• 1/2 cup of dried fruit

Mix altogether and leave overnight. Put into bottle and do up lid. Punch some holes randomly three or four times on bottle. Stick the wooden spoons through the holes so it looks how it does in photo. Then tie up in the garden on a tree or branch.

Hopefully you will attract lots of different birds.

Autumn Activites 4- Autumn treasure baskets

Welcome back to Autumn Activites mini series. Today we are going to talk about creating Autumn themed treasure baskets. Previously I have done a activity of the week on treasure baskets and have linked this below.
https://nannybicester.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/activity-of-week-treasure-baskets.html

To make a treasure basket more topical and reverent to Autumn you could add the following;

• Conkers
• Different shape and coloured leaves
• Pine cones
• Any other items you find in the outdoors
• Winter vegetables such as squash and pumpkins

Autumn Activities 3-Conkers

For Autumn activities 3 we are going to go old school and collect some conkers.  To play the game you will need to collect some conkers and drill a hole in them so you can thread them onto a shoe lace.  The game requires two people and the point of the game is to take it in turns to hit the other persons conker. The winner is the first person to smash the other persons conker off.

You will need:

• Some conkers
• 2 shoe laces or string
• Drill to create holes in centre of conkers

Autumn Activites 2-Pumpkin Picking

Welcome back to blog 2 of my Autumn mini blog series. Today I'm going to talk about Pumpkin picking.

With Halloween fast approaching it would be so easy to just pop to your local supermarket and pick up a small £1 pumpkin. There is certainly nothing wrong with that and great if you need to buy a few pumpkins however why not find your local pick your own farm and choose your own?

Great to get out in the outdoors at this time of year and I'm sure the children will get so much more from doing this as they can see the origins of where pumpkins come from. Once you take your pumpkin home the possibilities are endless. Make soup or simply do some pumpkin carving(post coming later on in October).

Autumn activities 1- Leaf printing

Hi everybody it's been a while since I've posted and Autumn is now upon us so I thought I would post a mini series over the next few weeks with some ideas on what to do with your little people.

To kick it all off I am going to start with Leaf printing.
Such an easy one to do really as we all have access to the outdoors and it's an age old yet simple activity to do at home.






You will need:

• Various sized leaves
• Paint
• Brush
• Cover/table cloth to paint on
• Large paper

Method:

1. Paint one side of the leaf.
2. Press down onto paper
3. Remove to see finished result
4. Repeat.

Hope you will enjoy my mini blog series and see you next time.

Back to school

Sounds of parents rejoicing around the country as this week the kids are finally going back to school. Hope you have all enjoyed your summer break and the kids have had lots of fun. I can't believe how quick its gone and despite some questionable weather at times we have all survived.  On the approach to going back to school everybody needs to be prepared mentally and physically so here is a few tips to be on your best form.

1. Make sure the week before children resume their school bedtime routine as everything becomes more relaxed when nobody has to get up early.
2.repack school bags,check name labels etc so you can get any last min bits
3.keep the first few days back at school calm with lots of free evenings as they are going to be really tired.
4. Night before lay out school uniforms, prepare any pack lunches and put out school bags
5.Set an alarm to make sure everyone has the time they need
6.enforce a no screentime rule an hour before bedtime to enable a more restful nights sleep.




Hope everybody has a great first week back!
Nanny Bicester x

Summer fun ideas 2-Bean bag toss

You will need the following

• A ladder
• Bean bags/small balls
• Cards to write point numbers on

Hope this photo explains what it should look like but it's very simple concept. Take turns to throw bean bags or small balls and add up points. Great for a set of challenges game.