This is a great craft idea for Christmas presents! Be sure to use fabric paint. It washes off hands and feet quite easily when wet…and peels off very easily from skin when dry, and it will make a permanent design on your sheet. Try squirting a spiral of the paint onto a paper plate and have the kids smear their hands around in it.

There are a couple of ways to do the reindeer’s head. First, you can use a footprint with the toes up and the heel where the nose will be placed. Do that footprint first … then do the handprint antlers slightly overlapping it (use both hands in doing the antlers … left for left, right for right). Second, just draw on a head for the reindeer using fabric paint - a fairly simple oval shape, colored in with the fabric paint. Then paint on the eyes and a nose (red, of course)

You can then draw a simple string of Christmas lights (bulbs of various colors) winding through the antlers if you wish.

Other cute holiday shirts to do are Christmas trees made out of upside down handprints .. a row of 3 handprints on the bottom, two in the middle, one on top. You could even draw on a star and ornaments (or use fingerprints for ornaments). Also, you can use an upside down handprint in white to be Santa’s face, with the fingers being his beard … draw on his eyes, nose, mustache, hat, etc. Or you can make a simple angel figure … just do a basic triangle for the body, a circle for the head and two handprints for the wings. You can obviously add more details if you want.

If you haven’t yet seen them, be sure to check out Toddler Gift Ideas - Part 1 and Toddler Gift Ideas - Part 2.

Now, our Stocking Stuffer ideas:

Learning Resources Backyard Bugs – just can’t have enough bugs to play with!

i-CAT Chill Clothing Accessories - add on to this or last year’s gift.

SpiderMan Football – good for smaller hands to hold on to with the web-like surface.

Mattel - Cars! Collector set – wrap the 8 separately for added Christmas morning fun or save a few for small gifts throughout the New Year.

Leapster Kids Carry It All Backpack – given all the planning Lil’ Duck does as to which toys will be coming along for play time at G’amma and G’ampa’s house, he needs a backpack (helps to limit the number, believe it or not!).

And, of course, we have to mention toy ducks, being LilDuckDuck.com! These cute, yellow numbered ducks have bath time and learning-to-count interest to us right now - Smart Splash Ducks. Have fun looking at all the additional “Make-You-Smile” yellow ducks as you scroll down the page! Stocking stuffer toys for sure.

Check back as we get ever closer to the holiday purchasing season for more ideas which will hopefully be helpful to you and your relatives in finding gifts with value: both play, learning and money value.

See you again soon,

Grandma Duck

If you haven’t yet seen Grandma Duck’s Toddler Gift Ideas - Part 1, be sure to check it out for more great gift ideas!

By now, Lil Duck has a selection of various little creatures and they are needing some new and exciting adventures as the play sets they came with have already seen multiple hours of play. Why not introduce a new “play set” for all these creatures to inspire imaginative play? Tree house play set definitely has my attention. As the customer review says, “It’s a lasting, creative, open-ended piece of childhood!” I remember our son playing for years with his small tree house and the delightful “adventures” his little creatures had – I really think this will be one of Lil Duck’s Christmas presents this year. (more…)

When Lil Duck’s birthday comes in September, I start thinking about Christmas gifts as well, which shows my plan-ahead style when it comes to surviving the Christmas season.

So here are some of the gift ideas, there is quite a variety, and, of course, once you click on the item, you will see a selection of similar items which are quite interesting as well. So here we go through my gift idea list for a toddler…

First you need to order the Advent Calendar now so you will be able to start the countdown on time! I have long been on a search for a nice REUSEABLE advent calendar and this one certainly is - Magnetic Advent Calendar.

Hopping and hiding, what could be more fun for a toddler? Lil Duck is always bouncing around and plays hide-n-seek every time I come over to pick him up. A great way to introduce him to games and learn memory skills with the Bunny Hop Game. Several of the suggested games might fit your toddler’s specific interests as well. (more…)

Not that I couldn’t list many more than thirteen, he is the only grandchild on three sides and makes out like a little bandit at Christmas and birthday time. However, we’ll just pick thirteen to highlight today ;).

1. His iDog, which he is surprisingly gentle with and really enjoys. It’s something I wouldn’t have thought to give him as I think of it as a grown-up toy, really, but he loves it and it is so cute!! He likes to make it growl and dance while he adjusts its ears accordingly.
2. Andy the Airplane who has the added draw of being able to haul things in his nose - the McQueen cars are always hiding in there while it flies around the house. He’s sturdy too, having survived the trip home in the suitcase, several smashings on the concrete lanai and other random abuse (including an accidental kicking across the room when left on the floor in the middle of the night).
3. His very first Elmo, Shout Elmo, given to him by a loving auntie who lives far away and will never have to be tortured by Elmo’s endless singing. I thought that the much-coveted TMX Elmo was rather cute, but this one really is sort of lovable…. for a toy that sings and dances and laughs. Lil’ Duck loves him, of course, especially to knock him over on purpose to hear him say “Oops, Elmo fell down, hee hee hee”. Poor thing.

(more…)

“Make da cookie, mama, cook da cookie den frosting and spinkles!!”

He helped put the cookies on the cookie sheet, I baked them, then I ended up doing most of the frosting work while he watched with great interest and stuck a finger in now and then. His special sprinkles, which he picked out in the store with great delight (”want da BALL ones, colorful, wow!!”) were now ready to be added to the much-anticipated cookies. (more…)