Pinterest: Life Hacks

So I'm a big Pinterest user. I love looking on it to see what I can make with N, or find things that will make our lives easier. Here are a couple of things I've seen on Pinterest that we use regularly to make our life easier!

                                         Pool Noodle

We have this on N's door. This is most helpful as she loves to go into different rooms and close the door. Recently she's been doing this more and more in her room, as she can now get into the closet full of toys there, so closing the door to her room is just one more 'big girl' thing she does. Closing the door is one thing, opening is a whole other problem, as she can't do that yet she'll yell for help and sometimes it takes a minute to figure out which room she's in! With the pool noodle on the door she can 'close' the door and not get stuck in her room and need help getting out. Just cut a piece of the pool noodle and stick it on the door. Some noodles have holes through the center and this will just cling to the door when placed on it. If there is no hole in the middle, you're just going to have to dig out a bit of the middle so it can wrap around the door.



Bath Tub Organizer
We as adults use tub organizers for our shampoos and soaps, so why shouldn't we use these for our kids stuff? We were in Walmart the other day and we were getting a new potty seat for N (one of those that has the built in kids seat to the adult seat) and I saw all kinds of organization bins with suction for adults to put their stuff in the bathroom. I got to thinking we need this for N's tub toys. So we got two of those corner suction bins and have all N's' toys in them now. This way she can reach the toys she wants too instead of us storing them outside the tub in the bathroom cabinet.

Books: 2 Year Olds

I love children's books. I have such fond memories of reading certain books over and over again; Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, There's No Such Thing as Dragons, The Butter Battle Book, Green Eggs and Ham, Corduroy, Make Way For Ducklings, Madeline, just to name a few.  So when I found out I was pregnant, I had my mom search through her book shelf to see what we still had and went to the store to get copies of these books for our little N. These books though are too wordy and don't hold N's attention right now but there are some other great books out there that weren't around when I was a kid that N really loves.

The Little Blue Truck Leads the Way By Alice Schertle
published by HMH Books for Young Readers
This book has great illustrations and a great message too. N loves finding the truck on each page as he drives along in the big city.

Each Peach Pear Plum By Allan Ahlberg and Janet Ahlberg (Illustrator)
published by Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
This is an awesome 'I Spy' book that uses all fairy tale characters in a really cute way. N loves looking for the character on each page.








Snowmen at Night By Caralyn Buehner and Mark Buehner (Illustrator)
published by Penguin Group (USA) Incorporated
This book is a wonderful story about what happens to your snowman and why each morning he looks a little more droopy each day. It really gets the imagination going and N loves to look and point out what each snowman are doing on each page.






Barnyard Dance & Pajama Time By Sandra Boynton
published by Workman Publishing Company

These two books (and there are many more by this author) are fun books with animals. Pajama Time is about getting in your PJ's and getting ready for bed. We look at our PJ's when reading the this book and see what colors and styles match up with the animals in the book.
The Barnyard Dance is about all the animals in the barn dancing together. When we read this we do all the jumping and bowing and hopping that all the animals in the book do.

Fisher Price Lift The Flap Books
We have several of these and for the last 6 months N has loved looking at each page and lifting the flaps on them and seeing whats under. Usually each page has to do with some category - shapes, colors, numbers, animals, etc. and its exciting to see he face as she lifts each flap to find what's underneath. ( We haven't read these as much recently but over the summer we did, so I'd say these are good for 1-2 year olds!)