Blue's Clues

Those of you that spend any time around Sam know that he is crazy about the show Blue's Clues. He calls it "ooose ooose" and does the double hand motion on either side of his face like they do in the movie. He begs for it first thing when he wakes up. If anyone happens to turn on the tv, Sam zones in and begs (with big puppy dog tears) for Blue's Clues. For awhile we were surviving on two vhs tapes I got a couple years ago at garage sales (a total of four episodes). It soon became apparent we would need something new before I went totally nuts. Thank goodness for grand ol' Walmart. I found the perfect DVD with four more episodes for $5.00- my lifesaver! And even better it was an Alphabet focused one. Perfect for Sam who is crazy for letters and Elijah is interested too.

Blue's Clues has carried over into the boys playing too. Sam and Elijah both latched onto a sole Elmo notebook that happened to be perfect for sliding a crayon through the rings which necessitated the buying of new notebooks to keep down the fighting. Sam loves his! He carries it around and calls it is "bo'book". He is constantly doodling in it. I often find him at our little art table or on his tummy on the floor talking to himself as he does his intricate little doodles on most every page in the notebook.

One of the episodes talks about writing messages and Elijah has taken paper and written/colored his own messages for family and friends. Yet another episode has Joe and Blue writing labels for various things around the house. This was our project for the past week (Elijah initiated). We cut paper into strips and Elijah had me write down words for him to copy onto the strips and then tape up around the house. He worked so hard on them and it was great practice for his letter writing (the strips help restrict his large, take over the world letters). Sammy of course wanted in on the action and has quite a few of his own strips with doodles on them. Only a couple labels actually made it up around the house. I think this week we will try and do some more.

It is so much fun to see my kids excited about something and learning along the way.