Ladybird Tuesday - Girls and Boys, A Ladybird Book of Childhood

It's that strange time of year between Christmas and New Year, and I'm cheating a little bit with my Ladybird Tuesday post today. I'm going to look at a book which I received as a Christmas present - Boys and Girls: A Ladybird Book of Childhood (affiliate link). Although it was only published in 2007 it seems to be currently out of print. My Mum managed to track down a second hand copy for me, which is in excellent condition.

It's a large, hardback book, and it's divided into chapters which reflect many of the topics that the Ladybird books are famous for - including 'at home', 'things to do' and 'special days'. It is stuffed full of vintage illustrations from the books and unedited full page extracts, featuring the familiar Ladybird typeface. It's the sort of book that you can dip in and out of rather than read through in one go.

At the end there is a short introduction to the Ladybird Key Words Reading Scheme, and a complete list of all the Ladybird books published, divided by series, from the 1940s to 1980s. During this time, 646 Ladybird titles were published, in 63 series.

I'm slightly too young to have enjoyed a true Ladybird childhood. For me, the nostalgia in Ladybird books comes from memories of reading the older books, and having them read to me, when I was little. A great deal of the book did strike a chord with me though.

A large number of the pages are titled after different types of experience or activity, with a list of things that would have been noticed by a child. My favourite page is titled 'being ill', accompanied by a picture of a small child in bed cutting out pictures from a catalogue. Some of the things on the page - 'My bedroom looks different in the daytime', 'Lunch on a tray', 'A box of tissues and a bucket by my bed' and 'Fall asleep even though it's light' - reflect perfectly things that I remember from childhood. It's a real nostalgia fest.

There are also short articles contributed by famous Ladybird book fans and a detailed account of themes found in the books and the volumes that are best known for reflecting them. It's a full and rich history of both Ladybird books and the period in history that they represent, and if you have an interest in Ladybird books I'd definitely recommend tracking down a copy - as a start there are several copies available through second hand sellers on Amazon.

If you're looking for another wonderful Ladybird related item I can also recommend Postcards from Ladybird (affiliate link) which is a collection of 100 vintage Ladybird covers reproduced as postcards. I received them as a gift recently and use four of them in a small photo wall which I blogged about here.

If you love Ladybird books, do pop over and visit Ladybird Tuesday, where Being Mrs C is assembling a really comprehensive catalogue of Ladybird books and reviews.

Below you can find links to all my Ladybird Tuesday book posts.

Snow White and Rose Red
Hansel and Gretel
Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves
The Three Little Pigs
The Old Woman and her Pig
Little Red Riding Hood
The Ugly Duckling
The Railway Children
A Little Princess
A First book of Aesop's Fables

A Ladybird Book about Knitting
More Things to Make - For Special Occasions
Easy to Make Puppets
Learning to Sew
Stamp Collecting
Tricks and Magic

Prehistoric Animals and Fossils
Dinosaurs
Stone Age Man in Britain
Great Civilisations - Crete
Charles Dickens
Nelson
Lives of the Great Composers Book 1
Lives of the Great Composers Book 2
The Story of Music

Plants and How They Grow
The Ladybird Book of the Night Sky
Sea and Air Mammals
The Farm

The Story of Nuclear Power
The Motor Car
How it Works - The Computer
How it Works - The Rocket
The Story of Ships
The Postman and the Postal Service
People at Work - The Nurse

Understanding Numbers
Talkabout Clothes
Going to School
Teaching Reading

Stories of Special Days and Customs
Christmas Customs

Girls and Boys - A Ladybird Book of Childhood

Christmas 2013

We've had a busy few days, and now Christmas is over. We had another lovely Christmas this year, spending the day at home and visiting friends and family on each side. We counted down to Christmas following the daily antics of our Elf on the Shelf which was definitely a hit with the little ones. Harry was well hyped up for Christmas, helped by all the activities that he took part in at school - the Nativity play, a trip to the pantomime, Christmas party and the carol service. I made two smaller gingerbread houses this year, one for each child, which they decorated themselves.

On Christmas Eve we went out into the garden to watch the International Space Station fly overhead, made more magical by convincing the children that it was Father Christmas going past in his sleigh. Then we scattered reindeer food, and put out the stockings, mince pie and carrot.

They received one large present each - Harry a Playmobil cargo plane and Mia a dolls house - which they were absolutely delighted with. Then I kept their stockings small and simple, and of course they received presents from family too. They both received some lovely books which I'm looking forward to reading with them.

The surprise hit present of the day was a couple of tiny Hexbugs, which cost about £2 each. We hadn't encountered Hexbugs before, they are little robotic creatures that run about and are an absolute bargain for the amount of play value. Harry spent ages constructing a maze for them out of Duplo to run around in, and I can see lots more fun to be had.

And as for me, among my lovely gifts I was lucky enough to receive some crafty things that I'm looking forward to trying out!

Our Christmas dinner is a little untraditional as we don't really eat meat so we don't go for a turkey. Instead we had roasted vegetables and party food. I don't want to spend Christmas cooking, so we go for easy options that just need to be heated up. Harry was beautifully behaved at the table, Mia a little more fidgety, but we still enjoyed a special family meal. We made our own crackers this year which were a big success, and a good way to use up some of those party bag fillers that we've collected through the year!

It has been lovely to spend some family time together, and we still have another week with us all at home, so I may be a little quiet over here for a few days, but I have plenty coming up, including some book giveaways, so keep an eye out!

I hope that all my readers enjoyed a lovely Christmas :)

The adventures of our Elf on the Shelf

Since he arrived at the beginning of the month, Elfiegoy and his antics have been a huge success. Harry and Mia loved hunting for him every morning, and were thrilled enough even to just see him move around from place to place. There were a few days though where I did get a little more creative, and here are some of my favourites:

When Ram and I arrived back from our surprise trip to Paris, Elfiegoy brought the children a note to say how well behaved they had been, along with some Christmas chocolates.

I've seen lots of elves bathing in marshmallows so I thought this would be a fun one to try out, he looks very comfortable! I had to use a safety pin to attach his arms behind his back, fortunately as the children aren't allowed to touch him it wasn't obvious!

Harry was beginning to wonder where all the Christmas chocolates were disappearing to after he had gone to bed, so he woke up one morning to discover the answer!

It was inevitable that Elfiegoy would get the Hama beads out at some point, here he is making a Hama bead Santa. I toyed briefly with the idea of having him tip all the beads out of the container, but that might have been going too far!

Finally, today was Elfiegoy's last morning with us. He appeared in the Christmas tree along with a note and two presents. The note read - "Dear Harry and Mia. I have had a lovely time staying with you this Christmas. Tonight it will be time for me to go back to the North Pole. I have left you a present to help you get ready for Christmas. Make sure that you have a bath tonight and wash your hair, and stay in bed until the sun comes up [on the Groclock] on Christmas morning, because you don't want to disturb Father Christmas! I will see you again next year, love from Elfiegoy." In the parcels were some new pyjamas for them to wear tonight, a Christmas tradition which I started last year.

It's been a lot of fun having Elfiegoy to stay with us, I'm so glad that we started this tradition. It was a bit last minute, so next year I aim to be a lot more prepared and come up with some more fun things for him to do!

Did you have an Elf on the Shelf this year? What was the best thing that he got up to?

Simple Childhood Christmas crafts

One of my favourite things about Christmas is all the crafting that goes along with it. I remember lots of Christmas crafting fun when I was growing up, and I'm having a great time re-visiting it all with my little ones. These are some of the favourite crafts that I remember from when I was little, all really simple and can be done with things that you have around the home.

Paper snowflakes

Use something circular, like a small plate, to draw a circle onto some white paper and cut it out. Fold in half a couple of times, then use scissors to cut out shapes from the folded paper. Unfold to discover a beautiful snowflake! You can experiment to see what types of cuts work best, and you might like to try folding the paper into six instead for a more authentic snowflake. Harry loved this activity, and produced a blizzard of snowflakes to stick up around the room.

You can try using different coloured paper, and then decorating with with felt pens, glitter or sequins. You could also make snowflakes from a dark coloured paper, and stick tissue paper on the backs to make sun catchers for the window. As a bonus, the tiny triangles all over your living room will make it seem as though it is really snowing! And if you want to take your paper snowflakes to the next level, try this fantastic paper snowflake tutorial.

Toilet roll and cotton wool snowman

I loved making these when I was little. Simply take an old toilet roll and cover with cotton wool. Use a larger ball for the head, or cover a ball of scrumpled up newspaper with cotton wool, then decorate with buttons, googly eyes, pom poms pipe cleaners or scraps of card.

Paper chains

We always made our own paper chains at Christmas when I was little. I think that we used to buy packs which came with a gummy edge to stick together, but I've also made them with old wrapping paper, stapled or sellotaped together. If you can't remember how to make them there is an easy tutorial here - how to make paper chains, they look so festive strung around the room!

Stained glass window decorations

When I was growing up, our front door was made up entirely of glass panels. Every year my Mum would lead us in creating a stained glass window display. There must have been at least twenty panels, and each one would have it's own design cut out from card and backed with coloured tissue paper. It looked fantastic when the light from the hallway was shining out! Our front door is entirely solid with just some frosted glass so it doesn't work in our house, but you can easily make stained glass patterns and pictures for any window in the house. Just use a craft knife to cut out your design, and scraps of tissue paper to cover it on the back.

Gift tags made from old Christmas cards

I always save my old Christmas cards and cut them up to make gift tags for the next year. I even bought a pair of pinking shears especially to add a little bit more interest. Since having the children I've also used old Christmas cards to make new cards and collages.

What Christmas crafts do you remember from your childhood? I recently asked some of my friends to share their favourite Christmas crafts and you can find lots more ideas here - Classic Children's Christmas crafts.

The end of Harry's first term

It has come round so quickly, and on Friday Harry broke up for Christmas. I can't believe how well he has come on. In terms of his learning, he has gone from not even recognising all his letters to reading books with proper words in. I don't know how he compares to his classmates, but I'm certainly impressed with how well he's doing. He also looks so grown up now, and so at home in his school uniform. He's had a busy week, with a Christmas party, a trip to the pantomime and a carol service, and I'm sure that he's ready for a break - although he will insist on being kept occupied!

I remember reading a blog post a little while ago which I enjoyed very much about the 'end of term art bundle', and today brought home his own very first art bundle. We had a great time looking through it and it was lovely to find some of the things that he's been working on, especially his painting and drawing. They also do a lot of work on the computers which is good to see. Fortunately I'm fairly ruthless when it comes to keeping artwork, so I've had a good sort through and only kept the pieces which I particularly like or which I remember him talking about after school.

So his uniform is in the wash, lunch box away in the cupboard, and now we have two weeks of school holidays, with Christmas preparation and crafting, probably far too much indulgent food and time to spend with family.

Simple paper plate Christmas wreath

These paper plate Christmas wreaths are a really simple Christmas craft for children, and would also make a great project for a large group of children. You might even be able to find some green paper plates, which would make them a lot easier and quicker to make!

You need:

Paper plates
Green paint
Green glitter
Glue
Bits and pieces to decorate - we used red and white pom poms, cut up pieces of green pipe cleaner and scraps of green paper and tissue paper
Ribbon to decorate and hang

Instructions:


Making these wreaths is a two step process, as you need to wait for the base layer of green paint to dry. If you don't have time to wait for them to dry, you could leave out the paint layer and just collage the decorations on to the wreath. I like to paint first because I find that little ones often don't have the patience to cover the entire wreath, and the green underneath looks nicer than plain white.

First, cut the centres out of the paper plates. I find the easiest way to do this is to fold the paper plate lightly in half and cut out the middle that way. Then paint with thick green paint. While the paint is wet you might want to sprinkle some green glitter across them before it dries for a glittery finish.

Then when the paint is dry, stick the collage materials all over the wreath. I found some ribbon in my ribbon stash to make a bow for the top, then we used BluTak to stick them to the doors of the children's bedrooms, you could also punch a hole in the top and use ribbon to hang them from a door or the Christmas tree.

A lovely decoration for your child's bedroom door this Christmas!

When chicken pox struck

We've been dreading chicken pox for years. We actually thought that Harry had already had it, especially as he had survived it doing the rounds for years at nursery and pre-school. But I tucked him up in bed as normal one evening, then when I went in to kiss him goodnight later, he was red hot. We managed to get some Calpol into him, and as we did so we saw the first spot. There was no doubt this time, it was a proper blistery spot.

Fortunately I think he got off quite lightly. He got lots of spots, but they didn't seem to bother him. He was very tired, but was happy to just lie on the sofa and watch television for a couple of days. He was a bit freaked out by the spots though and he didn't want anyone to see them, I had to get him dressed with both our eyes shut. This meant that he refused to go in the bath or put on any calamine cream, but luckily he didn't seem to suffer with any itchiness.

Then we were in limbo, knowing that there was an excellent chance that Mia would get it, and sure enough, almost exactly two weeks later, I found the first spot after her bath. Poor little Mia really suffered. We had to take her to the emergency doctor because two days later her eyes had swollen and she couldn't open them - he diagnosed infection and prescribed anti-biotics. Fortunately, although miserable, it was a fairly short-lived illness, and the next day she was feeling much better, and up and about like usual.

So we are left feeling enormous relief now that particular childhood milestone is out of the way, although I do keep hearing horror stories of children that get it over and over again!