Our Five Ring Circus: February 2020

Monday, February 10, 2020

Arctic Sensory Bin for Indoor Winter Sensory Play

Arctic Sensory Bin - Indoor Winter Sensory Play


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The calendar might say it's Winter, but Mother Nature is a bit confused! Our weather has been all over the place lately. Last Monday, it was 65 degrees and sunny, and on Friday, we woke up to 4 inches of snow. Just two days later, all the snow has melted, and it's raining and in the high 40's. No matter the weather, we decided to make the Arctic our theme for this month's sensory bins!


I'm sure you already know this, but we are big fans of sensory play here! So much that we actually have a sensory table in our living room, and allow the kids to engage in messy play. Play is such an important part of early learning, and there are so many benefits of sensory play. I would rather have my kids explore a sensory bin than sit in front of the TV or iPad!

This month, we have been talking about the Arctic and the animals that live there. Even when my kids are in school, I believe in learning within the home as well. In addition to creating an Arctic world for my kids to explore, we read books about Arctic animals (National Geographic Kids has some great options), and there are some fun documentaries on Netflix and Disney+ to help kids learn more about the Arctic!

Thursday, February 6, 2020

A Walk Down Memory Lane - Our First House


Grant and I have been together forever! We met as teenagers, we married young, and we moved into our first house while our friends were still living in dorms. It wasn't the perfect house - actually, our parents HATED it at first - but it served us well!


A few weeks ago, we took on the task of cleaning out from under our king size bed. It involves moving the mattress and box springs, so it isn't something we do often. We ended up finding a big box of old pictures, and we've been having so much fun going through them with our kids! I started sharing one old picture each week on Instagram for Throwback Thursday, and I thought it would be fun to make it a regular series on my blog, too. Just one picture, with the story behind it, every Thursday!

Just a few nights ago, after the lights went out, I found myself in tears thinking about my grandma. On February 18th, it will have been 20 years since she passed away. I have lived my life longer without her than I lived with her, but I still miss her so much. I was too young to think to ask the important questions about her life, so everything I know about her history comes from other people. I just kept thinking how I would love to go back for just one day, and ask her all the questions I didn't think to ask while she was here...and give her one last hug and tell her thank you for loving me so fiercely. Although this blog is part business, I also want to share these stories so my children and grandchildren can read through them one day, and know that these stories came directly from me! So let's kick it off with our first house...