Chickens. A thing! We only have one left, a dear and perfect Amercauna who still produces after six years and is perfectly fine after the other three meanies died. When she is cooped up, I feel antsy. When she roams free, pure serenity. Chickens are the best, problems and all. Thanks for sharing your chicken story!
Re: road trip with a 3 year old. I literally just got home from a 15+ hour drive with my 3 year old and I am full of tips! Actually very happy to have an outlet for my tips while they are still fresh!
- see if your library has read-a-long books these used to be picture books with a cd but now Wonderbooks and VoxBooks publish wonderful picture books with a little panel on the side with buttons that reads the book aloud and has a little sound so your child can follow along. They were a bit hard to hear on the highway in a small car but they have a headphone jack.
- I bought my kid a “reusable drawing tablet” (a knock off boogie board) at Walmart for $5 and it was also very engrossing. Writes very smoothly and has a delete button and that’s it.
- dry erase markers and little portable white board
- i kept a bunch of toys kind of hidden for a month or so before the trip so I could pull out something with a bit of novelty every couple of hours. (Or just ask any neighbourhood parents if they have any good car toys you can borrow for a short trip)
- we all listened to Zoey and Sassafras Dragons and Marshmallows via Libby and it was engaging enough that my very-recently-turned-3-year-old could mostly follow the narrative and also mostly not annoying for us to hear 3 times through.
- we brought a cookie sheet and magnet tiles and/or magnetic characters (tbh this wasn’t as big a hit as I had hoped but I still feel compelled to pass the idea along)
If you would like to be guaranteed to see bison, please pencil in the first Saturday in November, which is National Bison Day, and come down to Peoria and go to Wildlife Prairie Park where a very charming eccentric bison-obsessed local eye doctor will take you on a 90-minute hayrack ride through the bison herd and tell you so many things about bison. It’s free with admission. (You can also sleep in a train caboose at Wildlife Prairie Park and you will very likely hear wolves howling during the night, which is DELIGHTFUL). (We also have a small but adorable children’s museum and a small but free museum with lots of big heavy machinery because this is where Caterpillar still is, sort of.)
We did a six(?) hour road trip to southern Indiana with our 2.5 year old a couple of weeks ago. Reliable hits for entertainment were 1) melissa and doug Water Wow books. Theoretically they are mess-free. 2) LCD drawing tablet, which we call her iPad so now she does which delights us to no end. 3) Arnold Lobel reading the audio version of Frog and Toad. This is on Spotify, may also be on Libby. She liked this AND it made her fall asleep, which she hasn’t done much in the car lately, so it got her a nice little nap at naptime which made for a nicer arrival at our destination. 4) Her 11-year old cousin in the backseat. I don’t know if you have access to an 11-year-old cousin, but I do recommend it for many different applications.
Snacks. So many snacks. Some indiana rest stops (not truck stops) have playgrounds. Also, if she has a trike or a bike that can be tossed into the back of the car with the helmet even a very boring rest stop (again not truck stop) can be turned into a fun time that gets the wiggles out.
For my ceiling light/fan, I made the fan pull-cord shorter, since I don't use it as often.
Love a great children's museum.
Chickens. A thing! We only have one left, a dear and perfect Amercauna who still produces after six years and is perfectly fine after the other three meanies died. When she is cooped up, I feel antsy. When she roams free, pure serenity. Chickens are the best, problems and all. Thanks for sharing your chicken story!
Parts of this email that made me feel love:
- "seventy nine rats amount of time"
- "I started adding charms to the other ones in my house, but I can’t remember what the charms *mean.* Anyway, there’s something there."
- The existence of the Chicken Window -- !!
Re: road trip with a 3 year old. I literally just got home from a 15+ hour drive with my 3 year old and I am full of tips! Actually very happy to have an outlet for my tips while they are still fresh!
- see if your library has read-a-long books these used to be picture books with a cd but now Wonderbooks and VoxBooks publish wonderful picture books with a little panel on the side with buttons that reads the book aloud and has a little sound so your child can follow along. They were a bit hard to hear on the highway in a small car but they have a headphone jack.
- I bought my kid a “reusable drawing tablet” (a knock off boogie board) at Walmart for $5 and it was also very engrossing. Writes very smoothly and has a delete button and that’s it.
- dry erase markers and little portable white board
- i kept a bunch of toys kind of hidden for a month or so before the trip so I could pull out something with a bit of novelty every couple of hours. (Or just ask any neighbourhood parents if they have any good car toys you can borrow for a short trip)
- we all listened to Zoey and Sassafras Dragons and Marshmallows via Libby and it was engaging enough that my very-recently-turned-3-year-old could mostly follow the narrative and also mostly not annoying for us to hear 3 times through.
- we brought a cookie sheet and magnet tiles and/or magnetic characters (tbh this wasn’t as big a hit as I had hoped but I still feel compelled to pass the idea along)
The Rogers Park branch DEFINITELY has the voxbooks
If you would like to be guaranteed to see bison, please pencil in the first Saturday in November, which is National Bison Day, and come down to Peoria and go to Wildlife Prairie Park where a very charming eccentric bison-obsessed local eye doctor will take you on a 90-minute hayrack ride through the bison herd and tell you so many things about bison. It’s free with admission. (You can also sleep in a train caboose at Wildlife Prairie Park and you will very likely hear wolves howling during the night, which is DELIGHTFUL). (We also have a small but adorable children’s museum and a small but free museum with lots of big heavy machinery because this is where Caterpillar still is, sort of.)
We did a six(?) hour road trip to southern Indiana with our 2.5 year old a couple of weeks ago. Reliable hits for entertainment were 1) melissa and doug Water Wow books. Theoretically they are mess-free. 2) LCD drawing tablet, which we call her iPad so now she does which delights us to no end. 3) Arnold Lobel reading the audio version of Frog and Toad. This is on Spotify, may also be on Libby. She liked this AND it made her fall asleep, which she hasn’t done much in the car lately, so it got her a nice little nap at naptime which made for a nicer arrival at our destination. 4) Her 11-year old cousin in the backseat. I don’t know if you have access to an 11-year-old cousin, but I do recommend it for many different applications.
Snacks. So many snacks. Some indiana rest stops (not truck stops) have playgrounds. Also, if she has a trike or a bike that can be tossed into the back of the car with the helmet even a very boring rest stop (again not truck stop) can be turned into a fun time that gets the wiggles out.