Life skills

We've done a lot of practical life activites lately. Not in a particularly Montesorri fashion but just because it's a) easier for me to get chores done if Mischief helps and b) she really wants to help and learn these skills.

For quite some time she's been loading and unloading the washing machine which is actually really helpful. She even leans in and turns the drum to make sure she's got everything. So we stepped this up and made hanging the socks a matching game. She really quite surprised me how well she did this. Most of our socks are very similar with just different coloured stripes. But I was told who each sock belonged to (who know two year olds were so observant of socks) and when I picked one out she rummaged through and accurately found the matching one. She's not quite so good at hanging them but we're getting there.

Every day Mischief stands in her pod and helps me get dinner and make daddy's 'sam-itches' for the next day. She's very good at putting all the bits and bobs in the 'saucypans' so I taught her how to peel carrots.

The look of concentration is impressive. We did end up with some very flat sided carrots but she was so pleased with herself. We've also had a go at potatoes but these seem to have thicker skin. 

We made some cup cakes as she loves mummy's mixer and helped pour the batter into the cases. They did rather good impressions of volcanoes in the oven but still tasted good.

For some time she's been helping lay the fire too. She tells us what to do first, scrunches all the paper, brings the sticks and logs and stands back whilst telling us to light it carefully. It seems to be helping her establish respect for the fire and she does like being helpful.