Yellow Week

Last week was our final week of color week and we went out with a bang.  This summer, we celebrated the colors red, green, blue, orange, and yellow, and had so much fun doing lots of different activities together.  That was my favorite part - celebrating a different color each week encouraged me to come up with different ideas for summer fun and entertainment.  While I wouldn't want to do theme week every week, the weeks we didn't have a color to discover seemed to get a little redundant at times.  One of my favorite parts of the weekend was making a little list of color activities and shopping my house for items for the discovery box!

So, did Cruz learn his colors?  While I think he can recognize the different colors as we talk and read about them, he can't identify and say all of them on his own yet.  He does know and says 'blue' (booooooo), and recognizes and says 'yellow' (lello).  I'm not sure if I'll continue theme weeks during the school year or not, but am leaning on just making it our special summer fun.  Believe me, I'm already dreaming up ideas for letter of the week :)

Boy did we have some fun celebrating the color of sunshine this week.  

The week started with our Yellow Discovery Box.  It was easy to fill this week, and included: a yellow ducky, a banana, a ball, a yellow 'dump truck' spoon, a tube of Butt Paste, a yellow balloon, a cup, some Sponge Bob stickers, a yogurt smoothie squeezie, and a book about yellow hippos in the recycle pile at Mom's library!

Cruz LOVES to any mode of transportation, and get spot a truck, a pwane, and a bus from a mile away.  He is especially keen on yellow school buses, and he loved this little toy bus I scored in the $1 bin at Wal-Mart.    

We added a few yellow books to Cruz's new built-in shelves in his room...

And we just couldn't read If You Give a Cat a Cupcake without indulging in one ourselves, courtesy of none other than Scratch Cupcakery.

  
We snuck a few Golden Oreos, 

and paired Cruz's favorite cereal with a fun yellow book,

...and baked a refreshing lemonade cake that tasted like summer.

And for the finale, we invited Charly over for a YELLOW PARTY to celebrate summer and all things yellow!

My mom got all into the party planning festivities, too, and together we created one festive spread to celebrate yellow.

  

We played with yellow balloons...

Hung paper lanterns from the ceiling...

And decorated the table with yellow plates, napkins, and vases of daisies and lemons (did you know Wal-Mart sells five-pound bags of lemons for 99 cents?!).

For lunch, we had egg salad (and ham and cheese) tea sandwiches, chips and white cheddar corn puffs, fruit skewers (with pineapple), and lemonade with real lemons.

And for dessert, we dipped bananas in melted chocolate, and let the kiddos roll them in lots of sweet toppings (mini chocolate chips, toasted coconut, toffee, and their favorite, lots and lots of sprinkles).

  

We drew yellow things on the driveway with sidewalk chalk, and mom stuffed baggies full of popcorn for them to munch on.

  
The day was fun, I got some use out of my glass drink pitcher, and as always, Cruz and Charly had a blast chasing each other around and dragging out every toy in the house!  I love creating little out-of-the-ordinary experiences for them to take part in.  Although they're little, and likely won't remember our yellow party, there's a quiet recognition in the moment.  A, 'hmm...this is different' curiosity that lights up their faces and makes them act more aware and appreciative.  We saw this in the way they acted all grown up and proper as they sat like big kids at the table and nibbled on their sandwiches or pulled each individual fruit, one by one, off their skewers before popping it in their mouth.  We saw this in the way they dipped their 'sprinkles in bananas,' and the way they chased their balloons around the house.

Until we meet again color weeks!  You've been replaced with flash cards for now ;)