A Parent and A Therapist - Coloring and Crayons

When you are a Mom you are always wondering if you are making the right decisions. Knowing your parenting choices will impact your child, you wonder if it was the right choice or the wrong one. Of course children are resilient, and particularly in the first few years, they allow you to learn and grow as a parent too.  So will one small wrong parenting choice hurt your child forever?  Most likely, No.  So it is funny to think that I even agonized for a millisecond about the crayons I gave Eliana to play with today.

As a pediatric Occupational Therapist, I had the benefit of working with children prior to becoming a Mom.  I think there were several benefits to this - for example, I am familiar with child development.  The problem is that sometimes I can be too aware of how children develop.  I tend to analyze every toy to make sure there is some type of benefit.  I ask myself, "Is this toy helping her fine motor, visual motor, sensory motor development?"  I sometimes have to remind myself that playing just to play has its benefits as well.

For example, today we were coloring.  I looked at the crayons I had given her to use and realized I had given her crayons that were "too advanced".  Then almost immediately I thought "Danielle, you can't really give a child crayons that are too advanced".  The Mom in me picked the crayons that were most convenient at the time.

I had given her crayons very similar to these:

The reason I first thought "why did you give her the double sided crayons?" is because the therapist in me would use these particular crayons with an older child to work on a skill called "in hand manipulation", more specifically "Complex Rotation".  This is the ability to rotate an object in the pads of the fingers without the assist from the other hand or another object (body, table, ect).  To visualize this skill think about wring with a pencil and deciding to erase the last word you wrote.  You need to flip the pencil from the pointed end to the eraser end - that is complex rotation.

So does it hurt for Eliana to play with these "too advanced" crayons?  Of course not!  But is she getting all the benefits the crayons have to offer? No.  Actually she ended up breaking two of the crayons.  These crayons look fancy and fun in the store so they are a little more expensive.  At this point in her development all Eliana really needs are fat regular crayons.  Developmentally she doesn't have the fine motor skills to color with anything more than a "gross grasping pattern" (fisted palm around the crayons with pinky side toward the paper).  At most, she will use a "palmar grasping pattern"(fisted with thumb toward the paper).

So when you go to the store and see the vast displays of coloring apparatuses don't be overwhelmed and or think you need to buy the most expensive flashiest crayons.  When first starting to color thick (fat/chunky) regular crayons are great.

These "chunky crayons" above are great for first timers!

For the next stage of developmental coloring you don't even have to buy new crayons!  I will post on how to make your own developmentally appropriate crayons for the next stage - it is super easy - I promise!

I think this is how two of the crayons were broken... :-)

More on "container play" later.  Why the therapist in me puts toys inside baggies and other containers :-)

Edible Fingerpaint

Christmas Artwork

After taking our painted pumpkin down with our Fall Decorations, we decided we needed some Christmas artwork to replace it.

So now we have Eliana's newest masterpiece on display in our house.

It was a fun process.  I found a recipe for homemade edible fingerpaint online at: The Imagination Tree - I love this blog!

Lets face it - Eliana is going to eat or at least taste the paint, so edible paint was a necessity!

It is a nice thick fingerpaint.  Many homemade fingerpaint recipes are very runny - this one has the consistency of thick pudding.

When making this recipe I would recommend following the edited note of making it on the stovetop.  I first made it by adding boiling water and it didn't thicken up enough.  Once I moved it to the stovetop it thickened up almost right away.

Edible Fingerpaint

from: The Imagination Tree

* 2 cups of corn starch
* 1 cup of cold water*
* 4.5 cups of boiling water
* Liquid food coloring

Method:
Mix the cornflour with the cold water and stir together. Pour in the boiling water and stir between each cup. It goes really strange (you are basically mixing a hot oobleck goop) but keep stirring and it literally seems to "melt" into a wonderful, custard-like consistency. We then separated it into individual jam jars before adding colouring, but you can do it however you like and this is the stage to add colour.

Edited to add:
Some people have found that the paint remains liquid and doesn't thicken up as it should. I have no idea why this should be, but I have two possible solutions, based on the fabulous commenters below!


We first made a big pot of the paint

And then split it into two containers and added the food coloring and stirred

We decided on red and green for the holidays

Now for the fun part - painting!

Aunt Lauren was over, so she helped too!

Why not put it in between your toes?  Oooooh....squishy! Fun!

Standing/Stomping in the paint?  Even more fun!

The Finished Product!

 I had this frame laying around so we put it on display in the frame

I love children's artwork on display!

The 12 Month Transition

Transitioning from Bottle to Cup and Formula to Milk

Boy that is a lot of change that happens at the magical one year mark!  Something that is soothing and comforting and done multiple times a day is suddenly supposed to change.  Poor Babies!  This post comes from the occupational therapist in me: knowing that switching to a cup and milk is needed, but a very hard transition...

I knew this would be a big transition, so this is how we worked toward those two big changes in Eliana's life.

GOAL 1

We first worked toward the cup goals:
Eliana will drink all fluids from a sippy cup when she reaches one year of age.
Eliana will be able to manage fluid from an open cup held by an adult at one year of age.

How we did it:

• We introduced both an open cup (cup without a lid) and a sippy cup when she turned 6 months old.  I started offering her small sips of water while in her highchair eating meals.  This way she has had 6 months to master how to drink out of a cup and acclimate to it so that she does not become frustrated when it becomes her primary drinking instrument. 

• I started offering formula in a cup after mealtimes and before her bottle around 8 months of age.  At 10 months I started giving her opportunities to drink one of her bottle feedings a day from a sippy cup.  

• At a year we were on vacation, so we continued with both sippy cups and bottles.  Once we returned home we transitioned to sippy cups only.  

Goal Achieved: 1 year and two weeks

Eliana's Preferred Sippy Cups: Notice that both have handles!

This is a straw cup which is great for children before they can tilt a cup up to drink from on their own.  Drinking from a straw is also wonderful for encouraging lip rounding (closing the lips around the straw).

We love this cup because it keeps fluids cold for 8-12 hours!  No spoiled milk when out running errands or heading to the beach for the day.

I love both cups because they have handles that Eliana can easily hold on her own to self sip.  Buying cups with hands is wonderful for when introducing cups because it helps increase the child's independence while drinking.  Drinking from a cup is a new skill and being able to steady it easily is important.

GOAL 2

Eliana will drink only whole milk and will discontinue breast milk/formula at one year of age.

• This is NOT a practical goal.  You aren't supposed to even introduce whole milk until they are one, so don't kill yourself and try to transition them overnight.

• At a year of age we offered Eliana milk - in a very small amount.  We made very happy faces and drank it with her :-)  We created a positive association with milk!

• Our plan was to slowly transition her over the next month as follows: 
• Week 1 on Whole Milk: Mix 1/4 milk to 3/4 formula
• Week 2 on Whole Milk: Mix 1/2 milk to 1/2 formula 
• Week 3 on Whole Milk: Mix 3/4 milk to 1/4 formula
• Week 4 on Whole Milk: Eliana drinks whole milk

• Well, Eliana ended up transitioning to whole milk at a year and 2 weeks.  Our plan went out the window...  The first week we were in Florida on vacation and I wasn't going to force something new on her when we weren't in our own element.  And then the second week she got sick.  Again, I wasn't going to force it on her when she wasn't feeling well.  I offered it to her and she drank it, but I had no expectations.  Fortunately, she likes whole milk so by the end of the second week after turning one that is all she drank.  

 Goal Achieved: One year and two weeks

Eliana drinks about 2-3 6-8 ounce glasses of milk a day.  We usually introduce milk during meals.  If she finishes the whole sippy cup than I refill it with water.  She can have as much as she wants to drink during mealtimes, but only 6 ounces of milk.  This way she doesn't fill up on milk and will be hungry for food too.  She probably drinks just as much or more water throughout the day as milk.

Remember that the doctor may recommend that at a year they transition to a cup and onto whole milk, but that doesn't mean you have to do it overnight!  And it definitely doesn't mean that you have to do both at once!  If they finish the transition when they are a year and two months or three months than so be it - remember that you know your  child best and what will make the transition easiest for them.

Don't let yourself or your child lose sleep over the process - that is why it is called a transition - make it a slow and easy one!