Toddler vs. Meal Times: How I Keep Them Entertained

Dear Amy,

Sorry I didn’t check in on Monday. Our Internet was down and it rocked my world…and not in a good way. More like in the “We just struck an iceberg” kind of way. I didn’t realize how reliant I was on my friend the Internet until it was no longer there. I missed it…in a deep and meaningful way. I love you, Internet. There I said it. Now let’s move on.

We all know how hard it can be to keep kids, particularly toddlers, focused during meal times. I have a whole slew of input on that topic. D’s stubbornness in regard to eating has caused me to become a full-time researcher in the field of “Toddler vs. Food.” For today, I wanted to share what has become one of our favorite breakfast traditions.

Toward the beginning of the year, I saw one of those daily calendars on clearance at our local department store. You know the kind—the ones with the daily vocabulary word, cartoon, Sudoku puzzle, etc. Well, this one had a daily Origami activity. So, I bought it. Each day’s page serves as the paper for the next day’s project. We have made airplanes, animals, flowers, containers of all sorts, hats…the list goes on and on. The boys love it, and I think it must be good for their spatial development, right? Either way, they watch with complete fascination while they eat and I fold. Then they get to play with whatever we made that day. Hello? New toy everyday anyone? THEY LOVE IT!

Here are today’s adventures in Origami, I was super impressed with my flower (today’s activity).

The boys were less impressed. So, I recalled an old standby…the boat. And I made one for each of them to play with.

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Good fun. Have a great day!

Love, Kate