Rabbits!

A few weeks ago, Wendy @Flannel Board Fun shared her bunny sets and several rhymes and I was inspired!! We are planning to do a bunny theme in May so Wendy's post was a tremendous help in our prep! There are lots of bunny posts on the Flannel Friday Pinterest boards too. Anyway, here's my take on the bunny sets plus an original rhyme/activity set too. I used pom poms for the bunny tails and google eyes instead of making them from felt. I like the extra dimension it gives to the bunnies...plus cutting out eyes is a pain! LOL! I love the carrot patch and the baby bunnies!

Here's a printable link for Rainbow Rabbits. It's a take on my Old McRainbow character and his rainbow carrots and rabbits that eat them! The felt rabbits are a diecut. The carrots are just freehand cutouts. They are about 6 inches long. I did add some glue to the back of the carrot tops to stiffen them. They weren't quite dry when I took this pic. I do plan to make a filefolder of the carrot shapes too...eventually.

Rabbits are a lot of Fun with Friends at Storytime! There are more ideas on the Flannel Friday Roundup!  Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!

♫Green Grass Grew All Around♫

A couple of years ago I saw this post from In The Children's Room for the song, 'The Green Grass Grew All Around'. I loved the song and the idea! Here's a Youtube link for a longer version of the song.  I set to work to make my version of each of the flannel pieces so that we could sing this fun song!  I told the kiddos to pretend they saw the tree and then added the branch, nest, egg with bird, feather and flea. My nest has pieces of rafia and string glued to it. I used a feather with a piece of purple felt glued to the back. I used this with a bird theme but you could also do it with a theme about trees or homes!  This was a lot of Fun with Friends at Storytime!

There are more great ideas on the Flannel Friday Roundup. Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!

Veggies in the Garden

Time for planting gardens!! I made a set of veggies to go with a
song by Jean Warren to the tune of "Down by the Station. I can't remember where I found it originally because it's not on her excellent website, Preschool Express right now. There are a lot of other great vegetable songs there though!

Here is a printable copy of the song/flannelboard rhyme, Out in the Garden. I didn't really use a pattern for these pieces. I looked at a few Google images but they are pretty easy shapes to just freehand cut out. I could see playing the ever popular game, 'Which one is missing?' after singing the song. There's any number of ways to use these pieces and the song/chant. The children can help add the pieces or take off the pieces. If your group is too big you can have a puppet animal 'eat' the veggies!! Vegetables are a lot of Fun with Friends at Storytime! There are more great ideas on the Flannel Friday Roundup. Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!

Old McRainbow's Flower Garden

Here's another post for springtime bees and flowers! I was inspired last week to make up a new rhyme for Old McRainbow for Springtime! This is a color recognition and listening activity as well. Since I hand out the colored bees the kiddos have to wait and listen and watch for the color of the flower to change in the filefolder. There are several learning skills happening with this simple little activity! My littlest kiddos get the hang of this very quickly and love to add their piece to the flannelboard! Here's the link for the rhyme:  Old McRainbow's Flower Garden.

This is fairly easy to make too. I used a Google image of a cute bee and programmed a sheet with four bees and copied them on colored paper. I used my handy little laminator and laminated them. I rough cut them so that I could laminate 6 at a time and use less laminating film. Once I cut them out more carefully I'll add a small velcro dot to the back. I also used a Google image for my flowers. I just cutout some 'grass' for the bottom of the filefolder and a couple of leaf shapes. I cut out the flowers and the bee but colored with a sharpie the outline and stripes of the bee shape. I laminated the filefolder and hotglued two little googly eyes and stacked my paper and we're ready for Fun with Friends at Storytime!

There are more great ideas on the Flannel Friday Roundup. Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!

Numbers in Nature

This is a beautiful picture book that we used with all ages in Storytime. It has large beautiful pictures with minimal text. It features on two separate pages pictures of sea stars. It was the perfect chance to use my 10 Starfish flannel pieces and the matching game I mentioned in another post, HERE.









We played a matching game with a lot of talking about the colors and shapes of the different starfish. I printed Google images of real starfish and glued them to a piece of colored paper or construction paper and then laminated them.   I showed the large picture and added it to the flannelboard (velcro on back) and the kiddos would bring their matching picture and I tucked it behind the large picture on the flannelboard. This turned out to be a LOT of fun and very interesting to see that there are so many different starfish in the sea! LOL! Nature is so much Fun with Friends at Storytime!

There are more great posts on the Flannel Friday Roundup. Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!

Buzzzzing Beezzzzz!

Hooray, the bees are buzzing around the flowers now!! Pollen is flying in the air and everything is yellow! I've got a couple of ideas for a Bee theme for Storytime. I love the classic fingerplays, 'Two Big Beehives' and 'Here is the Beehive'. They are so much fun for buzzing and tickling! Then there are a couple of flannelboard rhymes that I like to use too. You can use 'Five Little Bees' with the flowers from last week's Flower post or make a hive to use with the rhyme. I posted a fun bee story HERE. Be sure to click on the titles of the rhymes for a printable docx of each one.

 As you can see, I have 2 different kinds of bees. I do have 5 of each, I just didn't get them in the picture. The set on the left is out of paper using a diecut. The set on the right is colored pellon. The hive is made of felt with some glittery fabric paint for detail. Bug stickers are a great giveaway at the end of the storytime. I had yellow bee bodies cut out of yellow construction paper with the white tissue paper wings and black markers for the kiddos to make their own bees for a fun Home Extension. Bees are always a lot of Fun with Friends at Storytime!

There are more great posts on the Flannel Friday Roundup. Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!

Flowers Make a Rainbow

I'm so happy that the daffodils and hyacinth are blooming here!!  I couldn't resist this adorable flower rhyme. I've had it a long time and used it several ways. I made a new set of flowers to go with it and am sharing with everyone in time for springtime flower storytimes!! Here's a link for a printable copy of 'Flowers Make a Rainbow'. I used my Sizzix flower diecut and 2 shades of each color to make my newest flower set. You can't tell it but there are two shades of yellow on the yellow flowers. Anyway, you can do the rhyme and put up the flowers then talk about the colors and the concept of 'more than'. If you have a fairly small group you can hand out the flowers and let the kiddos bring up the color as you say the rhyme. This is a more tactile way to get the concept of  'more' as they help make the rows of colors. There are lots of ways to use these flowers! There's always so much Fun with Friends at Storytime in the spring!!

There are more great posts on the Flannel Friday Roundup. Check out the wonderful resources on the Flannel Friday Pinterest Boards. Here's the link for the official Flannel Friday blog for more info!