Busy Siblings’ Corner

By Heather Kempskie and Lisa Hanson

National Siblings Day is April 10. Here are some ways to celebrate:

Let Me See Your Funny Face (video instructions available!)
Large mirror
Child-safe scissors
Colored construction paper
Glue stick
Paper plates
Stapler

Gather your children around a large mirror to make funny faces and admire their similar and unique features. Then your older children can create self-portraits by gluing construction paper features onto paper plates.

Baby
Your baby will enjoy studying her own face in the mirror. Touch her nose and eyes as she gazes at herself. This action will help her learn that the reflection in the mirror is hers. To strengthen her neck muscles, place her on her tummy in front of the mirror—she’ll work hard to get a good look at herself. While her siblings make funny faces in the mirror, she may even try to mimic them. For more fun, flip through magazines that have lots of close-up photos of faces for her to admire and study.

Toddler
Have your toddler identify the different features of his face, including the colors of his eyes and hair. Cut out a set of eyes, a nose, a mouth, and hair for him from construction paper. Help him glue them onto a paper plate to create his self-portrait.

Preschooler
Your preschooler can cut out a set of eyes, a nose, a mouth, and hair from construction paper for her self-portrait. She may also want to include other facial details like her eyebrows, eyelashes, and ears. Your preschooler understands different feelings, too. She may want to create a happy, silly, or tired face. While she works on the project, ask her to identify how she looks similar to or different from her siblings.

School-Age Child
Your school-age child can also use photos from magazines to create a more intricate or silly self-portrait. He can cut out eyes, a nose, and a mouth from images in the magazine. Encourage him to create portraits of his siblings, too, and then staple the paper plates together side by side for a homemade family portrait.

Crazy Sheet
One large sheet
Plush animal

Spread a large sheet on the floor of a room with lots of space and have your children gather around it. Play the following games for some crazy fun! Note: For most of these games, you’ll need at least two players who are toddler age or older. For Parachute, you’ll need four players.

The Wave
Have your children kneel on the floor and each hold a corner of the sheet. Tell them to wave their arms dramatically to create movement. Your baby can sit in your lap and wave his arms, too.

Popcorn
Instruct your children to hold the sheet close to the floor and quickly make little low pops with the sheet. If your baby can sit up, place him on the middle of the sheet. If not, lay him on the middle. He’ll love watching the sheet “pop” up around him.

Parachute
Have your children hold the sheet close to the floor, then work together to raise it above their heads as quickly as possible. Then have them take a couple steps forward while lowering the sheet behind them to turn the sheet into a parachute. Let your baby lie or sit underneath the sheet so she can watch it rise and fall around her.

Excerpted from The Siblings’ Busy Book. Copyright 2008 by Heather Kempskie and Lisa Hanson. Reprinted with permission of Meadowbrook Press, www.meadowbrookpress.com. Available in bookstores nationwide August 2008.

Identical twin sisters, Heather Kempskie and Lisa Hanson live in Massachusetts and are busy raising and entertaining two children each. Kempskie is the editor of Parents and Kids, a monthly parenting publication in Greater Boston. Hanson works at Bellani Maternity of Warwick, RI as a child movement educator teaching yoga and gymnastics to children.