Hickory Dickory Dock, Or Why Rhymes Are So Important For Our Little Ones

I always loved nursery rhymes growing up, I still do actually, the rhyme and meter and short silly stories were something I was always clamoring for my mom to sing with me and were a source of plays my siblings and I would put on for my parents.  Today my kids favorite nursery rhyme is The Itsy Bitsy Spider because I do the finger play on them with my spider fingers crawling up their water spout bodies and my hands raining down or drying them up, they love it and I love that I can turn it into a tickle game for extra giggles.  Who'd have thought that these simple rhymes would be so good for their development as well?  I certainly didn't but they help our little ones in many wonderful ways.

When they hear nursery rhymes they hear the sounds the vowels and consonants make in a way that's easy for them to process, they hear different words like fiddle, contrary, fetch, pail, etc. that they don't usually hear, and since they are so short, rhythmic and repetitive they are also easy to memorize so they are often a child's first sentence.

Nursery Rhymes use patterns and many even use counting, size and weight which helps with math skills and they tell a story with a beginning, middle and end which teaches sequence and how to follow along.

Children benefit both physically, and emotionally as well since they develop coordination, self confidence and learn to express themselves as they act them out.

With all the great benefits that nursery rhymes have for our kids I enjoy them even more when I share them with my three.  If you want to apply this to the learning triangle you can watch Barney, or a video that uses rhyming, talk about and recite your favorite rhymes, and then act them out or make a book of the rhyme together.

Afraid of Color? Don't Be.

After a conversation with one of my SIL's, I realized that a LOT of people do not have a natural knack with color, at least when it comes to their wardrobe, this certainly explains the sea of black and brown when I go to church.  You see I grew up with both parents being artists and so it never occurred to me that neutral was not merely a personal decision but a common fear of getting colors wrong.  I've definitely seen color go wrong like when a classmate chose hunter green and hot pink for her wedding because she was sure that any red and any green ALWAYS go together, the result was truly painful to look at.  There is a full proof way to avoid such mistakes though, use a picture, painting or print that you really like for inspiration, a printed cloth is the easiest since even a tiny amount of the inspirational print will help tie the whole look together.  Here's an example:  

 This headband has teal, aqua, black, white and a little bit of pale yellow so you could pair it with this outfit and a yellow skinny belt or yellow clutch purse.  I love teal and teal and yellow is a great color combination.

I'll be posting more color combination ideas as well as some "What I Wore" pics as further inspiration as well.