Lead Baby

Victor has a flu/cold/fever yuck thing. It's the sort of bug that you think is over, then the tylenol wears off and he's sick again. Right now, it's warm (will be high 70's before long - crazy North Carolina weather) so we're on the back porch. Victor is in the kiddie pool with 3 pounds of split peas. He is SO HAPPY. Really happy.
He had measuring cups, some funnels, a couple bowls and a spoon in with him. He's been pouring, dumping and shaking for the last hour. He only stops to look at an airplane overhead or right now he's stopped to watch the lawn behind us get mowed.
The pool idea is thanks to Momma Hedy. Victor has been loving playing with the dried peas - which started at the kitchen counter (proved messy and hard on your feet), then moved to the back deck (fun until the peas get stuck between the boards), so we had to come up with a better solution. This has proved to be the best. We got some rice and pinto beans too for later play when new textures are needed. Who needs questionable toys from China when you play with split peas, beans and rice?! For under ten dollars, we have hours of fun - and that is a beautiful thing.

If anyone has other ideas for cool things to play with in our pea pool - let us know. I'm going to look for some good ideas on some of the preschool teacher websites out there.