Sensory Camp 2016 Day 4

The last day with these guys! It’s been an incredible adventure, and we can’t wait until next summer to climb, explore, munch healthily, become yogi’s and explore through our senses again! I truly could not have made this camp such a success without the help and volunteering of Donna Bonang, Niki Olesky, Eva Morrow, Ilana Kanovsky, and Abigail Schmidt. You helped to make this incredible! Thank you parents for sharing your little guys and girls with us this summer, and a special thanks also goes out to Heather and Hobie for taking the time to walk the forest, choose the perfect trees, cut them down and tow them to our truck to build our balancing tree playground! What an awesome place to live J

Let’s look at our welcome sign – Greeting & water table play with seashells, rocks and colorful buttons; sensory bottles, gardening, snack, yoga, playground and tire play!

Niki & Owen reviewing our schedule

Sensory water table - this was a big hit! 

Making sensory bottles was such a success with this crew. The waited so patiently, socially were amazing in requesting items they needed such as; a funnel or certain color glitter, and had fun interacting. We made a game (thank you Kelly Arace for the idea on how to expand this activity :) turning the glitter into different emotions – sadness, anger, madness, frustration. 

When the glitter is shaken up the emotions are floating all around, but while watching the glitter, taking deep breaths and allowing it to settle, the emotions settle as well! It was so fun watching our emotions dance around the bottle, letting them land and then all chanting, “we’re happy!” The other day my 6-year-old, Henry, was having a tough time and kept going back to his sensory bottle. After using it a few times he came up to me and said, “Wow, Mom, my sensory bottle really works.” YAY! It also helped my 4-year-old fall asleep one day. Sorry, one last story…When we were down at the ocean last week, there were some older kids there, 12-15 year olds. They have been spotted picking up the bottle and watching the glitter numerous times on our trip! Something for all ages and stages and a great way to teach kids how to calm.

Next, we marched off to the garden to tackle the tactile system, work on upper body muscles, proprioceptive awareness wheelbarrowing, pincer grasps pinching, and all while being a team and working together!

I think the photos speak for themselves with this activity. A great sensory experience for kids while also teaching them about sustainability, health and eating well too!

By this point, the kids were starving! Frozen blueberries, blueberry muffins  and cucumber water, yum! This is the recipe that I used for the muffins, but I also came across this one, which I am going to have to try soon! Happy baking to you at home!

    

    

                              

As we transitioned to our “yoga grass” the kids found their spaces quickly and nicely and were ultra prepared for yoga time today! Just 4 sessions and it seemed as if they have been doing yoga for years (which is not much for the amount of time they have been on this planet!). We started this weeks’ yoga with a superhero mindfulness activity. After our 4 lion’s breaths, we all listened to the chime of the yoga cymbals talking about how the sound made us feel. Then, we each savored a mini chocolate chip - taking note of what it felt like in our mouths, on our tongue, and how it tasted when we were mindful. The results were incredible from the 4-6-year-olds. Some said that they had never tasted chocolate like that before! Amazing! Our yoga safari was inspired from an Africa yoga class that I went to the night before as part of Africa Yoga Project. If you ever have the chance to experience this, please do! The energy of the class was so amazing and the instructors brought so much of their culture into our yoga room, I can't say enough about it - it enlightened my spirit and all for a great cause. 

#africayogaproject @africayogaproject

Listening to our cymbals

Lion's Breath

Warriors on the safari - Breathe IN & OUT

Frogs hopping along - Breathe IN & OUT

The kids know their routine! Off to the playground, balance trees & tire tower to wait for pick up! On our playground, the skateboard swing, which is awesome for balance is called the SK8swing and can be found on Amazon, of course! We got this as a gift from a special teacher ;) and the kids absolutely love playing on it daily! The trapeze bar is so awesome for core strength and flipping to change up that vestibular system. I love our playground for the kids! 

The tire tower has been such a big success this summer, and it's so easy to
make. You can have fun painting it too! 

Go Owen!

Thank you, Mikaela, for all of your help this summer too!

Henry found a tree frog as our nature based sensory camp came to a
close - perfectly fitting!

Thank you again for sharing your children with us. I can't say enough of how much we loved Sensory Camp and are looking forward to next summer! Enjoy your fall everyone! Namaste!