Hurricane Irene: What we did while we were stuck inside.

We live in southern NH, about an hour or so from the coast so we were prepared for hurricane Irene.  We made a "hurricane kit" and a food bin filled with Organic GFCF meals and snacks in case we had to leave the house in a hurry.  We prepared for the worst case scenario, just in case.  The way I figured it, if we were prepared we wouldn't need it, if we weren't prepared then we would have needed it.....so we prepared.  As you all already know, we were blessed and the hurricane turned into a tropical storm and missed hitting us directly.  Needless to say, we were just stuck inside all day.  We were even more blessed to keep our power!!! (Not everyone in our area was so lucky).  Part of our preparation was finding things to do with Peanut and Sassy.  I ended up finding a cute hurricane craft to do with the kids.  We spent the morning in our jammies and watched movies.  In the late afternoon when the kids were crawling the walls, that's when I whipped out our hurricane project. 

I began by talking with the kids about what a hurricane is (in basic toddler terms, and as simple as possible).  The ability to look outside and "see" what the hurricane was doing made it a little easier for them to understand what I was trying to tell them.  I showed them the shape of a hurricane with the picture I had found the night before.  This is an actual space image of hurricane Irene that I found on "google images".  We individually went through the word "hurricane" and I had the kids name each letter in the word.  I then wrote the word on their paper and made a spiral shape to guide them.  I then had them draw out what they saw outside and/or in the picture I had printed.

Here is Peanut drawing his pictures.  He told me here he was drawing the trees outside and the rain

Sassy said she had drawn what she saw in the picture I showed them.

Then I gave the kids a handful of cotton balls and had them pull them all apart. (Awesome fine motor activity that encourages a pincher grasp as well as the use of both hands!) 

Then we put glue on our paper in the spiral shape of a hurricane. 

Then I had the kids stick their cotton to the glue to make their hurricane.

Here is their finished project.  The kids seemed to really enjoy this project.  I'll hold it aside for the next hurricane.  Hopefully this project won't be needed for a long time.  Maybe at that point we can get more scientific with it!!

We were blessed to have been spared, but not everyone was so lucky.  Our thoughts and prayers go out to all of those who were effected by the hurricane as well as to those families who lost loved ones as a results of the storm.

God Bless!