Karen had to go out-of-town quickly to be with her family, so I volunteered to take pre-school. Being last minute, I didn't know what I was going to do and then I got an idea.....
Of course students need desks, so I turned our coffee table into a make-shift desk, including a name tag for each girl.
In circle time, we read these books that talk about going to school. We also practiced and practiced and practiced sitting "criss-cross-applesauce", so everyone could see and not be bothered by their neighbor. We also practiced raising our hands to speak, listening to the teacher and had a line leader as we moved from center to center.
The girls LOVED sitting at their "desk". 
The first day, we made puppets in the Art Center. The next day, the girls could make what ever they wanted using the supplies on hand. Fun, fun.
I was surprised how much the girls liked the Puzzle Center.
At our Dramatic Play Center, we had a variety of flannel board pictures and magnets. I'm guessing the Dramatic Play Center at school might be dress-up or a miniature kitchen, but this worked for us. 
It was fun to see the difference in behavior these 2 days.... more mature. If they ever got too loud or forgot how to play nicely I'd ask, "What do you think a Kindergartner would do?" or "If you were a Kindergartner, how would you act?" 
Abree and I have continued practicing our address and phone number. I think she's got our address mostly learned. 
As the girls arrived, they painted these pots. It was messy, but a whole lot of fun too. I think the result was well worth some paint on the bathroom sink. What do you think?
A pot of gold at the end of the rainbow!
Next, we talked about what it meant to be lucky. I gave each girl a lucky penny. They made a wish on their lucky penny and hoped it would come true.
One of our focus areas this month, has been on exercise. It was a nice enough day that we all went outside to play an exercise game. Each girl took turns drawing a card and then we all did what it said. This proved to be a great way to get some of their energy out. Maybe this needs to become a regular part of pre-school. :)
We had Lucky Charms for snack.
I had big plans for these bags-o-green-fun. I wanted to plan a treasure hunt, with X marking the spot. (We were talking about X this week.) But... too many ideas, with too little time. I ended up just sending them home with the girls as a St. Patrick's Day surprise. 
We colored, cut and stapled "Cat in the Hat" hats.
Andi, Abree, Skylar & Emylie (missed you Audrey).
Instead of doing our normal "circle time", I gave the girls lots of blankets and pillows and told them to get comfy. Then we read lots and lots of Dr. Seuss books.
We talked about all the unusual creatures and backgrounds in Dr. Seuss' books.
Then each girl created their own crazy creature using a variety of supplies.
I believe this crazy creature's name was cupcake.
This was my version of the Dr. Seuss' truffula tree.... a yummy snack.
The girls LOVED the cotton candy and pixie sticks. 
For FHE we talked about kindness, by word and action. We challenged our family to treat each other with kindness and to notice when others treated us with kindness. --As we did kind things or had kindness given to us, we wrote it down on slips of paper and put it in our "Love Bucket". Our goal was to fill the bucket before the week ended. We reached our goal and the "Love Bucket" overflowed with kindness. The next week, we read all the kind acts and shared a treat too.
The plan:
Abree concentrates on getting her heart lei just right.
Andi models the finished product.
The girls actually really enjoyed lacing these hearts, but were not that interested in learning how to tie. Too hard and frustrating for right now.
Yum?
Emylie says YES!
The girls decorated these little mailboxes the day before. Toward the end of our party, they delivered their Valentines to each friend's mailbox. They were SO excited! Our mailboxes were so full of LOVE the lids wouldn't fit, so we put them in bags and they took them home to open.
Most of my kids are satisfied with store-bought Valentines.......
except for Taylee. 
Here is what we came up with this year.
And for the teachers, we made bigger ones, with the candy cane hearts I melted a few weeks back.
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I participated in another swap. This time with a Valentine's Day theme.When it was my turn for pre-school this month, I had the letter L.
The first day we talked about ladybugs. We colored a picture, made a counting book (with fingerprint ladybugs) and played a "site word" ladybug BINGO type game. (Some of the girls are starting to be able to recognize the site words! Some still don't really care.) :)
The next day we talked about lollipops. I had this idea about making lollipop sugar cookies.
Plan A : roll the dough into "snakes". Then wind them around in a swirl creating a lollipop.
The dough was WAY too crumbly to do this. Soooo....
Plan B: Form different sizes of balls squish them into circle shapes onto the sticks.
They were supposed to be edible, but they didn't taste very good in my opinion (a new cookie recipe that someone on the internet raved about). Maybe too much food coloring??? They were pretty bright! :)
We also made these little lollipop magnets. This was my last minute brainstorm that ended up being so cute. 
