Alphabet Bean Bags

My munchkin isn’t in pre-school, so I thought I’d personally take on the challenge of teaching her to read.  She knows all her letters, but mixes up some of their sounds (especially M and N) so I wanted to help her out with that first.

Which meant… crafty time with the kiddo!

I cut out the letters on freezer paper (used my silhouette.  Love.) and ironed them on to 5” squares, and handed the big stack to the munchkin with some white fabric paint. (and yes, most of our days are spent in dress-up clothes.)  We only had to re-do two letters :)

After she was done painting (and the wait was over for them to dry) I paired the letters with their matching 5” square counterpart and stitched them right sides together, leaving a small hole for turning.  Then, to make the bean bags look even more tailored, I ironed and top-stitched the squares (except where the opening was) before we filled the bags.  I should have left a bigger hole, because it was a nightmare putting beans in…

Then I stitched the opening closed, and we had bean bags.  26 of them.  I sewed for a long time.  And beans were everywhere.

But now we have a giant pile of letters!  We’ve been playing with them a lot, tossing them back and forth saying the letter and the letter sound(s) or saying words that begin with that letter. 

I also bought a piece of plywood (from the cull bin- 51 cents!) that we are going to paint for more phonetic fun and games.

But mostly, we just like to stack and toss and make colorful piles :)

Now I remember why bean bags are so fun.  You can do a lot with them.  Hooray for bean bags!

(Don’t forget to enter the Go! Baby Giveaway!  International entries welcome!)