So many times I have watched Sammi sitting quietly and just wondered what on earth was going through her head. I think that is the great mystery for parents about their children. You watch your child grow, you know their likes and interests. You can even guess the reactions they’ll have to different situations or food or challenges, but in the end, when they sit quietly (which rarely happens) we are left wondering what is running through their heads.

Are they complex, problem solving, abstract thoughts or simple thoughts about their immediate environment? How can we get at that information without affecting the content of what’s shared? I can figure out a lot when I watch Sammi play. She often recreates experiences she’s recently had and then manipulated them to change outcomes. But sometimes there are no leads to go from.

We had the opportunity today to use Cherish Bound‘s Child Chat cards to start conversations that gave us some interesting insight into Sammi’s thoughts. Each card contains a question to prompt a child to talk about a particular topic. The  Child Chat cards contain questions that come from a variety of aspects of a child’s life: school, about me, my family. My mom fanned the deck of cards out and let Sammi choose any card she wanted. Then we asked her the question and she answered. Some questions brought back memories for me that I shared with my mom and we were able to tell Sammi some fun stories.

Sammi’s Cute Answers

Q: What do you want to be when you grow up?
S: A big girl

Q: What is your favorite TV show and why?
S: Curious George because it’s fun.

Q:On rainy, snowy or extra hot days, what does your family do for fun inside?
S: Build tree houses.

Q: What is a lesson that you learned from your teacher this year?
S: To be nice.

Q: Describe something that was really hard for you and now is easy.
S: Counting.

One of the cards asked what happens in your family when you lose a tooth. This hasn’t happened yet for our children and isn’t something we’ve ever talked about. I almost moved on after reading the question, but at the last moment it dawned on me that this had opened a door to talk about the tooth fairy in a context where Sammi was ready to understand the concept. This worked because Sammi was really engaged in the activity of reading the questions and answering them.

After we had moved on from the cards, we found Sammi playing the card game on her own. She was making up questions for her pretend friends and stuffed animals to answer. She also loved it so much she wanted to do it with her daddy when he came home. I was worried that the cards might be above what she could understand or what she’d be interested in doing. I’m glad I was wrong! I learned a lot about Sammi and what she thinks about.

As part of the Fall Fling giveaway, Cherish Bound is providing one winner with a set of Child Chat cards. They are also giving away the Fall Story Starter book to another winner. If you haven’t entered yet, the deadline has been extended to Wednesday, Sept 30. Winners will be announced Thursday Oct 1. Leave a comment on the Join the Fall Fling! post to enter. Leave a comment on this post for an extra entry. I’d love to hear what your child is thinking and how you figured it out.

The idea for the Fall Fling really started off with the opportunity to work with CSNStores.com’s children’s site All Children’s Furniture. They carry everything from kids chairs to craft supplies with a whole lot of fun toys in between. We chose to review the Melissa and Doug Pattern Blocks because Sammi is lately obsessed with shapes.

First off, I love Melissa and Doug products. I like that they are all wood because they have great texture and feel solid. I’m not a fan of flimsy toys that are ready for the garbage the first time the girls look at them. We have the Band in a Box set from Melissa and Doug. It has withstood beatings from many children in two different states now and is none the worse for wear.

Sammi is at a stage where she is starting to see how little things can be put together to get something new. That combined with her new love of shapes led to the natural choice of the Pattern Blocks. The day we received them in the mail was like Christmas for her. We opened the box, removed the plastic and she went to town.

She pulled out each board and completed the picture. She carried them around the room and showed them to me and to my mom. She was so excited she had made the picture. She also loved talking about the shapes and the colors of each block. After that excitement had run its course, I showed her that you can turn over the picture boards and there’s anew picture waiting to be completed. She loved it!

All Children’s Furniture has a large selection of toys, furniture and other accessories for little ones. I thought their website was easy to navigate and the pricing/shipping was easy to figure out. The only thing I was surprised by was that after our blocks were ordered, I was automatically added to their email list. It’s easy enough to change your subscription status, I just wasn’t ready for the emails to start showing up.

All Children’s Furniture is offering one winner a choice between two toys: Melissa and Doug Beginner Pattern Blocks or Melissa and Doug Bug Jug Fill and Spill. Please leave a comment on Join the Fall Fling! to enter the giveaway and say which prize you’d choose if you win. You can also leave a comment on this post for an extra entry. I’d love to know what your little one is obsessed with right now: colors, shapes, letters, numbers or something entirely different?

Reading is a perfect activity any time of year, if you ask me, but I particularly enjoy reading in the fall. The cool weather, the start of the school year, the ability to curl up with a blanket again and not melt from the heat of summer are all reasons why I enjoy reading in the fall.

Recently we received a lovely package in the mail from Scholastic. We already posted our review of I’m Your Bus by Marylin Singer. Today I thought I’d share the hidden gem in the package. This one was slipped in at the last minute and we didn’t know we’d be receiving Mama Says: A Book of Love for Mothers and Sons.

I was hesitant at first since my little ones are girls. I wasn’t sure how Sammi would react to a book focused on boys. But she saw it and insisted I read it. Thank goodness she loves books and didn’t judge this one by its cover. To my surprise, she loved the book. I read it two or three times through the very first time we sat down to read it.

The book is written in verse. Each page is devoted to the relationship between mother and son in a different culture. As a linguist I loved that they included the text in English and the language of the culture on each page. Unfortunately they didn’t include any of the languages I know, but they did have Russian (by far more popular than Bulgarian) and I was able to sound out the Cyrillic alphabet to make an attempt at reading it.

They do have one page for Japan and since Brent knows Japanese, Sammi always insists he read the Japanese lines after I read the English. She was very disappointed one day when we read the book while Brent was at school and I couldn’t read the Japanese page. Maybe someday I’ll get around to learning Japanese.

I was surprised that this book intended for mothers and sons had such appeal to my daughter. But she really enjoys it. Even when I pulled it off the shelf to write the review she wanted us to drop everything to read it again. The message is one of strength, love and wisdom. A message that rings true for any parent-child relationship, regardless of gender.

The text of Sammi’s beloved Japanese page:

Mama says

Be honest

Mama says

Be true

Mama says

To put my heart

In everything I do

I’m excited to announce that a copy of Mama Says: A Book of Love for Mothers and Sons from Scholastic has been added to the list of prizes in our Fall Fling giveaway. Leave a comment here to enter to win on of our amazing prizes. Also, you can blog about how you welcome fall for extra entries. To read last week’s posts from BBGU readers, check out yesterday’s post.