Adventures in Lacing!

We've been working on lacing a lot lately, a great indoor activity to do (and make!)

I love to see my older child helping my younger child, and we've been enjoying some quiet together time on the couch before bed in the evenings cuddled together, practicing our lacing.

First off, why lacing?  It helps develop your child's 'pincer grip' which can help with writing.  Other good pincer grip activities include stringing beads, tongs and other transfer activities like tweezers, clothespins, pegs and pegboards, lacing a shoe or lacing frame, and basically anything where the child uses their thumb and forefinger to manipulate the objects.  I find it also does wonders in working on patience, and mutli-tasking as lacing can be a complicated concept at first.  The child has to concentrate on guiding the lace while also thinking about patterning (in & out, up & down), direction, and shapes/colors.

We have purchased a few sets of commercial lacing cards, including:

 Melissa & Doug Lace and Trace Shapes

 and this set of Eric Carle Animal Lacing Cards: 10 Cards & Laces.  Both sets are sturdy, thick cardboard, and I like that the Eric Carle set has patterns with increasing difficulty. 

We have been happy with both of these sets, and there are many more choices out there.

You can make your own custom lacing cards by printing out a picture or using a die cut shape, laminating it, and punching holes in your desired design.  Use a shoelace or yarn (with a taped end) with a knot at one end for lacing.  You can also tie on a button or a bead on the end of the lace/yarn to prevent the end from traveling through the first hole. 

I've included some links for free printable lacing cards below:

This site has a lot of printable cards- just scroll down a little and click on your desired card for a printable pdf file.  You hole-punch your own design.

Yellow Mums has this free printable lace-up doll pdf.  So cute!!  Just choose the outfit and lace it on the doll.

{Photo by Yellow Mums}

Update 11.18.10!  Yellow Mums just posted an adorable fabric envelope tutorial to make for pretty storage for your lacing dolls.  See it here!!  She also hints she may be posting more outfits in the future.  If she does, I will add them here as well.

11.19.10: Yellow Mums has posted the winter doll lace up clothing as her Freebie Friday.
You can find them here.
Thank you Yellow Mums!

Mini-Eco has these adorable lacing/sewing cards for printing.

{Photo from mini-eco blog}

Print out these lacing cards in a duck, mouse, frog, snake, or bug from Making Learning Fun.

I love this tutorial on making lacing cookies (you can also make lacing salt dough shapes using the same techniques) from Fifth Wizardy (photo is from their blog posting).

Download sets of uppercase and lowercase alphabet letters with patterns or in black & white to use for lacing at Home Grown Hearts.  They also offer this set of number lacing cards.

Homemaker has a great idea to cut off the fronts of old greeting cards, laminate, and hole punch for really neat lacing card designs.  What a great way to reuse!

It gives me the idea to reuse children's or scientific book pages by laminating them and punching hole designs.  Hmmmm, the possibilities are endless!!!
♥

Dressing Frames

Dressing Frames are an important part of the Practical Life Montessori Curriculum. They enable children to learn how to dress themselves, their dolls, and help others too! It gives them confidence and independence, and is a major step in potty training (When you gotta go, you need to be able to undo the button and zipper on your shorts quickly!).

That being said, I was excited about dressing frames. They just seemed like such a neat concept to me. I went ahead and purchased 3 dressing frames that were commercially made. And I demonstrated them to the children, put them on the shelf....and nothing happened. They weren't interested at all. Trying not to be a little disappointed, I waited a couple of weeks, and brought them out again. The kids still ignored them. No, actually my son drug one of them around by the laces like he was walking a dog. So, I tried to think of something to make them more interesting.

I came up with this idea. I took some clothes that we weren't in love with anymore, and I made my own dressing board. I took a large, finished, square piece of wood, and affixed homemade "dressing frames" to it using finishing nails. I made sure the fabric couldn't be pulled off by pulling on it myself for a while with some force. I actually sewed pieces of the clothes that I had cut apart- part of a shirt that snapped up (including the pocket that snaps closed), a portion of a skirt that used to button up the front, a zipper section from a sweatshirt. The kids like that these are REAL clothes that they are practicing on, instead of a unfamiliar dressing frame with plain fabric. They also enjoy that the board is large enough for both of them to work on it at once. One child can be zipping, while the other is snapping! The board I had handy to use for this project is heavy, so I usually leave it out so the children aren't trying to move it themselves. You can also lean it against the wall and allow the children to work on it vertically. I take the board away every so often, and cycle it back in later and it keeps their interest, like it is new again when it comes back out! This particular dressing board only has 3 skills on it-zipping, buttoning, and snapping. As they get a little older, I will make another one (or put on the flip side of this board) more skill levels such as laces, ties, and buckles.

If you don't want to spend the money purchasing new commercial dressing frames, this may be a good option for you. If you can't find any clothes to use at home, just make a run out to the nearest thrift shop and pick up some for just a few dollars! You may be able to use a staple gun to attach the clothes to the board, just make sure to tug on it yourself first to ensure it is attached on there securely, and run your hands over it to check and see if there are any sharp parts of the staples sticking out. If you use nails, be sure to use small enough nails where they won't poke through the back of the board, leaving sharp points to scratch and poke small hands. I recommend using a board with a finish on it so you won't worry about the possibility of splinters. I also chose to sew my pieces of fabric to a tougher piece of fabric first (like the type you find bookbags made out of) and nailed that to the board so that the nails wouldn't tear through the thinner material of the clothing. My 1940's Singer sewing machine was giving me fits that night, so you might notice the seams aren't straight, but I was just glad to get it working (it usually works like a charm, I guess it just felt tired that night!). So, that's it! A few months practice with dressing frames, and your child will be zipping, buttoning, lacing, and snapping their way to independent dressing!