Over the last several months I feel like our home finally settled into a good rhythm. My son dropped his nap nearly half a year ago so that took some adjustments. While that has made my days a bit more exhausting, we’ve found a rhythm recently that works really well for our family.

Recently, our family has gotten really into family board games! My son just turned 3 and one of the things I really went all out on for his birthday was board games. I got him several games and we have been playing them all the time since. Board games are a great way to connect with your child, work on math and reasoning skills, practice following rules and taking turns, and learn about sportsmanship.

I love real picture books. In general, babies tend to connect to them better than illustrated books. However, there are not a ton of real picture books available. Lovevery makes a gorgeous set but they are only available with a subscription. This blog post features our favorite real picture books that are not Lovevery. I have found more companies are producing real picture books recently, including some with more storylines. This is absolutely wonderful to see! These books I share below are, for the most part, not just books with real pictures and labels. They mostly have some sort of story, at least a very short poem throughout.

We recently started doing a letter of the week in our home with my nearly 3-year-old. I have gotten so many requests for what we do and how we structure it so I wanted to share some activities along with how we are doing letter activities in general.

I recently shared a tour of my son’s Montessori toddler bedroom and now it is time to share my daughter’s room tour. She just turned 1 and this is how her room has mostly looked for a few months now. It has many of the same qualities of my son’s Montessori toddler bedroom, but a few changes since she is younger.

Books about love are a favorite theme for me. It is always wonderful reading to our children about just how much we adore them. Unsurprisingly, there are a lot of books for babies and toddlers about love! These books include some classic favorites as well as some beautiful modern books. Many share a similar style of poetically convincing our children just how much we love them.

I am asked a lot for ideas for Montessori homeschooling for toddlers or just Montessori activities for toddlers. I used to share a monthly and then every few months blog and Youtube but I did not get to it for these months. At this point, I want to get the blog out because my son is nearing 3 and I will want a whole new blog post then!

A bit over a year ago we set up a meal rotation that completely changed our home. When I have mentioned it over on Instagram I have always gotten questions so I figured I would go into how it works. Quite a while ago now we started this for breakfast. Establishing the breakfast meal rotation completely changed that and after a few months of that, we added a dinner rotation as well.

The Montessori birthday walk has become a favorite birthday tradition in our home. This is our third time doing it and I look forward to many more times. The Montessori birthday walk is a bit different for a first birthday because obviously, even the most concrete concepts about seasons and birthdays are meaningless to them. Also, neither of my babies have walked on their first birthday. But still, I find the Montessori birthday walk is a meaningful way to remember my babies’ first year on earth.

It is nearly the Jewish holiday of Tu BiShvat (the new year and birthday for trees!) so our bookshelf is filled with books about trees. There are so many wonderful tree inspired books I wanted to share them in a blog post. Whether or not you celebrate Tu BiShvat these are great books. They are perfect for Earth Day, Arbor Day, or just because you want some books about trees!

It has been a while since I posted an ask the expert series post, but when I discovered Courtney English on Instagram I knew she had to be the next person I interviewed. Courtney is a pediatric occupational therapist supporting parents in meeting their child’s sensory needs. She has a plethora of useful information to help children with emotional regulation, bedtime, and meeting their general sensory needs. I was so excited to be able to interview her and speak about some of these things!

If you’re looking for a first birthday smash cake without the processed sugar, this is the one! We have done several first birthday cakes and I would say this is the easiest and incredibly tasty. It is sweetened with banana and has a fantastic moist texture. My real achievement this time was making a solid frosting for the rainbow cake without powdered sugar or food coloring.

Looking for an activity for a high-energy toddler inside? Try an obstacle course! It is the perfect way to get them moving purposefully. We like to pair it with shelfwork. This post shares all the items we use to make obstacle courses!

Do you have a toddler who loves construction? I do! This blog post goes through some favorite books about construction that are loved by our toddler! Some are Montessori-aligned and some less so, but all of them are well-loved by my construction-obsessed toddler.

I am so excited for the Montessori-aligned first birthday gifts we ended up choosing for our baby. I think they’re a great mix of things that will grow with her and she will enjoy with her big brother. So here’s the list of our favorite Montessori-inspired first birthday gifts. Some of them are even so good we bought them for my son and are buying again for our daughter.

We are almost 1 year out from when we welcomed our second child into our home. One year ago one of my biggest fears was my toddler really struggling with the transition to being a big brother. We spent a lot of time preparing him though and the transition went so much better than I could have expected. This blog post shares some of the top things we did to help our toddler adjust to life with a new sibling.

If you’re about to welcome your second (or third or fourth or…) child, congrats! Welcoming a new sibling is such an exciting but huge transition. One of my top tips for easing that transition is to read books about a new sibling. This blog post shares my favorite books about welcoming a new sibling. My preference, especially when using books to prepare for a big event is realistic books- bonus points for real pictures. These are our favorites including ones we used to prepare my son and a few that have come out since then.

Are you interested in designing a Montessori bedroom for your toddler? This post gives a tour of my son’s Montessori toddler bedroom and offers a guide on what to consider when creating a safe and developmentally appropriate Montessori bedroom for your child!

I have put a lot of effort into creating a kitchen space that is accessible for my toddler and serves the needs of our whole family. This looked different when we lived in our small apartment, but most of the factors were still present there as well. Here is a look at our kitchen and ways we make it accessible for our toddler (and baby!). My toddler is 2 years 9 months and my baby is 11 months.

Have you wondered why Montessori is so obsessed with independence? Why are toddlers cooking and cleaning from such a young age? This blog post answers that question with another question, is Montessori actually so obsessed with independence at all? I argue that Montessori is far less about independence than we think.