Spider Week, Day 2: Spider Snacks

Well, it was Spider Dinner really, but that doesn't have that alliterative quality that I was looking for. I guess I could have said Spider Supper, but that isn't entirely accurate either. So Spider Snacks it is.

Today we continued our Spider theme with another go at the Spider Web Game. Laurie is an old hand at this now and has reached the point where he will cheerfully lob any and all items retrieved from the basket across the room. Of course, he can't crawl yet, so this is then followed by him crying because his toy is two feet away and he can't reach it.

I'd kind of hoped to get a bit of studying done while he occupied himself (I had a video I needed to watch) but I gave up on that idea and played fetch with him instead. Then he snuggled on my lap while we watched the video about the Kula Cycle and the Trobriand Islanders together. It was sweet.

We also listened to the Spider Songs playlist again a couple of times. I've made up a tickle game to go with 'There's a Spider on the Floor' (basically tickling the body parts as they're named).

That was really it for today until teatime, when I trotted out a masterpiece for his dinner:

These are fruity spiders. Each one is half a (small) apple cut into smaller segments and pushed back together again. Each leg is one-third of a breadstick (Laurie is a big fan of breadsticks because they're easy for him to pick up and gnaw on). The spider eyes are raisins, 'glued' on with Greek yoghurt, plus two bonus raisins which I've just placed in front to act as pincers.

These were a big hit. The apples were just getting soft so he was able to scrape the flesh out with his two teefs. The skin was soft also, though he did get it stuck in his mouth a couple of times (it just gets swirled round and round while he gets frustrated about being unable to swallow it), I just fished it out and he'd get on with his meal.

I'm not sure if he actually ate any of the raisins; I didn't count them when he was done. He's developing a pretty good pincer grip but some things still elude him and it wouldn't surprise me if he'd not been able to get to grips with these yet. Don't worry, he had some mixed in his Greek yoghurt for pudding so he didn't miss out.

This could be modified in a few ways. I used fairly small apples, but for even smaller spiders you could use tomatoes (either full sized or cherry tomatoes). For legs for smaller spiders, carrot batons would work well. I used Greek yoghurt to attach the eyes but cream cheese would work just as well.

I briefly toyed with the idea of adding a swirl of spaghetti as a 'web'. If I'd only made the one spider I might have done this (I had spaghetti for my tea). I think that a dried prune with a couple of slits in it with a couple of Cheerios/cornflakes/small slices of cheese for wings would make a nice addition as a fly for the spider's dinner too.

This was a quick and easy way to jazz up his dinner. He didn't notice the fact that tea looked like spiders, so it was more for my benefit than his, but I told him which bits of the spider he was eating. In the future he'll be more aware of this stuff and it'll give us more opportunities to talk.