#365Penguins – January

If you follow us on Instagram then you will be aware of our latest adventure that will last throughout 2016 – #365Penguins.

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Last year we fell in love with the children’s book 365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental. On January 1st the family find a penguin has mysteriously been delivered to their door. Every day throughout the year another penguin arrives. The book details the difficulties that arise from having so many penguins. The penguins are noisy, smell, need to be fed, cleaned and where do you put 365 penguins?

Throughout December Adam read the story numerous times. Due to Adam’s love of penguins and numbers the combination meant the book was a huge hit. I then had a crazy idea. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we had our own 365 penguin adventure? What if we had a penguin delivered to our house everyday throughout 2016?

Each evening I place the penguin in a purple box and position it by the front door. When Adam is in the bath he hears a knock at the door. As soon as he is dressed he is able to go and get the penguin. Every day the penguin is collected with pure excitement. Adam identifies the number on the penguin and then places the penguin on our fire place along with its brothers and sisters.

Supplies needed to make 365 Penguins:

* 365 4oz black espresso disposable cups – they come in a pack of 50 or a pack of 1000

* Multi Purpose Labels – 21 Per A4 Sheet – you will use 18 sheets

* Two packs of White Sticky Dots (8mm – you will use 730 stickers for the eyes

* Self Adhesive Sticky Number Stickers

* A4 orange card – you will use around 14 sheets

* Double Sided Tape

* Black Permanent Marker Pen

* Scissors

How To Make 365 Penguins:

1) Cut the end off of a multi purpose label so that it is approximately 5cm long.

2) Cut out a beak and two wings from the label. I like to make each penguin slightly different to give them their own personalities. The penguins may have a larger beak or small wings.

3) Attach the label to the black disposable cup

4) Add two white sticky dots above the label.

5) Use a permanent marker pen to draw two black circles  for the penguins eyes

6) Cut a rectangle out of the orange card and fold it in half.

7) Cut out a penguin flipper with a long tab at the end.

8) Attach double sided sellotape to both flippers, peel off the backing and secure the penguin flippers to the cup

9) Add a numbered sticker to the back of the penguin

10) Repeat the above steps 364 times!

Currently I am making our penguins one at a time whilst I cook tea. One day I shall be organised enough to prepare them beforehand.

#365Penguins – January

My original plan had been to paint our own penguins. I found 50 polystyrene cups at PoundLand and set about painting them using black acrylic paint. After the first penguin I realised I was being too optimistic. I can’t paint in a straight line and the penguin took too long to dry. I needed to come up with an alternative plan.

Eventually I found 4oz black espresso disposable cups that were the perfect size. They were small enough to fit on our fire place yet large enough for Adam to play with. I could use a sticky label to create the penguins features – no more painting! I numbered each penguin so Adam can practise his number recognition and counting throughout the year. Each penguin only takes less than two minutes to make so our #365penguin project would be manageable.

The first three penguins that arrived at our front door had notes attached to them. These were the same notes that were featured in the story. Since then the box only houses a single penguin which has a number on its back.

January has gone incredibly quickly. I had thought that at some point during the month I would have forgotten to leave out a penguin. However, I have Adam reminding me and asking when the “Penguin Postman” will come.

Our Penguin Postman even knew when we had to move into Nan’as house for several days when we didn’t have any heating or hot water. Adam was amazed when he heard the knock on the door.

One month down and 11 to go. However, we have a dilemma for the month of February. In the book the family have 28 penguins delivered. Our problem is that February 2016 is a leap year meaning it has 29 days in it. If we have 29 penguins delivered during February then we will end up with 366 penguins! How do we overcome this issue? Write your solution in the comments below…

Be sure to follow us on Instagram to keep up to date with our #365penguins adventure.

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Emma Edwards

During a difficult pregnancy suffering from Hyperemesis Gravidarum (HG) Emma vowed to make every day an adventure once she had recovered. Adventures of Adam is the outcome of completing a 100 day play challenge with Adam as part of that promise. Emma has a section dedicated to HG friendly play activities so that Mums can still be part of their children’s play whilst they are ill.

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