Dr. Seuss Rooms and Reading Nook Ideas

Dr. Seuss’ birthday is this weekend. Our family is sitting down in our Dr. Seuss style reading nook to read a few of his books.

This is a corner of our play room. Behind me taking the photo is a mess of Legos, train tables and a Barbie house. But this corner is our reading spot.  Dr. Seuss once said to “Fill your house with stacks of books, in all the crannies and all the nooks!”  We have taken that quote to heart at our house and filled every corner with books.

 

We also added a swing to this spot in our playroom. It is a huge hit. I wish we had room to add more swings because with three kids, they fight over taking turns all the time. They normally don't read on the swing but I had my son hold the book for a quick photo. The prefer the chairs in the corner for reading time.

The ceiling hooks were purchased at IKEA. THen we added carabiner hooks from Home Depot and a swing from our outdoor playset. IKEA has darling swings you could use too. We just figured we could use what we already owned. We can take it down easily to get it out of the way for other play time.

I hand painted the water color Cat in the Hat and framed it.
I found the red magnet board for $2 at a thrift store. We use Dr. Seuss magnets on it.
The lower left round stool is a Dr. Seuss popcorn tin from Christmas back in 2003. The kids keep toys in it and use it as a stool.

See the Bean Bag above? It is filled with Dr. Seuss stuffed animals but they kids love to sit on it while they read.  See how I made the Bean Bag here.

Who Let the Cats Out of the Bag?  Can you ever have too many Cat in the Hat toys? The one hanging on the door is a laundry holder. The kids unzip the bottom and use it as a basket ball hoop.

There are two windows in this room. I made the curtains years ago using Dr. Seuss fabric for my daughter’s room. I made the tab tops look like the Cat in the Hat striped hat.  I found 2 white floating shelves at a yard sale for $5 and they fit my windows perfectly so I hung them up top and set Dr. Seuss books on them. These are duplicate books we own so the kids don’t need to try to get them down.

The photo below has a poster of a photo collage of our trip to Universal Studios, Seuss Landing. The kids love to see themselves having fun on the rides there.

I remember the rotating bookshelf below from my childhood school library. I’ve always wanted one of my own, so when I saw it listed in the classified ads for $15 I went to get it right away (only 5 blocks from my house). It has the ABC’s on the sides so I just taped on the Dr. Seuss book covers from a bulletin board set I found.
  The rocking chair was also from the classified ads. It was a Winnie the Pooh style chair and I recovered it with Dr. Seuss fabric. I made the pillow cover with classic red and white striped fabric.
Our kids love to pull down the Dr. Seuss finger puppet theater and Jack-in-the-box to play with.

DR. SEUSS BEDROOM
Sarah from the blog Bombshell Bling just shared this SEUSStastic bedroom she created for her son.  Check out the Truffula trees in the corner, the book page bunting and the hand made Dr. Seuss quilt and pillows.

The box above is used for dress-up clothes. She used book pages to create the design on top and lined the entire inside with book pages too. Click to see more photos.
She used Dr. Seuss fabric to cover cork boards for the wall and seat covers for the stools. She used a bulletin board kit for the multi-signs post.

I think my favorite part of the room is this hidden book nook. She turned his closet into a reading spot. There are books inside and the huge Cat in the Hat cut out. I love the little turquoise chair too. Notice the Dr. Seuss quote framed by book pages on the wall, she is going to post the quote as a free printable on her blog soon.

There are so many more details to this room. Click here to see more photos and ideas to help you create a fun Dr. Seuss style room.

Traveling Reading Buddies

A reading buddy can help kids get excited about reading. You can use this idea in the classroom, in Sunday school, or at home.


I grabbed this stuffed turtle at Kohl’s for $5 back in 2011. You could use any stuffed animal.  We had a goal in children’s Sunday school (we call it Primary) to have each child read the scriptures (Bible) at home with their families during the year.  Each week a family would be selected to take “Scripture Turtle” home with them.

He has a little back pack filled with scripture cards. They told a short synopsis of a story and the scripture reference on one side and pictures on the other side. You could add cards for whatever you are focusing on with instructions to let parents know the plan.  Ask the kids to sit and read to their reading buddy each day while they are visiting. They got them for a week then returned them at church to go home with another child.
Travel Souvenirs
Each child could add a souvenir to the buddy when they took him home.  Look how he started with just the backpack.  Now he has a Justin Bieber button, Dr. Seuss button, 3-D glasses, a tie, silly band, handmade friendship bracelet, sweat band, arrowhead necklace, pinwheel, missionary tag, and the red sweater above (he has lost a few things along the way).  My favorite was the knit pumpkin hat. A mom knit it right onto the head of the turtle and stuffed it.

I got the traveling reading buddy idea from my mother-in-law who did this when she taught first grade. Look at her Booker Bunny and Booker Bear below. Aren’t they so cute? And very well loved and read to. I borrowed her backpack for our turtle.


Our family got to take ‘Scripture Turtle’ camping. He smelled like campfire for a while after that. We loved reading with him around the campfire.

HOME READING BUDDY
You can make your own designated reading buddy to keep at home.  Have your child read to them. Let them take their buddy in the car around town and on longer road trips during the summer and add souvenirs to them. Encourage kids to read in the car (if it doesn’t make them sick). Let them know their buddy likes to be read to every day.
Have fun reading this summer!

Stuffed Animal Activities, Toy Bag and Books

I’ll admit, I used to be a stuffed animal hater. I didn’t like them much growing up and as a parent I thought they just collected dust. But my kids have loved playing with their animals.  Here are some of the things we’ve done.

STUFFED ANIMAL SLEEPOVER:
Our local library had a sleepover party for stuffed animals this past month. Kids were invited to drop off their animal Friday night and come back Saturday morning to watch a slide show of what the animals did during the night.
Too Many Toys - If you’re anything like us, stuffed animals have taken over the house.  Our Dr. Seuss characters alone filled our nightly reading spot. How could we choose which animals would go on the sleepover?

Surrounded by Dr. Seuss Stuffed Animal Toys

 
My kids finally picked these 3 as they lucky ones to go on the library sleepover.

Click here to see the video the library put together of photos from the sleepover. The animals got to roast s’mores, ride the elevator, read books about themselves and brush their teeth to prep for bed. The pics are so cute and the kids giggled through the whole slide show, especially when they saw their own animal featured.



10 Ways to Play with Stuffed Animals:

• Librarian/Storytime – Find toys that match book characters (like the Cat in the Hat). Have your child hold the toy when you read the book. Let kids connect and play with the character during reading time. If they are old enough, let them read to the animal.
• Zoo Keeper - Sort the animals into categories (monkeys, elephants, etc.), then kids get to take you on a tour of their zoo.
• Tea Party – Set up all the dishes just for the animals and let the party begin. See our party here.
• Veterinarian – Kids get to be the animal doctor and fix their toys
• Dog Catcher – Get a butterfly net and let your kids try scooping up the toy you tell them to catch.
• Circus – Have the lions and tigers and cats jump through hula hoops and your kids can ride on the elephants.
• Photographer – Let your kids pose the animals doing silly things then practice taking pictures with the digital camera (great teaching opportunity with a still object, talk about lighting and the rule about not cutting off limbs - and you can always hit delete).
• Parade – Put the animals in a wagon and take them on a walk around the block.
• Animal Safari- Hide a few of their animals around the house and help them find them by giving them clues.
• Puppet Shows – who says you have to be able to stick your hand inside and move their mouth? Just stick up a spring-loaded curtain rod in the hallway, pin a blanket around the top and use stuffed animals to put on a show.

Stuffed Animal Picture Buddy:
We picked a stuffed animal to be in a weekly photo series we took of each of our children. It is so fun to see how much they grew and compare their size to the stuffed animal. After doing this three times I would recommend the following:

• Find a toy about 20 inches tall so they start out about the same size (many babies are between 18-21 inches long at birth).
• Take your photo in the same spot or with the same backdrop each week
• Line the animal’s feet up with your babies feet so you can see your child get taller (I really wish we would have done this).

 
 


MAKE A TOY BEAN BAG:
To corral all of our stuffed animals I made these toy bean bags for my kids this past Christmas.  It has a mesh window and a drawstring opening so they can take their animals in and out. Filling it with stuffed animals makes them soft to sit on so it becomes a functional chair in their room.

See the stuffed animals peeking out of the mesh windows?
I just found my Dr. Seuss fleece fabric (I bought several years ago) and whipped up this bag in 20 minutes today, without the window.
Click here to see how to make your own bag.
 
Books about Taming the Toys:
We just found The Berenstain Bears and the Messy Room at the thrift store yesterday for 50 cents.

Another favorite is David Shannon’s Too Many Toys . See my post about this book here.

A funny book we love is Pigsty by Mark Teague.

What kind of things do you like to do with stuffed animals?



More fun ideas here: