It’s been a sensory exploration kind of a morning here at Jollies… xxxx

POP!!!

Emma and her children had lots of fun recently outside with the bubbles. They took it in turns to blow the bubbles for their friends to pop. They talked about where the bubbles might be flying to…..it turned into a very giddy time, pretending the bubbles were floating off to watch Moana 2 or even going to the seaside!!!!

Lucky, lucky bubbles floating away, along with our wonderful imaginations….

Such a simple activity, yet one which inspires awe and wonder every single time!! xxx

xxxx

Today was our first Jolly visit to the Memory Cafe held on a Thursday once a month at The Two Pointers. It was lovely to get out and about in our wider community and start to build some cross generational friendships.

We sang some songs together, we shared books, we chatted and completed puzzles and played a few games together.

We looked at special books of cars and Leeds from in the past and we explored the different twiddle (sensory) blankets and one lady shared her baby doll with our children too.

What a lovely afternoon and what a bunch of little superstars we truly have here at Jollies.

Thank you so much to our new friends for making us all feel so very welcome today… xxxx

Our super intuitive practitioners love to ‘tune into’ and follow their children’s interests. We love that our parents/carers work in close partnership with us too and let us know what they are currently loving at home too.

These observations and conversations have inspired a few additions to the role-play kitchen as our little ones are currently OBSESSED with babies and they also adore mark-making and animals too… So little tweaks have been made to make the room even more exciting for them all… encouraging further independence and exploration.

There are invitations to play wherever you look and that’s just the way we like it here at Jollies xxxx

Exploring Elephants got creative with Latisha last week when they set to to create a huge masterpiece together.

The paint was splodged (after much discussion about the colours about to be used) and it was then their mission to spread it about the paper and see what marks they could make and check out which colours would emerge when the paints mixed together…

There was much excitement moving the paint about the paper as there was a choice of tools to use; from large rollers, to smaller patterned rolling pins, to brushes and even fingers!!

Marks were happily made and explored and paint was mixed.

Afterwards the group proudly showed anyone (and everyone!) passing their room their masterpiece and excitedly told them all the different colours they had created together.

Great manipulation of tools, great control and coordination and great collaborative creativity Team Elephants!!! Xxxx

Possums favourite thing to do at the moment seems to be throwing all of the balls out of their ballpool!!

So this morning Ellison rolled with this obsession and followed her children’s interests and removed the side of the ball pool allowing the children to totally cover the whole room in balls!!!!

This led to six very happy babies throwing balls all around the room! They walked, crawled, bottom-shuffled and dived to get to the ones they wanted and they threw them about with pure joy!!! ………Physical development at its best, not to mention pure fun for everyone!!!! Xxxx

Was pretty much the reaction all our children had upon discovering our outside area earlier in the week…

They loved to wrap up warm and get out and about to explore. This snow involved careful manoeuvring and definitely drew upon core strength, balance and stability, but it was safe to say they love, love, LOVED exploring in it!

From the satisfying crunches it made underfoot to the exciting wellie-bob prints being created… not to mention exploring the differing tracks our vehicles would make too!! Sooooooo many possibilities….

They simply all had snow much fun!! xxxx

When exploration is the name of the game…

Magnets are truly fascinating!!!! xxxx

During the first couple of days back after Christmas Natalie observed her children pretending to be shopping together both inside and outside within the role play kitchens, so she decided to follow their interests and create a brand new area within the room to really extend and develop this interest!

The children responded so positively to this wonderful invitation to play and simply loved their new little shopping area!!!!!!!

Since inception they have been counting the coins, pressing the buttons on the till and filling their bags and baskets with all their shopping.

They have loved naming what they have bought whilst showing all their friends. They have been taking it in turns to be the cashier and giggled as they’ve pinged their shopping items.

Such a simple area, derived from their very own play and natural interests (quite a few have clearly been busy shopping with their families over Christmas!) and yet they have explored maths, technology and imaginative play amongst other areas.

They have also been chatting constantly too whilst shopping and then putting their shopping through the checkout having some wonderful conversations…. So all the time they have also been working upon their speech, language, vocabulary and developing their communication skills.

So much fun was already being had and it was only day two of nursery in 2025!!!!

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As we reopen today we want to wish our lovely Jolly Family a very Happy and Healthy New Year and also a BIG Happy Birthday to Jollies as our nursery is now 20 years old!!!!

We are proud to have been shaping and supporting hundreds of little superstars by working in close partnership with our children’s parents/carers since we first opened our doors way back in January 2005….

We’d like to thank each and every one of our fabulously amazing team, both past and present, all our wonderful families and our most amazingly brilliant children who have certainly brought the fun throughout the past two decades!

Watch this space for 20th birthday celebrations planned for later in the year and we hope that some of our golden oldies will update us with how old their Jolly babies are now and what they are getting up to. Maybe some of you will even pop back and say hello too….

Watch out for a post later in the year as we’d love to see a photo of our ex-Jolly babies and see how much they’ve grown and changed!! Quite a few of Team Jollies will no doubt remember them still, as we have Laura D and Emma who have been here for 19 years, Kirstan, Lauren, Laura S and Fiona who have been here for 15 years and many more who have been here for ten plus, plus some fabulous newer additions to the team who wouldn’t know them, but would certainly love to meet them as they are part of our unique Jolly history

In fact watch this space again, as we’ll also be celebrating ALL our amazing current Team Jollies as part of our 20th birthday celebrations this year!!!

Here’s to 2025 you wonderful people……….. Xxxx