Making our own picture book

I have been reading the ABCs of Storytelling series of posts by A Mom With A Lesson Plan and Chiquita is getting ready for some story telling activites as she likes to "read" me books sometimes (no actually reading involved :)).  I'd also seen a fun post by Hey Mommy, Chocolate Milk about making your own picture book that I really wanted to try a version of.  I know there was another inspiration for this activity but I can't find it now (leave me a comment if it was you!).

I have made her some blank books before from scrap paper so I figured we'd give making our own book a try.  I got out some old magazines and started flipping through them with Chiquita asking her what pictures she wanted for her book. 

The first one she pointed out was a sleeping baby.  She started the cutting (I finished it) and we glued it into her book.  A few repeats (most of the cutting done by me, she likes cutting but flags fast) and we had a book!

 It was a little difficult to keep her on track with the book as each picture prompted her to go and get a related toy (a bunny for the baby with a bunny, a baby bottle, etc.). 

I had to remember that this identifying with the pictures was an activity all in itself.  We tried reading through the book, having her tell me a little about each picture but she was pretty much done by then.

We will revisit this activity later to try writing some things down.  I cut out the letters of her name and pasted them on the front page so we could practice name recognition again!

We will definitely be trying other storytelling activities soon.