Growing up I had a collection of stickers – Disney characters, animals, sparkly, scented, felt stickers. I treasured my collection and would flip out if I couldn’t find it. My obsession with stickers continues to this day, so I’m very happy when Alia began to take interest in them. I think I introduced stickers to her when she was 13 months old, but back then, it was still quite challenging for her. It certainly takes practice to remove a sticker and then place it on a surface. It’s a great activity to develop and enhance a child’s fine motor skills. Here’s how we started:

• I’d peel off some stickers and put them on her left hand (she’s right-handed) or a large object (e.g. a mini pumpkin as seen on the picture below). This way, her main focus was to stick the stickers on the paper. I had to try different sizes of stickers to see which she was more comfortable with.

Once she became familiar with the sticking part, I began to teach her how to peel off the sticker:

• I’d remove the white stickers that serve as the border between the stickers. I’d peel off the sticker halfway and she’d do the rest.

We’re at the stage where she’s comfortable peeling the stickers by herself so long as I remove the white border. At times she gets frustrated when she couldn’t stick them on the paper, and she’d ask for my help. I usually would put the stickers on her left hand, and she’d continue.

Some parents said to me that they’re afraid that their child would then put the stickers all over the house and it would become a task for the parents to clean up since some stickers are difficult to remove. Well, now I only take out the stickers from our arts and craft bin when we do an activity. And then, the stickers go back into the bin. I also try to get stickers that are “Photo Safe” (I found ours at Hobby Lobby) since they can be removed easily.

We’re almost out of stickers so it’s a good reason to head up to Hobby Lobby again, right? 😀