22 Street Lane Nursery - July 2025 Newsletter

Nursery Newsletter July 2025 Play • Discovery • Growth

July Newsletter

Dear Parents and Carers, Welcome to our July newsletter! We are delighted to share another month of celebrations at 22 Street Lane Nursery, which has been filled with lots of fun-packed activities. The children have had another busy month celebrating Bicycle Day, Father’s Day, Healthy Eating Week, Eid, and National Picnic Week! We have some exciting times ahead, including our annual Swans Graduation festivities. We will be so sad to see some of our Swans leave us over the summer months, but we wish them all the best of luck in their next journeys to ‘Big School’. To find out more, please read on...

July Newsletter STAFF NEWS

Welcome Back, Felix! As you may be aware Felix left the setting in January to spend some time travelling, however, he has now returned as a member of our bank staff team and will be spending time in all of the rooms. It’s great to have him back!

Welcome Back, Emily! We would like to welcome back Emily, as she will be returning from her Maternity Leave in July for some Keeping-in-Touch days. Emily will then return to the setting 3 days a week from August, so you may begin to see her around the nursery more. We are looking forward to her being back!

Welcome Niamh! A warm welcome to Niamh, who has joined our Chicklets Room as a Nursery Assistant. Niamh has already started working closely with all the Chicklets’ children and is enjoying getting to know everyone. “I am extremely excited to join 22 Street Lane Nursery and be a part of helping the children learn and develop. Childcare has always been a passion of mine and I find it rewarding to watch the children flourish and discover their own personalities and confidence. I am extremely dedicated to providing a safe yet fun environment for the children every day and building a connection with them. I am looking forward to meeting all the children and becoming a part of an amazing team!”

July Newsletter

NEWS

Country of the Month, July 2025: Greece Throughout May, we learnt all about Morocco, linked to the Eid-Al-Adha celebrations. The children enjoyed learning some Arabic, all about the Sahara desert and learning about some famous landmarks and places in the country such as Marrakech (also known as ‘The Red City’) and Chefchaouen (Morocco’s famous Blue City). During June, we will be learning all about Greece, as many of our families have enjoyed holidays there recently! We will be creating the Greek flag, learning about the Greek gods and goddesses and tasting lots of yummy Greek food! If any parents have any resources that we can borrow to support the children’s learning such as maps, photographs, clothing, etc… we would be most grateful! Did you know? The first Olympic Games were held in Greece in 776 BC, and the tradition continues today.

World Bicycle Day The children couldn’t wait to bring their bicycles into Nursery for Bicycle Day, and they had lots of fun racing around the car park, around obstacles and competing against their peers! We were very impressed with the children’s skills, and it was lovely to see lots of children cycling to and from the nursery as well!

July Newsletter NEWS

Father’s Day Stay and Play! Thank you to all the wonderful Daddies, Grandads, Uncles, and other special people who attended our ‘Father’s Day Stay and Play’. The children really enjoyed spending time with you and we hope that you had as much fun as we did!

July Newsletter NEWS

Healthy Eating Week and Great Big Green Week The children had lots of fun during Healthy Eating and Great Big Green Week, learning all about which foods are good for us and give us lots of energy! Lots of the rooms also participated in baking and cooking lots of healthy recipes, including superfood smoothies and exotic fruit salads; even walking to our local shop to pick the fruits themselves! We were also lucky enough to have a visit for our Cygnets and Swans children from Sadie and Alicia (both dental nurses). They taught the children all about the importance of brushing our teeth and eating foods that are good for us! The children enjoyed trying on the dentist’s uniform and practised brushing some pretend teeth too!

Eid Al Adha Celebrations The children took part in lots of Eid-inspired activities such as baking Eid treats and creating moon and star pictures. Oli and Kim cooked a delicious Eid-inspired menu including biriyani and mango lassi, yum!

July Newsletter NEWS

National Picnic Week National Picnic Week is a dedicated week that encourages people to venture outside, savour delectable meals, and relish the beauty of nature. In order to celebrate, the children had a fun-filled week, as they went on lots of picnics in Roundhay Park, and in our garden, as well as designing their own picnic hampers and choosing foods they wanted to place inside!

Sun Cream and Sunhat Please can we kindly ask that your child has sun cream and a sunhat which is clearly labelled with their name? Thank you.

Nursery Leaver’s Notice Please note that we require 6 weeks’ notice if your child is leaving the nursery. Please can you email this information to kate@22streetlanenursery.co.uk

Birthday Celebrations Unfortunately, we do not allow parents to bring in birthday cakes/ treats to celebrate birthdays. If you would like to bring something in, we can suggest stickers, bubbles and other party bag fillers. If it is your child’s birthday, please tell us so that we can celebrate with a class disco! Thank you.

July Newsletter NEWS

Swans Leavers Trip - Stockeld Park Trip The Swans’ children had an amazing time when they visited Stockeld Park on 26th June! Everyone was so excited to go to Wetherby on a double-decker bus, and we spotted lots of wildlife on our journey, including pheasants, cows and sheep! At Stockeld Park the children managed to escape the great maze, explored the enchanted forest and went on some very exciting inflatable slides! The children were all so brave and gave everything a go! We also enjoyed a delicious picnic lunch made by Oli and Kim, and later returned to Nursery, where we couldn’t wait to tell everyone about our adventures!

July Newsletter

We’re only a few weeks away from our annual Swans Graduation Ceremony, which is always a special event for all of our leavers, parents and staff. We hope to make this year’s ceremony bigger and better than ever before, with tons of fun activities, big performances and yummy food. We’ll be looking back at the time our Swans spent at 22 Street Lane and wishing them lots of luck in Big School! Swans Graduation Ceremony: Thursday 10th July

July Newsletter

We will be running a Sponsored Walk Week to raise money for Forget Me Not Children’s Hospice. We’re asking children at home and at nursery to clock up the miles that they walk in order to raise money for this crucial charity, which has personally supported both staff and parents at 22 Street Lane during difficult times in their lives. Our aim is to raise £500, and we would love everyone to be part of this! As a nursery, we will walk three miles in total on Tuesday 15th and Wednesday 16th between the rooms; however, please let us know on Tapestry if your child walks any miles throughout the week at home, so we can add it to the total! Sponsored Walk Week: W/C Monday 14th July

July Newsletter Yorkshire Day Celebrations: Friday 1st August

Eh up! We will be celebrating Yorkshire Day on Tuesday 1st August. We will be creating Yorkshire roses, exploring the beauties of Yorkshire and making our own Yorkshire flags! Children are invited to wear the colours on the Yorkshire flag and they’ll get to try some yummy local dishes, such as Yorkshire Pudding wraps for lunch, which will of course be followed by a good ol’ cuppa!

July Newsletter

Dish of the Month

See our past selections on: 22streetlanenursery.co.uk/dish-of-the-month/

Ingredients • 1 leek, washed & finely diced • 100-200g of red lentils, washed and rinsed • 500ml of vegetable stock • 1 carton of Oatly (dairy-free) cream • 1tbsp of dried oregano • 1tbsp of dried basil • 1 red pepper, washed & finely diced • 1 clove of garlic, finely diced • 400g of best-quality chopped tomatoes, such as Mutti • 1tbsp of tomato paste • Handful of parsley to finish, finely diced • 1tbsp of olive oil • 1 washed and diced courgette • 5 fresh basil leaves

Method 1. Start by adding the pre-washed and prepped peppers, leeks and courgettes to a pan. Once they have softened, add the garlic making sure you turn the heat down so it doesn’t burn. 2. Add the vegetable stock to the pan, allowing the vegetables to cook, then add the rinsed lentils and remaining ingredients, with the chopped tomatoes and dried herbs. 3. Cook the lentils for around 20/25 minutes until they’re nice and tender, also checking that nothing is catching on the bottom of the pan. Finish it off with fresh slices of basil in the simmering sauce. 4. Cook the pasta according to the packet instructions, drain and serve with the sauce. Finish with the diced parsley and any additional cheese or toppings. We highly recommend yeast flakes or feta cheese.

July Newsletter

Chicklets Room News

The Chicklets have had a fantastic June and have been enjoying the beautiful weather! We started the month off by celebrating ‘Eid!’ The Chicklets enjoyed exploring an Eid-themed tuff tray and reading all about the celebration of Eid. We explored a star and moon-themed tuff tray with different textures and used our fine motor skills to fill and empty it with rice krispies and pasta! We enjoyed celebrating Father’s Day throughout June and invited all our dads into the nursery for a fun play and stay session! We enjoyed planting seeds, playing in the rice tray and painting our own pictures of our Daddies! Thank you all so much for joining us, we hope you enjoyed yourself as much as we did! We then celebrated Healthy Eating Week; the Chicklets enjoyed getting involved with all the fun activities! We started off by making a healthy fruit smoothie! The Chicklets used their fine motor skills to help Chloe chop the different fruits. We spoke about all the different healthy fruits we were using and how good they are for us! We then placed it all in a blender and watched as it turned into a yummy smoothie! We placed these in our own little cups and into the freezer to enjoy it for our snack! We have also been enjoying the hot sunny weather and have been exploring lots of water play! The Chicklets have been splish-splashing in the water and using their transporting schemas to transport water to and from different objects.

CHICKLETS ROOM

July Newsletter

Ducklings Room News

What a lovely month we have had in the Ducklings Room! We’ve had so many fun celebrations such as Eid! The Ducklings explored a blue and yellow powder paint tray filled with stars, moons, materials, bangles and paint brushes. We loved creating different marks in the tray using our fingers and paintbrushes. We learnt about Eid as we created music at group times! Healthy Eating and Great Big Green Week! The Ducklings had so much fun exploring all the different types of fruit throughout the week as we explored ‘The Very Hungry Caterpillar’ tray. We tasted pears, apples, oranges, plums and strawberries! For Great Big Green Week, we set out ‘the odd fish’ recycling tray with all the different sea creatures; the Ducklings put the plastic and cardboard into the recycling bins whilst we used the boats in the ‘water’ and looked through the book in groups. We also learnt about ice caps and global warming; this was a fun way to learn and spread awareness! For Picnic Week we set out our own little picnic-themed activities, we had ‘Goldilocks and the Three Bears’ with porridge, our cereal picnic tuff tray for the babies, we made our own shop to buy ingredients for the picnic and even had some fruit in the sunshine with all the ducklings! We enjoyed lots of warm weather where the Ducklings got their swimsuits on and went into the garden to explore the paddling pools! The Ducklings loved to transfer the water around the pools and splash with their friends to cool down.

DUCKLINGS ROOM

July Newsletter

Goslings Room News

It is definitely starting to feel a lot more like summer in the Goslings Room, as the children have enjoyed exploring lots of water-themed activities this month along with outdoor play! We celebrated ‘Big Green Week’ this month and as part of our contribution to the environment the Goslings have enjoyed learning about recycling and reusing, we have been creating junk models using recycled boxes and we have been reusing materials from our recycling bin to create endangered sea and forest habitats. The Goslings have also been exploring the plants within our nursery environment; we have been helping Chef Oli to water and take care of the allotment in the big garden and very kindly Katie had brought in her Chilli plant and the children enjoyed watering the plant and then using magnifying glasses to look at the plant’s features. We also really enjoyed bringing our bikes to the nursery for the day too and had lots of bike races in the car park! Later in the month, we worked together as a group to bake some banana loaf, the Goslings were all able to follow their instructions and add in each of the ingredients and then we had a turn stirring them all together. Finally, we celebrated ‘National Picnic Week’ where the children took part in many group picnics during mealtimes and we also enjoyed hosting a Teddy Bears Picnic. To build a little more on the children’s interest we also decorated some healthy pizza slices using tissue paper as our ‘cheese and pepper’ toppings to feed to our teddies in the afternoon.

GOSLINGS ROOM

July Newsletter

Cygnets Room News

The Cygnets had a fantastic June, filled with exciting activities and plenty of sunshine. One of the highlights of the month was looking after our very own caterpillars. The children watched them grow, spin their cocoons, and eventually emerge as butterflies, which we then released in the garden. Our Country of the Month was Morocco, and we had so much fun exploring Moroccan culture through a range of themed activities. The children created colourful mosaic tiles using foam shapes, transformed our roleplay area into a Moroccan restaurant where they pretended to eat on cushions on the floor, and even made traditional-style Moroccan hats out of paper cups. June brought us lots of warm weather, which we made the most of with plenty of outdoor play. The children loved splashing about with water in the garden, using the slip-and-slide and paddling pools to cool down and have fun. During ‘Picnic Week’, we went on walks where the children enjoyed sitting on picnic blankets, playing games in the sunshine, and even going to see the swans on the lake. It was a lovely way to enjoy the outdoors together. Another lovely moment from the month was our Father’s Day stay and play session. Thank you to all the amazing dads and father figures who joined us in the big garden. The children had so much fun playing games like bowling, ring toss, and Jenga with you, and it was a joy to see everyone enjoying a picnic together. We hope you loved the medals your little ones made especially for you.

CYGNETS ROOM

July Newsletter

Swans Room News

We’ve had such a fun-filled month in the Swans Room throughout June. To celebrate Healthy Eating Week we had a visit from two dentists, who spoke to the children about the importance of healthy eating and how we look after our teeth. The children took turns cleaning the large teeth as well as dressing up as dentists. In June we had our Father’s Day Stay and Play, where we invited all the Dads into the big garden, where the children had so much fun playing football, garden games and making medals! Throughout the past few months, the children in Swans have been busy creating a fairy house in woodwork with Jeff. We have now completed this, therefore a group of children took the fairy house to forest school and found a nice place for it. Whilst we were there, we noticed some fairies had arrived and wanted to live in our house! At the end of the month, the children were all so excited to go on our end-of-year trip to Stockeld Park! We had the best time! The children all travelled together on a big bus which everyone loved! We then had lots of fun in the maze, on the bouncing pillow and obstacle course. We also walked through the forest and stopped off to play in all the amazing playgrounds - it was the best day! Finally, the children have also been busy practising and preparing for their Swans Graduation which will be taking part in July. The children have learnt lots of songs as well as some dances which they can’t wait to perform for all their loved ones!

SWANS ROOM

July Newsletter

2025 Events Calendar *Dates subject to change - Please check the website for the latest calendar

Thursday 10th

Swans Graduation Ceremony

July

Sponsored Walk Week for the Forget Me Not Hospice

W/C Monday 14th

Friday 1st

Yorkshire Day

August

Summer Bank Holiday, Nursery Closed

Monday 25th

W/C Monday 25th

Carnival Week

TBC

Macmillan Bake sale

September

W/C Monday 22nd

Rosh Hashanah

Wednesday 1st

Black History Month

W/C Monday 20th

Diwali

W/C Monday 20th & W/C Monday 27th

October

Halloween Stay & Play

Team Training Day, Nursery Closed

Thursday 30th

Friday 31st

Halloween Fancy Dress Day

July Newsletter

2025 Events Calendar *Dates subject to change - Please check the website for the latest calendar

Wednesday 5th

Bonfire Celebrations

Monday 10th

Chicklets, Goslings, Swans Parents Evening

Tuesday 11th

Remembrance Sunday

Thursday 13th

World Kindness Day

November

TBC

World Nursery Rhymes Week

Friday 21st

Children in Need

Wednesday 19th

Cygnets and Ducklings Parents Evening

Thursday 27th

Thanksgiving

TBC

Christmas Jumper Day

TBC

Swans Christmas Nativity

W/C Monday 15th

Chanukah Celebrations

December

W/C Monday 15th

Christmas Party Week

Wednesday 17th

22SLN Christmas Dinner Day

Christmas Eve, Nursery Closes at 12pm

Wednesday 24th

July Newsletter

*ATTENTION* Important Information - Please Read Funding Update From September 2025, the Government’s new 30 hours childcare support will be extended to eligible working parents of children from the age of 9 months to 3-year-olds. If you are applying for a code for the first time, please ensure this is sent to us by 1st August, so your Septermber invoice is correct. For those who already have a code, please ensure you continue to re confirm your eligibility with HMRC every 3 months, so we are able to claim the funding for the Autumn Term. For more information and to apply for this and Tax- Free Childcare Car Park Please can we kindly ask you to only park in the designated parking spaces when dropping off and collecting your child/ren so that other families can get in and out of their spaces safely. We only have limited parking spaces and at peak times it can get really busy so please find street parking if the car park looks full, rather than causing long queues onto the main road. Please can we also remind you to be cautious when reversing and parking in spaces, as there have been several incidents recently where items in the car park have been damaged/knocked over. please visit the Government website: https://www.childcarechoices.gov.uk

July Newsletter

*ATTENTION* Important Information - Please Read Drop Off and Collection Please remember that we open at 7.30am and close at 6.00pm, and anyone who picks up after this will be charged a late fee. Absence Please note that we are unable to swap days or offer an alternative day if your child is absent from nursery. We are now extremely busy, and it is impossible for us to do this for all children. This is stated in our terms and conditions. Thank you for your cooperation. Car Park Please can we kindly ask that parents ensure they are only parking in a single car parking bay. As you are aware, we have very limited space, and it is very busy a peak times. Weather Appropriate Clothing With the warmer months upon us, please can you ensure that your child has appropriate clothing for warm weather including sun cream and a sun hat. We would recommend that you provide sun cream which is factor 50 and at least a 4-star UVA rating. If you could please label your child’s sun cream and hat with their name, it would be helpful.

CONTACT US 0333 043 22 22

www.22streetlanenursery.co.uk info@22streetlanenursery.co.uk