Cold Play

Create some cool artwork with homemade, frozen watercolors. I found this idea in a magazine a few weeks ago, dug it out of my heaping project pile and gave it a try today with 5 little ones. Definitely fun, pretty and cool however a bit messy. Once the ice cubes started melting I had red, purple and blue drops all throughout my kitchen. Maybe its a good outside project especially on a hot day like this.

1. Place 1 tsp. of tempera paint (I used washable crayola paint) in each section of an ice-cube tray.

2. Fill with water and stir with toothpicks. Let stand for 10 minutes and stir again.

3. Place in freezer until frozen. Pop out and start painting! Using think paper, card stock or butcher paper is best.




















Have fun!

Green Thumb

I have never had a green thumb and have no desire to garden. My mother-in-law loves gardening, has a beautiful yard and has done most of our gardening. I enjoy how pretty and peaceful gardens are but just don't like the outdoors enough to put all that time and energy into a garden.

However my husband has been talking about a vegetable garden for a few years now. Honestly I think he should have been born in Amish country or something, he is all about living off the land, eating locally grown foods and being self sufficient. I go in phases, jump on board for a while and then fall back into my place of liking the outdoors because my boys do, eating organic when possible and picking my battles.

A vegetable garden was not worth battling about so we now have fresh green beans sprouting up. I love green beans and am excited (don't tell him) but am participating in gardening by taking pictures and encouraging the boys to help daddy. All this inspired our garden theme this week and we sure had fun. A garden tour at Oma's house, played in the water because everything needs water, played hot tomato, painted with potatoes, planted grass, played pin the flower on the stem and made hand print flowers.


























Maybe someday a green thumb will appear but for now I'd rather use my thumbs crafting indoors!

All About Animals

This week has been all about animals. Week #2 of themes and it is going well. I have decided to only plan three days filled with games, crafts, fun foods, books and simple spelling words. Thursdays are going to be "Nama Days" where the boys go to my moms for a few hours to play with their friends and then Fridays are PB & J Days.

Monday was farm animal day which is basically our normal around here. They played with tractors, lined up all the animals, pretended to be cows, made cotton ball sheep pictures and we took a run to visit some live cows.

Tuesday rolled around and we celebrated pet animal day. I didn't plan much for this day as we get together with friends every Tuesday but we made puppy chow for the play date, looked through Bella's (our dog) baby book and pretended to be dogs.

Today, Wednesday, was zoo animal day and let me tell you my house was a zoo! It started really rough, Pace decided 3:30 this morning would be bedtime so I was exhausted which is never a good way to start zoo day. Some friends came over for the morning to play and chat which was wonderful. After that it all went downhill. Naps were terrible, lots of crying, whining and watching the minutes slowly tick by. We did manage to paint lion masks, watch some penguin videos on youtube, practice walking like penguins and read books about monkeys.

These weekly themes have been fun, make me feel better and definitely a great time filler during the most challenging hours. Enjoy the rest of your week!

Mid-Week

Our mid-week day was filled with green and blue activities, lots of whining, a fun play date, way too short naps, helping my mama out with her daycare kiddos and an anything but peaceful dinner. It hit me today how God's timing really is absolutely perfect. A year ago, heck six months ago, there is no way I could have stayed at home full-time with my boys. We dealt with colic, crying and no sleep for almost two and a half years making my time away at work necessary and restful. We needed my mom during the day so we could stay sane at night.

Life is different now, they are generally sleeping and we have a consistent bedtime. Just knowing there will be an end to the day, a time just for me, some quiet helps get me through the day. Yes my kids are still difficult (if you've ever come for a play date you know:) but they are easier when I get to sleep, so thankful for this time.

A few tips from my current read, The House that Cleans Itself:

• Determine a floor plan and flow- prioritize your spaces and determine what to clean 1st, 2nd, etc. Follow this same flow each time you clean.
• Decide on your "Home Base Zone"- what is the one spot in your house that makes you crazy when dirty??? (kitchen sink, closet, bathroom, pantry, etc.) Keep that one spot clean at all times, this will relieve stress and anxiety.

More to come along with a fun new "Meet Mama..." feature thanks to miss creative Kim L!

See you at the orchard Friday.

Yellow Day

Bright sunrise, yellow tulips, ripe breakfast banana and a day full of yellow activities. Since I planned my sister's "sweet as honey" bridal shower a few weeks ago and everything was yellow I have really embraced the color. In the past yellow hasn't been on my favs list, it is hard to wear well, difficult to find the right paint color and challenging to match shades. After seeing my house decked out in yellow and enjoying delicious yellow food at the party I've decided it is a really happy color. Yellow just makes all things cheery, joyful and full of life.

Today was "yellow day" and I anticipated a day filled with happiness, laughter and sense of mellow. However lemons are also yellow, the sour, cheek puckering fruit and sometimes when life hands you lemons you must make lemonade. Boys boths woke up incredibly crabby, not sure why but it was ugly. By 7:15 am we had sped through #3 on the schedule and things weren't improving. In the end though we gave some yellow duckies a bubble bath, met friends at a park for a picnic, took good naps, picked dandelions and filled up on eggs and lemon pudding for dinner.

We shall see what green/blue day brings tomorrow...

Red Day

What a wonderful first day as stay at home mom! Today was red day and the boys were excited. I have a white bin from Target that I am using to keep our daily activities in and it worked great. The day started with me actually getting up at 5:30 when the alarm sounded and going for a run. We had a rough night with Trex and I didn't sleep much but my husband is also so skeptical of me actually getting up (every night I tell him my morning plan to wake up early but it never happens) I just wanted to prove him wrong.

After the run I was able to write our tentative schedule on the board:

~Breakfast

~Get Dressed

~Game (included cleaning the bathroom:)

~Craft (didn't happen- had an impromptu visit from Nama and friends)

~Outside (even had a snack of red popsicles- yes before lunch)

~Lunch

~Nap

~Snack- red jello

~Basement Playtime (didn't happen- Trex wanted to go outside instead)

~Daddy Home

At the end of red day a few games played, laundry done, successful sewing time and overall a peacefully fulfilling day. I am not crazy enough to think all days will be like this but I appreciated a good first one.

Now onto making "red" spaghetti!

Upgrade and Promotion

Our PB & J (play, bond and join) blog is getting a bit of an upgrade and I a promotion. I start my new job as a stay-at-home mama Monday and I view it as the most wonderful promotion. More time with my kids, more playing, more snuggling, more fun and more opportunities to show them the world.

As I've been preparing for the change it hit me that for one we will need some kind of schedule and for two I now have time to show my kids and teach them a variety of things. I love teaching and for the past 4 years have prepared lessons for over a hundred kids each week yet haven't had much time to do that with my own little ones. Well now is the time!

(Picture below: our new chalkboard schedule area)

Up until now this blog has been a spot for me to organize weekly playgroups, post pictures and occassionaly share my mama experiences. Moving forward the blog will continue all that and in addition include weekly themes because well life is just more fun with a theme! Under the "weekly theme" page you will find themes including easy craft projects, games, lunch ideas and other fun stuff. Use this blog to best suit you, if that means you try some of our weekly themes-great, if you attempt one of the crafts-awesome or if you simple want to read, laugh and move on with your day- fantastic.
(Picture from our playdate today)










Winner of Beans-n-Cream gift card...commenter #2- Jenna!!! Your gift card will be on it's way.

Get out the Bubbles

It is winter, cold and windy, add in a very long string of sickness and everyone starts to go a little stir crazy. This week we had a record worthy blizzard and what could be chicken pox at my house. I try hard to keep the kiddos busy, coming up with fun activities such as snow in the kitchen, making snow ice cream, homemade play-doh and even the occasional finger painting. Today I felt like my energy was low and my creativity slightly depleted so... we got out the bubbles!














Kids LOVE bubbles in the summer, why not the winter! This kept my one and two year old busy, by themselves for exactly 17 minutes, quite amazing.
(However we did have a pile of bubble liquid on the floor at minute 18)