Goodbye to Summer Week!

 

I LOVE family traditions!  This quote by Susan Lieberman pretty much says it all "Family traditions counter alienation and confusion. They help us define who we are; they provide something steady, reliable and safe in a confusing world."

As a mom I want to provide a safe, steady and reliable home life for my kids because I know how absolutely insane this world can be.  Family traditions help me do that.  They help me reconnect with my kids and provide consistency.  We have weekly traditions like game night, family home evening (where we give a spiritual lesson), and Saturday pizza and a movie night. My kids love these and we all look forward to them.

This year we started a new tradition!  My friend Leanne has been doing this with her kids for years and I knew as soon as my kids were old enough I wanted to do it as well.  We called it Goodbye to Summer Week.  The week before school started we planned out a whole week of fun.  We squeezed all the fun we could out of the week so my kids can go back to school with lots of good memories of the summer.  We did a few special things that we rarely do (like go to McDonalds) and we did some of the normal summer activities like swimming.  Here's a look at our week!



 

 Day 1: I gave into the McDonald's thing and we did happy meals but the real highlight was our family hike.  Jaxson wanted to hike a mountain but there aren't any in Michigan so he settled on a forest area.

 

 Day 2: we explored a new park and did some science experiments at home.  They loved the volcano!

 

Day 3: we met up with friends we haven't seen in over a year and explored the Detroit zoo for the first time.

 

Day 4: we took at step back in time and visited Greenfield Village in Dearborn MI.  The village is set in the late 1800s to early 1900 time frame.  We even rode in a Model T car! 

 

 Day 5: we hit the pool where we have a pass and then we went to a Chalk & Chocolate street fair.  You can't beat free chocolate!

 

Day 6:  I planned a fun day at home.  We painted the sidewalk, played in shaving cream and made a lot of mud pies.

It was such a great week! I felt like such a good mom and my kids were over the moon with excitement for each new activity. (Plus they slept like rocks each night.)  This might be a my new favorite tradition!  I can't wait to repeat it next year!

I would love to hear about other family traditions you have!

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Recycle Robots

My son has been into robots for a long time and a few years ago he would ask me constantly to make him a robot.  After being pestered by my two year old for days this is what we came up with.  Nothing too special but it sure made his day.  He even slept with this robot for the next few days.  

 

All I do is send him down to the recycling box and then he gets to pick what we're going to use to make this robot.  We've had to get pretty creative at times. Usually I have the kiddos color on the box while I hot glue the pieces on where they tell me to.

Sometimes we even turn him into the robot. 

It's a quick, easy, fun and FREE activity.  Not only do they love making the robots but then they have a new toy that keeps them entertained for a while, and I can get something done! That's a big YAHOO!

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Personalized Bingo!

I LOVE pictures! They capture moments and memories perfectly; they capture life.  Because I am so obsessed with pictures I do a lot of projects with them.  In June my hubby and I were in charge of planning a family reunion for his side.  I decided to throw this game together for the event and it was a prefect gift to give to his mom.  Her own personalized version of a classic game, Bingo.

I gathered together pictures of everyone in the family.  I tried to get quite a few silly ones to make it a little more fun.  Then I arranged them orderly on a page using my Fotofusion program, but Photoshop or other similar programs would work. 

I used the same 45 pictures over and over on 12 different cards.  I printed them out in a 8x10 size and then put them in sheet protectors, so that they hopefully will last a little while.

I wanted the game to be very kid friendly so I decided to forgo the traditional letter and numbers that are used in regular bingo.  I just made sure I had every picture that I used printed out and then I cut them up.

 When we played I just showed the kids the picture so they could mark it.  Bingo is a tradition in my family and we always use Smarties candy as our markers, then I had a little prize for when someone got a BINGO!

The kids loved seeing pictures of themselves and each other on a game.  Such a fun and easy tradition!

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St. Patrick's Day for Preschool

I do a home based preschool with my 4 year old son.  We rotate with a couple of other families and each take turns hosting.  Today was my turn to host and we decided to do a St. Patrick's Day theme.  I think it's important to teach kids what the different holidays are about so they understand why we do the crazy things or traditions we do at that time of year.

We started out with a normal beginning and then talked about why we celebrate St. Patrick.  I had totally forgotten the legend that he had cast out all the snakes in Ireland and learned for the first time that he was actually not from Ireland originally. 

After our educational circle time we did a little scavenger hunt to find some hidden gold.  I more than LOVE doing scavenger hunts and try to slip them into our traditions as much as possible.  I usually write my own clues but because I procrastinated this I turned to pinterest and found this little gem. 

The girls at The Crafting Chicks had this hunt already to go with free printables.  Thank you!

 

For our crafts we made hand print four leaf clovers.  I'm a total sucker for anything with hand prints because I want to have something to remember how little they were and to watch them grow.

 

And while they weren't doing their hand prints they worked on lacing their rainbow and four leaf clover.   I made these out of fun craft foam and then punched holes in them.  I used yarn instead of shoe laces because it was much cheaper.  Buying these lacing activities can get pricey!  I did put some tape on each end of the yarn so it would easier to use for little fingers and not fray.

 

 Lacing activities are great for hand eye coordination and fine motor skills. Now if I could only get my active boy to sit still long enough to do it!

 

For snacks they gobbled up this small rainbow fruit tray.

 

And they devoured one of our family favorites homemade oreos!  I told them that the leprechauns like to play silly tricks and they gave our cookies green frosting.  You can find this recipe here.

 

To make our drink a little more fun I made rainbow ice cubes by putting one drop of food coloring in each.  I forgot to get clear plastic cups so I had to use my real tumblers and I'm happy to report that none got broken. The boys thought this was awesome and were more than willing to drink their rainbow water.  I will have to do this more often because it was so simple.

I absolutely love doing preschool with my little guy.  I love watching him learn, grow and interact.  I wouldn't miss this for the world!  I also love holidays because they get me to do fun stuff with my family!

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Creature Habitats

Some days I feel that my kids think it is my sole responsibility to sit around and entertain them ALL DAY LONG!  Don't get me wrong, I LOVE being with my kiddos but I do have other things I have to do, like constantly fight a losing battle with the laundry.  Because of this I'm always trying to think of new things to help my kids entertain themselves.  This activity takes a few minutes to set up but then you're free to do something else besides entertain for a while.

One day we came up with the idea of a creature habitat.  My son is very much into animals/bugs and learning everything he can about them.  I'm surprised with how long this will entertain him. Not only is this activity fun but it's also educational!

We start with an old Dinner Group pan that has seen better days but doesn't leak. You can use any old pan or container.

Then we decide what creature we are going to learn about.  This day it was worms.  We often will look up some info on our subject online or I just tell him what type of habitat that particular creature would live in.

Then we create it.  I send him outside to collect the specific elements that would be in the habitat such as rocks, leaves, trees (sticks) and whatever else he finds.  We usually add a little water because what kid doesn't love playing with water. 

I am a mom that believes that childhood is to be fully experienced which means getting dirty sometimes.  I'm fine with a little water and mud in the kitchen but we do set limits.  If anything leaves the table we're done.

We add our creature of the day.  Sometimes they are real like the worms and sometimes it's one of his toys.

Then I have one happy boy who loves to play with his little friend in his new home.  I really am surprised how long he will play with this.  He'll move those little guys all over their home, make up stories about them and on and on. 

He's happy and I can enjoy and few minutes of peace.  Often I use times like this to go to the bathroom ALL ALONE! :)

This post has been linked at Ginger Snap Crafts!

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Year of the Dragon

I saw this great idea in the FamilyFun Magazine Feb 2012.  We were invited to a Chinese New Year Party.  I thought it would be fun for our grandkids to have something fun to keep them busy.  The dragon in FamilyFun was painted with fabric paints.  I sewed ric rac and buttons on these.  You could use hot glue instead of sewing.  You could glue on felt eyes, buttons could come off and become a choking hazard if the child is under 3.  For the free pattern go to FamilyFun.com/funshop. Search for "Dragon of the Year."

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