Thursday, April 15, 2010

Home Grown Preschool

I have four girls ranging from 1 to 5 and a 2 year old nephew that live with me right now.  I decided to start a private little preschool this week.  The first couple of days I was going at it alone.  But I recently discovered this little gem:


Go check out this awesome blog!  We are doing an alphabet theme in our house, so this is perfect.  She has a ton of ideas for each letter of the alphabet.  Plus, she has FREE PRINTABLES for a lot of it!

Tuesday, April 6, 2010

Uh Oh!

I think my new love was just created!  I MUST get me one of  THESE!  Wish I'd had one for Cassy's birthday! Hope I have on for Charly's birthday!  Nate is going to flip when he hears about my new wish list!

Go check it out!  You will be wishing for one, too!

It isn't in stores yet.  It comes out on April 14th, but I SO wish I had the money to fork out for one!  Maybe I'll win one from the DIY Dish!  Oh please, oh please, oh PLEASE!

Friday, April 2, 2010

Helping the Easter Bunny

Here's the story:

I got a call from the Easter Bunny today and he said he was having trouble filling Daddy's Easter basket.  So he asked us to help him out.

Here's what Daddy will be getting in his basket from me and the girls:

*That's an egg carton*


*Inside*

And it took less than an hour!
And I got to do it with the kids,
in fact, it was all about the kids!

Wanna make one real quick?

Here's what I used:

Egg carton
Green acrylic paint
Small sponge brush (small worked better to get in the nooks and crannies of the egg carton)
Scrapbook paper
Tulle
Straight edge cutter
Corner rounder
Ink pads
Scrapbook letter stickers
Krylon crystal clear glaze (You could probably skip this one)
Regular printer paper
Colored pencils (or markers, crayons, whatever)
1 dozen plastic Easter eggs

I cut the scrapbook paper to fit the top of the egg carton, then painted  and sprayed the carton.  The spray didn't seem to do much, so you could probably skip it!  While the carton was drying, I put the lettering on the scrapbook paper and tied a bow with some tulle.  You can embellish the top however you like.  I also put numbers on the eggs.  I just thought it was cute!  Then I cut 4" squares out of printer paper and wrote on each one why each child loves Daddy.  I have four kids, so they each did three eggs.  The more original, the more it will mean to whomever you give it to.  Here is an example of one that I did from my one year old:


*And I just realized that I left out the "do" in that sentence!*
It should read:  ...you teach me to DO big kid things that Mommy is afraid to let me try.

Obviously my one year old isn't exactly coloring savvy yet, so I stamped her foot on this one, her and on another, and the last one has her little finger prints all over it!  Turned out so cute!


And what did the kids do in-between coloring time?

This has to be the best seasonal babysitter yet!
They were entertained for hours!


Disclaimer:
Sorry about the little streakers!
The two year old refuses to leave her clothes on,
And the baby snuck away from me before I could get some clean clothes on her.

So do you think he'll like it?
The best part is, it doesn't have to be for daddy.
You can make it for grandparents, friends, anyone!