Monday, June 29, 2009

I Spy Bottle

Ellie really enjoys the I Spy books and when we were at our local toy store I saw a neat I Spy bottle but I am cheap and didn't want to pay $15 for it. I saw this great post and her I Spy bottle looked just as good as the one at the toy store so I decided to make one. It was easy and fun. Ellie and I colored rice by putting rice in Ziplocs with a splash of vinegar and food color and let it dry for a few hours or in my case a few days:) Collect little trinkets to put in your bottle and take a picture of them so you know what you are looking for. Last step is to spoon the rice and trinkets in the bottle (make sure you leave enough open space so you can move the rice around) and hot glue the lid on. Wasn't that simple?




I think I am going to save this for our next longer car ride!

Thursday, June 25, 2009

Summer Days

Summer is so fun for us because we get to spend more time with our friends, we get to go swimming etc. but the down side is once we really get into the summer months it gets so hot out that we can't play outside and we get a little stir crazy being stuck inside. I saw this fun Cool Summer banner and decided to make one for the girls. Each cone is a pocket and you put a different activity in each pocket. My very crafty friend, Teresa, had the great idea for us to make a 7 day banner instead and that way we can do it for a week and then take a week off etc. Isn't she smart? So here is the finished product: (Thanks T for letting me copy you)I am going to start it on Monday so I better start coming up with our activities!!

Sunday, June 21, 2009

Wrong Feet

Poor Ellie is forever putting her shoes on the wrong feet. She has a 50/50 chance of getting it right but she just rarely does. Most of the time I don't notice until we are out and about so you will frequently see us sitting in a store switching her shoes. I saw this great idea the other day on this blog (a great blog that you should check out) and it was so simple. I drew smily faces on the curved parts of all of her shoes and when her shoes kiss then she knows they are on the right foot. It has worked like a charm.

Thursday, June 18, 2009

Muffin Tin Lunch

Emily had her first muffin tin lunch today. Ellie has been eating muffin tin breakfasts, lunches and snacks for awhile now but I have never done it for Emily. I think Ellie was more excited that Emily was going to have a muffin tin lunch with her then Emily was. We got some new library books today so we had a muffin tin carpet picnic with our new library books. Amazing how you have such a captive audience when they are eating:) We have been doing muffin tin lunches for a long time now, they are big in blog land, but Ellie still gets excited every time we make them. Hopefully Emily will enjoy them just as much.

Every week there is a new theme for muffin tin lunches so if you want to participate check out this blog!

Friday, June 12, 2009

Vacation

We just got back from almost a week at the beach. It was wonderful!!! It was Emily's first trip to the beach and I think she really enjoyed it. We swam a lot, built sandcastles, collected shells, took golf cart rides, and went to the children's museum. It was just so great to spend so much time together and I am really sad that it is over. I am truly blessed with a wonderful family!!! We took TONS of pictures but I will spare you and just post a few.

Thursday, June 4, 2009

Backyard Play

For some reason I have never really enjoyed taking the girls out to play in our backyard. We have a great playset that both girls really like but there is only so much time I can push them on the swings and play in the sand (Ellie can't seem to play by herself). This year I plan on spending most afternoons out there so I am trying to come up with some fun activities. I have decided to do an out door junk box. I want to be able to keep it under the deck and once the box is full something has to be taken out before putting something new in. In the box is going to be some random stuff: plumbing pipes, elbows, flexible pipes, random wood (with edges sanded down), etc. I want the girls to be able to get creative and see what they can create with them. We have moved the garden to a different part of the yard so now there is a dirt area to dig in and get dirty. I have just started collecting things for this box so we don't have much yet but the other day I broke out a few things and ran the water hose run through a pipe dug a hole to pool the water in and just played in the mud. It was fun for all of us.

Monday, June 1, 2009

Preschool

We didn't do preschool last week according to Ellie but we were still busy reading, drawing, making goo, playing with play-doh, having pretend picnics etc.

We are reading Charlotte's Web and I forgot how much I love this book. Ellie is enjoying it too and once we finish reading it we are going to watch the movie.

Ellie has been asking to make goo so I got each of the girls a tub, cornstarch, tea pots with water, plastic silverware and food coloring. It started out like this:

and once I went to the hose to fill up more water I turned around to this:



so we made green monster foot prints on the sidewalk and played princess and witch over and over and over. You get the picture!
Here are the girls having a picnic.