Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Painting rocks

I've been wanting to paint rocks and make a little rock garden for a long while now. And, we finally got around to doing it!


We collected our rocks over time. Then, we washed the dirt off of them and let them dry.


We used many different sizes, shapes and colors!


T found some mossy sticks to paint as well.


A good hour or so later, we finally finished painting all our rocks and set them out near our front step.


I loved how they turned out.


T now has been asking to paint rocks every single time we go outside. I do want to do it again, especially since our paint, sadly, got quickly washed away by the rain.

I sprayed acrylic sealent spray on them in hopes that it would keep the paint on the rocks at least a little while. I even put the rocks under the overhang of our house, but they quickly washed off in the first rain. I admit, I was quite disappointed. We both worked really hard on our rock paintings. But, then again, it just gives us a good reason to paint more rocks! And seeing how T loves doing it so much, I definitely see us doing this activity again. Especially when the weather starts to warm up. (Hopefully soon!)

After we made our rock garden, T was being her silly, 3-year old self and started making funny faces.






Then, she asked to take pictures of me making silly faces. So, I obliged.




I love days like these.

Monday, April 25, 2011

Gumdrops

Another great, rainy day activity- gumdrops and toothpicks!


We've tried this before with marshmellows but they don't seem to hold the toothpicks in place as well. The gumdrops worked a lot better! And T seemed to enjoy the activity better too.


I found this idea from another blog and just can not remember which one it is. If anyone knows, please let me know so I can give them credit.

Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Knitted Flowers

These flowers inspired me to pick up some knitting needles for the first time ever. I have never knitted anything before, but they seemed simple enough, right? I ended up asking my grandma for some help. I finally did it!



I loved the idea of using them to decorate the house for Spring and Easter.



I used a few of the ones my grandma made for me.



Some of mine are a little silly looking though, so don't look too closely...



I'm now actually trying to learn to knit. I haven't had much time lately, and my knitting is typical of a beginner; very tight. So, not much progress has been made. But, hopefully I can figure this thing out and actually say "I can knit" someday soon.

Monday, April 18, 2011

Easter Activities

Prekinders has a great free rabbit printable.


T has been doing this one over and over again. She decided to add the green leave tops to the carrots as well.



Our rice box for the month of April also incorporated a little bit of Easter.


Besides Easter eggs, I also added some dried pasta noodles. T loved that!

Also, Petals and Sunshine had a post about a free Easter banner she found here.



Check that site out because they have a few free Easter printables as well.

Such as, paper egg holders. T really liked the baskets.


I made bottoms to the baskets using one of the characters on the free printable.


T's been putting tiny, itty-bitty toys and things in her baskets ever since.
There is also a maze and a coloring page where you find the Easter eggs.


I helped her with the coloring but she found all the eggs herself. She also did the maze all by herself. She loves mazes.



Hope everyone has a wonderful week leading up to Easter!

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Featured...

I wanted to let my readers know that I have my first ever interview. I am so honored to even be included. Especially since I was asked by one of the most inspirational of mamas. If you'd like to take a look, you can go here: Still Parenting

And be sure to check out her blog along with the other blogs featured in the Creative Mama Series as well for more inspiration and creative ideas.

Letter of the Week

Letter M

'M' is for monkeys and M&Ms!

Day 1-

I usually set up a few letter activities out on the table.

T is pretty familiar with all the activities now. I let her choose which ones to do. Some days we get to all of them, and some days we don't.

I began these letter games (as we call them) so she could become familiar with all her letters and their sounds. I never want to push it on her and thankfully, I never have to. She really looks forward to doing them and enjoys learning her letters.

Day 2-

I always do our letter of the week over a 2-day span.

She is, after all, only three. This way, she doesn't lose interest.

We did a new activity this week that gave T practice with using scissors. She chose to hold her scissors a little different than the norm...

We didn't do a craft this week, but rather, a science experiment found here: Candy Experiments


Honestly, I don't know if we did this experiment the correct way. It was mainly to see what happens to M&Ms when they are put into water.

T learned that they dissolve and the colored dye spreads.

She had fun watching the pretty colors in the water. Then, she noticed a little letter 'M' floating around.

She thought that was pretty neat, and I did too.


I found this week's letter 'M' activities from Confessions of a Homeschooler.

Monday, April 11, 2011

Watercolor Butterflies

Spring is here! And our house is currently decorated with lots of beautiful coffee filter butterflies. They're in our dining room, our entry way and our front window. And they are a perfect decoration for Spring.

Once again, T and I used our liquid watercolors to paint coffee filters. (One of our favorite craft projects to do.)

Probably because it's so easy to do and T enjoys it so much. She painted as many butterflies as I did. And they always turn out so pretty with all the different colors.


They're also very easy to make. Once the paint dried, I folded the coffee filters into an accordian.

Then, I cut in half a pipe cleaner of T's color choice while T made a bunch of pipe cleaner happy faces.

I then folded the pipe cleaner in half and wrapped it around the coffee filter and curled the ends for the antennas.

We used thread to tie them to our dining room chandelier.


And we used folded tape to stick them onto the front window and entry way wall.

Some of them are hanging as well.

Don't they go perfect with T's hand print tulip canvas?

Happy Spring!