I introduced the animal by reading a few books and letting them color their own turtles and place them on our habitat mural. We also watched a few you tube videos about sea turtles. While Arthur colored his turtle, Lillian was learning how to draw one and Alan was completing a do-a-dot. But, Lillian got a phone call from her best friend and immediately dropped everything she was doing to chat and Arthur became very frustrated with the voracity with which Alan was banging his do-a-dot markers on the table. I fixed the problem by giving him a pair of headphones to muffle the noise. So, that is why he is wearing them the next few photos.

Then, Arthur and I did some letter and sound recognition practice with a turtle themed activity and discussed the life cycle of a turtle and read a few books about it. We finished up with a turtle themed snack.

We started zebra week like most others by learning about our animal and its habitat, coloring a picture of it and placing it on our habitat mural. Then we read a few books and watched a few videos and Lilly learned how to draw a zebra.

Then we made zebra face masks and worked on some reading and handwriting practice.

We wrapped up zebras with some black and white open painting and zebra cakes! Yum!

We started out with talking about penguins and their habitat. Then we colored a penguin and placed it on our habitat mural. We finished up our introduction by reading a few penguin books and watching a few youtube videos.
Then, Lilly worked on a reading activity while the boys did some do-a-dot penguin sheets and Lillian insisted on doing one too. After that, we conducted a science experiment to learn how penguins feathers keep them dry by coloring a penguin with crayons to create a waxy layer and then spraying it with water and analyzing how the water beaded up instead of being absorbed by the paper. Alan got pretty bored during the science experiment and enjoyed playing with his wooden train instead. 
We finished up the learning about penguins by getting some cutting practice with an icicle cutting worksheet I created, trying our hand at indoor ice skating and watching Happy Feet. For the indoor ice skating, we taped some paper plates on our feet and slid around on the floor. It kinda worked. lol.

The day started with such promise. I had it all planned. We would hit my gym so I could begin the day feeling super kick-ass about myself. Then grab a smoothie and treat the kids to build-a-bears on their first ever pay your age day. I knew there would be a bit of a wait but I was prepared with some snacks, my phone for Netflixing, the double stroller and well-fed kids. It wouldn't be an easy hour+ but it would be worth it for the discounted toys and would be a nice little lesson in patience for them. If only time-travel existed. I could prevent myself from making what would be one of the worst decisions of my life.

When we arrived at 9:35 I expected a line. This line was a bit longer than I anticipated but, I could see the storefront far in the distance. "Surely it wouldn't take too much longer than originally anticipated. I could give it more than an hour, 2ish was acceptable. Plus, I knew the person behind me from work which made the wait less terrible." I thought to myself. By 10:20, I had purchased some Dip'n'Dots from a vending machine we stood next to for a bit to calm the irritation starting to show in my children's sweet, innocent faces. In addition, Netflix was entertaining the older two and my youngest was having a blast walking around in my general vicinity. At 11:30 a friend farther up the line by about 20 people shared some of her snacks with us. We had long run out of the few I had brought for my anticipated hour long wait. The kids happily scarfed down pretzels and juice boxes while finishing up their movie and the baby had a blast running around showing off his toothy grin to his new friends in line. "I got this." I thought. They're good for a bit longer with the snacks.

By 1pm I realized that I had made one of the worst mistakes of my life. At this point the storefront was still just a speck in the distance and my current position in front of the exit doors to the mall was beginning to get uncomfortably hot. I was also forming friendships with my fellow linemates. We were all regretting our day' s choices but it had gone too far now. We had to finish. Wasting the last few hours was an unacceptable alternative. "Surely it wouldn't take too much longer. The line seemed to be moving a little faster now." I thought to myself. 

At 1:30, a BAB store representative came by offering us $15 vouchers if we wanted to leave and come back another day. The fine print (which the employee did not mention) stated that it was only redeemable on certain animals. My fellow line tribe and I all politely declined and upon her departure immediately began to discuss how insulting the offer was. "Does she understand how long I've been in line?! I'm going to need more than a lousy $15 voucher to leave now!" Said one of my brethren.

We learned about the cheetah this week including talks about its habitat, camouflage and African culture. It was a lot of fun so read on to learn all about it!

The kids woke up to find cheetah prints leading them to the play room. I decorated with some grass tablecloth and doorway items and pulled out the diy feltboard from years ago with safari felt board pieces I found from a free printable that I laminated and stuck some velcro on the back of. I also threw in a few plastic safari hats leftover from a bday party a few years ago and placed some plastic figures of African animals on the table. Admittedly, it was a little less engaging than usual. I was struggling with fighting off a cold and was definitely feeling sub-par. Overall, Alan enjoyed removing all of the felt board pieces and not putting them back.

We kicked off the week with making cheetah masks and cheetah feet. Then we colored a cheetah for our habitat mural after reading about them from the National Geographic mini book on cheetahs. Lilly wasn't into making a mask and did her own thing instead. It turned out pretty nicely.

Our next activities were to read about the origins of the kente cloth with the book "The Spider Weaver" and watch a video of people making it. Then we started a craft to make our own kente cloth paper art. But, they quickly grew bored and the project never got completed. The were not feeling the paper cutting. So, I pulled out stuff for the next craft which was to make some African tribal inspired necklaces with toilet paper rolls. Arthur didn't want to paint them and made his own masterpiece instead. However, once Lillian's were dry he wanted to make some and ended up with a necklace too. Alan found a new love of paint and truly enjoyed himself.

Another activity we managed to accomplish this week (they were somewhat ornery all week and weren't in the mood to participate is several activities) was an African sunset silhouette art piece. It was a two day project because we had to paint them and let them dry before adding the silhouettes. They had a great time painting their watercolor silhouettes the first day. The second day I cut out some silhouettes from black paper and let them glue them onto their sunset art. They are both very different but I think they are both great. Alan enjoyed watercolor painting too but didn't quite end up with a sunset. lol.

We did manage to talk about camouflage and conduct an experiment. We talked about what it is and why animals camouflage themselves then, we participated in an activity where I placed red, yellow and orange skittles and m&m's on a plate and told the kids they were m&m birds and only ate m&m's. So, they used their "bird beak" fingers and tried to only get m&m's out of the mix on the plate. They had a hard time at first because they did look very similar. It was a great way to illustrate the idea and they enjoyed the candy too.

This was definitely not the most active MC week ever with me fighting a cold and the kids being toots about participating but, we did a good chunk of the activities I had planned and we mostly had a good time doing them. You can check out all of the activities we didn't get to and find links to the ones we did by downloading the MC PDF for this summer here. 

We started our new animal today, the penguin so check back soon to read all about that fun! See ya soon!

Our first full week of Mommy Camp is a wrap! We had tons of fun with various activities including crafts, reading and writing, dramatic play and even a little cooking. 
The week started with a dramatic play area where the kids could play panda hospital and build a tower with some "bamboo" I made out of pool noodles. They also had some new books about pandas to look through and for us to read together. To finish the space, I created a mural of bamboo on some brown craft paper and hung some panda banners that I printed out.
​I usually set up the dramatic play area the night before so that they find it when they wake-up the next morning. This year, I also have animal footprints that I can print and cut out to place on the floor. These footprints match each animal and guide them to the dramatic play area. They thought it was pretty neat. Alan loved pulling them off of the floor and promptly destroyed them.

After playing for quite a while with the dramatic play area, we headed to my craft room to read a few of the books and learn about pandas. Arthur was a little irritated about doing some word and letter tracing in a book about China but he ended up getting on board. I just love his concentration face.
After learning about their habitat and the country in which they live, we colored a panda and placed it on our habitat mural

For lunch, I used a panda rice mold set and created some pretty adorable rice panda bears with seaweed for the black parts of the panda. (The mold set came with the press for the seaweed too.) We also tried using chopsticks to eat our lunch. It was interesting but they managed to make it work. 
After lunch it was nap time for Alan and Lillian and Arthur had fun watching Kung Fu Panda. After nap, we baked some panda cupcakes. Not only were they adorable but, they were also delicious and easy!

Over the rest of the week, we did multiple crafts including panda play dough, learning how to draw a panda, some worksheets about pandas and the letter "b", fork print panda painting and black and white process art. The links to all of these activities are in the MC PDF available at this post.

I made the play dough using a recipe from pinterest that calls for corn starch and conditioner. It created a really smooth and white dough that was great for making a panda. I provided them with black and white pom poms, green pipe cleaners cut into pieces and some googly eyes to complete their creations.

I was really proud of their panda drawings. They used the tutorial sheet that I created for Mommy Camp. 

The fork print panda painting was fun and quick. You just need white paint, red and black paper, scissors, googly eyes and forks. They use the forks to create the "furry" panda and then you cut out black paper for the accents. The paint acts as glue for the black paper and then you glue the eyes.

Before we started the process art I told the kids that there were no rules. I provided them with black and white paint, several different paint brush sizes, some black and white paper pieces and paper with the edges taped off so that when they are dry we have a frame around their art.The idea was to experience the paint and paper and to create. Arthur really enjoyed this and spent about 35 minutes on his creation. Lilly wanted to create something less abstract and painted a panda bear. They both enjoyed themselves.

Lilly had some fun with a pastel project where she drew a panda on a tree branch. She did a great job but kept getting frustrated and ended up trashing her art before I could stop her. She's a bit fiery sometimes. I have no idea where she gets it.

Alan is not usually really into the activities or he is unable to participate so I often have something else for him. He generally enjoys coloring and/or playing with some "toys" I've created including my genius decision to keep a bunch of puree food tops and baby puffs containers for him to dump out and then put back into the container over and over again. Even Arthur enjoys doing this.
​I also took some popsicle sticks and stuck tiny velcro circles on the ends of them to create some building sticks. He doesn't quite understand how to play with them but they did keep him entertained for about 15 minutes straight so I call that a win. Also, please ignore his lack of clothing. Babies. Am I righ? SMH.

We had a great time and we're ready to learn about our next animal the cheetah! So check back next week for all of the deets!

We spent a few of our first days of summer break relaxing and now we are rocking and rolling with Mommy Camp! We kicked off the summer lessons with a day devoted to learning about habitats. This is a theme that we will discuss with every animal throughout the summer so, the goal was just to establish the idea of a habitat and then build with more detail each week.
We started by reading a few books about habitats and watching a few videos on Youtube. The books I used and the video clips are all linked in the Mommy Camp 2018 free PDF which you can download here.

After introducing the idea of habitats and talking about them for a bit I let them dive into the habitat sensory bin that I made! It was inspired by several other sensory bins that I found on various sites. The difference is that I included all of the habitats into one bin. They really enjoyed it, destroyed it and were ready for something new as kids do.

This is my favorite. Alan was really enjoying himself and decided to take a chance by putting a rock in his mouth. It didn't make it in all the way and he is fine.

After making a mess with the habitat sensory bin, we made a habitat mural. I rolled out some brown butcher paper, taped it to the floor and then started a discussion. I asked them if they remembered what a habitat was and then asked for some examples. Then, I began to draw an area for each habitat on the paper. Once we had drawn something for each habitat we had learned about, I let them color! Well, by "them" I mean Lilly and Arthur. Alan was really into his corn and sitting on the mural but not so much into coloring it unless you consider corn tidbits and butter an artistic medium. The plan is to add the animals we learn about each week to the mural. So, after it was all done, I taped it to the wall in the hallway for us to add to throughout the summer.

He was just so stupid happy with that corn! He kept giving me the biggest "cheese" smile every time I took a picture.

To finish up the lesson, Lilly did a few worksheets while Alan and Arthur colored. Then, Arthur played a letter matching game with different animals in their habitats on each card and Lilly played a matching game where she placed different animals in their habitats. While they did that, Alan was basically the worst and tried to destroy their games, scream at be and be generally terrible. So it goes. The worksheets and games are also linked in my Mommy Camp PDF post previously mentioned.

They had a great first day of MC and I'm positive they will love our first animal day! Check back next week to see all of the fun we have while learning about pandas! And, if you haven't downloaded the free PDF get on it so you can join in on the fun too!

My friends over at Education.com wanted me to share this great worksheet just in time for Spring!

They have tons of free worksheets covering all sorts of things. I link to several of their activities in my new Summer 2018 Mommy Camp too! All you have to do is click the image for the FREE download!
Springtime is here so let's get in the spirit as we search for these words in this fun word search. You'll find more spelling resources, games, and printables like this at Education.com!

Enjoy the free worksheet and if you want the answer key you can click here!

Summer is almost here and that means nearly three months with THREE kids for most of the day ALL. DAY. LONG. So, I have once again compiled and created a plan for Mommy Camp to give the kids something to do and to maintain my sanity!

This year we will be be learning about nine different animals and their habitats. It is comprised of nine weeks of lesson activities and ideas about nine different animals, their habitats and the people that live near them and their culture. I have included links to all of the activities and a plan for how I plan on using them in the document. I will post each week about how I have used the lessons and ideas so you can get even more ideas for using the document. All you need to do is follow along! I also encourage you to share your experiences and ideas here on the blog by commenting!

And, you can download it for free! Right Now! Just click the image below!

I'm excited to get started and can't wait for summer break to begin! I hope you join us on this years Mommy Camp!

Lilly's school has an upcycle fair every year. Last year she made a plastic bag jump rope and won 3rd place in her grade. This year she made what she called "ipod Bears" which are basically mini bean bag chairs that look like chairs to hold your ipod or iphone. She won 1st place in her grade!

I'm going to show you how we made them so you can make your own. They are super adorable and easy to do using materials you probably have right now! We did get the idea from youtube and used this video to help us make them.

You will need:
- rice- hot glue and glue gun
- yarn
- stapler
- sock
- scissors
- ruler

It was a pretty easy and fairly quick project. We ended up making three in total and only spent about 1 and a half hours. It's definitely something interesting to do with all of those socks with missing partners!
Maybe now she won't lose her ipod under her bed. Lol.

My son turned 4 last week and we had a very fun party at a local museum. I took it a little easier on myself than usual by letting the museum take over some of the party planning in regards to activities but did dress it up a bit with a photo booth area and themed food.
As always though, I made a party planning board you can check out below.

Easy, transportable food options, a fun photo backdrop and a paleontologist outfit for the birthday boy were all I had to plan for this time with the museum taking care of goody bags, activities and cake!

I designed this poster on my computer using powerpoint and then sent it to be printed at my local Walgreens. For a grand total of about $10 (I also had a coupon). I had this great centerpiece for the food wall. I found the paper decorations in the discount bin at Target for a couple of dollars each.

Since it wasn't at my home and I had to transport all of our food I went pretty simple. The party was also at 2 so a full meal wasn't necessarily expected by guests. We had turkey sandwiches, doughnut holes, fruit and veggies and bugle chips. I also brought a punch. The venue provided the cupcakes and I added the cupcake toppers. I used powerpoint again to create the food labels. I just took a picture of the photo backdrop and then layed a text box with a white background over the rectangle image of the photo backdrop and printed them out. Super easy.

I bought the photo backdrop on Amazon. It is a tapestry/wall hanging and only cost $11! I'm sure I'll find another use for it in the future and because it is fabric it will still look great after each use!

The museum had a great plan for the party with a several paleontology themed activities. First, the drew clothes on skeletons while guests arrived. Then, they searched for "dino bones" to complete a large puzzle. After that, they learned about how fossils are formed by making a fossil sandwich filled with layers gummy worms, gold fish and pretzels that they then mashed down to create fossils in the soft, white bread.

After the fossil sandwich and discussion on fossils, they went on a scavenger hunt that had a really fun story element and found dino eggs, arrowheads and buried treasure!

It was a really great party and I think everyone had a great time. It was definitely nice for me to take a break from all of the crazy party planning I tend to get myself into.

Thanks for visiting!

It's been a busy and kinda rough last few months. My Mother-in-Law has been very ill and passed away on Friday. My grandfather also passed away only two days before on Wednesday. My husband and I both agreed to put our Valentine's Day on hold but, I knew that I wanted my kids to keep some semblance of normalcy and have a bit of fun to take their mind off of the very heavy things that have happened. Plus, I hoped to involve my Father-in-Law and Sister-in-Law as well to give them something to keep them occupied with the tragedy so fresh and it being the day of love as well as my FiL's 55th birthday.

So, I perused Pinterest for some ideas and decided on a fancy family dinner and for the morning, the kids had a scavenger hunt to find their gifts. Walmart had some pretty legit stuffed animals for only $15 so they received those in their favorite animals, some Valentine's Day themed socks and a package of edible bubbles. (I know, I was unaware this was a thing too. They seem pretty neat.)

For his birthday, my husband had a great idea of gifting his Dad with a giant, ultra, mega Nerf gun and got one for each kid too. This turned out to be the best idea. Even though the joy was brief, there was joy, and his Dad even laughed out loud several times in reaction to my squealing kids running in fear of being pelted with a nerf dart. Everyone enjoyed the dinner and our plan is to have a weekly dinner where they come and have a Nerf battle and an opportunity to be happy for a bit instead of grieving.

The family dinner was  such a success that I think we'll do it every year. I made it fun with a sequin table cloth, other decorations, a custom menu and fizzy juice for the kids. I also acted as a waiter, complete with a proper silly voice, for them and let them order off of their menus which they thought was fantastic.

Oh, and I had no idea that I was supposed to send a Valentine's Day box with my son until I picked him up the day before (Usually my husband drops him off and picks him up so the info fell through the cracks.) So, I ended up making a pretty adorable dino box for him. He is obsessed with dinosaurs. When my husband got him to school the next day, he said that most of the kids literally just had a box. Not a decorated one. Just a box. lol. I'm glad I was over-prepared and stressed to make it the night before.

With three kids taking adorable photos can get a bit hard. But, I managed to scrape together a few great ones using my awesome trick of pretty wrapping paper for a background. I dressed the kids in some adorable clothes, bribed them with the promise of candy at the end of the ordeal and quickly captured their adorable little faces with my phone camera before anyone had a meltdown.
I even managed without anyone making silly faces or sounds behind me this time! After selecting my favorites and running them through my favorite photo filter app, Rookie Camera, I ended up with photos that I really like and only cost me some time, a little sanity and $4 for the wrapping paper. Enjoy!

Since I was not looking photo ready during our session, I left the wrapping paper up and captured a few more photos the next day too.

Alan had a fantastic fiesta themed first birthday party...two months ago! I'm sorry for the extremely late posting! I have been so busy recently with work and kids and holidays that I haven't had any spare time for hobbies. But, I'm finally getting a minute now that the semester tests are nearing their end and I have mostly prepared my lessons for the next semester. Take a look at all of the fun that was had a few months ago celebrating Alan.

The party food was a taco bar with all of the fixin's. I made cupcakes (from a box mix) but made them extra cute with swirly icing, sprinkles and Alan heads. We also had corn on the cob and chips with salsa and queso. I also printed out labels in Spanish and English for all of the food. To make the cupcake toppers I took one of the photos from our fiesta themed photo shoot and sent it to Walgreens as wallet sized prints. Then I cut his head out and hot glued it to a toothpick.

For fun activities, we had a create a maraca and/or sombrero station and a pin the mustache on Alan. I just printed a photo of Alan into a poster sized print at Walgreens and cut out some mustaches from black construction paper. I also had a fun photo booth for selfies and such.

For the rest of the decorations I kept it pretty simple and posted Spanish labels on various items in the house and hung a large sombrero and printed sign on the door.

Also, Alan's shirt was made using my silhouette cameo machine. I created the design and cut it into stencil material. Then I used red acrylic paint to paint the design onto the shirt. It is way easier and cheaper than vinyl plus, I think it lasts longer and looks way more legit. For his party hat I used a store bought hat from Target and added the glittery one with craft foam. Easy and cheap!
Guests left with their crafts, some sticky mustaches and mini wooden maracas. It was a fun, colorful and festive party that was a blast to plan.

In preparation for Alan's fiesta themed birthday party we had a bit of fun with photos! It was a simple set up and I think the results are extremely awesome.

We took them last minute on a weeknight in the kitchen! All I did was tape a white sheet up over one of the walkways into the space and then added a kid sized chair and sarape. Then added Alan with a kid sized sombrero, sticky mustache and a few tiny wooden maracas. I was honestly amazed that he didn't try to take the mustache off. Probably because his hands were full of maraca and he was most likely confused about what was going on. lol.

After running them through a few editing apps and filters I came out with my adorable pics but, they didn't look great right out of the gate. Editing is a must!

After editing them up a bit I headed over to canva.com and created some invitations for his party. After saving the images I created on canva (for free) I created an invitation at Walgreens online and had them mailed to my house! I was super happy with how they came out!

Now it's time to get to party planning!