CVC Egg Puzzles

I had good intensions to get this posted before Easter, but since it is still spring I guess this idea could still work.  I found this CVC (consonant-vowel-consonant) Egg Puzzle at My Montessori Journey.  Click on my link, and it will take you to the post where you can print yours off for FREE too!

In my picture, the eggs had not been cut apart, yet but you get the idea.  I thought this would make a great literacy center or teaching activity for a child learning to read.  Who doesn't love puzzles?

The Letter "O" Activities

I have been thinking a lot lately about how I need to be doing more activities with my younger kids to get my 4 year old ready for preschool next year.  I have been looking for ideas on the internet to see what there is, and I have come up with some activities soon to come.  The activities will probably be random...ranging from letters of the alphabet to numbers to shapes and so on. 
Today I started with the letter "O".  I printed off this "O" worksheet from HERE.

I talked to my kids about the short o sound and talked about the 4 pictures from the bottom of the page.  The kids then colored the pictures, cut out the squares (with help from me) and glued them to a piece of paper.  Then they practiced writing the letter "O".

Next we made our snack.  We had octopus (using hotdogs and spaghetti noodles).  This is the before: 

I cut a couple hotdogs into 1/3 pieces and then broke a handful of uncooked spaghetti noodles in half.  First I talked to the kids about how many legs people have, then how many legs dogs have and then we talked about how octopuses have 8 legs.  I gave my kids the noodles and let them slide the noodles through the hotdog slices. 

Then they helped me drop the octopus into the water (just like where they live!)  After about 10 minutes, we had our snack of octopus and orange juice served in an orange cup.  I personally wasn't tempted to dive into today's snack, but my kids sure thought it was yummy.  If only I could make vegetables look as fun! 

(I saw the octopus idea at Plum Pudding.)
I ended our "O" day by reading the book The Great Swimming Race (By:  Ann Bryant and Peter Kavanagh)  I wanted to read a fun children's book about an octopus and this is what I could find at my local library.  It was an easy read, but after a busy afternoon my kids didn't seem to mind. 

The kids were really entertained and loved all the activities!  I can't wait to do more fun things like this with them!!

Some More O Ideas:
Art Project:
Make an octopus - Cover a small styrofoam ball with cloth and tie it with enough ribbons to make eight legs.

Sport/Game:
Build a simple obstacle course for your child to play on. Another game to play could be to help your child think of opposites. You say the word "off" and your child must reply with "on".

Math:
Octagon - point out the shape in everyday objects such as a stop sign. Draw and color one.

ABC & 123 also has some great finds for the letter "O".

Build Your Own Sand & Water Table

Have you ever wanted a sand/water table for your kids? I remember playing in one when I was in kindergarten. They are wonderful tools for teaching children about texture and for just having fun. My {2 year old} daughter loves to stand on a chair at the kitchen sink and "wash the dishes". Honestly, hours of fun! Think about how much fun it would be to have one of these. The only problem is that they can be expensive. Well no worries, now you can have one for a more reasonable price. The trick is having a handy husband or find someone who will to make it for you. Thanks to Studio 5, here is a tutorial on how to construct your own using PVC pipe.
Hmm...I wonder what I could bribe my husband with to get him to make one. If only I had the space!
Here is an even EASIER (and cheaper) idea from Heaps of Laundry.  Use a rice bin!  Fill a large plastic tote bin with rice and bury items in the rice for the kids to find.  I promise you, my kids would be THRILLED with this!

Car Mat & Car Cozy

I totally want to make one of these car mats for my little guy for when we are on the go. Thanks Fiskars Craft for the creative idea!

Here is another idea. A car cozy (with tutorial) from My Little Gems.

Fruit Loop Necklaces

Back to the Basics!
Yesterday my (2) kids were needing an inside activity to do. I decided to get out the Fruit Loops and let them each make a necklace. Remember doing this as a kid? I couldn't find any string, so instead I taped a long piece of ribbon (for gift wrapping) to my table.

They were more than entertained! But I decided I could slip some teaching in while they were having fun. With my 4 year old, I taught him about patterns. I picked out 2 colors at a time and we took turns making the pattern on the table before stringing the Fruit Loops. For my 2 year old, we worked on colors. I told her what color to thread on the string and she enjoyed picking the colors out of the bowl and showing them to me.

If you are looking for an easy and fun activity to do with your kids, this was a great idea.

Coloring Pages & Bingo

If you are being hit by the BIG winter storm right now, you might appreciate some of these FREE printable coloring pages. They are all Valentine related, to keep with the upcoming holiday. If would like other coloring pages, google it, and plenty of other options will pop up. I know my kids will enjoy some new indoor activities today!

Coloring Pages from Kaboose. More FREE coloring pages HERE and HERE.

Crayola offers FREE coloring pages and Bingo cards, perfect for any party! Kaboose also offers printable Bingo cards.

Christmas Games

First of all, to all of my readers and followers, I am sorry for my last post, but I had big news and needed a way to get the word out there. If you are interested, you can still let me know, but I won't be doing any more posts of that sort on here.
Anyway, back to Christmas ideas because I am sure that is what you are all looking for...

Here are a few more Christmas games that could be used for a classroom or family party:

* Christmas gift wrapping race. See who can wrap the box the quickest.
* Pin the nose on Rudolph.
* Present Scramble - This game requires a bit of prep but is well worth the effort. Put a small prize (such as a $10 bill) in a small box, tape it well, and gift wrap it. Put the box in a bigger box, wrap that box and put it in another, and so on, wrapping it as many times as you have the boxes and the patience for.
With everyone sitting in a circle, the youngest chooses a number from 1 through 6 and rolls a die, then passes the die to the next player. The first person to roll the chosen number puts on two oven mitts and tears into the present. The other players continue rolling the die. The next player who rolls the chosen number grabs the mitts and takes over the unwrapping. The person who unwraps the actual box with the prize gets to keep it.
* Have a "snowball" race. Create 2 teams and have them each form a line. Have a pile of "snow (cotton balls) dumped and scattered where the kids are in line. One at a time, the kids are to use the "shovel" (spoon) and carry the "snow" from one end of the room to the other, where they then dump the "snow" into a bowl. The kids can only use the spoon to carry the "snow" and can not use the other hand to scoop it up either. They can use a shoe or something along those lines, but not their hands! First one to shovel all their snow wins!

My (10 year old daughter) and her cousin are hosting a Christmas party tomorrow with some friends from school. More ideas from this are to come...

Thanksgiving Crafts & Centerpieces

Studio 5 had a guest, Kristine McKay, on the show the other day who featured several great Thanksgiving ideas.
The ideas are mainly craft and centerpiece ideas. I love the idea of using the same table cloth every year and having your guests sign their names each year. After each year, embroider over the signatures to preserve the names and watch the family and guest names grow over the years.

The other idea I really like was the crayon turkey the kids can make and use at the kids' table. Such fun and easy ideas for entertaining! Check out more of Kristine's ideas and FREE downloads on her site.

Cornucopia Treats

Tonight my kids and I made cornucopia treats for dessert. I had bought sugar cones back in October thinking that I would make witch hat treats with them, but life got hectic and that never happened. Since I had the cones on hand, we made cornucopias instead. I tried heating a cone in the microwave first, thinking that maybe I could soften and bend the cone. Unfortunately it didn't work the way I had hoped so we had to leave the cones as they were. We melted some chocolate chips over the stove and then rolled the cones in the melted chocolate. Then we put some sprinkles on the chocolate and set them in the fridge to set up quicker. Once the chocolate was set, we filled each cone with some Runts candy. My kids all thought it was a fun idea and they didn't taste too bad either. Really though...can you go wrong with chocolate ANYTHING?!?

Thanksgiving Ideas

Crafts and Deals left a comment so I decided to check out her site. I love blog hopping and seeing all of the creative people and ideas out there! She has some really fun and great Thanksgiving ideas (along with other non-Thanksgiving ideas!). I love the Thanksgiving memory game,

Paper Bag Turkey,

and Fall Fingerprint Tree.

I know I will be trying out some of these ideas with my kids. Thanks for sharing!!

Coloring Pages for Thanksgiving

Need a way to entertain kids at the table this year while waiting for Thanksgiving dinner to be served? Here are some links to free, printable coloring pages and activities...

KABOOSE

FAMILY FUN

TONS of pages to chose from HERE

Hope this helps keep the little ones busy and happy!

Pine Cone Turkeys

Live near pine trees? Looks easy enough. Check out how to make these darling turkeys using pine cones HERE.

Memory Game From Recycled Lids

I just found the best idea for recycling those Gatorade bottle lids. Check out what My Little Gems decided to make as a fun and cheap Halloween game. I know Halloween is over, but I thought I would share anyway so that you can keep the idea in mind for next year. Besides, the concept could work for any occasion or holiday. Just change up the stickers! You could even place letter stickers underneath and have the kids match upper case letters to lower case letters. The possibilities are almost endless.

Turkey Treats

How funny is this? Last year for Thanksgiving, I had the kids in the family make these yummy turkey treats. I had gotten the idea from a friend. As I was looking at Family Fun today, I came across a link with the directions on how to make these. My turkeys are a little different, but the idea is the same. The kids all had a fun time making these turkeys! The hardest part was not eating all the ingredients before the turkeys were made!!


**If you like the way my turkeys turned out, here's what I used:

*Oreo Cookies (1/turkey, unless you want them to stand upright. In that case use 1 1/2-2 cookies)
*Candy Corn (6/turkey: stick 5 between the Oreo cookies, into the white frosting of the cookie. Bite down a candy corn to make a tip for the beak)
*Miniature Reese's Peanut Butter Cups (For the body. Attach with frosting.)
*Whoppers (For the head. Attach with frosting.)
*Chocolate Frosting (Use as the "glue")

Thanksgiving Treats

Here are some fun food ideas found over at Family Fun. Check them out!
The Fruit Gobbler

Tepee Treats

Turkey Cupcakes

Marshmallow Pilgrim Hats

Halloween Food Ideas

Mousse filled wtiches hats, bat wing soup, and jack-o-lantern pancakes are just a few of the fun Halloween recipes you will find HERE.

There are many other spooky and yummy looking Halloween treats found at Super Punch.


I think the Invisible Pops look like a fun and creative treat for a Halloween scare!

A page full of Halloween recipes at Britta. Including:

Brittle (Meringue) Bones

The Food Network has plenty of great food ideas too!

Check out Delish for even more spooky dishes.

A site for sore eyes, and other ideas are at Wilton's.


Here is a Frankenmallow idea, where the kids can help make these spooky creations. More Halloween ideas can be found at Family Corner, including crafts, coloring pages and more!


I am sure there are many more great ideas out there. If you have something to share, let me know. Otherwise...happy baking!

Spider Pops

Need a treat for a Halloween party? Check out these cute Spider Pops. You could either have the kids make these treats or just send them home with the kids as a fun treat.

Salt Dough Ghosts

The other day my daughter came home from a friend's house with a plate full of ghosts. They were all labeled on the back with the names of our family members and they have made a cute addition to our Halloween decor (minus the plate of course ;). Check out Family Fun for the directions and materials needed.

Some Summer Ideas Before Summer Ends!

Like I mentioned before, I have kind of put this blog on hold for the summer and I am sorry about the lack of ideas lately. I totally skipped over ideas for Father's Day and the 4th of July, but I know that all of you crafty people out there have provided plenty of ideas. Anyway...summer isn't over yet, so I am going to feature some ideas I have come across lately.
Check out these adorable Petite Watermelons from Chocolate on my Cranium. Yummy and oh-so cute!

From Make and Takes, comes a watermelon Pie made from sherbet:

And while we are on the subject of watermelons, why not use a cookie cutter and punch out a shape and stick it on a Popsicle stick? Such a quick and yummy summer treat idea. (The star would be super cute for the 4th of July!)

Make some sidewalk chalk for the kiddos like it's done over at Skip to My Lou.

Homemade moonsand you can make with your kids. Also from Skip to My Lou.

Or check out Kinderinfo for a recipe for homemade finger paint.

Not sure what this has to do with anything, but I want it! I honestly want to make one of these handy "take along race track and toy car holder". The problem is that I think I would love it more than my son...he's more the animals kind of guy.

Try 50 summer crafts for kids over at the long thread.

Kool Aid Play Dough

Today it is snowing for the 2nd day in a row. You would think that since I have lived in cold, snowy places before I would be use to it by now. The truth is, I probably would be if I had lived in the snow more recently. For the past 9 years, up until this last summer when our family moved, I have been living in almost 365 days a year of pure warmth and sunshine. I will get use to the change in weather, but for now I am going stir crazy.
I decided to try out THIS recipe for Kool Aid Play Dough. (I am sure there are TONS of these recipes out there, but this is the one I decided to try. It was super easy and super fast! It is suppose to smell good too, but I can't really smell too much from it. (I used pink lemonade kool aid though so maybe pick a more potent smell.) It turns out really soft too and my 2 little kiddos are having a blast playing. YEAH~no fighting! Anyway, if you too are longing for warmer outside days and looking for something to do (indoors) try out this recipe.
From a teaching stand point, you could turn this into an educational tool too. Try having your kids make letters or words with the play dough.

Also, if you have cookie cutters, you could have the kids cut out shapes and name them for you. (My 3 1/2 year old is having fun making triangles and telling me all about them.)

You could also try doing a little math. Make numerals or try story problems such as rolling out 4 balls/snakes/whatever and take away one. What are you left with? 3! You can even have your child practice counting the objects you/your child makes.