Jellyfish in a Bottle

We saw the jellyfish in a bottle craft and had to make it.We found it here :
http://bhoomplay.wordpress.com/2011/09/09/diy_jellyfish_eng/
Just a hint,make the jelly fish small it will work better.We are going to make another one later when we have another bottle.

Little Ones and School

I have had many people ask what I do with the little ones while the big kids are doing school so I thought that I would show you.Sometimes I set things up for them to do, like an activity box and sometimes I just let them play.This day I was working with the older ones and just let Ethan play.It does often mean more mess but that is OK!

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Nathan Turns 4

Nathan turned 4 today.He has been playing and watching a movie,that is what he wanted to do for his birthday.We do not do school on birthdays,unless they want to(that has happened).He will have a party on Saturday also.

Nathan is a laid back lovable boy.He is such a joy!

Sarah made his cake

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Bath Paints

I needed another present for Nathan (3) and a good friend of mine gave me the idea of bath paints. It is so good to have help sometimes! I also added a sponge ball.

The bath paints are super easy. I used baby soap, corn starch, and food coloring. I put it the soap in a bowl and added corn starch until it looked good, not too drippy. Then with small bowls I put the soap in and added my colors. Next I put them into small containers with lids. I had some that fruit had come in. I have a problem saving containers that look like I will use them someday for something. Sometimes it is so bad I have to recycle a bunch at once, but this time my obsession was handyJ.

The sponge ball was simple also. I used 4 sponges (thin ones from the dollar store), a plastic tie (dollar store) and scissors. I cut each sponge lengthwise into thirds, and made four rows of three. I picked up the stack and twisted it once, put the tie on and pulled it as tight as it would go.If you use thicker sponges you would only need three.

I hope Nathan likes his little bath kit. Bonus….It will get a boy in the tub!

Beautiful

I love to see my kids all together,getting along.

Christmas for the Birds

Bird seed Wreath

4 cups bird seed feed
3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup water
3 T. corn syrup
1 package of plain gelatin
cooking spray
bundt pan

In a large bowl put warm water and gelatin mix together and let the gelatin dissolve.

Whisk in the corn syrup and flour to create a paste.

Add  bird seed and stir well.

Spray the bundt pan well, and then scoop the seed into the pan evenly/

Tap down the seed well.

Put on a plate or paper towel and let dry 24-48 hours.

Tie a long piece of ribbon on the top.

Hang on a tree branch. After just a few days ours was mostly gone.  

I saw this idea here:

http://stitch2buttercups.blogspot.com/2011/12/quick-easy-gifts-bird-seed-wreath.html

Sarah's Gymnastics Show 2011

Trains

Our county set up a train show in one of the old outlet malls this year. It was fun to look at and the best part….free! The boys came home and went straight upstairs to get out their train sets to play.

The Bethlehem Project

Andrew, Sarah and Matthew were in this year's Christmas play at our church. They had been going to the church 2-3 times a week for practice. All three of them worked very hard. Andrew had lots of lines to learn (he seems to be a natural) and lots of actions to go along with the lines. Matthew worked hard on learning songs. Sarah worked on her few lines and songs, but also was an under study for another girl. Sarah  memorized all the girl’s lines also! I heard the play went very well. I was home with Sarah that night. She ended up with a belly bug that day, we were both very sad. The good thing is Craig got lots of pictures and Pat got a video that I will see later.

Christmas

This is the beautiful advent wreath that Matthew made our family to celebrate

Games for Reading

We have been trying to get Matthew to recognize when he can read a word without taking the time to sound it out. We took all the books that he can read really well and has read many times and made word cards of every word in each book. As he read one of the word cards quickly he would get a cup to stack. Let me just say...I sure am glad that we had the warehouse bag of cups. He did a great job and had fun.

Happy Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving day,I hope everyone else did also!

Enjoy the Day

Today was such a beautiful day here today. I wish I had put my camera in the car, but I did not. We dropped Andrew off to work and took a nice walk to the beach, we played, walked, and collected sea glass. Most of all I just really enjoyed the blessings that God gave me. We laughed and enjoyed the sunshine and the beach. Even threw a few leaves around, what a pretty fall day!

When we got back home we did school and made some new chore charts.

 Get this: the kids were excited about the chore charts and also did extra school. The sun sure did some good here!