The Internet Makes Life Easy

I don't know how our parents survived without the Internet. One of the easiest - and funnest - things I will do is download pictures for my daughter to color.  It's great because she can pick whatever theme she wants and is into that day. This morning, it was Strawberry Shortcake. To make things even cooler, agkidzone.com had cut out stick figures of all the characters. I didn't have any wooden Popsicle sticks but my 3 yr old was way ahead of me and brought out the plastic popsicle sticks that we use to make homemade popsicles with.  Great fun!!

Soap Clouds

How have I lived 35 years without ever hearing about how awesome it is to microwave a bar of ivory soap?  It grows into a huge cloud (deflated in the picture). I imagine you could take the cloud and add water and make bath crayons but for now, our soap clouds are sitting magnificently on the counter.  

Cutting and Pasting

My 3 year old came up with this activity on her own and it distracted her for all of ten minutes. But, it gave me time to wash dishes and I'm hopeful she will try it again:

What you need: old magazine, kids scissors and glue stick and a piece of paper. 

She happily cut out pictures she liked and glued them to a large piece of paper. It may be a better activity for slightly older kids as she had some trouble with cutting - chopped the heads off people a few times (and thus ended her enjoyment of the activity). 

Banana Popsicles (healthy and easy)

I had three very ripe bananas and not a lot of time.  I mashed them up and added a half cup of full fat milk.  Made six delicious Popsicles - healthy too with no added sugar and about 70 calories each.  They were a hit!

Dora Party

My daughter just turned 3 and she LOVES Dora!

So, we had a Dora-themed party, complete with a treasure hunt.  The treasure hunt was great - I used the tunnel from her tunnel/tent set, blew up a camping mattress for the kids to jump on and over (crocodile lake) and then scattered party favors all around the yard.  We first decorated plain, white party bags, and then I explained that Swiper had swiped all of the party favors - so, with Map in hand, I explained they had to go through the tunnel, over crocodile lake and to the tree with the party favors. 

For the food, I kept it simple.  I made cards by finding an image on the internet and pasting it into word and adding a title - so, we had Dora's Drinks, Diego's Animal Rescue Crackers, Boots' Bananas, Swiper's Strawberries, Tico's Tortilla Chips and Salsa, and Benny's Cheese. 

Cupcakes were fairly easy too - my 3 year old helped me make them and we used purple and pink (store bought) frosting and added little cupcake toppers that I found on amazon. 

Balloons were of course a big hit - we kept with a Dora-color theme, pink, purple and orange.  I am not good at this type of thing and I think we pulled it off pretty well!

 

Bath Crayons

Bath Crayons

This was a super easy project that my 3 year old and I did Monday morning, before work. 

Simply take a bar of ivory soap and grate it (very easy to do - I thought this might be difficult, but my 3 year old managed to do some of the grating).  Add a little bit of hot water - just enough to make a paste - and then add food coloring.  Put the mix into a mold (we used play d'oh molds, but cookie cutters would work too).  Freeze for 30 minutes and pop out.  Let dry for 24 hours.

I Should Have...:  Only added a little bit of hot water at a time.  By the time we got to the last color, the mixture was starting to harden.

I'm Glad I...: Mixed the color in plastic cups.  Clean up was really easy, as I simply threw the cups out.  Not great for the environment, but helped us get out the door on time.