Getting Ready

  As I was working on lesson plans for Allison, I kept thinking that the 2 yr old curriculum was too easy for her (a good thing), but I really didn't want to have to start over on a new one or purchase one.  It didn't take long to after trying to incorporate the 3 yr old one into the 2 yr old to where I said, "Forget it!" and bought the new one.  I'm actually still waiting for it to come in the mail, but that's not stopping me from getting ready.  Everything is online and free, but I like having the printed version so I'm not constantly on the computer printing things off.  While waiting for it to come in the mail, I've been prepping by cutting out a LOT of felt.
  My hands are sore from all the cutting.  Yesterday, I cut out felt for busy bags to help keep Allison entertained during quiet times.  I made the button snake, build-a-cupcake, and clothesline busy bags from Money Saving Mom.  (She hasn't played with yet, so no pictures)  There is more I want to do, but it will have to wait until my hand is not sore.  Today, I made textile letters and number for school. 

 I bought the letters already cut out, so that helped.  I cut all the card stock though.  I had enough in the package to do the alphabet, Allison's full name, and the numbers 0-9 twice.  I put the 2nd set on smaller cards, so when we are doing double digit numbers, they can be closer together.

Cousin It helped. :)

I even make something for Mary-Kate.  Just a bottle with a hole cut out of it for her to drop clothespins down.  She likes it. :)
  Who knew duck tape came in such fun colors?

  I'm hoping to have the curriculum tomorrow, so I can really plan for start date of Aug. 27.  The only thing left on my school wish list is a Bible flannel graph.  I think it may be the only way Allison will listen about the Bible.  Right now when I get the Bible out, she runs away screaming....

Attempt #2

  Last year I tried to start "homeschooling" Allison to fill time as Mary-Kate napped in the morning.

Well, that lasted less than one week.  Here she is doing the one project we did, coloring the circle red on a vertical surface.  I think my attempt last year failed because, A. I was too tired to think clearly.  B.  She was too young.  C.  Who wants to sit and learn when you can be outside and play.

Here she is looking at butterfly last year.  The trouble is in the South, the weather is so nice almost all the time.  It's hard to stay indoors, so I ditched the whole book teaching thing and just played. 




  Well, a year later, and Allison no longer naps.  Mary-Kate now naps only once a day, but for 3-4 hours!  That is a long time to entertain a 3 year old.  I've been lazy and let Allison watch Netflixs the whole time on my phone.  Even though she doesn't nap, she still needs that down time, so I'm ok with her watching movies for 1-2 hrs.  But what about the other 2 hours?
  The answer is the curriculum I bought last year and never used.  It's the 2 year old curriculum, but I think Allison will be ok with it.  I'm still going to be very flexible with it.  If the weather is nice and the girls want to play outside for a couple of hours, we're going to do it.  Physical activity is more important at this age than academics anyway. 
  I'm going to give this a good try though.  I printed out an example schedule and lesson plans, so I need to start on those soon if I want to be ready to start the 4th week of August.  But, I'm not going to stress myself out over this.  There are no grades or deadlines but hopefully just a lot of fun and less Wonder Pets.

Soap!

 
  For a few years now, I've been wanting to make my own soap but been busy with the whole baby thing.  I finally found some time to make it, and to my surprise, it is quiet easy.  Yes, there is a chemical involved that will eat your skin (why I haven't done it with little ones around), and yes, there is math involved.  But, the end result is so exciting. 
  I've made 2 batches the past 2 nights.  One batch was soap bars, and the other was shampoo bars.  I plan on making a third batch next week, laundry soap to make detergent out of of.  (I would make it tonight, but we're having a party tomorrow.  I need to do some hosting work)  I'm making so much right now because it has to cure for a month before it can be used, and we move in three months.  I want to make sure I have plenty of everything and cured before we move.  I also want to use up all the lye (the nasty chemical) before we move.  I would have made a 4th batch of castile soap (100% olive oil), but that will have to wait.
 
  Here's the breakdown of cost for the soap (4 oz bars):
    Bath soap--$1.79 a bar
    Shampoo bar--$2.17 a bar
    Laundry soap--21 cents  a bar  (this will drop my detergent cost to about a penny a load)

  If you were to buy these online or in some frilly store (I used good stuff to make these):
    Bath soap--$4-7 a bar
   Shampoo bar--$4-10 a bar
   Laundry soap--97 cents to $1.50

 So, there you go.  I've been up super late the past few nights making soap, looking online for recipes, and doing calculations.  I've even worn my lab coat and safety goggles.  I guess soap will fill my lab need until I can go back to work. ;)

Happy 4th of July! (Late)

 
  We had a good 4th.  We stayed home all day and did fireworks in our backyard before it was even dark.  We were in bed way before the city's fireworks, so to Brandon and me, it was a very good day.

Busy Summer

  Payton has been here, and now that he going back in 6 days, I'm finally feeling adjusted to having 3 kids.  It's been great having him here.  I've been able to do some fun things with him that the girls are too young to really care about.  Allison enjoyed them but not as much as Payton.

    We made slime.

 Made Allison a "car" for her birthday.

 Peanut butter  playdough

 Bouncy balls (big mess and failure)

 Ivory soap clouds

That we turned into personalize soap.

  Oh, and fireworks in a jar that I didn't get a good picture of.  I keep forgetting to get the correct food coloring for them to work well.  I'm not sure if we'll do anymore experiments before he leaves, but they have definitely been the highlight of this summer.  Almost everyday he has asked to do one, but I've limited them 1-2 a week.

Busy Bags!

I had been wanting to try some of these for awhile.  Moneysavingmom.com is a great blog (I don't follow many blogs outside of friends and family) for ideas to save money, things to do with kids, and great easy freezer-friendly meals.  On there, she has always talked about her busy bags.  I finally sat down and looked at them one day and realized that I had the material to do some of them.  She even has a plan to do a busy bag swap.  It's where you get as many friends involved as you can, and you each make a busy bag as many friends there are.  I posted something on FB about it but only had 4 people respond.  I don't know if that's worth the trouble of buying supplies.  I might ask again later for interest since it's summer right now.  We spend most of our time outside these days. 

 Anyway, my 1st busy bag idea was the pom-pom pusher since I had the supplies on hand.  Basically, cut a hole in the top of a container and let the child push pom-poms through the hole.  Allison played with it for 45 minutes the 1st time!  Since then, she won't play with it that long but long enough to keep her busy so that I can get some things done.

  My 2nd one was completely free to make.  A friend gave us some eggs, so free egg carton.  The Easter eggs came from a free egg hunt, and I got the markers to color the carton free at Walgreens with a coupon. 

   Again super easy to make.  I didn't have enough eggs to fill up the whole carton, so I cut it in half (I guess I paid for the scissors 10 yrs ago).  You then color the bottom of the egg holder with different colors.  The child then puts the egg in the corrsponding color.  This entertained Allison for 10 minutes the 1st time.  She also played with it the other day when I was trying to get dinner ready. 
  I'll have to buy supplies to make the other busy bag ideas but so far so good in keeping Allison busy.  There is a cute clothesline idea that I'll probably do soon because Allison likes to help with the clothesline outside but gets frustrated that she can't reach the 6-foot high line. :)

Cereal Bars! Kinda

  My girls love cereal bars.  Many mornings the 1st thing out of Allison's mouth is, "E bar."  Sometimes I give in and other days I don't.  Have you ever looked at the ingredients?  They are aweful, so I definitely wanted to try a healthier version.  I found a recipe online for cereal bar cookies.  I thought this would be good b/c they would be smaller and hopefully not as messy.  Wrong, but they are so good.  They are about the size of muffin.

Some did leak everywhere.

But most of them stayed intact.

  These are definitely healthier b/c A. I can read the ingredients and B. They are made out of oatmeal and whole wheat flour.  Next time I'm going to add some flax meal to them.  There is brown sugar and butter also, but at least my body knows how to digest that stuff properly.  It's basically a muffin made out of struesel topping and has jelly in the middle.  I think I will keep  making these b/c they are easy, but definitely not as neat and car friendly as I was hoping.  Oh well, good thing I'm trying to get in the habit of vacuuming the van once a week.