Saturday Morning

We like Saturday mornings nice and lazy at our house. When the kids wake up at their insanely early hour, we make them up "movie beds" using couch and bed pillows and soft blankets. The kids pick a movie and we supply them with cups of cereal. Fun for them and more sleep in time for us (note the adult movie bed in the background!)

Happy Weekend!

Become an Author/Illustrator Team

{Connor reading the book we wrote/illustrated together}

TIP: Write and illustrate books with your kids; it's a great way to bond over a common goal.

I have a dream of becoming an author of at least one children's book. The problem is that I don't have any fabulous ideas and I'm not a great writer. Plus I think it would be cool to illustrate my own book, but I'm not good at drawing or painting or collage or computer graphics.

So, I decided to adapt my dream and make it come true at home with my own kids. I have a long mental list of bedtime stories that my kids love to hear. They love them because they're true stories from my life. A few of them have become real favorites because they have humor, sound effects, a real climactic moment, or suspense.

I typed up one of our favorite Mommy bedtime stories and had my oldest son help me illustrate it; his drawings are much more interesting and colorful than mine. Now we are united as an author/illustrator team. We're working towards our very own Caldecott Medal!

Make it Real

{Connor in front of our planet display.}

TIP: Take something your child LOVES and LEARN about it.

Connor discovered the Fisher Price Planet Heroes when we got a promotional DVD in a freebie bag at the zoo last summer. He was immediately enamored with the Planet Heroes' cool characters and fun toys. Like most kids, Connor wanted to get all the Planet Heroes.

My tip today is to take obsessions like these and turn them into learning experiences. Connor was so excited about these fun toys that he loved learning about the planets. He quickly memorized all the planet names, along with the corresponding toys' names.

One day he was drawing and wanted to draw Earth. We drew Earth, then moved on to Jupiter, and soon we had drawn, colored, and cut out all nine planets. (We aren't ready to give up on Pluto yet!) We hung our planets on one wall in the house, making a lamp become our sun.

Over time we practiced the planet names and the order of the planets and learned a little bit about them. We added the moon and the asteroid belt. We added four moons to Jupiter. (Jupiter has 16 moons, but when I looked in a telescope once I could see 4 moons and after I told Connor that he decided just to make the 4 that I'd seen.) We labeled each planet, an opportunity for Connor to practice his writing.

Take those opportunities to turn the things your kids love into learning experiences that are fun for Mom and kids!

Theme Weeks

{Abby and Connor with symmetrical butterflies they painted during Bug Week}

TIP: Choose a theme to study with your kids each week.

A few months ago I was feeling lame as a mom. I was just getting through the days, not making them special. Not that every moment as a family needs to be special, but I wanted to have one small moment each day that felt special. One moment when I was really living in that moment with my children, experiencing life and learning together.

With a nudge from a good friend, I started Theme Weeks (for example, Weather Week). Each week I chose a topic and came up with five activities, one for each day, we could do to learn about and celebrate our theme. At some point in every day we found time to focus on our theme and, more importantly, on doing something together.

SIDE NOTE: As I mentioned in my introduction, I'm not good at playing with my kids. I don't know how to play trains or Planet Heroes; setting up a track, sorting toys, playing board games, doing puzzle, an activity with a method is more my style. Organizing a plan for focused kid-Mom time is necessary for me to feel involved and successful as a mother.

You can check out the theme weeks we did at the blog I created for planning and recording our experiences. (You'll notice that it's been a while since we've done this. Just like everything, these ideas ebb and flow. I'm sure we'll try theme weeks again when the need for them arises.)

I found that having a theme each week really helped us to learn more about one subject. It helped us remember what we had done and learned. And it helped us learn how to learn; by studying one subject we found different ways to gather answers to our questions.

If you feel like you could step it up a notch as a mom (like I did) then give Theme Weeks a try!

Water Painting

today's painting craft, is super easy & super free! water painting requires very little materials, but it is high on the fun meter & on low on the mess meter which makes it my #1 way for kids to paint at my house! you need:

*bowl of water (size should reflect the responsibility level of the child)
*painting "tool", i like q-tips and brushes
*item to be painted

the most enjoyable part of this craft is that it is transferable to nearly any surface, and age level. if your child can grasp, she can "paint"!

haven is painting on colored construction paper here, which dries after a couple of hours so you can reuse for another occasion. but we also paint on chalkboards (good craft while you are on the computer), outside on the sidewalk, and even on my walls. really the sky is the limit, and who doesn't have some water and q-tips laying around ready to party?

Cream Paint

as the name suggests, cream painting uses a medium of "cream". you can use cool whip, redi-whip, or homemade whipped cream (yum!), add a few drops of food coloring to a couple large spoonfuls, and mix.



your table should be covered with a towel or newspaper, this is a bit messy, although i have never had a problem with staining on any surface, clothing or kid part!



the coolest part about the paint is that you get to play around with textures! awesome waves, and swirls, chunky shapes and bumpy spots!



my kids favorite part is that it is ENTIRELY edible! so no worries if your toddler wants to shove it in her mouth, that's what it's for! you actually can make a non-edible version using shaving cream instead of the other "cream", but where's the fun in that? make this a two-part activity by teaching your kids how to make whipped cream first, then continue with the craft!

4:00 Fun

4:00 seems to be a crazy hour for Mom's, across the board.  Here's  a little activity my daughter "invented" that perfectly rescues four o'clock from freak outs.

Pick a favorite CD and pop it in

Choose a high energy activity to do during each song

Some of our favorite activities are tickling, chasing around the house, somersaults, piggy back rides and flying airplane rides.

After a handful of songs, put on a calm song and cuddle or do slow dancing.

Moms: you can now go make dinner and your kiddies will be tuckered out and play happily and quietly...for at least 10 minutes!