Working on Fine Motor Skills

My five-year-old struggles a little bit with fine motor skills.  So as much as I can, I try to have him do activities to work on that.  Recently I've found an activity that he loves to do.  He's constantly asking me if he can work on this activity.

 

 

 This activity is very simple.  All I used was golf tees, marbles, a piece of Styrofoam (I kept it from a package we received) and bowls to hold the tees and marbles.  Very simple!

 

I gave him the piece of Styrofoam and the bowls of the tees and marbles.  I explained to him what to do & let him get to it.  He put all the tees up first, then added the marbles.  Since he's done this activity a few times now, I think I may start giving him a pair of small tongs as well and have him add the marbles with the tongs for more difficulty.

 



 

After he added all of the marbles, I had him remove the marbles and the tees and put them back in the bowls.  Super easy clean up for me and now everything is ready for the next time he wants to do this!



Easter Craft: Watercolor Cross

My kids had Good Friday off from school yesterday, so we decided to make a cross craft.  I saw the idea on Pinterest.  We painted our Easter eggs yesterday as well, so I thought they'd enjoy the cross craft while the eggs were dyeing and drying.

I started by making a cross shape with masking tape on watercolor paper.

 

 

Then I had them watercolor on the paper.  (You can see some of the eggs drying here too.)

 

I did make sure that the kids painted around the cross so that it'd be noticeable once the tape was off.  I had to paint around the cross of my youngest since he was just doing small strokes all over the paper. 

 

 

I let the paint dry overnight & took the tape off this morning.  I think they turned out pretty cute!

 

 

 





Using Paint to Practice Writing

My daughter is in second grade and has spelling words to practice every week.  It gets very boring for her to just write them on paper over & over, so I'm trying to think of different ways for her to practice the words each week.  I have seen paint baggies around on various blogs before, so I thought she might like that.

I only used tempera paint and zip top baggies to make them.  I did use tape as well to tape the top so they couldn't open them and get paint everywhere!

 

 

I just squeezed some paint into each of the baggies.  My kids favorite colors are yellow, blue and green, so I mixed the yellow and blue together for the green one.  I do think I used a little too much paint because the letters don't stay visible for too long, but it seems to get good enough for my kids.  You probably don't need more than 2-3 squeezes of paint.

 

The kids can just use their fingers to make the letters, but I also taped a Q-tip tied to a string onto the bag.  That way it was always there if they wanted to use it & they didn't use up all my Q-tips.

 

Here is my daughter practicing her spelling words.  She's been using this almost daily since I made it.

 



 

Here are the boys with their paint baggies.  My three year old was practicing letters, while my five year old was practicing words.

 

I really like this activity.  It's not messy since the paint is contained, but they still get a sensory experience. It's not expensive to make, and may use items you already have at home.  It's also great for all of my kids.  The youngest can practice letters, the older two can practice words.

Tutu Hairbow Holder

My daughter wears hairbows and they were starting to overtake the house.  She's not the tidiest person, so they can be found in her room, the upstairs and downstairs bathrooms, my room, the living room, kitchen...you get the idea.  I got tired of seeing them all over, so I decided to make her a hairbow holder.

 

 

I found this tutorial on Pinterest & my daughter loved it.  We planned to hang this in her bedroom which is purple and yellow, so we chose complimentary colors for it.  The bows attached to the ribbon above are just for decoration.  There are five ribbons hanging from the tulle to hang her bows.

 

 

Here's a closeup of the top.  This thin ribbon works perfectly for her smaller bows.

 

 

Here is the completed holder.  She wanted wings on hers, so I found some in the birthday aisle at Hobby Lobby.  I just removed the strings for wearing them and hot glued them on.  The bow holder is now hanging in her room and housing all of her hairbows.  And I'm a happy mom because I don't see them all over the house!  Well, yet anyway. ;)

 



Lenten Activity: Crown of Thorns

My family is Catholic, so right now we are celebrating Lent.  I wanted to help my kids understand this time of sacrifice and preparation a little better and make it a little more concrete for my younger boys, so I have some activities planned throughout Lent to do with them.  One of them is a crown of thorns, which we made on Ash Wednesday.  I got the idea here, and I thought it was a great way for the kids to see the good they do.  For our crown of thorns, we decided that as the kids do good deeds, they would get to remove a thorn.  We are hoping to have all the thorns removed by Easter, and then we will put flowers in the crown instead.  The kids have really taken to it & seem to understand why we are doing it.  They are happy that it's making them closer to Jesus.

 

 

To make the crown, I used a salt dough recipe from my Christmas Pinterest board.  After I kneaded the dough, I split it into three sections.  My daughter helped me roll out each section into a long rope.

Sidenote: I do think we rolled ours a little too long.  It started falling apart as we braided it & the crown turned out pretty large!  So next year, I think we'll roll it into a shorter rope.  Somehow I must have forgotten to get a picture of the braiding, probably because my hands were a mess with the dough!  But after you get three equal size ropes, you braid them together and then make a circle with the braid, as you can see below.

 

The kids were all very excited to help add the thorns (toothpicks).  I read online from someone else who made this that they suggested breaking the toothpicks in half.  They said it made them easier to come out.  

After the kids added all of the toothpicks, I put it in the oven.  I think it was in there an hour or so, just until it's dry.  I put it on our kitchen table where we put our Advent wreath in November.  It's a great daily reminder to the kids to treat others well.  I'm going to keep looking for a purple plate or place mat to put under it, but so far haven't found anything yet.

 

Birthday Wishes for my Daughter

Until I became a mom, I didn't realize HOW quickly time flew.  I had always heard people say that kids grow so fast, or enjoy this time or this moment.  Well, my oldest just turned eight, and I am seeing firsthand how quickly children do grow.  Time, especially as a stay-at-home mom, can seem to move SO slowly day by day.  It seems like many days just blur together as one very long day, especially when the children are young.  But I look at my now 8-year-old daughter & wonder how has it been eight whole years already! 

Here she is on the day she was born.  She really spoiled us as first-time parents.  She was such an easy baby & good sleeper!

And here she is now!  She's growing into such a beautiful young lady, inside and out.  I'm looking forward to seeing her grow more & more every day.

The Christmas Express

Have you ever read the book or seen the movie, The Polar Express?  It's a cute book/movie about children who take a ride on Christmas Eve to the North Pole.  They see Santa and one of them gets to open the first toy of Christmas.  They all learn lessons about themselves along the way.  It's really cute and my kids love it.  I've seen these tickets floating around on Pinterest, so I thought we'd make our car The Christmas Express for an evening of fun.

After dinner, we told the kids to get in their pajamas.  As my husband helped them get ready for bed, I put chocolate milk (a rare treat in our house) in travel cups and popped some popcorn. I put the popcorn in brown lunch bags so it'd be easy to eat in the car.   Earlier, I placed a ticket on each of their pillows so that they'd see them when they went to their rooms.  They were so excited to find them! 

 

My husband stayed in the house and played train conductor while I ran outside to hide the snacks and get pictures.  I blew a train whistle as each child came out one by one.  (I believe I found it in the dollar spot at Target.)  Here is Danny showing me his punched ticket.  My husband stamped a "J" on each ticket before they left the house.

Andrew just loved this experience.  He kept calling my husband Mr. Train Conductor all evening.

Wouldn't you know that neither of the older two could find their slippers, of course!

They are ready to go!  You can see the "J" punched on their tickets.  Well, except for Danny's.  He refused to hold his up.  Three year olds!

Here we are at our first stop.  My husband's office isn't far from our house, so we made that our first stop for snacks.  The kids were thrilled!  I also hole punched an "E" on their tickets here.  I did laminate their tickets for durability, but I'll tell you, that made it quite hard to punch them!

 

Again, Danny is less than thrilled about getting his picture taken!

 

 

Here we are at another stop, looking at Christmas lights.  I just love how absolutely excited Andrew looks here.  At this stop I punched a "S" on their tickets.  I also punched "U" and another "S" by the end of the evening to spell out Jesus.  After getting their snacks, we went to a neighborhood we hadn't been by yet to look at lights, through a really great drive-through light display in a local park, and finished up by driving downtown, where they have a big Santa light display.  We did this a couple of weeks before Christmas and the kids asked just about every evening after if we would do it again.  I think they had fun!  Even Danny, though you wouldn't really know it from the pictures!  ;)