Spring Fairies

Bree had a sweet friend over for a play date. They both love creating and when they said they wanted to start a book I was not surprised. After some debate about what the book should be about they settled on Fairies. So cute.

I found an easy step by step fairy tutorial here. Most fairy tutorials are really in depth, but this one was easy for the girls for follow. The girls chose to use black sharpies and water color pencils. According to Bree water color pencils are the perfect way to color fairies.

I LOVE the book cover! It makes me dream of wonderful spring days! I love the flower pot on the side of the hill.

The fairies first adventure was to fly to this beautiful waterfall. I love how trees grow in this magical place! I can’t wait for more pages to be added to this sweet little book. Way to go Bree and Courtney.

Kickball Party

I was looking through old pictures and came across Kaleb’s 8th Birthday party. Kaleb is a HUGE kickball fan. He loves playing at church, school and anytime he can convince his sisters to play in the back yard. It is a simple game, and really easy for kids to learn and join in on.

Kaleb really wanted a sleep over party. He had been asking for one for a while, but I held off til his 8th birthday. My in-laws owned the perfect house for boy sleepover, and they were more than happy to let lend it to us for a night. Not only was the house on a lake, and had a great playing field, but the house was completely empty(no furniture) and it had a theater in the basement. Perfect!

All the parents dropped the kids off at our house and we drove 2 mini vans of excited kiddos 45 mins to the lake house. The vans we packed out with all the kids sleeping gear. I wish I took pictures of our voyage, but I was not blogging at the time.

Upon arrival, the kids received a kickball shirt in their team color. I found cheap shirts at a craft store, made a cute kickball stencil and painted them with black fabric paint. It took a bit of time, but the kids loved them!

Kaleb thought the kickball game was the “best ever”. Love that!

The personalized water bottles were a hit.

Since the house had no furniture, it was the perfect place for a Nerf Gun fight. Each of the kids brought their own gun and we supplied the bullets. It was a crazy war zone, and the boys loved every minute of it.

There were bullets everywhere!

The kids loved the theater, and ended up sleeping here as well. I had a bunch of cute blue and green themed snacks for them to munch on during the show.

Each of the kids brought home a medal, their kickball shirt and these cute little kickball gumballs. The party was a huge success.

Cup Stacking

Minute to Win it Game ~ Cup Stacking

I love it when kids are entertained by simple things. I don’t know how many Christmas mornings and Birthday’s we watched our little ones enjoy the box more than the present. Today the girls played a simple Cup Stacking game during Sunday School. They were so excited and couldn’t wait to get home and show us their new skills.

Cup Stacking Supplies:

The thing I love about Minute to Win it games is that they use regular house hold objects. Things we already have around our house. For this game you will need:

36 disposable plastic cups
A flat surface like a table
A stop watch or one minute timer
a group of friends to cheer you on ~ not necessary but way more fun.

Stack Attack ~ a simple Minute to Win it Game

Place the cups in a single stack on the table. When the one minute timer begins, pick up the stack of cups and begin creating a triangular-shaped tower. Your bottom row should contain 8 cups, then you stack 7 cups on top, stack 6 cups in the next row and continue on ending the tower with a single cup.

Once you have the tower built, quickly deconstruct the tower into a single stack. Your goal is to build a tower and take it down in less than a minute.

(The girls ended up adding a few more than 36 cups just to see how tall they could get their towers.)

I love how tall they made this stack. Bree ended up standing on the couch to add the last few cups.

Team Work

The girls were in total concentration mode as their tower of stacked cups grew. So cute! They had fun beating the clock individually and as a team.

I LOVE Annika’s expressive face. Every cup that was placed she got more and more hilarious!

Problem Solving

I enjoyed listening to the girls work together to build the largest tower of cups possible. There was lots of giggling, squealing, and nervous gasps. Who knew a few cups could be that exciting!

For more Minute to Win It Games, check out our:

Floatacious

Bite Me and Junk in the Trunk

Don’t Blow the Joker

Heart Shaped Binoculars

Heart Shaped Binoculars ~ Recycled Valentine craft ideas for kids

We love simple Valentine craft ideas. One of our favorites is this simple Heart Stamping activity. Seriously if you haven’t tried it yet, you have to check it out. The little heart tubes were too cute to throw out, so we decided to turn them into adorable Heart Shaped Binoculars.

This post contains affiliate links for your convenience.

These little Valentines Binoculars are so easy to make. Bonus: we were able to squeeze 2 activities out of one! These little cardboard tubes (aka toilet paper roll) first became the star of our beautiful art work, and now we are transforming them into binoculars.

Materials Needed:

2 Cardboard tubes ~ we used toilet paper roll
Paint
Paint Brushes
Sting or Yarn ~ This is our current favorite yarn for Finger Knitting. Click on the link for an easy to follow beginners tutorial. My kids love finger knitting!
Hole Punch
Hot Glue Gun or tape

Easy Instructions:

Paint the cardboard tubes (aka toilet paper rolls) your favorite color. We chose shades of pink and red.
Then simply glue the tubes together with hot glue.
Add holes on either side of the binoculars with a hole punch.
Thread your string through the holes and tie to make a necklace

Of course your don’t want to forget the jewels!

Simple Valentines Play Ideas:

Hide paper hearts through out the house.
When the hearts are all hidden, send the kids out on a hunt for hearts. They can use their heart shaped binoculars to help the look.
We numbered our hearts so that they knew how many were left to find. The kiddos loved the challenge.
As an added bonus, everything that they looked at was in the shape of hearts.
Work on simple shape and number recognition as you play this game.

From more simple Valentines Craft Ideas, check out our:

7 simple Heart Animals

Glitter Marble Painting

15 Origami Hearts

DIY Valentines Day Stamp

Glitter Tissue Paper Hearts

Family Movie Night

Bree came home from school Friday night asking if it would be OK to set up a fun surprise for Annika and Kaleb. Absolutely! Her plan was to create a home movie night. We have done this a couple of times, but usually all the kids are involved in the planning. It was so cute watching her plan and prep the fun surprise.

Each of the us received this cute ticket booklet. The book included a ticket for a wrap, carrot sticks, grapes, apples, a drink, popcorn and a vanilla steamer. I love it, great selection Bree!

Bree made sure that everyone surrendered their tickets before taking any of the food. SO cute! Kaleb was quick to ask if there was free refills. Ha!

I’m so happy that Bree wanted to have a Movie Night. Not much set up, and the kids LOVED it! Watching a movie is fun, but it is always better when you make it an event!