"La Fleur" Playmat

I made this "La Fleur" playmat when Kate was a baby (after purchasing the pattern from this website).  I finished it right as she began crawling at eight months (of course!).  So, considering that fact, and all the effort I put into it, the playmat has never actually been a "playmat"... but a wall hanging instead.

Look at how cute Kate was!  Those eyes!

The playmat's actually had quite a journey.  We moved from California two-and-a-half years ago, and stopped in Idaho to visit my family for two months before coming to New Mexico.  Sometime during that trip, a jar of tahini burst open in the little trailer we were pulling behind the van and spilled on the playmat.  Try as I might, I never fully removed the stain.  And, since Kate's sharing a room with Jack, the playmat is hanging in Maggie's room for now.

Our Halloween

 I loooove Halloween.  Mostly for the costumes.  I love seeing creativity at work.  I've taken pride, so far, in piecing together my kids' costumes each year, instead of just buying a complete costume at the store.  However, I've noticed that, with three kids, homemade costumes can cause a little stress.  I try to start planning a couple months in advance, but this year I was also a little easier on myself.  Heck, I didn't make any single piece of Maggie's whole costume.  I did find her dress at a consignment sale, though, so that satisfied my thrifty self.  And I tried to plan a few fun activities for the kids that afternoon, between naptime and trick-or-treating, so we didn't get too antsy. 

Jack putting together his jack o' lantern busy bag.  It was Crazy Hair Day at his school (thus the orange-striped hair).

This was a fun project!  Lay out wax paper, make a web with Elmer's glue, then sprinkle on silver glitter.  Let it dry for awhile, then peel off the wax paper and voila!  A sparkly spider web.  Fun for table decor.  I got the idea here. 

Here are the kiddos.  Dorothy, Hello Kitty, and Batman... what a group!  I made a scrap tutu for Kate's costume, along with her "ears."  For Jack, I appliqued the Batman logo onto his shirt and then whipped up a cape.

Trick-or-treating at Grandma Pat's house.  It was only after I took these pictures that I noticed Kate's headband was backward.  Ugh!

Here's a close-up of the bow turned the correct way.  It was a fun and easy project!  I found that Youtube tutorial here. 

Jack o' Lantern Busy Bag

Here's a fun idea for a Halloween-themed busy bag, taken from this blog post.  Cut a pumpkin out of orange felt, glue on a green stem, and make it into an interchangeable jack o' lantern with black felt pieces.  I made several pairs of eyes, a few noses, a couple mouths, some whiskers, and a scary-looking scar.  The blogger I read from made a little pocket for all the black pieces to attach to the back of the pumpkin, but I'm just putting the whole thing into a Ziploc and keeping it with the rest of our busy bags. 

Jack had fun putting a jack o' lantern face together. 

His finished creation

20 Busy Bag Ideas

Make a Sock Puppet Kit: includes pair of socks, felt, pipe cleaners,
googly eyes, beads, fringe, and instructions.

Make a Monster Face

Wooden Numbered Beads Lacing Kit: includes color and number pattern cards

Denim Fabric Roads: scrap fabric from old jeans and yellow puffy paint makes great portable roads!

Clothesline: uses twine, clothespins, and felt clothing.  Patterns for clothing found here.

Clothespin Color Matching Game: uses paint chip cards

Ribbon/Button Snake with Felt Squares: a slit is cut in each square so little fingers can work on pushing the button through

Felt Playmat

Play-Doh Dots Game

Pipe Cleaner, Bead, and Pasta Lacing Activity

Popsicle Stick Puzzle

Make Your Own Stick Puppet

Pom-Pom-Stuff-It-In

Numbered Pool Noodle Lacing Activity

Peanut-Butter-and-Jelly Stacking Game with Dice

Felt Cupcakes with Sprinkles

Stacking Cups, including one object to hide

"Fish Stix": a felt pond, fish with paper clip mouths, and a magnetic fishing pole

Mix & Match Sticker Game

Glitter Bottle (with water, glitter, ribbons, beads, and other objects) and two "I Spy" Bottles (with rice and several objects hidden inside)... lids glued securely shut, of course!

Fabric Flower Rosettes

My new craft obsession.  I've been making fabric flower rosettes (the tutorial I used was from this blog post).  They are surprisingly simple to make.  The first few I made were for our niece Loie's birthday present; I just attached them to alligator clips for a cute little hair accessory.  But I can think of a bunch of other ways they could be displayed as well. 

Creative Play with Play-Dough

Some fun things we've added to our stash of play-dough tools lately: spaghetti (uncooked, of course!) or other kinds of pasta, googly eyes, Cheerios, popsicle cleaners, and pipecleaners.  The kids had fun making play-dough monsters/aliens the other day.  Thanks to this homemade play-dough recipe (it really is super simple to make, as long as you have cream of tartar on hand!) and this Artful Parent post, where I got the creative play ideas.  Next on our list: a play-dough volcano!
 

Cloud Dough

Our summer afternoon experiments continue!  This time we worked with cloud dough, a.k.a. "moon dough," which is a moldable dough that is fun to play with and super easy to whip up.  Eight cups flour, one cup baby oil... that's it.  A pastry blender is a good way to mix out all the clumps.  I put it in a couple plastic bins, dropped in a bunch of tools (spatulas, spoons, plastic knives, and cups), and covered the table with newspaper.  Sure, there was a little mess to clean up afterwards (especially on Kate's side of the table!), but that was definitely worth it, since my kids easily played with this for a good hour.

Our Hot Summer Afternoon Experiment

Haven't done much crafting lately.  It's been a busy summer, and everything's been a little topsy-turvy.  We've moved our two oldest into the same bedroom, however, and I'll be using our fourth bedroom as a CRAFT ROOM!  The hubby is actually building and installing counters for me to use.  It'll be nice having a dedicated space for all my crafty endeavors, and being able to leave it out and shut the door for awhile, instead of hurrying to clean it all up when naptime has ended.  So, MY craftiness has been on the back burner.  But with the hot summers here in New Mexico and the inability to go outside in the afternoons, I've had to focus on giving the kiddos creative outlets.  We tried this experiment this week.  Add food coloring to little bowls of vinegar.  Fill a pan with baking soda.  Have kids use medicine droppers to squirt vinegar into the baking soda, and it fizzes all over the place!  Super fun.  It kept the kids occupied for a good solid hour... so I didn't feel so bad about them not having outside time!

Our Sidewalk Painting Adventure

Gotta love Pinterest!  It's where I've been getting all my best ideas nowadays.  Including this little recipe for Sidewalk Paint.  

Super easy to mix up: one cup of cornstarch and one cup of water.  Then just add food coloring!  I made it in six colors and put it in six-part muffin tins so each of the kiddos would have an individual paint set.  I armed them each with foam brushes and set them out to Van Gogh our driveway. 

 

Little Maggie was perfectly happy with a set of sidewalk chalk and a few crackers.