January Sensory Bin And Play Dough Walking In A Winter Wonderland

I know it's not January yet but it's only 2 days away! Wow 2011 here we come.!!!! I have to admit that the past 5 months have been tough, really tough. I have been using my blog as a creative outlet to forget my troubles as I'm sure most of us bloggers do. So a huge thank you to all of my followers for continuing to read my blog. I'm new to this whole blog world thing and have learned oh so much in just a few short months. For one, for the love of Pete link back to where you got an idea or the blog world will explode. No, not really I'm just joking but really I had no idea this was even expected as I was unaware of the social rules in blogging. So again, thank you for your kind comments and sticking by me though my awkward posts, poor grammar and bad picture quality. I'm really hoping that 2011 will be kinder to us all and we can all rally together with creative ideas and support one another along the journey of teaching our little ones.
If you have read this far I will get back to your scheduled programming.....


This months theme is winter and snow. Since we have done a lot of pom pom activities and cotton ball activities I thought I would use rice to look like snow. I did add a few pompoms to add some color and interest. Now keep in mind I am not a fan of using rice in sensory bins because it bounces off our floors and we find rice in the strangest places long after the bins are put away. However, I do have to admit it really does look great and is a lot of fun to play with.




What I used:
Pom poms
rice to look like snow
scoop and bowl
peg people ~ gift from Santa. I just love them! we may paint some up in the coming months
winter trees
buttons
magnifying glass ~I added this because there are some very tiny buttons in there and some pretty cool textured ones. Plus we just got a new one is this is a great excuse to try it out


Building snowmen play dough kit



Sparkle, sparkle. I know it's hard to see but trust me it sparkles. My only regret is not adding the peppermint extract


I got this idea from HERE

I love saving those liquid laundry detergent caps. They come in so many different colors and shapes. They make great hats for our Snowman play dough activities and they will be great for scooping and pouring

I knit all the different colored scarves in less than 30 minutes. The rocks are left overs from our Dino sensory bin and his nose is just a tiny lacing bead.
Thanks for stopping by:)
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Christmas Vacation

We are on Vacation until next Tuesday. I have been busy working on my to do list and making up actvity trays for January. I have been putting together the materials for our play dough and sensory bin too. I still have a lot on the to do list that I just don't think I will get finished before school reopens. That's o.k. as it seems the to do list grows daily. I really don't think I will ever see the end of that list...ever
Here are some pictures of our vacation so far:
Cooper sleeping

Jada setting out Cookies and Chocolate milk for Santa

Helping Cooper get into the picture

Bum change for her baby

"Cheese Mom"

Christmas morning

Jada was less than impressed with the learning doll. And I was so excited for her to open it too:( oh well maybe in time she will warm up to it

Jada finally got around to playing with her Tree blocks tonight while I was cleaning up the daycare so I grabbed the camera

Trying to be careful not to knock them over. About 10 seconds after this picture was taken she kicked them down with lots of yahhhhh's

Well back to the to do list I go. I really hope I find the energy to cross off at least 3 more things before Friday.

Last Minute Gift: Mitten Clips

I'm a teacher and a mother so I see a lot of missing mittens. Or more like I spend a lot of time looking for lost mittens. Last year I went on a search for mitten clips and there were none to be found in our area. So I decided to make my own. I ordered the clips off of EBay in bulk and bought the ribbon at Michael's. So easy to make all you do is cut your ribbon and seal the ends by taking a lighter to the ends very quickly to melt the wax that acts as a seal. This is so you don't get any runs in your ribbon. Then feed your ribbon through the clips and sew the under side. To make 1 set it should only take a maximum of 5 minutes. So there you go an easy, quick and inexpensive gift. I think they ended up costing around $2.50 each to make. Awesome stalking stuffer or small gift idea. I gave each child a pair along with a book.

On another note this is my last post for a while. Tomorrow is our Christmas party and we have such a hectic schedule over the holidays, any spare time I have I hope to get some home improvements finished. You know like my baseboards that haven't been painted in the 4 years that we have been living here ! Not to mention January teaching plans need to get started. I will still be around just won't be posting. When I get back from my break (hopefully by the end of next week) I will post pictures of Jada playing with the homemade goodies she got for Christmas:)
Happy Holidays to you all and I hope you all get to spend some time with the ones you love

Homemade Piddle Pads And More No Waste Gift Bags

You might remember my post on getting a new Puppy? Well the cute little guy creates a lot of pee! I mean A LOT

We go through a lot of these



Yes they are cheep but they are ugly and wasteful



So I made my own. A layer of flannel, a layer of towel and a layer for the back of water proof fabric. Just wash and reuse. I plan to keep the big one in his crate in case of the occasional accident.

So much cuter than the disposable. I just hope he will use them.... who am I kidding he pees on everything :)

And I may have gone a bit crazy making more Eco Friendly gift bags. The yellow and pink ones are made from Jada's old recieving blankets and the red snowman one is made from Jada's old t-shirt that had an oil stain on it from salad dressing.

A close up of the snowman gift bag.

I made these ones for all occassions such as Birthdays, Valentines, Easter and more

Christmas is all wrapped up

Christmas is all wrapped up at our house, literally! I have been debating on if I should do this post for many reasons. One good reason is that I don't want people to think I'm "showing off" how many gifts Jada is getting and two people might think we didn't get our child enough. I want to do this post because I wanted to share with all of you that gift giving can be simple and educational. Or at least I tried to stick with the educational theme and asked our family to do the same. So here it goes...



First up is the super soft numbers that I purchased here.
Also the tree blocks and lacing buttons that I blogged about HERE and HERE. And in the snowman gift bag is a CD rom of learning numbers, colors and shapes with the help of Elmo and friends. This group of Gifts is from Mommy and Daddy.

This learning doll was purchased off EBay second hand in mint condition for $5.oo it has zippers, snaps, laces buttons etc. And the Little Tykes drawing board is double sided for all sorts of learning fun. I bought it at Toys R Us for $10.
Here is Jada's stalking from Santa. Markers from the dollar store, Matching wood discs from HERE, Wooden people from HERE, a tooth brush, little daisy earrings, and the rag alphabet I made and blogged about HERE And lastly the little quilt I made for her doll and blogged about HERE All of this is from Santa


And this is what her stalking stuffers look like all wrapped up and waiting to be placed into her stalking Christmas eve. It took me all year to get ready for this Christmas but it was so worth all the time spent creating, planning and shopping for bargains.
We also got her a cleaning cart that was $5 at walmart after Christmas last year and a easel that was $8 after Christmas at Winners. They are already wrapped in gift wrap but I will try to post about them in the new year. In all I think I spent between $100 and $150 I don't think that's too bad consittering the quality of the materials.
Over Christmas break I plan to get working on making more Eco friendly gift bags in large, medium and small so next year we can eliminate the use of gift wrap paper altogether

Amazing Christmas Stalking From A Stranger

How beautiful is this stalking?

No I didn't make it but I wish I had an ounce of this tallent. My brother's soon to be wife's grandmother knit it for Jada and she never even met her.

The detail is just incrediable

This picture just doesn't do the tree justice. It has little gems knitted right into the tree and is sparkles and shines

All I can say is wow! I just can't believe that someone would put so much effort into something for someone they never met and probably never will as she lives on the other side of the country.

No Waste Gift Bags

Don't you just love it when you find a really great post that gives you a boost in inspiration and motivation? Did any of you see the post How does she had yesterday on reusable Christmas bags? No? Well you can check it out HERE
I was so inspired that I got out my stash of odds and ends of fabric and came up with these:


I made these out of left over black out fabric I had from when I made Jada's curtains in the spring. Me and Jada had fun stamping the bags with red paint to make dots.

And these are my favorite because I made them out of Jada's old t-shirts. They are so soft! I plan to use these small ones for stocking stuffers. I just love the idea of a no waste Christmas so much that I will probably make some more as Jada grows out of more clothes. I pass on the clothes that aren't stained and use the ones that have small rips, holes or stains for projects such as this.

Advent Day 16: Pop Bottle Christmas Trees

Recycled Pop bottle Christmas trees was our advent activity this morning.

to make these you will need a green pop bottle, green paint, water, sparkles, foam or cardboard star x2, pompoms, hot glue gun, scissors, pipe cleaners and any other decoration you want. I did things a bit backwards so I will tell you how I SHOULD have done it.
Step 1: Fill the bottle with water, add sparkles and some green paint. This will not only look pretty but keep the bottle in place when your child decorates it. This is where I went wrong and was very frustrating for Jada because the bottle was moving all over the place.
Step 2: hot glue the pipe cleaners on for garland
Step 3: hot glue the stars on both sides of the bottle cap

See she is trying to decorate the bottle only to have it slide away:( lesson learned the hard way.
Step 4: get your child to dip the pompoms in glue and stick to the bottle. I used white school glue and it didn't work very well at all. I ended up hot gluing them on after she was finished.

Step 5: Enjoy your Christmas tree. This would make a great gift if you filled it with homemade apple cider instead of water, paint and sparkles. Hmmmmm maybe an idea for next year???

P.S. I am still learning how to use my new camera and I'm having back light issues


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