I took this original picture of Prince L a couple weeks ago
Then Mark decided to play with it in photoshop. See the difference?
Tag: Kids
-
2 HUGE Flirty Apron Sales
You have heard me talk about Flirty Aprons before right? I think they are so cute and stylish, but a bit pricey. Well, right now they have 2 HUGE Sales going on. In fact they are so good, I think I’m going to buy the girls matching aprons and put them away for Christmas.
Irregular Apron Sale – These aprons have minor thins wrong with them, but are still high quality aprons. These are on sale WHILE SUPPLIES LAST, so don’t miss out! Some of the aprons are up to 81% Off. You can reach the Irregular Sale Page HERE
Fathers Day Sale – 30% Off sitewide good until June 30th. Use code Father30.
*This post does contain Affiliate links. -
Kimochis – Sponsor Spotlight
Kimochis – Toys with feelings inside.These are my new favorite stuffed toy! If you have kids, you know how fast those stuffed animals pile up. Then you start wondering how often your kids play with them. You want to get rid of them, but you find your just as attached as your kids (OK maybe it’s just me, lol).Kimochis are one stuffed toy you will all be attached to, and your kids will continuously play with. Each Kimochis comes with feelings tucked into a little pouch. These toys can help you teach your children about different their different feelings.Our feelings I think are one of the hardest things to figure out, and then express to others. Even as an adult I sometimes struggle communicating just what I’m feeling.Having a Kimochis to guide your child in what they are feeling is an amazing new tool for parents, and fun toy for kids.
We received Kimochis Cloud for review. Tucked inside his pouch were the feelings Happy, Sad and Mad. Having these little plush feelings has led to many discussions, especially with Princess V (5years old) in how to express her feelings. Tantrums have become few and further between as she now can tell us what she is feeling. Instead of throwing a fit, she tells us“I’m sad”or“I’m mad!”We still get tears, and some meltdowns, but we are better able to understand how she is feeling, and what may be causing her to feel that way. Our home has been much more pleasant since Cloud became part of our family.
Princess V absolutely loves Cloud! She even insists on sleeping with him every night. One night this came in very useful. Princess V woke up and was scared of having bad dreams. So we pretended Cloud was a “dream” Cloud. We put on his happy face, and talked about happy things Cloud could help Princess V dream of. When she woke up in the morning, Princess V was very excited to tell me about the Princesses she dreamed of thanks to Cloud!
You can purchase your own Kimochis by visiting their website HEREOR come back Friday to enter the Charity Hop Around the World where you can enter to win your own Kimochis Cloud!*I was provided with a product for review. All thoughts and opinions are my own. -
Creativity Matters with Crayola
What a true statement! Creativity does matter! I try to be creative, I want to be creative. Sometimes my creativity is quickly tossed in the fireplace, where it will never be seen by anyone, and sometimes with the right inspiration and instructions from others it will hang above my kitchen table forever. Instilling our kids with a creative sense, will help them achieve so much as they face problems and come up with solutions throughout their lives.Crayola wants every child to be creatively alive, so they´re inviting parents “Inside the Crayon Box,” for a special live chat with celebrities and trusted parenting experts that will inspire and spark ideas to expand your child´s creative thinking.The first “Inside the Crayon Box” live chat is TODAY at 9 p.m. EST. Join Crayola and musician, children´s author and mom, Lisa Loeb for a 45-minute live streaming video chat on the Crayola Facebook Page. Lisa, best-known for her number one hit “Stay (I Missed You),” will share personal stories, practical advice and ways she brings a little creative play into every day for her daughter. Particpants will be able to ask Lisa their questions during the event.
I, unfortunately, have another event tonight (Relief Society birthday party!), so I won’t be able to attend this live video chat. But I will be checking in later tonight to see what kind of tips and ideas were mentioned. Eventually when I have some time to sit down, I’ll be watching the whole session on Crayola’s Youtube channel. So if you also can’t be there tonight for the live chat, you can watch it tomorrow or the next day or next week, on youtube.
How do you get the creative juices rolling with your kids?*I was provided with this information from Crayola through MyBlogSpark
-
Making a House a Home: All about the Attitude
As my blog title states, I’m striving to turn our House into a Home. For me this means, it’s not just a dwelling, a roof over our heads and beds to sleep in (though I have recently taken up residency on the couch, darn pregnancy pains). A home is a place full of love, laughter, family and friends. A place anyone can feel welcome in as soon as they cross the front doorstep. To help with this in our front room we have this quote painted on the wall.
Last week as I pulled into the driveway after picking Princess V up from school, she declares “I hate this house. It’s a big mess. We need a bigger house.” Thank goodness I was already parked, because I was floored by this 5 year old’s statement. I LOVE our house. I DON’T want a bigger house (this one’s plenty big to clean as is!). Why would she say something like that? After talking it over with Mark we decided it came down to attitude. Was I displaying an attitude of love for our home? Was I showing our home love and teaching the Princesses how to love our home? I’m guessing not. Actually, I’m not guessing. I wasn’t. Being 8months pregnant and emotionally and physically drained, I just didn’t have it in me to show as much love and caring to our home as I would like. Instead, I realize I showed more frustration and anger with the constant messes that I just couldn’t keep on top of. No wonders she thought she hated our house, she was associating it with the mess, which is exactly what I was exemplifying to her!
On a recent trip to visit Mark at work, I saw a sign he had hung on one of the doors. I really liked it, and decided I needed to incorporate it into my daily thoughts.
So how do I turn this around? How do I change my attitude. The messes still frustrate me, especially as it gets harder and harder to bend over to pick things up. How do I teach my kids that we can love our home, by keeping it clean?First, I have to change my attitude. From now on, if there is a mess, instead of becoming frustrated, thinking I’m the only one who cares (come on, you know you’ve thought it before too), I need to kindly ask for help. I need to pull out that little reservoir of energy to put a smile on my face, and get to work. Then once we have the mess clean, I can show the Princesses the type of fun we can have in a clean home. There is so much we could do, but I never do, because of the messes. We could have so much fun, if only we clean up after ourselves, and all pitch in.Once we have our home clean, I am feeling the need to make each room enjoyable for everyone. There should be some element in each of the rooms that will make it home for us all. Here’s some ideas I’ve put together, and begun to incorporate into our home.Front Room – I’ve added an art wall. Although our front room is mostly used for visiting with friends. It’s a place I always strive to keep clean and free of toys. But it also seems to be where we spend the most family time. Having an art wall to display the Princesses work has been both fun and enjoyable for all of us. For some, the front room could be your family room, your game room. Whatever room you spend the most time in. Try to keep it simple, with elements for each member of the family. By doing this it can bring the family closer together while still giving that individuality.Kitchen – Our kitchen is very small, and is more like a hallway. Really, to get to the rest of the house you have to walk through the kitchen first. To change the attitude in our kitchen I’m planning on involving the Princesses in cooking each day. Besides getting some more time with them, it will also teach them life skills, and responsibility. For the smaller one, I have our tupperware drawer available for her to play in. The older girls love playing in it too, and they have many pretend parties with tupperware strewn across the floor. Allowing them this space lets them feel apart of the kitchen happenings.Dining Room – Now that it’s remodeled, we all love our Dining Room more! We went for a Venetian theme with the color and decor. After Princess V’s declaration though, I wanted to make it more child friendly as well. So the play kitchen came out of the toy room, and into the Dining Room. I haven’t seen them play so much with their kitchen in forever! Just today after lunch they sat around it getting “drinks and ice” from the little fridge. While they did that, I was able to clean up lunch. What a joy this brought into our home, as the 3 girls played nicely together without any fights or tantrums.
Play Room – If you have a place specifically for toys, that is great! After our flood last fall we were able to remodel and make that space. Don’t forget to add elements for the adults in this room. Yes the room is built for the kids, but you want to be able to get down and play with your kids. When we first made the room, there was no seating in it. I realized soon that I needed something down there so I could be with the kids, but still be an adult as well. So down went our little IKEA couch. The problem we have with this room now, is keeping it picked up. It seems like an impossible chore, but it isn’t. My first idea, is to create some game art. My kids love their board games, but don’t know how to play by the rules yet. This causes pieces of different games to be left spread around the room. I saw this brilliant idea on Pinterest, and plan on adding it to our play room. It keep it fun for the kids, and clean for the adults.
Once we have the rooms set up, as the adult I need to set clear rules and boundaries. For some it may be “Food stays in the kitchen”, or “Shoes stay by the door”. Decide what’s most important to you in your home, and what is possible for your life situation. For us, we mainly keep food in the kitchen, but we often enjoy a fun “picnic” in the front room. It breaks the same old, and keeps the Princesses entertained. I do prefer no food downstairs though. I just haven’t made that a clear rule; one with consequences for being broken. Once you have your rules decided on, if you have kids, talk about consequences and rewards for obeying. We do a Daddy Dollar and Mommy Market system that our kids love! They’ll do just about anything to get a Daddy Dollar, and they know we mean business if one is taken away. At the end of each week they get to shop the Mommy Market.Now this whole post started because of what Princess V declared. So I’d like to end with another of her declarations, a few days after the first“Mom, I love this house. I love the seat here, with my blanket and pillow and watching Avatar”.Let me give you a little bit of a view into what it was exactly that she loved.
Amazing what a little change in attitude can do.*This post is part of Blogelina’s 100 Blog Comment Event. -
Tuesday Tip – Crayon on Walls
Have you ever stopped and looked around your house, specifically at your walls, and went “WHOA!, what happened there?” You suddenly find that just about every wall from 2 feet down is covered in crayon.
Yeah, that happened to me this week. I couldn’t believe I let it go that long. I’m sure I could blame it on the dining room remodel, being pregnant, trying to get kids to actually sleep at night, etc. But in reality, 5 minutes with each wall and I could’ve had them cleaned ages ago. We’ve all got 5 minutes! Granted, if you’ve let yours go as long as mine, to get it all clean, may take your whole day. That’s the price of procrastination.
I recently read that WD-40 will remove crayon from walls. I had a can in the cleaning cupboard, so I figured I’d give it a try. The worst possible outcome would be that it did nothing. To my joy, it actually worked. Sadly, it only takes off crayon; no pen, pencil, marker, or little dirty handprints.
Nice right! It even wiped off pretty easy.This here’s my favorite though
See if you look right near the top center to the left of the face, you’ll see CTR. CTR stands for Choose The Right. I’m so glad my kids thought to write CTR on the wall, they must be learning something, right?
As you can see, the crayon came off, the pencil stayed. I also learned that if the crayon is under something else, say like lotion smeared on the wall, the WD-40 will do nothing. Sigh.If you know of any way to remove pencil, pen and marker, I’d sure love to hear it!Leave me a comment with your best wall cleaning tips!
-
Princess Bathroom
In the midst of our dining room remodel, I’ve been trying to create a spa like bathroom for the Princesses. I’ve decided it’s time to resort to pinterest again, because I’m stumped. This is what we have so far.
As you come down the stairs to the kid area, I’ve got their cute bathrobes ready to grab to head up to a bath, and easily accessable to put away after the bath. This is probably my favorite thing so far!
Just inside the bathroom I’ve hung their bow holder within reach so they can do their own hair. I want to get some cute towels, but it’s on a budget waiting list.
And this is what I have to work with. I’m just stumped. It’s an odd bathroom, and not much place for anything. Now I think it would be fun to paint it pink, but since we are adding a boy to the family, we’ve got to keep it a little more gender neutral.Now here’s some inspiration I’m getting from pinterest
These signs would be fun
-
Book Review: Storee Wryter Gets a Dog
Title: Storee Wryter Gets a Dog
Author: Barbara CarducciAbout the book (from Amazon): Storee’s ideas for her writing often come from her many adventures. And when her friend, Kyria, talks her into getting a new puppy, Storee gets some great ideas for her next book while she and her cat, Critique, have fun watching her puppy learn to become a trained therapy dog. Join Storee as she learns to train her puppy to be helpful and soothing. Watch as Storee visits a classroom of special needs children, using her dog to reach out. And have fun with Storee as she gains new experiences certain to help her create her next bestseller! But most important of all, find inspiration for your next masterpiece as you read Storee Wryter Gets a Dog.
My Opinion: I enjoyed reading this book to my girls. It would be a great book for young readers to learn about training dogs, as well as starting the imagination for their own stories. After we finished reading it, I asked Princess C (3 years old) to tell me a story. She made up a cute story about a mom named “Andelina” who was a princess and then a queen. With more stories like this one, we can help our kids look inside themselves to find their creativity. At the end of the book there has been space left with 2 writing prompts to get children creating their own story. I love when books go a little beyond being just a good story, to help kids succeed and progress!
You can purchase a copy of Storee Wryter Gets a Dog from The Young Voices Foundation, a mentoring program for young writers, K-12, Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, and on www.storeewryter.com.
*I received a copy of this book for my review. All opinions are my own. The opportunity came to me through Business 2 Blogger; where businesses and blogs get together!
-
Menu plan Monday 1/2/12
We’re still working around a kitchen remodel. Dinners have made me a little crazy and stressed out lately. Today I had a brilliant idea to get the whole family involved in planning what we eat. We sat down with my new planner and got everyone’s input for the weeks dinner. I already feel less stressed, and plan on getting their input every week now!
Monday – French Toast and Bacon
Tuesday – Chicken Nuggets and French Fries (homemade) per Princess C’s request
Wednesday – Pizza, soda and ice cream per Princess V’s request
Thursday – Lasagna per Mark’s request
Friday – Soup
Saturday – leftovers
I’ve been waiting for a good time to try out this recipe for Chik-Fil-A nuggets, and with Princess C’s request it finally made it to the menu! I’m excited to try my hand at these.
What are you eating this week? Look for more great ideas and link up your own menu over at Organizing Junkie
-
Wordless Wednesday – When kids get the scissors
Thankfully this outcome turned out much better than our last scissor/hair escapade.
