Making "Clean Up" Fun

In the spirit of St. Patrick's Day, I die-cut some shamrocks at the school where I teach. I was trying to think of a fun game to play with them and then it came to me: I will write bead amounts (if you don't know about my bead system for doing chores, read here) on some shamrocks and hide them under the kids' toys in the playroom. The kids will have to pick up toys to find the shamrocks and they can not have their beads until the toys are put away.

Naughty Leprechaun

For instructions on how to make this cute St. Patrick puppet, visit the author here.

Oh my goodness I love the holidays! I have such fond memories of my mom decorating the house for each holiday. I don't know that she did much more than that, but the teacher in me looks for as many ideas as I can find to make holidays memorable in our home. Yesterday, I found this idea on "Many Little Blessings" on Facebook and today, Family Fun posted about the shenanigans that a little Leprechaun tries in homes everywhere.

"Green milk? Green toilet water? Green footprints? Trails of shamrock confetti? "One year the kids woke up with green kiss marks on their foreheads," recalls mom Monique, still clearly shaken. "

Despite powerful bait (Lucky Charms cereal!), their traps have caught only chocolate gold coins and candy bars, accompanied by notes taunting them with "Good try," or "Can't catch me!" As everyone knows, leprechauns hoard pots of gold, and if caught, must reveal the treasure's location to their captor. But that's not the payback Jacob seeks. Because the elusive elves are always leaving him chocolate, he figures they must have even more of that than gold!

"It's for the sake of Jacob, Elise, and all the other St. Patrick's Day mischief fighters that we offer here three state-of-the-art leprechaun traps. Each is easily made from ordinary household materials and uses lures and baits drawn from the latest research in leprechaun psychology. But please take our designs and customize them to make something unique: leprechauns, as we all know, won't be fooled by the same trap twice!"

More ideas:
green bath water

For fun St. Patrick's Day food ideas, check out my cooking blog.

What it's Like With 4 Kids 6 and Under (and a Half-Time Job)

Just when you think you REALLY can't handle any more, God proves you wrong.

Things were already overwhelming before with me working 7:30-11:30 and Stephen working 12-9 plus some weekends PLUS taking classes online. Monday nights were crazy with having dinner on the table by 5 so we could get Lauren to dance AND Caleb to soccer, both at 5:45. Hmmm... Every other Thursday night Lauren has Girl Scouts.

My dad moved in with us on December 29. Even though there are many things we are working through right now, this really is a GOOD thing. Dad was not taking care of himself and I was sending people to check on him, only to call me and tell me they had to put him in the hospital. I was a wreck always wondering about his health.

So now we are adding my father's MANY doctor's appointments to our schedule plus some other issues we were dealing with that really were taking hours out of our weeks.

My fabulous friends from church heard my cries and got together to make meals to stock our freezer. What a blessing! Think about doing this for any friend in need. It not only saved me the time of making dinner, it saved time of going to the store to buy the ingredients, putting the ingredients away when I got home, and cleaning dishes, etc... Even with that help, my husband had to take a break from classes.

This week has been particularly stressful for me. Caleb turned 5 yesterday which means a party tomorrow. Stephen took off of work last night so we could have our little family party. We had not bought Caleb any presents so here is how yesterday looked after work:

-home/lunch/naptime
-2:45 woke all the kids and went to pick up Lauren from school
straight to Wal-Mart to get a cake for the evening plus order a cake for Saturday (this hurt because I had to admit I did not have enough time to make his cake this time), bought presents with Caleb in the shopping cart
-rushed home to feed starving baby
-got everything ready for Caleb's soccer and evening out (thank goodness Girls Scouts was cancelled)
-took Caleb to soccer and wrapped his presents in the van
-party at Chuck E Cheese
-8:45 home and prayers/bedtime only an hour late
-fed starving baby again
-tried to clean a little for housekeeper

Today will prove to be just as crazy:
-pick up Lauren and straight across town to the party store to get more goody bags
-home to get Lauren ready for her first sleepover
-church for Mardi Gras celebration...Lauren to sleepover late
-home to get the kids bathed and in bed

Saturday will be tricky as well:
-Caleb's game is at 9
-We are supposed to pick Lauren up in the next town at 9
-Pick up the cake and buy the food for the party
-Home to decorate and stuff the goody bags
-3:00 PARTY TIME

I think I can, I think I can, I think I can!

Mardi Gras and Lent

The Valentine's decorations have come down and the Mardi Gras decorations have gone up-well, all we have right now is garland, but it's up! I plan on making a trip to the party store soon to see if they have anything to add to my collection.

Catholic Icing blog/Facebook just posted a cool "Countdown to Lent" calendar. Please check out her blog for many wonderful ideas. In the meantime, I am trying to prep some Mardi Gras crafts for my kids. I'll be sharing those here as we complete them.

Prayer Cube

My daughter brought home a prayer cube from RE that has made it easier to teach our young kids a variety of prayers. It is a box with a different prayer typed and glued on each side. After we say our prayers for others, we roll the cube and say the prayer that lands face up. The kids LOVE it! We had to make a spreadsheet to keep track of whose turn it is to roll the cube.

PICTURE coming soon....

Valentine's Day Crafts

Most of these ideas are from Oriental Trading Company, you can go to their website and order the kits.

From the Catholic Icing website.

These recipes can be found on my cooking blog.

I love, Love, LOVE to gather craft and recipe ideas for each holiday. As a matter of fact, I am a little OCD about it. I save all the pictures I find in a folder on my computer, and then I print out the page of pictures and keep it in my family planner. I figured why not keep them here on the blog as well? For my recipe ideas (so far), click here. If you have any questions, please leave a comment below, but remember to leave an email address for me to answer you.

Lunchbox Love Notes

I just started looking into putting "love notes" in Lauren's lunchbox. Since my fabulous husband makes her lunch, I figured he and I had better make a lot of them in advance and he can put one in each morning. So while I am gathering everyone else's ideas, I am going to put them here...so they are all in one place.

Here is a new one (found 10/7/11) on TipJunkie.
Here is a site where you can print a few cute cards.
Here is another.
Attach these to your fruit.
Lunch box bible verses.
Lunch box notes.
Lunch box jokes.
Disney character notes.
Dora printables.
Little Bill notes.
Blue's Clues notes.
Heart of a Mother notes.
iMim Valentine notes.
Fruity jokes.
Some Thanksgiving and Christmas love notes from iMOM.

And here are a few phrases so far:

• You are special.
• I love you.
• I'm glad you are my child.
• You are important to me.
• I love the way you smile.
• You are the sunshine in my life.
• I am very proud of you.
• You are a wonderful kid.
• Thank you for helping me clean up after supper. I can always count on you.
• You have the best manners. Thank you for being such a gentleman.
• I look forward to seeing you after school.
• I can't wait for you to come home so we can have snack together.
• You studied very hard last night. I am proud of you.
• You are smart and pretty/handsome. I am the luckiest mom/dad on this earth.

Advent Song

"Hark the Herald Angels Sing"
Advent Song found on Little Flower Bugs website.


1. Light the Advent candle one
Now the waiting has begun
We have started on our way
Time to think of Christmas day.

Chorus:
Candle, candle burning bright
Shining in the cold winter night
Candle, candle burning bright
Fill our hearts with Christmas light.

2. Light the Advent candle two
Think of humble shepherds who
Filled with wonder at the sight
Of the child on Christmas night.

3. Light the Advent candle three
Think of heavenly harmony
Angels singing "Peace on Earth"
At the Blessed Savior's birth.

4. Light the Advent candle four
Think of Joy forever more
Christ child in a stable born
Gift of love that Christmas morn.

5. Light the Christmas candles now
Sing of Donkey, Sheep and cow
Birthday candles for the king
Let the Alleluias ring.

Christmas Bucket List

A few years ago, a dear friend and co-worker, Sandy F., told me how she would sit down with her calendar over Thanksgiving break and write a family activity on each date. Then she would cover each square (with foil I think) and each day one of her four children would uncover that day's activity with great anticipation.

She inspired me to make a similar list and I have added to it each year. I am in the process of adding recipes to this list as well as pictures of each of the crafts. If you have any questions, I'll be happy to elaborate. Please share your family traditions.

1. Bake cookies: Candy Cane Twists, Holiday Wreaths, Meringue Snowflakes, Red and Green Holiday Pinwheels, Stained Glass Cookies, Raspberry Poinsettia Blossoms, Reindeer Cookies , Jingle Bell Cookie Pizza
2. Go to Santa’s Wonderland December 23rd or before (you don’t know how weather will be)
3. Visit Nursing Home-caroling
4. Take treats to priest/doctors
5. Go to a Movie
6. St. Nicholas Day-read story about St. Nicholas and watch Veggie Tales
7. Games Night
8. Puzzle Night
9. Christmas Parade (1st weekend)
10. Make Gingerbread house/cookies
11. Make Jesus’ birthday cake
12. Make a clay dough ornament with cookie cutters.
13. Make choc dipped reindeer pretzels14. Make countdown chain
15. Make & decorate Advent cookie bouquet
16. Movie night- (Charlie Brown, It’s a Wonderful Life, Christmas Vacation, Miracle on 34th Street, Polar Express, A Christmas Story, Elf, etc....) with hot chocolate, Wassail, or hot cider.
17. 24th read story of Christmas-Luke
18. Make reindeer food
19. Bake candy cane twist cookies & read legend of candy cane
20. Make Advent wreath beads/bracelet
21. Ice Skating
22. Crafts with popsicle sticks (See Oriental trading.com for ideas)
23. Make reindeer Krispie Treats, Santa Claus Krispie Treats, or “holiday” Krispie Treats ,
24. Shop in Calvert?
25. Christmas in the Park26. Legend of the Christmas Tree
27. Make S’Mores
28. Gatti Town
29. Horseshoe Junction (go carts, mini golf, etc… in Brenham)
30. Elf on the Shelf ($30 @ Hallmark)
31. Paper plate crafts (see Oriental Trading’s website) . Gingerbread plate.
32. Tissue paper crafts (candy cane, wreath, tree, stocking)
33. “Stained glass” crafts (on transparency or laminating film). Print one of the coloring pages. Place a clear transparency page or laminating film on top. Tape them well. Let the kids color with Sharpies. Saran Wrap works, too. Hang the finished product in the window, or place on top of foil and cover a paper plate for a different look.
34. You and your kids enter a baking contest (College Station’s @ Christmas in the Park)
35. Ice Sculpting (click here).
36. Make an Advent Activity Chain. Here is one I found online. It is not the same as Lauren brought home from church. Here is another one. Here is the Nativity Story on a chain.
37. Santa pom-pom countdown to Christmas.
38. Let your child(ren) pick from the giving tree at church (or Salvation Army tree at the mall) and buy a gift for the less fortunate.
39. (Do this Thanksgiving weekend)- Wrap all your Christmas storybooks and let the kids take turns opening one each night. That's the bedtime story! Thanks, Jennie F!
40. (Again, print this Thanksgiving weekend)-Print this Santa Advent countdown on cardstock. make sure you have plenty of cotton!
41. Here is the link to the Advent Chain my daughter brought home from Religous Education this year. The teacher copied the links on purple and pink to correspond with the candles. Lauren ABSOLUTELY loved doing this and got upset if she couldn't do each one right away!
42. Handprint crafts: Help the kids paint their hands green and paint into a wreath, Santa, reindeer, Poinsettia, or Christmas tree pattern.

43. Make these adorable Melted Snowman Oreo Cookies by Idea Room Blog. Scroll down below the "pops".
44. Make homemade Candy Cane Marshmallows.
45. Make Mint Thins
46. Pringles can Nutcracker, Santa, Elf, or many others.
47. Print these Nativity stick puppets and recreate the Nativity Story.

48. Bake cookies and send to troops overseas.

49. Make these "Pretty Plastic Light Catchers."
50. Make these Advent Boxes. There is a box for each day in the month of December (up to Christmas Day). Each box holds a small item and a scripture (or Biblical principal) to go along with each day.

51. Make this Advent mantle display from Shower of Roses.

Here are posts from previous years. I hope to consolidate the lists soon.

My Favorite Season

Every now and then people ask me what my favorite season is, and after years of thinking about it, I always used to say the beginning of every season is my favorite. Today I realized that fall into winter is my favorite season for so many reasons. First of all, I love baking, and this season brings so many wonderful baking opportunties with a variety of flavors such as apple and pumpkin. We also go through about 20 boxes of Chex making our Spicy Chex Mix. Second, it is finally cool enough in Texas for my family to spend time outside...the kids playing so beautifully together while Stephen and I can relax with an adult beverage and watch (or join in). I love LOVE football and that is only played in the fall. Also, this is the time our church begins the praparation for the birth of Christ and there are so many wonderful family traditions to practice and pass along. So I've finally made up my mind- fall is my favorite season of all!

All is Well

That's my mantra these days as things seem to be falling apart. Yesterday, as I was preparing dinner, Lauren accidentally spilled chocolate milk in the refrigerator. It spilled down onto every shelf below, and into the drawers. So I got to check "Clean the Refrigerator" off the massive to-do list. How in the world do little crumbs get into the fridge anyway? And how on earth do they get under the glass and lodged into all the tiny crevices? I guess I should have had an old toothbrush handy. This was all after I decided not to be so OCD about the kids playing with Play-Doh, mixing colors, and shredding the big ball into tiny pieces that fall on the floor. I was so calm about that!

So Stephen walked into the house for his quick dinner break and found dinner not on the plates, and me with my head buried in the fridge. I told him he might not make it back to work. So see, I have to tell myself that all is well because in the grand scheme of things, it is. The kids are healthy and happy.

On a positive note, I hope to have a little more time to try some new apple and pumpkin recipes this month. I have already tried a few fabulous apple recipes and posted them on my cooking blog. I made some spicy Chex Mix last Friday, and the double batch was gone in less than 4 days. Cooking and baking always put me in a good mood. I love this time of year and I hope I can make the time to stop and blog about all the fun we are having.

I hope all is well for you, too!

Motherhood Mayhem

Last Sunday I had to take Lauren to RE (Sunday School) by myself because Stephen had a display at the Bridal Show. I had no problems taking her in with Caleb, Abby, and Spencer in-tow, but picking her up proved to be a disaster.

I pulled up along the drive and parked behind a SUV. I told Caleb and Abby not to get out until I could make sure there were no ants in the grass. First I checked for the stroller, but it was not in the van. I took Spencer's carrier around and told Caleb and Abby that it was safe to get out. Within a few seconds, Caleb was screaming. He was covered in ants. I yanked him up and onto the street in front of the van and made sure Abby was okay. I started smacking the ants and watching them surround him on the ground. A man walked by, staring, but not offering help. I picked Caleb up and put him on the hood of the van and tried to call a friend to pick up Lauren. She did not answer. Then, Abby said she had to go potty. This was the first day she was in panties. There was a man in the SUV in front of me and he did try to help. He gave me a few wipes so at least I could wipe Caleb down. I had to get the kids inside. Caleb begged me to carry him and I guess that Mommy adrenaline kicked in because I carried Caleb AND Spencer in his carrier and managed to hold Abby's hand.

We went straight to the family bathroom where I set the carrier down, left Caleb (still crying) on the floor, and put Abby on the toilet. I opened the door to look for someone to help. I found one friend and asked her to get Lauren. Then I started asking strangers if there was a first aid kit. I left all 3 little ones in the bathroom and went to the teacher's workroom where we did find a first aid kit.

Long story short, we found some Benadryl spray which allieviated the pain a little bit. Leslie brought Lauren to me, and Julia helped me get all the kids out to the van. Wow, what a day.

Back To School

Oh my goodness, I am so behind. I had to stop what I was doing to post a story that Lauren's teacher just dropped by to share with me. Let me begin by saying that Lauren hasn't played out side much this summer because it has been too darn hot. When she does play outside, she often comes barreling into the house screaming about a spider or a wasp. Yes, we do have a lot of wasps, but EVERYTHING is a wasp to her.

So her teacher just stopped by my classroom to tell me that the other day, Lauren walked up to her with her hands cupped together and asked where she could put "it." Her teacher asked her what she had and Lauren told her it was a grasshopper. MY LAUREN had a grasshopper. She wanted to know where she could put it to bring it home. With much consideration of Lauren's sensitive nature, her sweet teacher told her that it might be best to take it back outside to be with it's grasshopper family.

I am so happy to hear that Lauren is already making good friends and has not come home once telling me that someone was making fun of Tinkerbell or that someone was going to take her to the zoo where the monkeys ate the people.

Next year I will....

How many times do you say that?

Let's face it, we are busy moms and we can't remember as much as we used to now that we are keeping up with our kids.

Last night we went to watch the fireworks at the George Bush Library. We learned last year that we could beat traffic and get good parking by watching the fireworks from the top of the nearby parking garage. We had to park 3 levels down, and not knowing how many more levels there were, we walked all the way to the top with 3 small kids and the heavy carseat. Note: Next year we will park by the elevators and use them!

We didn't know what time the fireworks actually started and we began to say, "Next year.....we will bring the wagon....arrive later....etc..."

And as we left, we exited the South end, which took us back to the main traffic. Next year we will exit at the North end!

So how will you remember all these things 'next year'? I actually have a family planner where I make all my notes and it is paying off. I started it because I was constantly saying we should do 'this' or 'that' next year and then I'd forget. Also, I thought it would be neat to one day pass it on to my kids. I used to keep birthdays on the planner, but Facebook reminds me of those now. It is month-by-month, and I list all holidays plus traditional meals and the recipes for them. I am currently adding crafts for each holiday. My favorite thing about it so far is the 25 days of Christmas Fun which was an idea from a co-worker. For summer months, I have a list of ideas of all the different things we can do so the kids don't get bored.

At the end of the Family Planner, I have a page with a list for planning parties. That way, I don't have to brainstorm what we need each and every time. Personally, I think this planner is ingenious! I don't know why all families don't have something similar.

4th of July Fixins

I've just posted tons of 4th of July recipes on my food blog. Check it out and let me know what I'm missing. Also, feel free to join my group on Facebook: Aggieland Mommy Cooks.