Sticky Man

Two boys did a great job cleaning up the toys in the back yard on Friday.  They each chose what we call "sticky man" from the treasure box.

Just throw him at the wall and watch him flip head over feet as he works his way to the bottom.  The boys just love this toy! I think I purchased them at target in the birthday party department for about $3.00.  Th package had maybe 6 guys in it. 

Yard was clean, kids were happy and so was I.  

♥♥♥Happy Monday!♥♥♥

Tribe

I think you know where we were going with this craft, right?  To create the headdress, we stapled two long strips of construction paper and the kids spent a good amount of time making them colorful.  

We spent some time looking on the internet at beautiful photos of Indian headdresses. 

It's a LOT of information for the group of kids I have right now, so they weren't very interested.  I remember last year around this time the age group was older and they were FULL of questions. 

Here are the "feathers", just cut out of construction paper. 

 Here was some of the tribe!  the kids chose their Indian names by naming an animal and then telling me what the animal was doing.  So fun!  The boys wore them all day. :)
Happy Friday!  I think we might have a three day weekend- so exciting!♥♥♥

Compassion In School

Here is Ethan, our middle child. ♥  He was in the process of carving his pumpkin back in October.  He goes to Emerson Elementary School, and they are doing something amazing!  Every month, several times each month, the kids all walk to Merry Haven Nursing Home to read to the residents.  They also enjoy conversations and just spend time together.  I have always been grateful for our Snohomish public schools, and this just adds to the list of wonderful things about them.  These schools are teaching compassion! 

Yesterday Ethan brought this home to me.  I feel so blessed that he gets to be a part of this ministry!  Whether the school system knows it or not, they are teaching Gods love and compassion toward others.  I know that a large majority of Ethans school is filled with Christ believers.  I am so thankful!

This morning it is frosty outside. :)

Brrr! 

♥We are cozy on the inside. ♥

Even Smudge did not want to venture out with me this morning. 

I love this time of year.  The air is brisk and the home is comfortable.  Happy Thursday!♥♥♥

Busy As Ever

Look at Chippy with his muddy nose.  He was here for hours yesterday, burying peanuts in our garden.  He is back this morning.  He or she is as busy as ever!

Here's what Smudge did all morning.  Intimidate.  After doing the usual outside cat and squirrel chase, he came inside and just watched.  Chippy is not afraid of Smudge.  They have an understanding.  (I hope...)

"Hell-OOOoo.. Can't you see that I've been begging forever?"  The longer I take to give him some nuts, the closer he comes to the doors.  I love when he grabs the door and plasters his face to the glass.  He's so desperate.  I just want to snuggle Chippy.  

Meanwhile, I've been busy as ever, too.  I found this on Pinterest, but the process took much longer than the boasted one minute that Pinterest claimed it takes to bend a waffle cone.  Try 10 minutes per cone, plus 4 DAYS of dry time.  Boy was that post way off.. but they are finally completed and I now have little cornucopias to hand out the the daycare kiddos before Thanksgiving.

To bend a waffle cone, soak the tip in warm water (I poured some inside, too.) for about 30 seconds.  Microwave the wet cone for 45 seconds and then mold, using a pencil or your hand.  Then you need to set it somewhere that will hold that shape forever while it dries.  I shoved mine up against the kitchen back splash and set a chopstick on the curve to keep them in place.  It was really an ordeal, especially because I made around 20.  I am going to recommend that the kids NOT eat the cone, which is clearly stale by now. 

See how cute the curve is?  Next step is to fill them with MNMs or Reeses Pieces and wrap with plastic wrap, tie a bow to secure the wrap.  

 I went further and placed mine inside baggies with some shredded wood to add some cushion.  This way if the MnMs were to escape the cornucopia wrap job, they will be contained in the bag. 

Phew!! FINALLY finished.  Cute idea, but I will look for something else for next year.

 We are working on recognizing the number 5, so we created turkeys yesterday using our hand print.  (Count the fingers and thumb..) I forgot to take photos!  Happy Wednesday!♥♥♥

A Giving Tree

We went for a walk yesterday to visit with our giant tree again!  It was time to see what color the leaves had turned.  I don't think the kids expected to find the surprise that was waiting for them.  The tree has dropped almost all of it's giant leaves.

Not sure what to do, the little ones looked at me and just waited. 

We looked up and saw the blue sky!  

What would we do with all of these leaves?  A leaf pile, of course.  Everyone was very helpful, and it didn't take long to create a nice pile.

It was a fall celebration!  We have been talking about what it means to be thankful.  I don't know if they understand yet, but I am thankful for days like this!

We have sure enjoyed our giant tree visits this year!  We are thankful for the fun time that it gave us by sharing it's beautiful leaves.  Happy Tuesday!  Please pray for one of the kids who is at home sick today.  ♥♥♥

Fall Cookies

Friday we baked some cookies to celebrate fall.  Click here for the recipe!  I like this particular recipe for sugar cookies when baking with the kids because the dough is just like playdough.  It's easy to manipulate and not sticky.  I mixed it beforehand because we have had lots of colds going around and I wanted to avoid adding sneezes to the dough.  I used Wilton food coloring gel to color the dough with red, yellow and brown. 

I created one ball of dough for each child and added all of the colors to it. 

Each child rolled their own dough!

They were all really great about waiting for the rolling pin. :)

I love the way the colors roll out together.

Roll..roll..roll..

They were happy to point out the colors, too.  We are learning yellow and brown this month.

Roll... roll...roll...

Cut...cut...cut...

Eat...eat...eat!!

They had enough to eat them at afternoon snack time, too.

I got a pile of dirty aprons.  Happy Monday!♥♥♥

Dress Me Challenge.. Adam vs. Nicole

Ok, so I love my hubby so much for coming up with this idea.  We work together at home, you know.  Every day at noon, one of my favorite shows comes on.  What Not To Wear.  Guess who sits with me and watches it?  The handsome hubby.  We spend the whole hour oohing and aaahing over each outfit piece and agreeing or agreeing to disagree on the results.  One day Adam mentioned it might be fun to go to Kohls and choose outfits for each other, just to see what we come up with.  FUN!!!  So I agreed.  The rules are that we are not allowed to give input to each other unless it pertains to size.  Here is what we had to choose:

One casual outfit.

One outfit for a date night out on the town.

One dressy outfit for a wedding or something. 

Ready... set... GO!  

We were near the mens dressing room by the time we collected all of our choices for eachother, so Adam went first.

Here is his casual outfit.. it looks so great we had to purchase it.  Jeans, long sleeved shirt and light jacket.

Next outfit for a date night- jeans, t-shirt and long sleeve button up shirt, casual style.  We both loved it.  Loved the shoes, too.. but at $60.00, clearly not in the budget.

Outfit number three, he didn't like it.  The vest was an impulse grab, but the pants were very nice.  I suppose my outfits for Adam scored 2 out of three stars.  Now I have ideas for him when shopping on a whim. :)  Here is what Adam chose for me.. get ready....

I am chuckling at this... It's my "casual" outfit..  He agreed with me that it was really not a good idea after all.  In fact, it screams "What Not To Wear."  The dress could've worked somehow, but certainly not with the other stuff he chose.  It was so hard not to say anything or even grumble below my breath.. 

Outfit two, for the night out on the town was also a miss.  I almost like the shirt if it didn't make me look pregnant.  The skirt was great if used under other circumstances, although it was a size too large. I am not a fan of those boots.  He agreed that he wasn't scoring yet.

Outfit three for a wedding or something was a half a star for me.  Actually, if the dress had about 4 inches added to the bottom, I wouldn't have been able to leave the store without it.  It's a beautiful piece.  The shoes were ridiculous- I almost died just walking out of the dressing room. 

Needless to say- I won this challenge.  I do not, however, think that men are easy to dress.  I am very excited that Adam actually wants to do this again when we have more time.  He loves a challenge.  I love HIM.  This was so much fun.  Happy Saturday!♥♥♥