Simple Child-made Christmas Story Book

Last year I ran across Musings of Me who posted an adorable 8-page Christmas storybook she made with her toddler son. I remember thinking, "I need to do that next year!" Thankfully someone pinned one of the pages, and I found out Michelle was now selling the instructions for the book as a downloadable pdf.

So now A and I have a project to work on together between now and Christmas. I'm taking my own creative liberties with the instructions, using the craft materials we have on hand and giving the project our own unique style. When we're done, we'll have a handmade keepsake book, telling A the Christmas story through her own artwork!

Owl Shapes

More owls! After our paper tube owls, I had the idea of letting A create an owl of her own out of paper shapes. Like all good ideas in this digital age, someone had it before me. I found this adorable template online and got to work.

It's been a while since we last reviewed shapes, but A did a great job naming the circles, ovals, and triangles. To create the owl we worked on "big" and "little" to choose the right sized shape for each part. Then she glued the whole thing to another toilet paper tube. (Yes, apparently we go through a LOT of toilet paper around here.)

Wow! Said the Owl by Tim Hopgood

This isn't a book about shapes, but it covers colors and is cute to boot! One little owl stays up way past her bedtime to discover all the amazing colors that come out during the day. Each collage-illustration features simple but vibrant scenes of each new color. In the end the little owl decides the starry sky is most beautiful of all. Fun, cute, and perfect for reviewing colors with your toddler!

Check out these other shape activities and corresponding books!

ABC Scoops

Thanks to Ronald Reagon, July is National Ice Cream Month and we're celebrating all week long with ice cream crafts and activities. Today I whipped up this simple matching game for A as we continue to work on her ABC's.

I google-imaged "cone" and "ice cream cone scoop" and found this great cone graphic as well as a template for a scoop. I printed off a bunch of the cones and cut them out, writing a lower case letter on each one. For the scoops, I used Photoshop to fill in each one with a fun pattern. (Squidfingers.com has some fabulous patterns for free.) You could always just use the template to trace and cut out of scrapbook paper, though.

Eventually I'm hoping A will be able to match the upper and lowercase letters, but until then this is working great for letter recognition. She might just know all her letters by the time preschool starts!

Easter Window & Our Favorite Easter Story Books

The girls and I decorated for Easter this morning with a lovely stained-glass cross on our front door. I thought about doing this project on our back door, but our neighbors might as well know from the start that we're a little craft-crazy around here.

I just love the effect of tissue paper stained glass. For this project, I made the outline of a cross with masking tape and then let the girls fill it in with cut pieces of colored tissue paper.

They both did a great job and even A was entertained for quite awhile sticking up the tiny pieces of tissue paper.

To keep the paper stuck on, we first applied a watered-down solution of washable Elmers to the window with a sponge brush. Filth Wizardry recommends glue pens, but I haven't been able to find any around here. (Did you ever see her tissue paper window collage? Amazing!)

The cross is just as lovely from the inside. I can't wait to see what it looks like at night!

Our Favorite Easter-story Books:

I've reviewed all of these books before, but I thought it would be a good idea to visit them again. Finding books to explain the Easter story to young children is difficult, but here are my favorites.

The First Easter by Carol Heyer

I think I found this one at Walmart. What I love about this book are the illustrations. They are gorgeous and none of them actually show Jesus' face. The story is explained in detail, although you may wish to rephrase or sum up parts, as the writer doesn't take the time to explain what a "Pharisee" is or what "Passover" means. To see more pictures from this book, visit my original review.





The Easter Story by Patricia A Pingry

This is the go-to board book for explaining the Easter Story to young children. The illustrations are nothing special but the story is told succinctly and at a level appropriate for little ones. Read my original review.








Let's Celebrate Jesus on Easter by Amy Beveridge

I have no problem enjoying secular traditions along with sacred ritual. We enjoy decorating eggs and doing crafts about bunnies as well as attending Good Friday and Easter Sunday services. This book helps put those secular celebrations in perspective and even connects them with spiritual truths kids can appreciate. Read the full review.

One Rainy Day

Our house is officially under contract, which means we can once again pull out our messy paints! It's a mild, rainy spring day, so we decided to paint a picture of the rain.

Yes, we do own an easel but it - along with so much other "stuff" - was stored away when we listed the house. The fridge actually works quite well, and A enjoyed spreading the watered-down (washable) blue and green paint onto the paper.

She was also excited to discover the tiny raindrops I had applied ahead of time with a wax crayon. If I were to do it again, I'd fill in the raindrops with crayon as well.

One Rainy Day by Tammi Salzano

Duck loves the rain, because rain means red boots, an orange umbrella, yellow flowers, and so much more. Like any good board book, it's not the story that takes center stage, but the illustrations. Bright, cheerful drawings fill each page and tell the story through colorful and adorable characters. Accentuating the artwork are silver foil raindrops which not only fall from the sky, but drip and puddle on the illustrated leaves.

I thought this padded board book might be a little young for A, but she loved it from the start. It's her current favorite and our must-read before naptime.

Update: You can win your own copy of One Rainy Day! To enter, just visit Tiger Tails Books and comment on your thoughts about ebooks for kids.

Disclaimer: One Rainy Day was provided to me courtesy of Tiger Tails Books free of charge in exchange for a review. This does not in any way influence my review. 


I'm linking up to:
- stART @ A Mommy's Adventures 

Playdough Fairy Garden

I mixed up some of my favorite play dough to let A make her own fairy flower garden. This play dough turns out so smooth and non-crumbly, I much prefer it to store-bought. Today we used it as a base for the garden.

I gave A a basket of silk flowers (leftover from E's Fancy Nancy party last year) and let her arrange them in the "garden."

She's got her grammy's gift for flower arranging! When she was finished, I gave her a few of these adorable fairy cupcake toppers to add to the garden. Aren't they precious? My boss found them at TJ Maxx and had to pick them up for my girls.

Half an hour later, and she's still playing in her garden. I don't blame her... I might just join in!

Fairy Colors by Caroline Repchuk

This is about the cutest book I could find on fairies, although it's a little young for A. As you may have guessed, the story is about different colored fairies getting ready for a ball. It's a nice reinforcement of colors, and the sparkly pages will probably hold the attention of babies and young toddlers.

But I want something better. So spill it... other than Disney and Dora, what fairy-themed books are worth reading to my kids?



I'm linking up to:
- stART @ A Mommy's Adventures

Bubble Counting Fish

I ran across this adorable bubble counting fish activity at My Montessori Journey and knew we needed a set of our own. While A refuses to learn her letters, she's proving to be a whiz at counting, so I'm trying to find engaging math activities appropriate for a two year old.

My Montessori Journey's fish are super-cute and sewn from felt, but I made these little guys out of craft foam from this template. After I cut each out, I glued-on a googly eye and wrote numbers 1-10 across their bellies.  Then they were ready to swim! How come I've never thought of using these florist glass gems in a craft before?

To play, simply ask your child to place the correct number of bubbles above the fish's head.

Ten Little Fish by Audrey Wood

I found the perfect book to go along with this activity! Ten little fish slowly disappear from the pages of this book, providing a countdown exercise that leaves one little lonely fish. That little fish soon finds a mate and they have - you guessed it - 10 little baby fish to be counted all over again. It's a simple, straightforward book that will reinforce the numbers 1-10. The computer-generated illustrations are bright and colorful... and full of bubbles!

Who says cars are just for boys?

I am the youngest of three girls. Our house was full of dress up clothes, dolls, and all-things-girly, but we also had tonka trucks, legos, and even remote-controlled race cars. I love that my parents didn't limit our play options simply because there weren't any boys in our house. Now that I'm the parent of all-girls, I'm attempting to do the same.

This fall, I bought A a set of Playskool Chuck cars having been inspired by a Busy Bag activity I saw on My Delicious Ambiguity. I started off creating roads for her cars using strips of masking tape on the carpet, but that got old quick. When I saw this great fabric at a local fabric store, I snatched it up and sewed a simple playmat for A's automotive adventures.

I also snipped squares of felt fabric in matching colors to create parking spots for the cars. A loves matching each car to its corresponding spot, and it provides an easy lesson on colors. It's such fun to see my little girly-girl vrooming and zooming her cars on the mat and off the mat and all over the house! Of course, she also occasionally wraps them in a pink blanket and rocks them to sleep.


My Car by Byron Barton

Barton is one of those author/illustrators that I fell in love with through my kids. I'll admit I'm not immediately drawn to his primary colored, block illustrations, but toddlers can't seem to get enough. Dinosaurs, Dinosaurs was our first introduction to Barton's simple drawings and sparse stories. After a few readings, each of my girls could easily tell the story themselves.

This book is much the same. Sam is a simple fellow who loves his car and follows the rules. He keeps his car clean and stops for pedestrians. If only all drivers were so courteous! The book makes good use of primary colors and will engage boys and girls alike.

Paper tube heart stamps

It took having children to get me to enjoy Valentine's Day. I love my hubby, but we're both way too independent to enjoy a holiday that dictates romance. So, I channel my inner pink-fanatic at the start of February and dive with my children into a world of hearts, hugs, and warm fuzzies.

Using a couple toilet paper tubes and some red and pink paint, I created heart stamps for the girls. It took a bit of practice to get the heart just right, but once it was firmly creased it worked well as a simple and disposable stamp.

A enjoyed the stamp for about 5 seconds before she moved on to full-blown finger painting. My "H is for Heart" turned into "H is for a horrendous, happy mess!"

E did a great job on her card. I love how the paint splattered in spots... although I later found out it was non-washable paint, and I spent part of the afternoon carefully scraping it off of my dining room table!

Valentine Surprise by Corinne Demas

Lily tries to create the perfect valentine for her mom. Each day she makes a new heart, but each day it isn't quite right: too lopsided, too skinny, too pointy. At the end of the week a frustrated Lily gives her mom all of the rejected hearts only to have her mom exclaim, "Oh, Lily! You made me one for every day of the week!"

This simple story has sweet illustrations and subtly teaches days of the week and shapes to young children in a gentle story that kids will easily relate to.