Sunday, November 24, 2013

Thanksgiving Prep! - Turkey Army

So excited about Thanksgiving this year!!!  We're having the whole family over to our house!  18 people!  We're making the Turkeys (yes, plural), the stuffing, the gravy, and the rolls.  I also need to put together some nifty delicious appetizers......but food aside.......I'm totally trying to get into the decorating and crafty stuff.  So.......what else do you start with when you have 18 people for dinner than place cards!  I saw some really cute place cards on in the FamilyFun magazine.  Started making them and then re-engineered them to be 'topple-proof',  go me!  An original idea.  Here they are!






So, i started out with just regular card stock and drew some half circles on them.  Then gave the kids 6 colors in orange, reds, and browns and had them use their finger prints to fill in the half circles.  I forgot about taking a picture of them until it was too late to go back, so here is the page with everything already cut out......sorry.





i used some of my fun scissors to cut them out and add more to the feather look.






Then we wrote the names of each of the people on each one.

Then we made big thumb prints using the same paint on another page.  Once again I almost forgot to take pictures.  We cut the thumbs out to use as the faces.  Each one just needs two dots and a little triangle for the beak.
And then this is where I deviated.  The original craft had me painting and glittering (glitterfying, maybe?) clothespins.  Then you're supposed to glue the body to the feathers and clip it into the clothespin and set that up in front of the place setting.  however, my thought is that while that looks/sounds cute, those things are going to just be laying around on their sides with glitter on everything.  So, what could i do that would use something i had around?  Paper towel/toilet paper tubes!  So, we cut them into about 1/2 inch wide rings.  attached them to the feathers.  



 Then attached the little heads to the front.  be amazed! mu ha ha ha!


Behold my army of turkeys!





Thursday, October 24, 2013

Bus Driver Appreciation Week!

Go ahead and roll your eyes now.  I got the email from the PTO that this week was Bus Driver Appreciation Week.  I love that stuff!!  Unfortunately, they didn't send it to me until Wednesday in the middle of said week, so I didn't have the opportunity to do a little something each day or to at least start Ms. Terry's week off right.  Oh well.  Do what you can, right?  So, I hit my favorite site and found something cute and do-able with the boy.  Found something, but unfortunately, the blog it came from is by invitation only, so I guessed at most of it and decided to blog it myself.  I got a large chocolate bar and wrapped it in a piece of yellow card stock.  Then we decorated it to look like a bus with a special message!  To be delivered tomorrow morning!




A Boy Moment

Haven't posted in a while, because I haven't really had anything to say, but i do have some pics to share...just a little amusing.

So tired.......


Another great use for the Moby Wrap!  This was not in the instruction book for possible configurations, but we discovered it and thought we'd share!  This works similar to the "get along" shirt.  Happy wrapping!




Wednesday, October 9, 2013

Pumpkin Chicken Stew

So, I was in the mood for something seasonal and on a whim I bought 2 cans of pumpkin puree.  What to do?  What to do?  Oh yeah, consult Pintrest.  Accept, everything i found had ingredients I didn't currently have and I'm sick right now, so I'm not going out.  After a little browsing, i figured, what the heck, I'll put a bunch of stuff in the crock pot and see what happens.  Turned out pretty good.  The hubby, of course, needed some salt, but said it was pretty good.


All amounts are subject to whatever you have in your fridge/freezer, so I'll just say what i put in, but do what you want!

3 ears corn - kernels cut off (canned or frozen would probably be just fine, but i had this frozen from the summer)
4 carrots
1 big squash
half a bag of frozen peas
mushrooms
1 onion
1 can pumpkin
1 can diced tomatoes
salt
garlic powder
oregano
chili powder
half a box of turkey stock
cooked rice
4 boneless skinless chicken breasts

slice, cut, chop up all the veggies.  Put them in the crock pot.  Place the chicken breasts on top.  pour the tomatoes and pumpkin over the top.  add the spices/seasonings.  Pour the stock over everything.  Turn on high for 4-5 hours.  Turn/stir occasionally.  the chicken will start to fall apart by the time you are ready to serve.  Serve over rice.

Saturday, October 5, 2013

Angry Birds Birthday!

My Mikey (wants to be called Michael now, but Mommy just can't seem to remember) turned 6 today!  Last year he chose Angry Birds for his theme, so all year we've been saving boxes and planning towards this big day.  I think it went pretty well and was a perfect excuse for some little boys (and some big boys!) to take out some aggression and expend some energy too!  As usual, I'll explain what I did with the pics.


 Started collecting boxes......a year ago.  This is the only pic that came out, so you are only getting to see a very small pile.......we had 23 boxes, in the end, designated for angry birds


...And i started wrapping.  Now, I've had a bit of time on my hands being on maternity leave, however, it still took me a few days.  Very therapeutic actually, turn on Rachel or The View and just start wrapping.  I wanted them to look like the game pieces somewhat, so we wrapped them in brown packing paper.  I'd suggest going to staples instead of the post office for the paper.  About $5 a roll and i used almost 3 rolls.  The post office has it for much more and a lot less on the roll.



The pigs...what to use? what to use?  Well, how about gallon milk jugs since my family goes through 2-3 a week.


Paint them green.  There has been some discussion as to whether this was the appropriate shade of green, however, it's the color I had leftover from the boys' wall murals.....so camo-yucky green it is.


let dry and then draw on faces.  ta-da!


For the birds, we decided 3 red birds was perfectly fine.  No need to go crazy with all the different types.  We found these balls at Five Below.  They are the kind i remember from gym class.  Plain old smelly rubber balls.  I painted the white part and used a black sharpie for the rest of the face.


PLAY TIME!!


We started out with the idea that an adult would build the first set with 6 boxes.  Then Mikey, birthday boy, would take his turn and throw all 3 balls.  Then he would get to choose any 6 boxes and build for the next kid and so on and so forth.....this worked......for a while...

 


 Then the dads got involved and decided it wasn't challenging enough and we needed to try to use all 23 boxes each time...........I have to admit, this at least allowed for much better pics!!




 

Food:  usually I go all out on food.  However, this time, having just had a baby, we kept it simple.  Decided to go with pizza and snacky food.  Mikey actually had a school math project to plan a party on $45.  he had to go through store adds and figure out what he could get.  he did pretty well, but whoever set that assignment definitely intended for an Aldi shopper! (good thing we are).  So, pizza, BBQ cocktail franks, Doritos, cheese puffs, carrots, and root beer and orange ice cream floats.


The cake was done by my fabulous sister!  It was a green pig and super cute!  Apparently, though, a picture of it was not taken with my camera, so i will need to wait for the pics to be uploaded by someone else.  So, to be posted!

Tuesday, September 24, 2013

Do You Know A Funnier Joke?

My first post as a mom of 3 and a mom of a girl, at that.  I have to say, it's only a little different, so far.  You use a lot more wipes and there is A LOT of pink and purple!  Also, one thing this girl seems to do that her brothers never did........she has the ability to shoot her......for lack of more sophisticated word, poop.  The boys, I was used to covering them up to avoid a shower.....but how do you avoid this?  Just at the moment I life her little booty up to remove the old diaper......there she goes.  Has now gotten me a couple of times!  This afternoon, she did it in the presence of her brothers.  Mikey nearly wet his pants laughing!  I asked him why he was laughing (sarcastically, of course.  I’m not that dumb).  He looked at me and between giggles said, "Well, can you think of a better joke?"  

I'm in trouble.

Friday, September 6, 2013

Lego Hell.....I mean Land

Legos.....tiny little foot torture devices masquerading as colorful childhood play things.  I swear, the little spikes seem to multiply all over the house........I'm pretty sure I'm not buying more, but there always seem to be.......more!  Now, I do value the brain development and quiet play that result from the demon blocks, but how i despise their inability to be completely picked up or put away.......so, I ran to Pintrest to find comfort in other's attempts to conquer the devil cubes.  I found a unique bag that lays out flat and wide so that a large number of Lego's can be sorted and searched through without coming in contact with my floor and then cleaned up quickly and without a lot of drama.  Guess what?  Only took me 3 weeks to finally get around to sewing the thing.  And I bet you'll wonder about the color; well, purple seemed to be the only color that didn't result in the camouflaging of large quantities of the pieces.  Hopefully, we have a solution.....I'll let you know.




 Large enough to stay "on your side!"



Best thing is, I found one of these on amazon and they wanted $52 for it......
...i think I spent maybe $15.  Score!

Wednesday, September 4, 2013

Owl Feet or Foot Owls?

Guess what?  Found something cute on my favorite site, again.  I have a bathroom cabinet in our downstairs powder room that has two glass doors.  The cabinet is packed full of medicines and such and quite unsightly.  A couple of years ago, my fab hubby, suggested I do some kind of art project with the boys to cover the windows.  So, the tradition began.......now every time I change the season decor in the house, we do a project for the bathroom.  So far, I've stuck with painting made from hand prints and foot prints and finger prints and then I save them and we pull them out and see how much the boys have grown.  Not sure what i'll do with 3 kids, but we'll figure it out at Christmas, i suppose.  Our autumn pictures this year is owls made from foot prints.  I think they're cute.  I was skeptical as we were making them, but they came out pretty cute.



Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Evie's Room: Part II

Painting is finally done!  The crib is together, the furniture is arranged, and clothes are clean.  Now, we probably won't actually use the room until sometime near Thanksgiving when she's 2 months old, but it's done anyhow.  yay!  I set out to do a Pooh-centric room because I have 4 beautiful hand-made Pooh friends from my mother-in-law......but then I embraced my 'jenna' and the room became a collection of fun things.  

 

A rainbow....a little wonky but I still like it

 

The honey tree........this is where I started and I was totally in Pooh mode.........

 


Butterfly #1


Our first friends


For my little sunshine


 Yes, his and her chairs...don't ask


Butterfly #2