Marble Run Fun!!

Part of  our Summer Fun bucket list was to make a marble run. I originally saw the idea on where other than Pinterest

This is quite possibly the easiest thing we've ever made and SO cheap! I'm talking like this cost me $1 to make!! Yes, it's not as perfect as the one I found on Pinterest, but that's besides the point. Main point here is that it cost me $1 to create hours of fun! Did you hear that? Hours of fun this has brought us so far!! When you find something like that with kids, you know you've hit the jackpot.


To make this all you need is the following:

• Large piece of cardboard or some kind of thick board (we used a piece of cardboard fromt he box our new dishwasher came in)
• popsicle sticks (found mine at the dollar store)
• Glue gun & glue sticks
• Cups

First, we cut some popsicle sticks up to smaller pieces, from there I just kind of eye balled where to put the popscile sticks on the cardboard. Using the glue gun, I would glue lines and the big kids would put the sticks on.

Seriously, this took all but 5 minutes! Once we were done with gluing the sticks, we grabbed some paper cups we had on hand and glued them to the bottom.

We worked on this when Avery was napping but made sure to include her as soon as she woke up!

 

The kids came up with the numbers to write down and every time someone gets in the 1,000,000 cup, they scream so loud, it's so cute.


And there you have it, cheap, easy and FUN!!

I hope you try this - your kids will love it!

*linking up with Jessi's Deisgn

Turkey Leaf Craft

Happy Wednesday! We've been having a great week so far and I hope it continues. 

Our weather has still been amazing and the leaves are still falling off the trees. This made me think that we needed to do a craft with them which also could go with Thanksgiving. That's when I decided to make turkeys with the leaves.

Ella and I did this craft yesterday afternoon while Brayden was at a friends house (no school for election day) and Avery was napping. It was so fun and super easy and held Ella's attention very well.





Here's all you need for this craft:

• White cardstock, brown, orange and red paper
• googly eyes
• glue sticks
• leaves

We had everything on hand so this was not only a fun project, but a free one too.

First, I gave Ella the job of cutting off all the stems on the leaves.  Next, we cut out our turkey heads (I just traced a cup upside down to get a perfect circle)

Then we cut out our beaks and wattles (totally had to google what the red dangly part is officially called) We glued the turkeys head on our white card stock along with the eyes, beak and wattle.

Next it was time to grab some leaves and start gluing. Ella had so much fun with this and she did it all herself. She was quite funny though, she would not use a red leaf on her turkey, or any leaves that had brown spots on them.

When we were all done gluing our leaves for the feathers, we used a sharpie and added legs.

Here are our turkeys! This was such a fun project to do with my special girl!

If you have some leaves still hanging around, I encourage you to try this! 

*linking up with Jessi's Design

Our First Butterfly Kit

You guys, I'm here today to show you something awesome! Some of you may have seen this and some of you may have done it, but if you haven't, it's something worth looking into it (if you have little kids, but hey, any age would enjoy this)


My sister gifted Brayden a butterfly kit for his birthday (at my request but I knew it was something he would love)

via

As soon as it got delivered to our house we opened up to get started.  We didn't realize that at first you don't really do anything.

The box comes with everything you need to watch caterpillars turn into butterflies.  The caterpillars come in a cup with food already in it. The first step is to watch them grow bigger and bigger.  We were shocked at how big our caterpillars got over a few days!!

gross looking, I know

After about a week the caterpillars built their chrysalis and they attached to the top of the cup.  After 2-3 days of letting them really get sturdy, we moved the chrysalis' to the net that was provided.  From there it took another few days for the butterflies to emerge! I was so bummed we never saw this in person, most of them came during the night and one while we were out one day.  Either way, it was SO awesome to see this transformation! The kids were obsessed! We ended up with 5 butterflies which was 100% success (they guarantee anywhere from 3-5 butterflies)





After feeding the butterflies some sugar water for a couple of days, they were strong enough to be let go.  We let them go in our backyard and I must admit, we were all kind of sad to see them go (although I was happy to get them off our counter)

All in all, it was less than 2 weeks from start to finish and it was something we as a family had so much fun with.  If you are looking for a great gift or for something cool to do with your kids, get a butterfly kit! And make sure to get the one that comes with live caterpillars.  I saw some kits that come with a voucher that you have to send in for the caterpillars (and still pay) and that's just a waste of time in my opinion.

This in no way was a sponsor post, I just wanted to share how much fun we had doing this together!


*linking up with Jessi's Design for What's Hap-Pinning Wednesday

Valentine Treasure Rocks

Hump Day is here again! I'm here today to share with you a super fun little activity that will keep your kiddos entertained for at least 30 minutes (which is a win in my book)

I originally saw these treasure rocks here and have used them the same way for last St. Patrick's Day. So when I was thinking of something fun to do for Valentine's Day besides making cards or crafts, I thought back to this.

I knew I could find little heart gems (treasures!) at the craft store and we already have the little droppers (which are great to have on hand!) so I knew this would be an easy and fun thing for the kiddos to do.


Here's what you need to make these (heads up - they need a long time to dry so I make these at night then they are ready the next day)

• Baking Soda
• Food coloring of your choice (optional)
• Water
• Treasures
• Vinegar

First start with the baking soda - add your desired amount to a bowl.  I probably used 1 cup. Then add a few drops of food coloring.  Next add water, very slowly.  You want the mixture to be a thick consistency, not watery so less is more here.

Once you have a nice glob mixture, take some of your treasures and grab some mixture and blend them together in your hand to make a ball while making sure the treasures are inside. Do as many as you can make and place them on a baking sheet or baking dish to dry.

Once ready, pour some vinegar into a bowl and hand your kiddo a little dropper and tell them to find the treasures! They will love watching the treasure rocks fizz and erupt!

The possibilities are endless of what you can hide inside - I think for St Patrick's Day this year I'll put real coins in, my kids will LOVE that!

paint chip pumpkin turkey {craft}

Hey hey friends! Guess what? I made a craft last night with the kids that didn't involve me finding it anywhere on the internet or a magazine! Yep, I used my own noggin to think of this one and I think it turned out pretty darn cute if you ask me!

I came up with the idea to turn the kids pumpkins from Halloween that they decorated with my mom (using stickers) into turkey pumpkins.  Then I kept thinking what would be good for the feathers and since I have painting on the brain for our front door, I knew using paint chips would be perfect!

Here's what you need to make these super adorable and easy Paint Chip Pumpkin Turkeys:

• Small pumpkins (stems removed)
• Lots of paint chips
• Construction Paper
• Markers
• Googly eyes
• Glue gun

First, I had the kids choose some colors they liked from the paint chips.  Brayden cut his choices into strips and I cut the rest.


Then I cut out circles out of light brown cardstock for the turkeys' heads.  Then we glued on the googly eyes and Ella and I used a small cut out of an orange paint chip for the beaks but Brayden wanted to draw his own.  We used a red marker to draw the snoods (the red dangly thing - totally had to google it's official name) Ella and I wanted to add hats to our turkeys but Brayden insisted on drawing his own on :)

Once the heads were done - I used the glue gun to glue the feathers to the back of the pumpkin and then to glue the heads on the other side.

Here are our Paint Chip Pumpkin Turkeys!! So adorable if you ask me :) The kids had so much fun making these and it didn't take us long at all.

In order: Mom's, Brayden's & Ella's

block ice fun!

You want to know how to keep your kids entertained for an entire hour? (maybe even longer, depending) Make a gigantic ice block with a bunch of random items inside, freeze it, then let them have it at!

This easy idea came from my Parents magazine and we finally got around to doing it a few weeks ago.

We literally just grabbed random items from the playroom, tossed them in a bucket, filled it about a quarter of the way, froze it, then repeated 2 more times.

The kids had SO much fun going at this thing. I did step in and help hit it a few times because otherwise they would have been there all day LOL

Brayden was cracking me up with his faces he made while smashing the ice, he was so intense :)

There you go, an easy, fun summer project for the kiddos! 

Halloween crafts for kiddos

Want to know a secret? Before having kids, I hated Halloween.  Everything about it; the haunted houses, the dressing up, the parties.  It just wasn't my thing and I honestly don't have a real reason for hating it other than I did - good enough, right?

But now that I have kids, I absolutely, 100% love Halloween. Everything about it! The dressing up, the trick or treating, the little kid parties, the pumpkin patch, and of course all of the adorable Halloween crafts there are out there!

I rounded up a good list of crafts to do with your kiddos this Halloween season, I am sure we will knock a few off this list ourselves.

handprint spiders

Handprint witch

Frankenstein feet

Popsicle stick frankenstein

Vampire plate

Paper plate pumpkin

Candycorn monster

Cotton ball ghosts

Candycorn feet

Paper plate cat

Now go get your crafting on!