New Blog

I have a couple tutorials that I'm working on right now. Unfortunately, I left my camera at my parents' house out of town over the weekend. So, as soon as I get it back, I'll be posting some new tutorials for you.

In the meantime, I started a new blog that will be devoted to homeschooling. It's called Growing and Learning. There's not much to it yet, but I would love for you to check it out.

It's our 7th Anniversary today. So, I'm off to make some yummy cookies for my husband. I'll be posting the recipe tomorrow.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

I just have to share this wonderful activity to go along with Eric Carle's book, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. My sister made this set for my boys and they just LOVE playing with it. This makes a fantastic gift for a child, or a teacher. Here are the pictures, so you can make your own:

A little egg lay on a leaf.... Pop! Out of the egg came a tiny and very hungry caterpillar.

He ate through: one apple, 2 pears, 3 plums, 4 strawberries, 5 oranges.....

one piece of chocolate cake, one ice cream cone, one pickle, one slice of Swiss cheese, one slice of salami, one lollipop, one piece of cherry pie, one sausage, one cupcake, one slice of watermelon.....and one nice green leaf. He built a small house, called a cocoon, around himself.

Then he nibbled a hole in the cocoon, pushed his way out and.......

he was a beautiful butterfly!

Here he is with all the food that he ate.

The caterpillar is made from a soft green sock with googly eyes glued on it. All food pieces are made from felt and glued together with a hot glue gun and details drawn on with a Sharpie marker. The cocoon is sewn together around the edges.

Thanks to my sister for this wonderful idea (which she got from a friend- so, thanks to her friend, as well!).

Head over to I Blame my Mother for more Kid Friendly ideas.

"Tot Books"

I am currently doing home school Kindergarten with our five year old and have found the same challenge that many home school moms have, what to do with our two year old? I wanted to include him in school time, while still letting him be a toddler. That's when I discovered "Tot School" at 1plus1plus1equals1 and now on their new site, totally tots. There is a wealth of ideas on both sites to make the most of your time with your toddler and including them in school time. The creator of the site, Carissa, is generous enough to share the templates for "tot-books". To be honest, at first I was a little skeptical of the tot book and whether a two year old would be ready for this kind of focused schoolwork. Then I tried making one and was I ever proven wrong!! My son LOVES his tot books, it makes him feel like he's doing big boy work like his brother. Her are the first two tot books that I've assembled for him.

Big Machines

When I first put this together, I was out of staples, so I just had the counting pages paper clipped onto the folder. Once I got them stapled together as a book and attached to the folder, my son was very upset that he couldn't take them apart and "sort" them. So, we went back to the paperclip!

He loved coloring the different colors on the trucks!

Thomas the Train

My very favorite part of this tot book is the Thomas and Friends mini book, which has a place to put your child's photo and name!