Archive for April, 2010

Easter portraits

Posted in Leah, Molly on April 23rd, 2010 by jen – 3 Comments

I took the girls to have Easter pictures taken in the dresses that Grams made them. Leah's dress has been worn by Molly, Emmie and now Leah, all for their first Easters!

I also had some individual pictures done to mark milestones: 3 years for Molly and 6 months for Leah.



Upcycled skirt to sundress

Posted in Molly, Sewing on April 19th, 2010 by jen – 5 Comments

I upcycled one of my skirts into a sundress for Molly. I loved the fabric and hung on to it for some reason even though it never fit right. I used this tutorial and now Molly has a new dress!

The Before:

The After:

I'm linking up to Making the World Cuter so you can see what's new in the world that's cute!

Letter of the week – U

Posted in Kid crafts, Letter activities, Molly on April 18th, 2010 by jen – 6 Comments

This week, we focused solely on U is for umbrella. Molly made a letter U and added raindrops with an eye dropper. She loved dropping water with the dropper so much that she asked to keep using it on another piece of paper.

For our stART project, we read The Umbrella Queen. It's about a little girl whose village is known for their hand-painted butterfly and flower umbrellas and are anticipating the arrival of the King to name the umbrella queen.

Molly made a paper umbrella with butterflies and flowers, just like the book!

She walked around all day under her umbellla, hiding from the rain.

I wanted Molly to practice patterns again, so I made her these umbrella patterns. (You can download them here.)

She is getting better at her counting and matching. (These were part of the number flip book at Home Grown Hearts.)

You can check out what other moms are doing with their tots at 1+1+1=1.

Spreading hope in Liberia

Posted in Sewing on April 15th, 2010 by jen – 8 Comments

I am participating in Craft Hope's project 7, creating bean bags for the Liberia Orphan Education Project. I have wanted to donate to a Craft Hope project since I found the organization back in January. I was very excited when the new project was something I could do, so I signed up to make a set of numbers 0-20.

I used this tutorial to make my bean bags. I worked on them a little each day over a week, and 21 bean bags later, here they are.

I also used this tutorial to make a drawstring bag to store them in. The deadline for this project is not until May 15th, so if you'd like to participate too, simply sign up in the comments here.

I'm linking up to Strut Your Stuff Thursday at Somewhat Simple so you can see other crafters newest creations.

Bubble fun

Posted in Leah, Molly on April 14th, 2010 by jen – 3 Comments

Last week, the weather was perfect for some late afternoon bubble fun!

We were outside at least 3 times last week, and Molly even convinced Pop to blow bubbles with her when he came over one evening.

While blowing bubbles is fun, popping them is even better! Molly runs around jumping, yelling "pop, pop, pop", and poking at the bubbles. It is so funny to watch! Here she is mid-air.

Letter of the week – J

Posted in Kid crafts, Leah, Letter activities, Molly on April 13th, 2010 by jen – 1 Comment
To make our letter J for jaguar, Molly painted spots with a q-tip then helped glue all the pieces together. We didn't have kid-friendly black paint, so we created our own brown-spotted breed!

We used Molly's new zoo foam stickers to create our own jungle scene.

I purposely planned J week after Easter since I knew we'd have plenty of jellybeans. Molly had fun counting and matching them, but the best part of this game was eating the jellybeans when we were done!

Molly made a jellybean prayer cross to hang in her room. It says:

Red is for the blood He gave.
Green is for the grass He made.
Yellow is for the sun so bright.
Orange is for the edge of night.
Black is for the sins we made.
White is for the grace He gave.
Purple is for His hour of sorrow.
Pink is for a new tomorrow.
A handful of jelly beans,
Colorful and sweet,
Is a prayer, a promise,
A loved one’s treat!

We also made some jewelry. Molly has loved wearing her new beaded cross necklace. (You may have to look closely. It blends in with her colorful shirt!)

And lastly, Leah has started playing on Molly's little keyboard in hopes of making it into Juilliard!

You can check out what other moms are doing with their tots at 1+1+1=1.

Letter of the week – E

Posted in Kid crafts, Leah, Letter activities, Molly on April 12th, 2010 by jen – 1 Comment

While most of our week concentrated on Easter, I couldn't pass up making this cute E for elephant.

This was Molly's first time working with patterns. I tried to relate them to the patterns that are on Team Umizoomi.

Molly also worked with clothespin count and clip cards for the first time. Opening the clothespins is also great for fine motor skills. (Both of these egg printables were found at Home Grown Hearts.)

Molly participated in her first egg hunt at our church, but we also had our own egg hunt in the backyard. We probably hunted the eggs 5 or 6 times because Molly enjoyed it so much!

As Molly opened the eggs, there were E items for her to match: eye, elephant, ear, egg, letter E.

For our stART project, we read What is Easter? and talked about the real meaning of Easter.

Then, Molly, Leah, and I made these handprint Easter lilies to give to Grams on Easter morning.

A funny story from this week...A wasp flew into the house, so I sprayed it with Raid and it flew into the dining room. Molly kept asking where he was, so I told her that it was not alive anymore and she says, "But Jesus is alive!"

You can check out what other moms are doing with their tots at 1+1+1=1.

Celebrating Easter

Posted in Celebrations, Leah, Molly on April 11th, 2010 by jen – 3 Comments

This was our first Easter with 2 kids. Molly, experienced with Easter mornings, jumped right into her Easter basket and the candy within (I believe she's eating jellybeans here). Leah joined in too, enjoying her own Easter egg (no candy included).

We, of course, had to count the eggs.

Leah got a new book in her Easter basket, and was obviously very excited.

Leah's eggs were filled with different things and sealed, so they became shakers. When she became bored with chewing on them, Leah decided she'd try to get in shape for when she can crawl. Here she is doing push-ups. :)

After church, we headed over to Grams and Pop's house, where more Easter baskets and good food awaited. Leah enjoyed hanging out with her Aunt Caroline.

Molly knew fun was in store when hanging out with her aunts. Aunt EA obliged with some high-flying jumping.

We had strawberry shortcake for dessert, which Molly liked a lot. Of course, the stawberries were completely unnecessary to her, as she was fine eating straight Cool Whip.

Here's the family, plus our cousin Jacob who joined us for Easter lunch.

Easter egg hunt

Posted in Molly on April 10th, 2010 by jen – 2 Comments

Molly participated in her first Easter egg hunt this year, which she was really looking forward to. She got to be a part of the first group to hunt for the eggs since she was still 2 years old (by 2 days). As soon as they said go, she took off grabbing eggs and never turned around. So, this was the only shot Chad got of her, after she had collected a bunch of eggs and headed back towards us.

It's important to shake and egg and observe it closely to determine what kind of candy is held within.

Owen was at the Easter Egg hunt as well, and they were both pleased with their haul.

After the egg hunt, Molly colored some Easter pictures. She did a great job focusing on individual eggs with different colors.

Owen came over and joined us for coloring as well.

Quality cousin time

Posted in Family visits, Leah, Molly on April 2nd, 2010 by jen – Be the first to comment

G'mom, Grampa, Aunt 'Chelle, and Emmie came in town to celebrate Molly's 3rd birthday. Molly was happy to get to play with her little cousin.

They loved rolling the ball to each other.

Leah thought she'd show them both up and show G'mom how she's been working on her soccer skills before she can even crawl.