Water Balloon Bath Tub Fun

I saw a post on Play at Home Mom that I loved.  Play at Home Mom: Water Balloon Bath   The momma gave her kids water balloons to play with in the bathtub.  At first I thought it was kind of a weird thing to do.   Who would ever do that?  Then I decided to try it with my kids and they loved it.

I tried actual water balloons and they were really, really hard to fill up with my faucet.  (they were the very tiny ones)  Then I found regular balloons and bigger water balloons.  In each balloon I put different colors of food coloring.  The girls had fun guessing what colors where in each balloon.  They had fun using scissors to cut a hole in each one and watching the colors spray all over.

This time I changed it up and gave each little girl one balloon filled with hot water and one with cold.

They had fun playing with them and feeling the different temperatures on their cheeks.  It is a great tactile activity for kids.

"The blue is so cold, mommy.  The red one is really warm."

Concentrating on using the scissors.  This is a great hands on activity that has instant feed back.  The moment a hole is cut, water squirts out and surprises them.

This is such a simple, inexpensive thing to do with kids in the bath tub.  They both ask every bath time if they can play with the water balloons in the bath tub.  The girls play catch with them and invent all kinds of games to play.  Try it once and bathtime will never be the same!!!!

Garbage Collecting on Our Walk

The girls love nothing more than to go on a walk by the creek.  As we walk, the girls always notice the trash.  After being bothered by it, I finally decided to just go pick it up and do so with my girls.  They absolutely loved picking up trash.  It is like a treasure hunt for them.

Each of the girls got a bag and ran around finding trash to fill up.

They are so sad to see that people actually litter on the ground.  

Of course we have to stop and see the sheep on our walk.

It was a good thing I brought the wagon.  We found a ton of trash and card board.  The girls balanced the card board and worked together to get the trash home.

Here is all the trash from just one little walk.  I love the happy and proud looks on their faces.  I love walking on a clean path too.

Just think how much good we can do if everyone does their part?  Kids can make a difference if you let them.

Prayer Bulletin Board

Last year after a Missions Sunday at our church, I was trying to figure out a way to help our family pray more consistantly for our missionaries.  I remembered that my mom had set up a world map with missionaries pictures around it in our dinning room. We would pray for a missionary every dinner.  We were able to see their families and look on the map to see where they served the Lord.

I decided to try that with my family.  I went to the local teachers store and bought a small bulletin board, a world map and some pins.  The whole thing cost about $20 dollars.  We cut the world out and pinned it up.  That Sunday I got a few prayer cards from the missionaries that had spoken.  So we put them up and talked with our little girls about who they were and how they served the Lord in the country they live in.  Then we put up the pictures those we support.  This has been a great way for the girls to remember to pray for those we support.

We love getting new pictures of our missionaries.  We pray for the Writebol's as they work on the air planes in Africa.  We pray for Jeanne as she works with the children in South East Asia.

We pray for Rommel, our child from Compassion International.  We just started supporting the Child Survival Program in Uganda, Africa.

Mission India is awesome and the girls love seeing the passport to India on their website.  It is important to help the kids learn about who we are praying for and how they serve the Lord.

How does your family remember to pray for missionaries or others that need your prayers?

Energy Bites

I am constantly looking for healthy gluten free food to make for my family and me.  As I was purusing through pinterest, where else would I be?, I came upon something called Energy Bites.  I had never heard of these before but they looked interesting.  I could easily make them gluten free and super healthy too.  So I pulled up the recipe and made a batch.  As I was putting it in the fridge, I stole a taste.  It was so good and delicious that I immediately made another double batch.  Since then I make a triple batch each time I make them and always have some on hand in the freezer.  They are a quick, healthy and fillilng treat for the girls.  I actually take 3 or 4 as part of my lunch at work.  These are amazing and fun to make.  The girls love to help me make them.  We work on clean technique ( such as not licking the spoon and putting it back in the bowl), measuring ingredients, counting, stirring, sweeping (if they have helped stir), and working as a team. The girls call them injury bites since they keep forgetting how to say energy.   Silly girls!!    Here is the link to make these for your family.
http://fooddoodles.com/2011/06/28/one-bowl-all-natural-no-bake-energy-bites/
Bekah measures the oats and spreads them on a sheet to toast.

Here are most of the ingredients we used in this batch.

Hannah works on adding the honey to the bowl.

This is a great hands on activity to build motor skills.  Bekah works very hard on getting out the peanut butter to fill up the measuring cup.

Hannah loves getting the honey off her hands.

Team work is great thing.

Bekah had to sweep the floor since stirring is very hard work and easy to get the ingredients flying across the room.  Hannah helped with the dust pan and then danced in joy when it was done.

After chilling the dough, it is easiest to use a cookie scoop with a soft back to press the dough into it.

Once they are popped out of the cookie scoop, you can freeze or refrigerate them like this or roll them in a ball. 

This is how much my triple batch made.  Yummy!  I freeze them like this and then put them into a ziplock baggy and store them in the freezer.

For the nut butter, I was just using peanut butter.  Recently I discovered coconut butter and use half of that and half of peanut butter.  It is really good.  I use gluten free Oats so that this is gluten free.  I always add in crasions and/or raisons.  This time I used pistachio nuts as well.  I love adding sesame seeds, poppy seeds and sunflower seeds.  Any thing little and healthy is fun to add in.  Each time I make it, it tastes slightly different.  

Skate board Swing

I saw such a great idea on pinterest the other day.  It was a skateboard swing.  What an interesting concept!  I fell in love with the idea and I immediately roped my sweet husband into making one for the girls.  As soon as the holidays were past and we both had a free day, we got busy making the swing. Here is the post that first caught my interest.

http://www.cedarworks.com/blog/2009/02/skating-the-summer-away

Since this site doesn't tell you how to make it, I decided to show any that were interested how we made our swings.  So here goes.

We found these skate board bases online at Amazon.com.  They were $18.00 each.  Since we have two girls we decided that we should make two.  Ok, I decided that Chris should make two.

 Lowes provided, for a price, the rest of the supplies for the swings.  We got a heavy duty rope that would hold almost 400lbs.  We bought two sets of rope ($26 each) but we probably could have done it with one.

 We bought one wooden dowel that was 1 1/4 inches by 4 feet.  This we cut into 4 peices.

 We bought 4 lag eyes for each swing as well as 4 stainless steel carabiners.  We bought 4 wire clamps for each swing and a roll of safety tape as well.

 Chris used a 5/8ths paddle bit to drill the holes into the skate board.

 After cutting the dowel into four peices Chris used a belt sander to smooth the ends of the dowels.

 We threaded the rope under the skate board and tied knots securely on the top of the board.

 Chris used the same paddle bit to make holes in the wooden dowels.

 Each rope was threaded under the board, tied above the board.  Then I had the girls stand on the board to see where the dowels needed to be placed.  Knots were made at the right hight and then the dowels threaded onto the rope.

 A strip of safety tape placed in the middle of the board, and they were ready to hang.

My little helper.

 
 The eye lags were placed 10 inches apart on either side of the support beam of our granny unit.  Then the carabiners were attached.  The rope from each side of the swing was threaded through and the wire clamps were put on the rope.

 My other sweet little helper.

 All set up and ready to go.  From the time we left to buy the parts to when it was hung, the project only took about 3 hours.

 Now the fun begins!  This is a great toy and so much fun.  The girls love swinging on their new swing as does mommy.  It takes a bit of balance and skill to swing.  This swing is competely unlike any you have ever been on.

 I love how the girls have found a ton of ways to swing on it.   Love how this is making them be so creative and intuitive.

 Easy enough for 3 year olds to swing on it.