Sensory Fun ~ Rice Krispies

Both Emily and Juliette have really enjoyed playing with our newest sensory tub.  This time I filled it with Rice Krispies!  I had a box that has been in the cabinet for longer than I can remember, so instead of throwing them away I added them to our sensory tub with spoons and containers for them to scoop, pour and dump.  I also included rocks that my sister brought for both of the girls from her trip to the Hoover Dam.  Emily loved finding the different colored stones and putting them into the pull string bags.

Toddler Recycled Containers Game

 

I have been saving cylinder shaped containers with lids for a while now.  I have used them with Emily to do some roll and painting projects, but when I was cleaning out a cabinet Juliette came across them and made up her own game with them!

She collected them…

 

…and lined them up.

“"Look at my creation Mommy!!”

 

She was so entertained with finding them and setting them up, until she was distracted by the camera.

Muffin Tin Monday ~ Numbers/Counting

This weeks theme for Muffin Tin Monday was Numbers and Counting.  I was very excited to use the really awesome number punch set that I got for a few dollars on clearance at Michaels to make number picks.

Emily’s Muffin Tin Lunch

Top Row: 1 cup of water, 2 meatballs with spaghetti cuts and 3 plum slices

Bottom Row: 4 cucumber sticks, 5 homegrown cherry tomatoes, 6 grapes

Emily loved her number/counting muffin tin lunch.  She was especially excited for the number picks!!

Homemade Ice Cream

We have been promising Emily that we would make homemade ice cream since the beginning of the summer, but have not had a chance until now!!  We used a very simple recipe but it was still delicious.  It tasted more like frozen fresh whipped cream so we decided we needed to try some other recipes too.

Simple Vanilla Ice Cream

You will need:

1 cup milk

3/4 cup sugar

1-2 tsp. vanilla extract

2 cups heavy cream

 

Pour 1 cup milk and 3/4 sugar  into a bowl

Mix with a mixer on low speed until sugar is dissolved in the milk.

Add the vanilla

and 2 cups of heavy cream

Mix to combine    

Pour mixture into prepared ice cream maker.

(Picture courtesy of my little photographer!!)

Wait for the ice cream maker to work its magic.  It took ours about 25 minutes.

Keep checking to see if it looks like ice cream yet.

Serve up your yummy ice cream.

We have a very fun soft serve with mix ins ice cream maker.  My Mother-in-law gave it to us for Christmas before Emily was born.  Sadly I have only used it a few times before this.  But, now I think we are all hooked.  We are already trying to decide which flavor we will create next!!

Emily couldn’t have been happier!!

Field Trip Fun ~ Hands on House

During our trip to Lancaster County, in Pennsylvania we visited the Hands on House.   I have a membership to our local children’s museum which enables our family to get into children’s museums across the country for free through their reciprocal program, which I think is awesome.  I am trying to visit as many Children’s Museums during our travels as possible.  (Being that we don’t travel very often I suppose it may be a little more difficult, but still fun to try!!)  Anyway here are some pictures of the fun things there are to do at the Hands on House.  This is really a great little museum for children.  The last time we were here Emily was only about 18 month.  She had a good time, but was really able to play and enjoy it this time now that she was older and with her friends!  Juliette had a great time following Emily and checking everything out too.

One of Emily’s favorite exhibits is the store.  It is set up like a miniature grocery store.  There are all different types of foods, a real cash register, shopping carts and even shopping lists.  Emily and I worked together to get everything she needed from one of the shopping list and then her friend checked us out!

There is a dress up/make believe room.  Here the kids enjoyed pretending to steer a ship!

  Emily and Juliette picked corn from the corn stalks in this cute exhibit. Juliette loved this fishing exhibit…Daddy not so much, no I think I just caught him mid blink, but how could I not share that amazing little smile on Miss Juliette’s face!

If you are ever in the Lancaster area I totally recommend visiting the Hands on House for a fun and educational experience!

stART ~ Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?

 

Welcome to stART! I hope that you will enjoy our story and art project and maybe even share your own too. All I ask is that you link back to A Mommy’s Adventures so that everyone can see all the other great projects that everyone shares too! The linky will be open all week.

I added a stART tab in my navigation bar to make it easier to search for past stART projects. Be sure to check it out!! All the books that we have read and did a stART project for are listed in alphabetical order.

This week Emily has been talking about the zoo nonstop!  We were supposed to go to the zoo on Sunday, but were unable to go because it ended up raining all day.  Hopefully the weather will cooperate and we will be able to go this weekend.  In preparation for our trip to the zoo we have been reading all of the books we have about the zoo.  So far Emily’s favorite is Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What Do You Hear?, by Bill Martin Jr.  This book  uses a fun repetitive and predictable text to introduce children to the different animals that can be found at the zoo and the sounds that they make.  I loved that by the middle of the book Emily was helping me read it! 

After reading the book I asked Emily which animal she would want to have in her own zoo.  She picked the peacock, and right away I knew Emily would love to make the pretty peacock pictures that I saw on The Frugal Family Fun Blog. 

Once Emily’s picture was finished I knew we had to put her peacock in a cage like at the zoo.  So we used an old styraphone lunch tray and some yarn to make a cage.

Emily glued her peacock picture to the tray

Emily used a blunt tip yarn needle to sew through the holes that I made in the styraphone tray. 

I helped her go back and forth into the correct holes, but otherwise she did this on her own.  My mom has been working with her on doing plastic canvas so she is used to sewing.

 

Emily’s Pretty Peacock at the zoo.

Wordless Wednesday ~ Bouncy House Races

We recently celebrated my nephews 6th birthday at Pump It Up an indoor inflatable fun zone!  Emily had fun racing her cousin through the Bouncy Obstacle Course and of course bouncing, climbing and sliding the time away.

I scream, You scream…

…we all scream for ICE CREAM cones!!!

 

Emily has been enjoying the summer and especially getting ices from Ralph’s after dinner.  She also really loves ICE CREAM!!  I thought it would be fun to make our own ice cream cone project and Emily totally agreed.  We had a great time making this project with our art group friends!

We used pink, brown and white construction paper, brown and red paint, and all different colored tissue paper squares.

First, the girls painted the cone shape that I cut out for them brown with a small sponge.

Next, they glued on the ice cream scoops.  I cut out a pink, white and brown circle for each child.

After that, they used their thumb to make a red thumbprint cherry on top. Finally they glued tissue paper sprinkles all over their ice cream scoops, which looked really cute and was also great fine motor skills practice.

Yummy yummy!!! 

We are planning on making some homemade ice cream too, so stay tuned  :0)

Muffin Tin Monday ~ ABC’s

Theme’s are back for Muffin Tin Monday and we couldn’t be more excited!  I have enjoyed using my leftovers to create muffin tin meals, but it was so much fun to make a fun Muffin Tin Breakfast for this weeks ABC/Alphabet theme.

Since this week’s theme is alphabets we focused on the letters A, B and C.  Both Emily and Juliette enjoyed their breakfast.  Emily noticed the letters and was very excited by them.  She started naming all the other foods that we could have had to go with the different letters.

Emily’s ABC Muffin Tin Breakfast 

Top Row: A B C shaped French Toast  (Hand Cut by yours truly, how I would love a set of alphabet cookie or fondant cutters!!)with some syrup on the side.

Bottom Row: A is for Applesauce, B is for Bacon (which was switched for Blueberries since Emily does not like bacon anymore!) and C is for Cheerios

A very happy little girl with her A B C breakfast!

Juliette’s ABC Muffin Tin Breakfast

Pink Cup: A is for Applesauce

Blue Cup: B is for Blueberries

Yellow Cup: C is for Cereal

A Dutch Wonderful Vacation

Right after Juliette’s first birthday we had an amazing family vacation to Dutch Wonderland with some of the other families in our playgroup.   This was actually Emily’s second time at the park, we took her when she was about 18 months old.   We all had a great time and it was really nice to be able to spend time with our friends too!  Emily was super excited that we got to go on vacation with her friends.  It was even cooler that we had adjoining rooms with them too.

You have to be this tall to ride:

Juliette’s first ride!!

 

Emily kept her head back the whole time…thank you Dawn ;)

 

Could she smile any bigger…she loved the Froggy Ride!

 

They were not so into taking the picture with Duke the Dragon…clearly I was!!

 

Bumper Cars with Daddy…

 

…while Juliette and Anna slept

 

They loved the giant slide.

 

Emily’s first time on a water slide

 

Emily and Me right before her first real roller coaster ride!

 

She LOVED it!!!

 

And the log flume too!

Emily and the Princess at the end of the night!!  We closed the park down what a great day :)

Back in the hotel the girls pretended to paint each others nails.   

We can’t wait to go on vacation with our friends next year!!!