DIY colored sand

what you need

• Salt
• baggies
• food color
• vinegar 
• plates
• school glue
• paper
• plastic tub

What to do

1. pour salt into baggies 
2. and color
3. add a cap full off vinegar
4. zip and shake until salt is fully coated
5. pour out on to plates to dry over night
6. repeat for other colors.

To make sand art

1. make designs with school glue.
2. coat glue with colored sand
3. let dry

 Then you can just play in the left overs.

video

Melted bead wind chime

what you need
• beads
• muffin tin
• coil closures for bracelets or necklaces
• Clear string. We used bead n stretch
• nail polish or crazy glue to secure the knots
• and either nail clippers or wire cutters to cut off the excess coil after your beads are done melting.
• you're also going to need something to tie your finished melted beads to. We had an old winter time that I took part and just put back together with our new parts. You might be able to use a coke can or one of the wooden rings from needlepoint. Get creative.

What to do
1. First you can align the bottom of your muffin tin pan with the single layer of beads

2. Then you're going to add one of those little coils near the top but not too close to the top
3. Once you have all tins filled put them in the oven at 400 degrees leave in for 25 to 30 minutes 

4. Take out and let cool hang out and let cool the plastics released from the bottom of the pan on its own.

5. Once cool remove and cut off the excess coils. 

6. Assemble your wind chime reinforce your knots with crazy glue or nail polish.

Foam paint ( video included)

What you'll need:
•school glue
•shaving cream
•food coloring
• zip lock bag
• tiny rubber bands (optional)

Directions:
1. Mix equal parts glue and shaving cream in to zip lock bag.
2. Add food is coloring.
3. Let out air, close bag and smush around until fully mixed.
4. pull paint to one corner and tie as at rubber band above the paint to keep the paint at one corner to help little hands paint easier.
5. Snap the tip off and paste piping style

Our Experience:
Messy: yes, we did it in a kiddy pool to contain the mess.
Easy to make: yes. It's very quick to throw together.
Fun: absolutely.

It was near in doing it again over summer break because I know my daughter will love it.

Video

Dollar Ben Bargains - Building Blocks

Our Experience: 

I feel that all the best crafts and activities for toddlers come from the dollar section. After all the rip, break and lose soo much. Today we are busting out the dollar building blocks. 

We have not ourselves invested in Legos as of yet simply because the cost a pretty penny and my toddlers would lose them. We love the idea of Legos so when I spotted these at the bottom of a Target dollar section I had to have them.

The kids are definitely enjoying these blocks. I say money well spent.

Always take time to scan the dollar section anytime you're there you never know what neat things you'll come across.

DIY Moon Sand ( 2 ingredient)

You need:

• 4 cups flour
• 1/2 cup baby oil
• container (we used the lid off a sheet cake) 

Directions:

1. Add flour to your container
2. Drizzle oil evenly over flour.
3. Knead the oil into the flour with your hands until the all the flour is completely coated

Our Experience:

Why haven't i done this sooner it was so fun. I love playing in sand and so do the littles. It was super quick the throw together and super fun. Haven enjoyed it lots also hahaha. It was pretty messy though. We were covered in white when we were finished. I wouldn't do it in a carpeted area or near upholstery because even tho the flour can be easily vacuumed the oil might stain. 

Ice Cream Playdough

 I originally found the recipe for Ice playdough at Smart School House. There they have the exact recipe of how to make it but i left winged it. I'm going to tell you how i did it.

You need:

• Frosting
• Powered sugar
• Food coloring 
• Mixing bowl

Directions: 

1. Put Frosting in to mixing bowl
2. Add food color
3. Stir
4. Add about a cup of powdered sugar
5. mix. Its going to start getting thick.
6. Add more sugar into the dough and knead it in. In the original recipe she used a mixer with a dough hook attachment but i don't have that so i used my hands. 
7. You'll want to add powdered sugar until the dough is soft but not sticky.  You'll use about 2 3/4 cups of sugar for a cup of frosting. I didn't measure because was to much works, so i just eye balled it.
8. Add a drizzle of oil if you added to much sugar or it begins to dry out  

Storage:

Store in a Ziploc bag in the refrigerator . Take out 30 mins before used to soften the dough before play.

Our Experience: 

Haven loved it! he like making ice cream out off it and just simply squishing it with his hands molding it and having fun with it.

For me though it was very messy. Maybe if it wasn't sugar i wouldn't of had a problem with the mess but we have ants. All I could think about was if i didn't clean this really well the ants would be every where and I'm out of Raid. It dried out pretty quickly and flaked of a lot. 

It  was fun and i do think its something you have to try at least once with your littles. I mean come on is playdough made out of frosting, that is kids two favorite things combined.

Mickey and Minnie Ears Headbands (Includes Variation For Baby)

I'm so excited about theses ears! I'm taking the  littles to Disneyland tomorrow, YAY. I wanted them to have something special to wear and i cant afford to buy Mickey ears at Disneyland to be honest. So i took to Pinerest and found this awesome tutorial from tutorial from The Suburban Mom on how she made Mickey ears for a birthday party. She has a Youtube video and everything there.

I spent $5 at Micheal's for materials (for 3 Sets of ears) and used some headbands i already had in a drawer. I'm pretty sure that beats what you'd pay at Disneyland.

I did everything exactly like she said to in her tutorial for the two bigger kids ear but went i got to the baby's I had to changes things up a bit. I still used her basic concept but i used a elastic headband for his.

For this one when I covered it with the felt i couldn't glue the felt to the headband because i needed the the headband to stretch freely. This part was tricky . I started in the middle of folded the felt over then tucked it as tight as i could and folded over the other side and glued the felt to the felt. I worked my way all the way around the band going a inch at a time creating a felt tube around the elastic band. I did not seal the ends for the felt tubes together. Instead i left the lose because u need ed elastic to stretch freely.

I measured the band before i started and the circumference of my babys head. His head was about a inch larger the the headband before stretched any. So i began to add pieces of felt in between the original ends of the felt tubing and stretching it to the size of my babys head so it wouldn't be tight on his little head all day long. Its not even noticeable once he's wearing it.

Bingo Marker Art Activity

Super fun, super easy.  All you need are bingo markers and paper. I bought our bingo markers at the Dollar Tree, so that makes this activity super cheap also. Bonus.

We let free and got pretty in to our art making session and pretty messy. I'm a spotted multicolored Mama right now. We where doting pretty hard to make a splatting effect and we achieved that effect on paper as well as all over ourselves . So I'd say wear old clothes and do this activity out doors.

I think this activity is a keeper as long as you have some clean up time available, which is the case with most crafty activities, so no big deal.

Simple Things I Did to Make a Week Day Birthday Special.

Haydynns birthday landed right in the middle of the week this year, and although we will be celebrating this weekend with a party and all the family, her BIRTH DAY is still special. So this is what we did for her to make her day special as she is. 

When we woke up for school I traded my coffee time to make her look extra special. So worth it she was beaming from ear to ear.

I made little goodie bags, with bulk candy. Easy enough.... 

Well kinda. Haven kept swiping the candies.

Then finally when he gave up our little kitty Dexter decided thought it be fun to try to steal whole bags.

This i where normally i would bag them up and place them in her back to deliver to her teacher as soon as she got to school, But we got lucky this year and grandma bought cupcakes and we got to visit her class room after lunch. It was so nice.

Then later at dinner time i made her the exact dinner she requested the night before, no questions asked. It was very yummy.

And of course in true birthday fashion there was cake. It was homemade and very homemade looking but that didn't matter because she loved it. We sung and then enjoyed this delicious cake. It was a absolute great day. She felt as special as can be which is very important to a little girl with two little brothers so close in age.