The Best Advent Calendar 2020

November 11, 2020November 11, 2020Leave a comment

Christmas is almost here! Kinda. With the way this year is going I am not sure if the next few weeks will feel like an eternity or be like October which went by in the blink of an eye! I mean it went so quick. I am usually a person who waits until after Thanksgiving to do Christmas, but this year we need some more cheer! So I decided to start earlier than usual. No one in the house is complaining! I can tell you that! Millie is already asking about Santa and when he coming and what he is bringing!!

This year since she is old enough to really understand I decided to make an Advent Calendar. I wanted to make it simple but cute. Since there is so much ‘stuff’ given around the holidays I decided to do most of the days an activity not a gift. She is little so I thought that having those experiences would be more fun. I have attached the list of all the 25 days of activities below.

I went to Joanns and found a frame with a board already made. There were cute tags in all different colors- I chose pink, white and red since that will be our main color scheme for Christmas this year. I thought the tags were cute because they are gift tags- perfect for the holidays.

When I got home I had to measure all the spots to do the nails for the tags. This was a pain. I am not going to lie, but I do have a laser level which made things way easier for me. I did 5 rows of 5. After I hammered all the nails in. This was simple and went quick. The frame originally had a different rope to hang it, but I didn’t like it and chose a gold zig zag ribbon. I removed the original rope and used a staple gun to attach the new ribbon. I wanted to make sure it was sturdy and would stay on.

For the tag I printed out my 25 days of activities and gifts and cut them out. I used a glue stick and only glued the top on the activity in case I want to remove it and do new ones next year. On the front of the tags I chose to write the numbers. I went back and forth with doing printed stickers or even creating with my circuit but I decided against it. I wanted the hand drawn look.

Once I was done I hung the frame up in a spot where the kids can see it and participate in it easily. I hung each of the tags and then we were set!! Millie was so excited. She thinks this is the best thing ever. She cannot wait till we can use it every day! I told her we get to do different activities and fun things during our Advent Calendar.

A bunch of my friends made some this year too for their kids! Make sure to click through and check them out! They are SO fun and creative too!

Do you do Advent Calendars? Have you ever made your own?

Easy Halloween Boo Bag Ideas (with free printable)

October 16, 2020October 16, 202010 Comments

This Halloween things are more than likely going to be different! I have no clue how we are celebrating yet. It makes me a little sad for my kids, well, Millie at least- Clark doesn’t anything about Halloween yet! I have gotten in the Halloween spirit this year! I started early and have made a cute cake, threw a Ghouls Only Tea Party, and cute Ghost Pops!

I have seen people make Boo Bags before for their neighbors and friends and thought it was so cute and a great way to spread some holiday cheer! Since we more than likely won’t be seeing a lot of friends this Halloween I decided to make “You’ve Been Boo’d!” Bags for our friends. There were easy and fun to make. It really took no time at all. I created printables for the bags too! You are welcome to download and use for your Boo Bags!

There are SO many ways you can make these. There is no right or wrong. I have seen extravagant ones and simpler ones. It is the thought that counts! Some ideas of what to put in the bags include:

Candy
Small toys
Play-doh
Snacks (goldfish, fruit snacks, etc)
Crayons
Stickers
Wands
Drinks (alcoholic for adult bags)
Glow sticks
Homemade treats (cookies, cupcakes, etc)
ANYTHING!

You can literally do WHATEVER you want or you think your friends would like! Keep in mind peoples food allergies or restrictions when making them too!

Since our kids are small -3 and under -I made mine for littles. I included: Candy, Goldfish, vampire teeth, halloween notebook, and a sticker sheet. I got most things at the Target Dollar Spot. I used Orange Bags to put everything in and topped with white tissue paper. I made the “You’ve Been Boo’d” printables (free to print out and use!). I taped the printable on the bag and delivered to friends! Super easy and the kids have seemed to enjoy them. It is a simple gesture that can brings some Spooky Cheer to your friends and family.

Be sure to check out our other Holiday Posts!!

Spooky and Cute Halloween Cake (semi from scratch)

October 14, 2020October 14, 2020Leave a comment

I love to bake and I love Halloween so baking a Halloween cake was so fun! This cake is easy to make and it is always delicious. The recipe has cake mix and pudding in it. The pudding make it super moist. I have made it for years but then had the idea to decorate it for Halloween! It usually is dusted with powdered sugar, but I wanted to do something festive. The decorating is simple too. The ‘hardest’ part it doing the eyes!

I always scroll through Pinterest to get ideas and inspiration. I have seen so fun Halloween inspo for cupcakes and cookies, but couldn’t find anything simple enough for me! So I took a bundt cake recipe I have used forever and added some fun! I have seen people melt the store bought frosting and drip it onto cakes so I decided to try that!! It worked! I bought cute sprinkles from Michael’s that I found in different colors and textures. This is what I think is key- having the different textures and sizes to the sprinkles.

1 package Yellow Cake Mix
1 package Chocolate Pudding Mix
8 oz Sour Cream
1/2 C Vegetable Oil
1/2 C Water
4 eggs Slightly Beaten
1.5 C Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips

You mix all the ingredients together and pour into a GREASED bundt cake pan. Bake at 350* for 40-50 mins. Once baked, let it cool for 10 minutes and remove from pan and place on cooling rack for 45min or more to cool. Once the cake is cooled you can decorate!

I used store bought icing and color gel food coloring. I slowly added the food coloring until I got the lavender color I wanted. I put the icing in a microwave safe bowl and microwaved in increments of 15 secs until I got the consistency I wanted. I did not want it too thin and runny, I wanted it still a bit firm, but with enough movement to pour and make the fun drips. I poured the frosting on slowly and went around a couple of times until I achieved the look I was going for. Next I did the sugar crystal sprinkles, the pink jimmy sprinkles, then the green round one. At the end I added the eyes. I placed two eyes next to each other around the cake at different levels.

And Viola! Our not so spooky Halloween Bundt Cake! Millie was VERY impressed! She said “Wow it looks bootiful mommy!!”. It was really sweet to hear how impressed she was in her voice and intonation! Making magic in the kitchen is one of my favorite things to do. I love the joy it brings me and my family.

Fruit Art

May 28, 2020May 28, 202028 Comments

Our theme for the week is FRUIT! We have made a couple fun crafts. This one is simple and a BIG language activity. Did you know I am a Speech Language Pathologist too?! I like to look for activities that use a lot of different language and let Millie explore everyday objects.

This activity is Stamping sponges on paper to make watermelons and strawberries. I bought the sponges at the Dollar store. It is a great place to find a lot of fun project items for super cheap.

For this project you will need::

Sponges- you cut out a triangle and a strawberry shape

Paint- red, black, green

Paper or Cardstock

Paper plate- to put the paint on

Cut the sponges into a triangle and a strawberry shape

Place the sponge in the paint and place on the paper. Millie put a lot of strawberries on her paper! She was loving the stamping. After take green paint and finger print the stems for the strawberries. While we do the fingerprinting we count how many we are doing. After take your pinky and do black dots on the strawberries for the seeds! We talk about how the paint feels cool and squishy, the sponge is soft, and we use a lot of counting. Counting the strawberries, counting when we make all of the dots, etc. We also talk about colors and tried to think of other things that were red! This is a bit challenging for a two year old, but older kids would do much better! We talked about how strawberries are FRUIT and the letter of the week is F. You can talk about SO much with this activity.

We did the same thing with the watermelon. Sponge in paint, on paper, then we used our finger to finger paint the rind of the watermelon and then dots again for the seeds. With the watermelon we discussed shapes! How the water melon is round to start then this was cut into triangles. Once again we counted the black dots while we were dotting and then counted how many watermelon slices we made! We talked about how the fruit tastes too! Cold, wet, sweet, slimy, etc.

Looking for ways to use as much language as possible is an amazing way to teach your child more. Talking about shapes, textures, temperatures, colors, numbers, etc is great for their little brains to take in!

Make sure to Pin this to your Pinterest page for later! What is your favorite fruit?!

Fall Scavenger Hunt

November 11, 2019November 11, 20193 Comments

This time of year we cannot be outside enough. Millie loves to go on walks multiple times a day. We walk up and down our street over and over. She likes to walk up to certain houses with fun holiday decor and ohh and ahh at them. It is so funny. There is a *tiny* hill between our neighbors house and ours. She will walk up it saying “HILL” like it is a huge mountain and run or roll down it over and over and over and over. She really does kill me.

In Dallas we usually have a short amount of time where we can really enjoy the outdoors. We have HOT summers and our winters are pretty chilly (to us at least). Overall we do not seem to have a lot of 70* weather days around here. That does not keep us locked up in the house though. There is nothing like the fresh air from being outside. I love to see Millie’s face when she finds something new on the ground. A stick, flowers, leaves, acorns, she will collect them all. A lot of the time we take a bag or bucket with us to collect all of our treasures. Not getting her to take all our findings inside has been a challenge, but I have convinced her to leave them on our front porch.

Since she loves finding items on our walks I decided to make a fun Fall Scavenger Hunt checklist! This is a FREE printable for you! These are items we would really find on our walks outside anyway, but it is a fun way to go on an adventure and find everything. On our list is different color leaves, acorns, small animals, a flag, bug, stick, and a couple more. You can save and print out the Fall Scavenger Hunt and use it as a checklist for your fall walks and adventures. You could even take it to the park with you too!

Tell me…what do you find on your walks?

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