Kid Friendly
Memorial Day Fun and Crafts
I love our preschool co-op. Yesterday I hosted and the theme was “Memorial Day.” Just in time to share some fun decorations and crafts with you.
Decorations:
I was very excited to pull out this Red, White, and Blue Felt Garland that I made last year for Fourth of July.
Attire:
Free Time/Sensory Time:
I made Star-Spangled Slime combining the idea from icanteachmychild and this helpful video from about.com.
Here’s how I made the slime:
You will need glue (clear glue for transparent slime or white glue for opaque slime), borax, water, food coloring (optional), and star confetti.
Mix 1 tsp borax in 1 cup water and stir to dissolve. In a separate bowl, combine 1 container of glue with 1/2 cup water. You can add food coloring if you want your slime to have a color. Mix the two solutions and add the confetti. HAVE FUN. Store the slime in an air tight container or zip lock bag.
Circle Time:
To introduce the theme I shared with the kids that Memorial Day is a day to honor the men and women who died serving our country. It is a day for peace and prayer. I introduced some vocabulary words about Memorial Day and had the children take turns matching the words and pictures to the words and picture on my easel.
I passed out small flags to the children and we sang two flag songs from a great pdf file I downloaded from oopseydaisyblog.
We counted to 70 using groups of 10 stars. I used simple star stickers that I purchased at JoAnn’s.
Snack:
For snack I had the kids make their own flag designs with graham crackers, blueberries, strawberries, and marshmallows.
Crafts:
1. Flags
We sang a song about the American Flag to teach the kids …
Read MoreCranberry, Date and Orange Crumbly Bars
Are you looking for a new twist to the typical fruit bar? This recipe is delicious and nutritious and full of fiber. You can take these to your next summer picnic for a tasty dessert or snack or serve them as a breakfast bar for a high energy “running out the door” breakfast. Store them in a tupperware in the refrigerator until ready to use but once you pack them to go they do not need to be refrigerated and they will be gone before you know it!
Ingredients
2 cups chopped dates
1 ½ cups fresh orange juice
1 cup dried cranberries
1 Tablespoon grated orange peel
3 cups oats
3 cups flour (I used a combo of whole wheat, white-wheat and almond meal flour)
1 cup brown sugar
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 ½ cups butter (I used 1 cup butter and ½ cup coconut oil
1 Tablespoon water
In a medium saucepan combine 1 cup orange juice and dates and cook over medium heat for 5 minutes. Stir often so dates do not stick. Add remaining ½ cup orange juice, ⅔ cup dried cranberries and orange peel. Stir and set aside to cool. In a large bowl, combine oats, flour, sugar, baking soda and salt. Mix until combined. Cut in butter/coconut oil until a coarse crumbly mixture results. Press ⅔ of the crumbly mixture into a lightly greased 9 x 13 pan. Spread cooled date, orange, cranberry mixture evenly over cookie crumble base. Add remaining ⅓ cup dried cranberries to the oat mixture with 1 Tablespoon of water and mix thoroughly, to make topping. Sprinkle topping over date mixture and press down lightly. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 25-30 minutes until slightly golden on top. Cool and cut into bars. Makes 24-30 …
Read MoreOh! The Places Your PackIt Can Go
I love my busy, fun, on-the-go life with my girls. Sometime it gets a little crazy, but I find that we work better when we get out of the house every day. This is why I love my PackIt and why it is such an essential part of my every day routine.
Packing lunches for myself and the girls keeps us healthy and nourished throughout our day. I love to fill our PackIt with our cold food and snacks. Our family favorites are cheese, nuts, sandwiches, veggies, salads, scrambled eggs (yep I’ll eat them cold!), and fruit.
I have a small Lunch size PackIt for most days or days i just pack snacks, and my Picnic PackIt is essential for day trips.
We love to fill our PackIt with our favorite snacks and you can join our Wellness Wisdom Campaign to get your free Growing Weisser snack list printable here.
Experience all the places you can go with PackIt by getting your own! BUY A PACKIT.
We want to see where you take your PackIt and how it fits into your life. Post a picture of yourself and your PackIt adventures on social media with #packitandgo and tag us @growingweisser and be sure to add #gwwellnesswisdom anytime you enjoy one of our favorite snacks!
AND Click the link below to be entered to WIN A PACKIT.
Mickey says, “Oh boy. These PackIts sure are swell! Make sure you get one and see ya real soon.”
…
Read MoreThe Best Way to Keep Your Pack-N-Go Snacks Cool
Did you all sign up to get our FREE PRINTABLE – “Top 20 Healthy Pack-N-Go Snacks”? If not, check above to sign up or click here ! Once you sign up, you may be thinking…
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Summer is coming which means HOT, HOT, HOT! One of the top challenges in the summer is keeping your snacks cool when the sun is shining. So, what should you do?? We have a solution for you:
PACK-IT Freezer Bags!
Check out Pack-its reasons for Why It’s Great!
Pack-its are our FAVORITE cooler/freezer bag for our
On-the-Go Snacks! We use them for Day Trips, Road Trips, Daily meal packing, and more!
There are so many Shapes & Sizes for any type of occasion to keep your snacks, food, or drinks cool, including Baby Bottles!
Rachel uses her Pack-it in her Smart Planning for Day Trips!
“I LOVE LOVE LOVE my pack-it cooler. It is so easy to just pull it out of the freezer the morning of and “pack it” with my food that needs to stay cold. Because the bag itself is insulated, I don’t have to add bulky ice packs.”
Now that you know how passionate we are about the Pack-it products…..you can purchase one:
And, we have a treat for you! We are giving away one Pack-it Freezer Bag! Enter the giveaway below!!
…
Beautiful Butterflies
A few weeks ago I visited the San Diego Zoo Safari Park butterfly exhibit with my mom, my grandma, and my 3 daughters. It was a wonderful experience!
It was great timing because we had just visited one of Ellie and Hanna’s sweet friends that had her very own butterfly garden! The girls were very interested and excited to see her caterpillars and it reminded me of when my sisters and I used to have our own butterfly gardens when we were growing up. It is such a neat and fun way to teach kids about science and life cycles.
I decided to get the girls their own butterfly garden so that they could observe the caterpillars growing and moving through the different stages of their life cycle. They have really enjoyed checking in on the caterpillars each day and watching them grow. We bought this garden from Insect Lore on Amazon and it came with a coupon to get our 5 caterpillars for only $5.
It was also perfect timing for me to teach a lesson on butterflies for our preschool co-op. In addition to our regular curriculum here are the butterfly and bug specific activities that I shared with the kids.
Circle Time:
During circle time I incorporate these fun movement/action songs:
“Butterfly Butterfly flutter around
Butterfly Butterfly touch the ground
Butterfly Butterfly fly so free
Butterfly Butterfly land on me
Butterfly Butterfly reach the sky
Butterfly Butterfly say good-bye”
“Five little butterflies by the door, One flew away and then there were four
Four little butterflies by the tree, one flew away and then there were three
Three little butterflies up in the blue, one flew away and then there were two
Two little butterflies out in the sun, one flew away and then there was one…
Read MoreSaved by Smart Planning
Today I took my girls to Sea World with some friends. We loaded up my awesome van–even took my friend and her daughter–and drove down to San Diego. We had an amazing time.
I have learned a lot taking these small trips to fun places with my girls and I feel like I have finally got a good system down for saving time, money, and sanity when doing trips with kids. Here are a few of my tips:
1. Carpool – save on gas, split parking, and enjoy the time with another adult!! (That is something so precious in this stage of life). I LOVE my Toyota Sienna van and we recently put the two big girls in the back row together. They love it, and it easily frees up one of the captain’s chairs and our removable 8th seat for guests if and when we need it.
2. Pack your own food – I treated myself and my friend to a Starbucks for the drive, but other than that purchase I spend $0 today (not including gas). I pack lots of snacks, lunch, more snacks, water, and I ALWAYS bring my own treats for incentives. I like to occasionally reward good behavior with a little treat and they come in handy for unexpected wait times (such as our 1 hour wait today in the hot sun to redeem our passes! yikes!). I also try to pack the kid’s favorite meals and snacks to let this day be all about easy fun. Their favorite snacks are fruit snacks, pirate booty, raisins, freeze dried fruit, and pouches. They love lollipop so I usually throw in a dumb dumb lollipop for them.
3. Along the same lines – Pack your own treats! Like I said, little treats can be great incentives …
Read MoreEaster Essentials
Easter day is approaching, so I wanted to to share a few fun suggestions for your Easter brunch and your Easter baskets.
Yummy Bunnies are a fun and healthy treat you can bring to any Easter celebration. It would even be a fun snack for the kids to make and eat at your party.
All you need to do is make a quick trip to the grocery store for cuties, raisins, bananas, mini marshmallows, strawberries, shredded coconut, toothpicks and green food coloring.
For more details on how to assembly these “cutie” bunnies visit our Yummy Bunny post.
Our Baby Bear Stew cookbook is filled with tasty family recipes that will be sure to delight your Easter day guests. Buy one for yourself to prepare our yummy recipes and grab another as a hostess gift if you will be visiting someone’s house for brunch.
Visit our shopify store to get your copies!
Below I have some great suggestions to fill your child’s Easter basket. All links are for Amazon so you can shop from the comfort of your home. (I know that is a lifesaver as a mom.)
AND when you shop from one of our links Growing Weisser makes a small percentage. Thank you!
I love to give my children books for holiday treats. This Easter book is one of my favorites. It presents the Easter story with great illustrations and simple words for children.
The Story of Easter
We also love this adorable fun dvd that teaches the Easter story using resurrection eggs. It’s called Miss Patty Cake’s Eggstravaganza.
Here are some other neat ideas to fill your child’s Easter basket with fun learning activities. I chose a variety of characters, but if your child fancies a different favorite just use the suggestions below the item to find …
Read MoreBirthday Cupcake Cones
First of all…
HAPPY BIRTHDAY, RACH!!
I hope your day is as AMAZING as YOU ARE!!
We love celebrating! And, celebrating can be refreshing – it is the opportunity to stop all the busyness of life and focus on somebody else! This weekend, our family got to put our focus on THREE “somebody elses” celebrating Calvin, Hanna, and Rachel’s birthdays all in one day!
Jess decided to try something new and fun for the party. Instead of just making cupcakes for the kids, she made Cone Cupcakes – literally making cupcakes that go in a cake cone. The kids thought this was so fun – they are easier to hold and easier to actually get the cake into their little mouths! The directions were on the box of the cake cones but were not descriptive at all. So, after we did a little research, Jess decided to give it a try!
Here is the How-to…
1. Follow the directions on the cake box to make the cupcake batter (Funfetti is our favorite and #1 choice :D)
2. Cover a muffin tin with a piece of foil so that you can tuck it over the edges. Poke a small hole in the foil in each of the centers of the muffin spots. Widen the holes so that the tube of the cake cone can fit into it so that they will not tip over.
3. Place the cones in the holes. Fill the cones with the batter in the tube and halfway into the upper section of the cone. Do not fill too much or the cake will spill out of the cone while baking.
4. Bake at 350º for 20-30 minutes. Check at 20 minutes and place a toothpick in the center of the cake to see if it is …
Read MoreToddler Smoothie
Smoothie to the Rescue!
Recently, my baby who would eat anything has quickly become a picky eating toddler. I am having the hardest time getting her to eat anything other than bread and cheese…Smoothie to the rescue!…
Read More