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A stay at home mom raising 3 girls - twin 3 year olds and a little one under 2. We love to have fun with activities and projects. A former teacher, I believe kids learn through the process and mess. I also believe in saving money where I can and spending less while still having fun.
We have been having so much fun discovering different ways to paint. You may recall we did some Slide Painting and Kids Window Art. Today we explore painting with squirt bottles. That’s right, those condiment bottles that you probably already have at home can be used for painting. Painting with squirt bottles is an outdoor activity, as it can get messy. Wear play clothes and get ready for fun! Read the rest of this entry »
My husband thinks I am a culinary genius after the delicious and easy dinner I served this weekend. I made a Southwestern Casserole, and while I did accept all of his compliments, I know what really bumped this dish up a notch was the Kraft Fresh Take Southwest Three Cheese breadcrumb mix. I found mine at Walmart in the shredded cheese refrigerated section. If you want to impress your loved ones or even just jazz up an ordinary dinner, read on to see how simple it can be. Read the rest of this entry »
With Spring and Summer approaching, wedding season is upon us. Weddings are exciting and fun. Unless you happen to be the parent of kids in a wedding, in which case the whole experience can be stressful. This past summer, I had all three of my kids in a wedding. My twins had just turned 4 and my youngest was 2 1/2. While I was excited about the wedding of my brother-in-law and sister-in-law, I was less excited about how my kids would perform. Here are some tips I learned for having your kids in a wedding.
Research Weddings
Help your kids become wedding experts by reading kids books about weddings. Some of our favorite were The Most Special Flower Girl, The Best Ever Ring Bearer and the coloring book At the Wedding. You can even show your kids some videos of kids in action at a wedding. There are lots of videos online, but I bet your kids will get a kick out of seeing your own wedding. This will help them understand what will be expected of them. Read the rest of this entry »
Here is a quick and easy patriotic snack that you can bring to any party. Our red, white and blue patriotic pops come together in minutes and are so simple even a child can make them. Read the rest of this entry »
Faithful Mess For Less readers might notice that my kids look a lot younger in these photos. No, I didn’t acquire some sort of time machine, but I did find these photos of my kids bathing dolls which we did BMFL (before Mess For Less). So prepare to get wet and have some fun bathing dolls with us! Read the rest of this entry »
Recently, we paid a trip to the Bay Area Discovery Museum. My kids enjoyed playing in all of the exhibits, but their favorite was a window painting area. They spent so much time here that I knew we needed to recreate this kids window art at home. It was a huge hit! We set up our kids window art outside so I could just hose it down at the end for an easy cleanup. Learn how you can set one up below.
This is the kids window art area at the museum.
Have you ever started out doing one thing and ended up with something totally different? That’s what happened with our exploding milk experiment. It started off as a completely innocent experiment using milk, food coloring and dish soap Read the rest of this entry »
Pipe cleaners are some of our favorite supplies for kids fun. I love how they come in a variety of colors, are fairly inexpensive (I’ve seen them at the dollar store) and are totally versatile. I also have great memories of creating pipe cleaner crafts when I was a kid. Well, pipe cleaners are still very popular all these years later. Check out over 20 ideas for Pipe Cleaner Crafts and Activities.
Making Robots from Train Up A Child
I am thrilled to bring you some fun Learn Through Movement activities with my friends Mom to 2 Posh Lil Divas and Train Up a Child. We are sharing all kinds of activities that will help kids learn while moving and having fun. Monday, we all shared some math activities. I shared our Math Number Hunt which got the kids outside where they practiced counting and numerical order. Today’s Learn Through Movement activity focuses on Reading and includes free printables.
I decided it would be fun for the kids to go on an I Spy Neighborhood Walk. I created some free printables which you can download here. On the printables, I included sights that kids might see on a stroll around the neighborhood, and a place for them to record their post walk thoughts. There are pictures and words to help emergent readers make the connection between words and print. My 3 year old is not reading yet so the pictures were a big help to her. My 4 year old twins are readers so they used the words more than the pictures as they walked along.
I got some cheap clipboards at the Dollar Store and used them for this activity. Simply tie a pencil to a clipboard and the checklist can be completed on the walk. Before we left we talked about what a neighborhood was and what sorts of things we might see. The kids had lots of great ideas for things I hadn’t even thought to put on my list. I then gave them their clipboards and asked them to read me the names of the things they would be looking for. Read the rest of this entry »
We are big fans of tissue paper in our house and we have used it for many art projects. Recently, we combined it with coffee filters to make some Spring coffee filter flowers. You will love how the colors from the tissue paper transfer when wet to create these coffee filter flowers.
You will need:
To make these coffee filter flowers, you will not be gluing the tissue paper to the coffee filters. This confused my daughters at first Read the rest of this entry »
