Happy Birthday, O!

Happy Birthday, O! I can't believe you are 2! Its almost 1am, and Elliott and I are busy getting ready for O's birthday. Elliott is putting together her kitchen set that we bought in February. I set up her place at the table with her birthday crown (its missing the ribbon, but we'll finish it before her party on Sunday), wooden cake, birthday ring, and her 1st birthday block puzzle.
I taped balloons to all of our chairs. She is going to be SO EXCITED when she wakes up in the morning and sees everything. We have a busy day planned for O (storytime at the library, picnic with family and friends, and then swimming and playing in a small spray park), but I'll try to post pics tomorrow night :)

Another Masterpiece

O made her Grandaddy Harry a handprint painting as a thank you gift. He and Elliott have been building a deck playhouse for her, and we are so thankful and excited about it. They worked all day on the roof, while I painted the house, and O played. Hopefully, it will be finished by her birthday party on Saturday :)

Chocolate Covered Bananas

O requested bananas when I asked her what she wanted to eat on her birthday. She said it in an excited tone like bananas are a special treat that she doesn't get very often...she eats AT least one, usually 2, bananas a day. So... I decided to make frozen chocolate covered bananas. They are covered in dark chocolate, and I rolled most of them in walnuts and a few in sprinkles. O is going to be so excited! We are having a picnic tomorrow after storytime at the library, so I hope the bananas don't melt before we eat them :)

Making Foam Maker

The idea and directions for this project came from this blog. All you need is a bottle with the end cut off, a washcloth, and a rubber band. Super simple and fun! Once you construct the foam maker, all you have to do is dip it in a flat dish of bubble solution and then blow. You'll have lots of fun foam! Unfortunately, this is not the greatest activity for a toddler. O helped make the foam maker by stretching the rubberband over the washcloth, but then it was time to make foam. Here's my advice to you...don't let your toddler blow on the bottle because if they suck back in, they will get a mouthful of soapy foam. Not fun! Poor little O. She was foaming at the mouth :( She handled it well, but she wasn't willing to try again.


Here's my foam maker.
O REALLY enjoyed playing with the foam, so this was definitely an activity worth doing.

A Gift for Guh-guh

O made a special birthday present for my mom today. They share a birthday (which is on Wednesday), and we wanted to make Guh-guh (aka Duggie) something original. So... Duggie, DON'T look!! O had fun painting the canvas green. She said she was "done" before covering the canvas, so we painted the rest of it together. She liked me holding her hand and helping her finish which surprised me. After the canvas was covered with paint, she held her hands up and I pressed them onto the canvas. O was super excited when she saw her hands on the painting, and she wanted to make more. I told her that we'd make another one soon (because I want one for my wall!). The idea for this project came from here.

Homemade Bathtub Crayons

I thought it would be fun for O and I to make bathtub crayons a few days ago. I was right...it was fun, but the crayons were a dismal failure :( I can't find the recipe that I used, but its similar to this one. I think I should have grated my soap finer, and I added in extra water when the soap hardened too soon. Don't do that if you make these crayons! The crayons with the extra water were mushy and crumbly. O enjoyed helping grate the soap
and mixing in the warm water
and mixing in the washable paint.
Here they are. Aren't they lovely? I didn't have any candy molds or cookie cutters, so we tried to shape them like these cool rock crayons. Didn't turn out so well :( The good news is that O had a terrific time playing with the bathtub crayons in the shower tonight. She colored a little bit, but then she made a delicious soapy soup in her upside down water drum. We'll try this again soon, and hopefully it will turn out a little better :)

Sponge and Straw Boats

O and I made sponge and straw boats this morning. It was easy, fast, and fun! To make a boat you need a sponge, a straw, and a triangle of craft foam for the sail. See Make and Takes for more detailed instructions.
O helped put the straws in the sponges.
Putting the boats in the water.
"Tiny O" is going for a ride!

Muffin Tin Monday

Here's O's Muffin Tin lunch for today- tomato sandwich triangle, cucumber slices and mini pickles, grape tomatoes and banana pepers, raisins, avocado, and grilled chicken. She was SO excited about her muffin tin lunch today!

Goodnight Moon Lapbook

Thanks to Sako for this wonderful Goodnight Moon lapbook! If you haven't checked out her blog, One Little, Two Little, you need to do it right now! I love this lapbook, and her most recent one which is about the human body is great, too (I can't wait to make it!). I've wanted to make a lapbook for O for a while, but I was a little intimidated by the process. However, all I had to do was download the files, print, cut, laminate, and glue :) Thanks, Sako, for sharing the wonderful materials you made!!! I especially love the pockets on the lapbook, and O does, too. I laminated the mini books, but I probably shouldn't have because now the pages are difficult to turn. O loves the clock, but I think coloring the balloons was her favorite part so far.
Its so great to have so many different activities in a small, organized space, and I love that O's 1st lapbook is based on one of our all time favorite books!

Writing Names

Amazingly Simple, Yet Soooo Entertaining

Can you guess what O's doing? She's pulling a tape measure out, then I'd count, and she'd let it go. This was VERY entertaining :)

Homemade Pizza Night

I'm trying to get back into the routine of having homemade pizza for supper on Friday nights. I couldn't find the recipe that I've used in the past, so my friend, Becca, sent me her recipe. I decided to share it since the pizza was DELICIOUS. Since we don't eat red meat, we always make vegetarian pizzas and the bell pepper and tomatoes from our garden were delicious on it. We usually have leftovers, but we ate the whole thing tonight. Here it is:

Whole Wheat Pizza Dough (do not substitute flours - must be exact)

1 Cup Water (80 degrees) I just use hot water & don’t check temp.2 TBL Oil (I use Olive Oil)1 TBL Sugar1 tsp Salt1 Cup Whole Wheat Flour1 ½ Cups Bread Flour 1 tsp Active Dry Yeast

Select Pizza Dough Course if your machine has one.

Dough takes about an hour in my machine.

Place finished dough on a lightly floured surface. Divide in half and press onto a 12 inch pizza pan raising the edges. (Very Thin crust) -

Sprinkle the pan with a little cornmeal. It keeps the dough from sticking to the pan and gives the crust a little more texture. I use about a teaspoon and a half if that much.

Generously prick the dough with a fork. Rub a little olive oil all over the pizza especially the raised edges.

Bake in a preheated oven at 425 for 10 minutes.
Take out when the edges of the crust begin to turn a light golden brown.
Remove, add toppings and return to oven to bak and additional 15 - 20 minutes.

Yikes! I just read the recipe a little closer after I pasted it from my email, and I really didn't follow the directions. Oops! I put the toppings on right after I coated it with the olive oil, then I cooked it for about 15 minutes. This worked GREAT, but I might try the real directions next time :) Also, I didn't have any cornmeal, so I used whole wheat flour on my pizza stone. In the past, I've preheated the pizza stone but I didn't tonight because its so hard to transfer the pizza to a hot pizza stone. I was afraid that the crust would not be crispy, but it was perfect. The best thing about it is that I have enough dough left over, so we'll have pizza again Sunday night :)

Summer Matching Cards

I downloaded and printed these summer matching cards from Montessori for Everyone. The cards are beautiful, and O was excited to do this matching work!
I tried laying them in a row, so that she could match left to right, but then she ended up looking at them sideways because she wanted to sit beside the cards on the rug. I didn't like her looking at them sideways, so I turned them for her.
She had a great time, and we'll do this again soon.

Postcard Book

The idea for making this postcard book has been bouncing around in my brain for months, so I'm so glad to finally have it made! I added a piece of cardstock to the left side of each of O's postcards and laminated them. Then I cut the cards out of the lamination, punched the holes, added the rings, and now she has a book of postcards! Yay! Most of the postcards are from her grandparents from their various vacations. I've also started getting postcards whenever we travel, and I write a few lines about what we did and what O liked about each place. It's an easy way to create a vacation memory book, and hopefully I can get Elliott to participate, too. Since I used ring binders, it will be very easy to add new postcards to the book.



O likes looking at her postcard book, and her favorite page is the postcard from Disneyland :) I'm not sure why she surrounded herself with the bowling game bottles when she sat down to read. Silly girl :)

Helping with the Laundry

One of O's favorite things to do is to "elp mama" load the washing machine. I sort the clothes from the hamper and put them in a pile in the hallway (outside the linen closet where the hamper is kept), and she takes them piece by piece to the washing machine. This keeps her busy for a LONG time (long enough for me to fold and put away a load of clothes), and she is very proud of herself. She kept sniffing the clothes while saying "dada's shirt dirty." Occasionally, she'd say "stinks" although none of the clothes actually stank :) O chose all of her clothes today, and she was very proud of herself. She was especially happy about her "tap-tap" shoes and socks!