An idea for the Holidays

It seems like the tendency around the holidays is that kids tend to have their heads in the clouds. It's easy for that to happen to adults as well!

Around here, the cold weather isn't really something that keeps the boys from going outside. In fact, they have actually said that they enjoy playing outside more when it's cooler more than they do when it is hot.

However with Christmas coming up and with this momma needing to work on some projects, I decided to come up with an idea to give them something extra to do that would be educational.

So, I decided to do a "reading contest". Today we finished our cute little bulletin board for the wall.  Very, very easy!

I used a foam posterboard. I also found some great lined stationary at this site on which to write book information.
Clipart can be printed from here. We used a glue-stick to paste everything to the board except for their book lists.  I pinned those.
The boys are to write on the list what books they read, the author, and how many pages. I told them that they get a sticker for every 20 pages read. The older boys get extra incentives for reading to Ryan out loud.

I sat down with Michael and we decided that the "contest" would go through the month of December and into January. We decided what the rewards would be and made it something they'd be excited to get.  Some ideas are cash, dates with dad, inexpensive outings, privileges such as getting to stay up later, etc.

The main rule is that I get to choose the books they read. I decided to choose a mix of topics so that they will actually be learning what I want them to learn. When I had reading contests in the past, they tended to pick easy books that had no significance.

We are using our local library.  Justin is already begging me to go back and get more books as he has read almost everything I have chosen (and that was just on Friday!).

Edible play dough recipe

Here's a fun alternative to play dough.  It's edible!  I made this with Ryan yesterday and he loved it.  Put it in the refrigerator when you aren't using it and it will keep.

Yes, that's a Kool-Aid smile (actually it's a Crystal lite smile!)

See my snake?

He and I both ate a few bites.  Its SWEEEET.

Tasty Clay
from  McCormick



INGREDIENTS1/3 cup margarine, softened, or shortening




1/3 cup light corn syrup



1 teaspoon McCormick® Pure Vanilla Extract or 1 teaspoon McCormick® Pure Peppermint Extract (I used Maple)



1/4 teaspoon salt



1 package (16 ounces) confectioners' sugar



McCormick® Assorted Food Colors and Egg Dye or McCormick® Assorted NEON! Food Colors and Egg Dye



DIRECTIONS

1. Mix margarine, corn syrup, extract and salt in large bowl. Add sugar; mix with hands until well blended. Add additional corn syrup if mixture is too dry.







2. Divide the mixture into as many portions as you would like to color. Add food color to each portion; knead well.







3. Shape into flowers and other stuff you can eat! Store in an airtight container.

June stuff...

June has been very busy.  Lots of time spent with family and friends and hanging out around our home.  Here are a few pictures of some happenings and simple things around here we have been enjoying.


We acquired 6 baby chicks a couple of months ago:

For several weeks, they made their home in a Rubbermade tub.  It didn't take long for them to outgrow that home, so something had to be done.  Michael built them a temporary home in the lean-to of the barn:

The boys enjoyed
helping...The chickens love their new place to roost!

Speaking of babies....we found these babies living in the barn...  The boys love to visit and stare at them while their parents try to dive bomb the boys' heads :-)

Another fun thing is the Catawba tree.  It has now attracted worms (more like caterpillars).  According to the internet and avid fishermen, these make the best fishing bait.  Look closely to see there are several of them on just one leaf, so you can imagine how many there are.

The tree won't look like this very long, I'm sure, as the leaves are being devoured.

Justin, especially, thinks of these worms constantly and considers it his joy to see how many of these he can obtain in the empty ice cream bucket.  The other day I fed some to the chickens, and he could hardly part with them....even though he knows there are probably thousands of them still on the tree.  Such are the joys of boyhood. :-)

Snake

Seems we have black snakes in our field.  This one was 5' long.  Justin spotted it, and then he and his brothers and cousins proceeded to whack it to death with their guns and swords.  Yuck; I detest snakes.  I am glad it is dead.

Amish Neighbors

The boys and I went with one of my new friends to visit and sight see our Amish neighbors.  I didn't realize they lived that close to us.  My friend knows several of them personally, so we were able to stop at a couple of farms, talk with them, and buy from their shops.

  Amish do not like for you to take their pictures so I made sure to try to respect that.  I did catch one couple working in a field when I was taking a picture of her house.

Click the pictures to see close-ups :-) 

Recipes

Click here if you are interested in the new recipes I just added to my home-maker blog

Incentives for Children

I don't normally like to do a constant stream of incentive activities because I believe children should help around the house, and work because it's expected and right. We are training them to be service and ministry oriented.

Yet I do think it is a good thing to do incentives occasionally. We all need something new and different sometimes... right? Balance is key, I think.

The boys wanted to do something like this again. I found this neat website where you can print mazes. I printed three of the mazes. I cut everything out and used mod podge to decoupage them to a heavier paper. I used scotch tape (sticky tack works great) on the back of the bug cutout so he can move to each number.

Mod podge is a WHOLE lot easier than trying to laminate.

My plan is that if the boys complete the chores and work listed on their clipboards by a certain time each day, they get to move to the next number (I wrote these in randomly) on the maze.

When their bug makes it to the ice cream cone, we go out for sundaes or something like that.

Anyway, thought I'd share this just in case there may be a mom out there who needs a change of pace.

If you click the picture of the maze, you can print from the new window. If you want a different theme, try this link. Go to "mazes" at the top :-)

More snow!

You can tell how much more snow we have by the amount on the trees.

This is the pasture.... You can't see them, but there have been a lot of tiny little birds out there.

The driveway (where'd it go?)

Steve's puppy

Steve's little Westie. His name is "Hunter".

I didn't even know I had recorded this on my camera, but here it is...

Snow pictures

It has been snowing most of the day. I took this looking out my kitchen window.

I took this out of the sliding glass door.

Running water is a blessing

It has been an interesting couple of days. The other day when we got our water bill, we noticed it was high. Then yesterday when Michael got home from work, he noticed water coming up out of the ground. After a lot of investigation he found not one, but two broken spots.

Michael and Joe are working outside to dig up the pipes and replace them. Thanks to Joe (our brother in law) who has been so helpful today.

We have no running water in the house at this point, but thankfully we do have a well hooked up to our barn. I have been trudging up and down the hill getting buckets of water, boiling it, and straining it so we can drink it.

On the negative side of things, Ryan has been sick with some type of virus. So thankful for that well water and thankful he is feeling better now.

We are supposed to have freezing rain and between 4-9 inches of snow. It was supposed to start this morning, but it hasn't! The Lord has been so kind as to answer prayer and hold it off for us! Thank you Lord!

Random Winter Pictures

The whole reason I haven't blogged much lately is because of time. I have so much going on these days! Adding pictures takes time because of sizing, editing, rotating, etc. Well, today I just decided to add some pictures without doing any of that. I will type a little explanation below the picture and I apologize, especially, for those pictures that needed rotating. Hope you don't get a knot in your neck. :-) It would be best and more orderly to go to the very bottom of the post and go backward to get the pictures in order. ;-)

Winter is for.....

taking apart broken microwaves and looking up the parts on the internet....

Winter is for fun Christmas gifts... Monkeys, in particular...
Ryan, below with one of his many monkeys he got for Christmas (he expressly said he wanted a thousand)

Jonathan and Uncle Joe trying to get a battery into his remote control spider

My sweet little niece Megan with her new cooking set from Uncle Steve

winter is for building block robots

and reading Knight stories to your little brother

winter is for lots of snow

and for building blocks (My neice Hannah came with my mom to visit the day after Christmas)

Yes, that is my mom target practicing with Justin's new BB gun

Justin, with eye protection so he doesn't "shoot his eye out"

Hannah doesn't get much snow where she comes from

winter is for making cookies

My mom giving her grandsons spy equipment, robots, and microscopes

Ryan with his monkeys
Jonathan's swords (these are the kind they use for martial art practice and fencing!)
Justin's new BB gun
Hope you have enjoyed your winter!