Birthday's, More Ghostly Activities, and Homemade Banana Bread

My husband's birthday was on Saturday and Harmony and I decided that we would make him homemade banana bread in lue of a cake, for he doesn't like cake (that strange man).  :)  

Recipe:

Preheat oven to 325

Prep and Mix:

1/2 cup butter/margerine/oil (your choice)

Pinch of salt

3 ripe banana's

2 cups flour

1 cup sugar

1 teaspoon of baking soda

2 eggs

Additional:

1 tablespoon guava

1 teaspoon vanilla

In the process, I recycled this really cool bottle to use as a tree trunk and then took a branch from my grandparents yard to use to hang our Elmer's Glue Ghosts.  We took some string and hung each one up.

  I had actually originally come up with this idea to for our clay leaves, but for now.. this is adorable and  satisfies the need for halloween decorations just fine.

Enjoy!

Candice S.

Halloween Decorations & Crooked Mirrors

Mama Spider and Baby Spider.

..I swear, my mirror's aren't crooked..it's totally the photographer's fault because her silly husband randomly tossed her memory chip up in the air a week or so ago (don't ask me why, men are strange).  Yet again, I apologize for crappy pictures.

We're having a fun day making Halloween decorations for around the house.  Our house can't be scary- per Harmony, so we made cute spiders and a few ghosts.  So far, this is what we have come up with.  I'll be adding more as we go.  :)  

Traced spiders onto construction paper, cut out, and applied googly eyes.

Spooky Mirror Ghost.  :)

Fun ghost made out of scrap paper and a sharpie marker.  A job for Mom.

Closer view of Baby Spider. 

Happy Thursday!

Candice S.

Wordless Wednesday =)

Love these picture's!

Mark and Harmony- she looks so much like her brother!

Mark and.. well, Mark  :)

Harmony and I being silly.

Enjoy!!!

Candice S.

Super Fun Lunch Idea's At Family Fun

These lunch idea's are priceless, creative, and are sooo much fun!  I think the snail is my favorite!  Enjoy the recipes at Family Fun... I know we are!  =)

Snack-o-lantern

Lady Bugs

Two-Toned Sandwich using Cookie Cutters

Sail Boat with Toothpick Sails

Carrot Patches

Snail Sandwich

Candice S.

Christopher Columbus

Activities, History, and Fun for Columbus Day:

About Columbus :)

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/explorers/page/c/columbus.shtml

http://www.alphabet-soup.net/columbus/columbus.html

For the adults:

Here are some articles that support that Columbus didn't discover America.  Viking Leif Ericson was here almost 500 years before Columbus, not including the fact that Indian's lived in America way before Columbus set foot on their land.

Today, I taught my daughter history that I had learned from when I was a child.. but tomorrow she might be looking at a set of different historical facts or I hope she will.

What are your thoughts on this?  Review the following articles and tell me what you think.  :)

Columbus : Mysteries of History
No Columbus Day at Brown University
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1000Vinland.html

Happy "Columbus" Day and Happy Learning!

Candice S.

Salt Dough Fall Leaves

Harmony and I made decorations for fall.  They came out beautifully.  We first made Salt Dough.

Salt Dough Recipe:

4 Cups Flour

1-2 Cups Water

1 Teaspoon Salt

and knead, knead, knead!  

Little Brother rolling around like a little nut and Harmony attempting a smile..  :) haha.

Set oven at 200 and cook for about 1-2 hours or until dough is hard.

 Harmony and I kneaded the dough and it was PERFECT.  I love this recipe.. I have tried so many other recipes that required cooking on the stove, etc. and they were always a big fat flop!  HA!  I then added in food coloring so I wouldn't have to paint the leaves or our final finished product.  You can leave out the food coloring and use acrylic paint for decorating the salt dough when you take them out of the oven.

I used a butter knife to create the leaf look and then used a pen to poke a hole so we could thread the leaves.  Don't you just love the hand-prints?  The hand prints are beautiful and so unique.  I just love how they came out!  I love, love, LOVE IT!  .. Harmony wanted to use a cookie cutter for the little muffin man and then wanted to make a snake.. so we did.  :)  Overall, I'd score this craft idea as an A+! 

Have a great fall day if you aren't experiencing warm fall weather, as we are! 

Happy Crafting.

Candice S.

Sprout Online . Com :) You have to sing it!

Sprout Online has crafts, recipes, videos, and all sorts of activities that you and your youngsters can participate in together.  Harmony and I have so much fun (when we have time) getting new fun idea's from Sprout and playing their online games, etc.  They have an array of fun resources for learning with your kids.

This is "My Refrigerator", which allows us to save our favorite crafts, upload our crafts where they can show them on some of Sprout's shows.. like, The Sunny Side Up Show, The Goodnight Show w/ Nina and Star, and Caillou.  Those three are Harmony's favorite, must watch, shows!  :)  You can also share recipes, crafts, print out AMAZING learning tools, and so much more!  *I am the one doing the "clicking", as we feel Harmony isn't quite ready for computer usage yet.   

 Go take a look...it's fun, creative, and it's FREE! 

Candice S.

It's Fall Baby.. Even Though It's 85 Degrees Outside!

We have had a busy week, yet again.  This week we had so much fun!!  We crafted our heart's out, baked cupcakes (which are gone..), homemade pancakes, I started my next round of classes, picked our pumpkin, had doctor's appointments, and did some fun Fall inspired crafts!

Remember this post about this fall tree craft from last Monday's Craft Share??  I love how these recycled TP rolls converted into pretty fall trees.  Those are our finger prints!  The brown tree to the right has Harmony's handprint.  :o)

Love the Apple Stamping.  All you is cut an apple in half and put some paint on it and stamp it down on paper.  Pretty, right?  .. Oh and I NEVER EVER EVER buy paint.  I make my own that is safe for consumption, just in case, and it is oh-so-easy to clean up or off of anything.

Homemade Paint and Finger Paint:

1 Tablespoon Flour
1 Tablespoon Water (or less up to you)
Add in food coloring

Harmony learned the letter "D" in school and is working on some fun fall projects.  One of her questions have been, "Mommy, why doesn't it feel like fall?  If it were Fall then the leaves would change color, right?"  ..Of course, I reply with something like..we don't live in Massachusetts anymore honey, this IS SW Florida.

Mark Jr. also had his doctor's appointment this week, which has led me to pursue some research on a variety of topics for my, "The Intuitive Parent" series.  Mark Jr. is healthy, active.. and weighs a whopping 20 pounds and is 27 inches in length!  My boy is growing up so big!  He's six month's old by the way, and so very active that we are now in the pursuit of baby proofing our home.

Recipe for yummy pancakes, thanks to My Wooden Spoon:

1 Cup of Flour
1 Tablespoon of Sugar
3 Teaspoons of Baking Powder
1/2 Teaspoon of Salt
1 Egg
3/4 Cup of Milk (but I actually used around 1 cup or more, you be the judge of thickened consistency)
2 Tablespoons of Vegetable Oil

I added 1 teaspoon of Vanilla and banana's!

::Blog Share::  I Can Teach My Child's Blog

I Can Teach My Child's Blog has a TON of awesome learning and developing idea's, crafts, and activities that you can do with your kids so please go take a peek.  :)  Here are two really adorable idea's to do for with and for your child that I was really rather impressed with.

My Body Book
Apple Garland- Fruits of the Spirit

Enjoy and Happy Crafting!

Candice S.

I-Spy A Ghost :)

I-Spy Supplies:  Great Value Cherry Jar,  Rice For "Filler", Lincoln Log, Plastic Ring, Fake French Fry, Buttons, A Candy Bracelet, and A Sea-Shell.

We have had a busy school and work week.  Our family is still feeling the leftover congestion of our cold's but we are feeling MUCH better and are now trying to get into the swing of things again.

I decided with all of the uproar of creating I-Spy games in the blogging world, that Harmony and I would take the time to do one ourselves.  Harmony LOVES it!  I basically just went to Harmony's room and dipped, yes "DIPPED", my hand into her toy box and pulled out a handful of small things.  After I added what we wanted into our recycled jar, I then added the rice as the filler.  I took green construction paper to cover the Great Value Brand Label.. and then sealed the lid and paper with hot glue.  

Whaaaa laaa!

Onto making our Halloween Ghosts.  I loved this project and so did Harmony.  Mine is on the left and Harmony's is on the right.  She wanted her Ghost to have a nose.

Supplies:  Elmer's Glue, Black Construction Paper for Nose, Googly Eyes, and Wax Paper.  

It took about 24 hours for dry time.

*I lost my memory card to my camera and would like to say that I am sorry for such poor quality pictures, which are all taken via my Mac webcam.*

Have a great day!!

Candice S.

I'm linking my Ghost Project to: