Guest Post at Tutorial Tuesday

 Today I am guest blogging at Cachey Mama's Classroom for

My guest post is all about planning preschool activities. Feel free to click on the above button to link to the post. Happy Planning!

Tickle Monster Fun!

 I found an awesome 6 Week Summer Reading Adventure at Mom on Timeout that looks so fun! Here are the rules:

• Pick your favorite children’s book
• Blog about the book inspired activity, recipe or craft
• Stop by and link up!
• The post can be old or new – any and all book related posts are welcome!
• You can link up below or at Mom on Timeout and your post will be visible on both blogs
• You don’t have to but we would love to have you follow along here or Facebook!
• At the end of our 6 weeks ALL of you who have linked up will be eligible to win a copy of Tickle Monster by Josie Bissett!

We are very blessed to already own a copy of Tickle Monster as it was given to Baby Brother as a baby gift! It is a precious, fun book. I love the colors, the rhyming words and the illustrations in this book!  I was so excited when I saw all of the awesome ideas here to match the book. Many of the activities we did came from this link. If we did end up winning the book by chance, I would gift it to a friend!

So tonight I pulled out our book and allowed the fun to begin. Our book came in a cool box with 2 tickle gloves! So fun to put our fingers through the holes and tickle each other!

The boys were ready to read and tickle!

We made silly faces together! In the middle of the book the Tickle Monster encourages you to do this.

We also made play doh monsters by using our play doh, googly eyes, and Mr Potato Head parts.

I even made a tickle monster too. I often facilitate the play instead of joining in it. This time I played with play doh too. Then I handed the camera to JP, not too bad. :) And you get to see the whole living room. Oh well!

Then we made our own Tickle Monster drawings. I helped draw the outline and the boys colored them. I loved the way that JP added a lot of detail to his character.

While reading the book we discussed rhyming words and body parts. We had a lot of fun with this awesome book!

Linked up to some of these awesome  parties!

Beach Theme Tutoring

Since becoming a stay at home mom, I have tutored students when I can.  I enjoy tutoring as I can use my teaching gifts, help a student and family, and earn a little income for our family. It is a win-win! Recently this spring I had the privilege to tutor a fourth grade talented student. When Baby Brother joined our family I took a little break from tutoring, then this week I picked it up again.

During the summer I try to make the tutoring sessions as fun as possible. I recently discovered Teachers pay Teachers. It is an online marketplace where teachers buy and sell original downloadable educational materials, hard goods and used educational resources. It is an awesome site! There are many free lessons and activities available. I found two great multiplication games to use in tutoring. Then I had an idea to play "Multiplication Toss". I found a beach ball at the Dollar Tree that I wrote numbers on. We tossed the ball to each other and whatever numbers our thumbs landed we multiplied those two numbers together.

Overall we had a fun time together pretending we were at the beach!

Father's Day 2012

Happy Father's Day 

to the most amazing Daddy to our three blessings!

We began our fun day to honor Daddy by making whatever he wanted for breakfast. He requested banana pancakes. This is one of THE best banana pancake recipes ever! Keep reading for the recipe. :) I have decided that breakfast is my favorite meal to make for my family and I love involving these sweet boys.

CA loves to help. He happily grabs his stool and joins me! Here he is mashing the bananas.

JP is a little more reluctant to help or too busy playing. He did join us to hold the recipe and snap a picture.

The boys were so excited to give Daddy their card. The boys are very much into super heroes these days and Daddy's card was a Spider Man card.

 I love using this "You are Loved" plate for special days! I used to display it in my kitchen years ago and now I use it often for birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, and any other fun, exciting event in our family. Why only display the pretty items we own? Why not use them for the ones we love!

This banana pancake recipe is my all time favorite breakfast recipe. I received it from a fellow mama of preschoolers a few years back at MOPS. I make this delicious recipe at least 2-3 times a month. :) It is SO easy and yummy!

Banana Pancakes
1- 1/4 cup flour
1 Tbsp sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup milk
2 Tbsp oil
1 egg
2-3 ripe bananas

Mix together egg, milk, oil and mashed bananas. Stir in flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Cook over medium heat, add more milk if batter is too thick.


Are you wondering what this sweet bundle of joy did the whole morning while we made and ate banana pancakes?

 He slept right through all the excitement and yummy breakfast!

Here are the most awesome men in my life!

a

Happy Father's Day, Honey! We love you!

 Linked up to some of these awesome parties! 

Summer Bucket List 2012

School's Out for Summer!!! 

Yea!!! This means the Daddy of our family is home with us more and we ALL love that! The last few weeks of his school year was a fun count down for the boys! And still 2 weeks into summer they ask him daily, "Do you have to go to work, Daddy?!" To which he happily replies "Nope!" He loves teaching and coaching, but thankfully he LOVES being with his family too! And I LOVE the help! Ok, how many times can I write "love" in one paragraph??! I digress!

So I found this awesome intentional summer plans blog post that has really helped me to be sure to plan our summer fun. Feel free to check it out here. There is an awesome printable there with great questions to help plan your summer activities. In the years past I feel like I've looked up and thought, "Well, what did we do all summer?" And I don't want to feel that way come August 1st. I want to be our plans to be intentional and meaningful.

So here is our family's summer bucket list:

• VBS for JP (CA is too young this year)-Check! He had a blast!

• Swim lessons for both the boys
• Work on a few house projects
• Enjoy the http://www.kidsbowlfree.com/ program.
• Visit the Children's Museum a few times before our gifted annual pass expires. 
• Run through the sprinklers a lot and enjoy our neighborhood swimming pool on hot days!  Check!

• Enjoy our first family vacation to Colorado in July!
• Visit with cousins and family more too! 
• Mommy gets to tutor 1x a week (Yay! I love to do this as it fills my teaching fix and brings in a little cash!)
• Mommy is enjoying a Proverbs 31 Bible study, if you need a great Ladies Bible Study this summer feel free to follow along at Women Living Well
• Enjoy our family time together through visits to the gym, library and fun crafts and activities together! 

What are your "fun in the sun" plans?

Keepin' it simple...

The learning activities at our house have had one theme lately: simple! I have reminded myself that the boys are still learning through the simple things like: preschool books with dry erase markers, free drawings, puzzles, playdoh, riding bikes and walks. Since Baby Brother has joined our family I just haven't had it in me to plan many detailed lessons or activities. And that is OK by me! Here are a few snapsnots of our fun over the past few weeks.

His tongue still goes out when focused!

Silly faces with TC!

The boys love him so much!

He is now 6 weeks old and smiling often!

Daddy's Little Rookies in matching pjs!  The boys fought over who was going to hold Baby Brother in this pic!

The Fab Five enjoying the beginning of summer!

The Daddy of our family is now home for the summer! Yahoo!!! We are thrilled to have him home with us! He is a wonderful, hands on, helpful Daddy and husband and I am thrilled to have his help. We have a lot of fun activities on our Summer Bucket List. :) Stay tuned for summer updates!