Dying Easter Eggs

Today Reese and I dyed Easter eggs! It was super quick and easy.

For the dye we used 1/3 cup boiling water, 1 tbsp of white vinegar, and about 1/4 tsp of food coloring. (I reused old applesauce cups for the containers.)

After hard boiling the eggs, we let them cool and wrapped them in rubberbands for a different effect.

After we let them dry, this is what they looked like! (Yes, we only made three. Didn't see the need in making a ton w/ just one child...more children, more eggs.) We also decorated them with stickers.

And because you haven't seen much of the little guy on here lately, here he is tonight before our walk to Dairy Queen. (Hooray for ice cream weather!!!) His little belly (with food all over it) gets me every time. Oh man does he look old here!

Our Letter Window

Reese and I have been working on our letters. She's known her alphabet since she was 2, so we've now moved on to writing each letter and talking about what sounds they make. She's doing so well. This fall we starting making letters to represent a word that started with that letter.

To save on paper, we used the thin cardboard from granola boxes and crackers waiting to be recycled. I usually used the letter of the day that was on Sesame Street that morning. We chose the word together, then I let her decorate it with markers, crayon, paint, collage, etc.

We put it up on the window with tape so she could see it and then got out her whiteboard and markers so she could practice writing that letter.

We are over half way through the alphabet and this is what our window looks like so far!

Y is for Yellow

P is for Pig

R is for Rice

M is for Monster

K is for Kick

Q is for Queen, etc

It's been fun so far since she can see them every day and is constantly saying things like "P makes the 'puh puh puh' sound like the potatoes we're having for supper!" It's soooo cute!

The window was getting kind of full, so we just took the letters down this morning and put them in an "alphabet book" so she can flip through and continue to practice writing her letters.

(And then a little while back I found the fabulous site No Time for Flashcards where that mom did almost exactly the same thing! It is UNREAL how similar our letters turned out, and I thought I was a genius for coming up with such a creative idea on my own. Check out hers for even more ideas!)

She's getting so big! :(

Finally Warming Up!

Yesterday the kids and I played outside in the snow. One of our creations was this snow castle for Barbie!

Our new "Clab Hose"

** UPDATE: I took Neighbor Girl to the library with us this afternoon and she said, "Liz, you're really nice. And I like your shirt." She might have been just sucking up after what happened this afternoon, but it did make me feel like I did the right thing instead of scolding her. With as much time as she spends here, I hope I can be a positive influence on her. Oh, kids. :)

Original Post:

Little B got a new armoir from R+M this weekend and it was the perfect size to build a little fort! Or a castle. Or a club house. It changes frequently. :)

So yesterday with a cleaver and a little duct tape, I hacked away at this box for the kids to play in. It's a little ghetto, but way cute. They played out there for almost 5 hours straight. It's nice to know that if we ever become homeless, I'll be able to provide us adequate shelter!

But today, laughter turned into tears. I let her play outside with Neighbor Girl and Friend, but totally spied on them the whole time to make sure everyone was playing nicely together. Turns out they weren't. For some reason, the girl's claimed the playhouse as their own home and Reese's home was in "the cage" in the backyard behind all the outside toys. She seemed a little sad, but was tolerating it so I didn't say anything. They were playing "let's pretend you are [......] and I'm [.....] okay now it's two hours later and we [......]" and so on.

Then I noticed that they were trying to "lock" Reese out of the house by putting up their shoes in front of the door so that she couldn't get in. Then Neighbor Girl starts YELLING at Reese, telling her to "get me that shoe", "gosh, she never listens" and "now go home!"

(I took a picture of it to show Wade. Ha! strange I know.)

I about lost it.

Reese slowly turned around and started running toward the house bawling, so sad. I came outside and just hugged her while she cried. Having just saw what happened, I told her to go inside for a minute while I talked to Neighbor Girl. Instead of yelling at her (like I wanted to) I put on my teacher hat and asked her what happened and how important it was to not leave anyone out, especially when your at someone else's house. After that they all played well together and seemed to have fun. But it seriously made me so thankful that I get to stay at home w/ my kids to teach them those little lessons on a daily basis.

But MAN was it hard not to just CLOCK this little girl for making my child cry. Ahem.