FunThingsToDoWithUrKidz

We are always looking for ways to incorporate old toys with new toys. Recently both my kids have started loving legos, leaving the car phase behind.  So we came up with this idea to get the most out of all the toys. It ended up being a lot of fun and even a chance to learn. We talked a little about velocity and raced cars. It ended up being a fun play time idea!

Some people have them extra large "get along" shirts for  when their kids misbehave and need space but we do it different here and we have found that when my kids are not being forced to "hug it out" or sit in a oversize shirt they figure out their problems way quicker and better. Now let me say no, not every kid is the same and that big shirt might work for you but if it is not try something like this.  What we do is set up hunts. Some lead to treasure (if being rewarded) some are just for fun(maybe leading to a park for some play time). Some things they do separate and some things they need to do together to move on to the next spot/clue. It might take a few moments to write out clues but watching them figure out how to solve their problems/disagreements is rewarding. It gives them skills they will use for a lifetime. 

This word wall is something we have always done and found helpful. You can make a word wall as decorated as you would like but for my kids I found simple was better for them. To hang all words up I used velcro dots found at my local  dollar tree, they did not take off any paint but if you are worried about that you can try double sided tape. I really like the velcro because kids can remove words as needed, if you like to play games with the words it makes it easier to do so. Another idea is making two different parts to a word wall. You can do a section for words they know and words they still need to work on. All in all after 3 years I have found it very helpful to have the words hanging up for kids to see and study. Feel free to try it out and let me know how it helps your child!

My daughter has recently found out what American Girl is all about and of course like many girls is in love. She asked me if we could make mini books for her toys and so we got to it. We googled and printed out mini books and even covered some empty tic tac containers with book covers to make them look like real books. It was a pretty easy craft and came out pretty well.

It has been a long time sense I have been on here but I am happily back! We have recently took a trip to our local dollar store and sense it has been awhile sense my kids last sensory bin I figured to try one out for fall and see if it is something they are still into. I now have one in second grade and one in  kindergarten  and the days fly by. So yesterday when we had a little down time I brought out the bin and man they were so happy! I realized my kids loved this and I... kind of.... felt bad I stopped making these for them. So without anymore hesitation here is our fall bin!~ We included~(all from the dollar store) Fake pumpkins Different fall decor fake beaded corn hay colored straw potpourri Please note~ Everything I included in my bin was safe for my older kids. If you have younger childern try these ideas instead~ fall toys (like little people) Big decor that they can not fit into their mouths real fall leaves  and make sure to always watch childre

AS a kid I would see these gel candles sitting around and of course wanted to play with them but knowing better I never did. Well now that I am a adult and found these candles cheap at a local store I decided to grab two. Really I bought them for a theme dinner but I had another thing in mind the whole time. When the dinner was done I gave each of my kids one.  (Side note these are NOT real candles! there is no fire, only a fake led light and both my kids are old enough to know the difference between this candle I am allowing them to play with and a real one.) First thing they did is what I would have loved to do as a kid and they dug right in. As they played we talked about the texture of each thing. (the gel, sand, seashells, etc.)  I asked them about the smell and even the color of the shells. We covered almost all of the 5 sense but taste! For sure, not edible. lol When they were done everything but the gel went back into the cup and was still used as a light for awhile afte

Everyone knows that time before bed when kids seem to get a second wind, sometimes the energy my kids show close to bed time is crazy. Anyway as summer is now here we love playing with glo sticks and this is when my son got this idea to go on a night time walk with just the glo sticks. It ended up being a lot of fun and got out a lot of energy! Of course if you do not have glo sticks go for a flash light it is just as fun! It was a night way to end the day and get little minds ready for bed.

Nothing better on a hot day then homemade lemonade. It is such a easy drink to make and can easily be sold at kids lemon aid stands. For this recipe you will need either 6 large lemons or about a dozen small ones. We used the small ones just because that is what we found. First thing is to squeeze all the juice out of each cut lemon. We do have a hand juicer, you know the ones to place the lemon on and press down but that proved to be a little hard for little hands so we moved on to just squeezing them into a bowl. After you have all  the juice fill a pitcher up with 2 quarts of cold water. Add the lemon juice and mix in 1 cup of sugar. Let it chill in the fridge until you want to use it and pour over ice. This was great on a hot day to enjoy and my kids loved that they hand made it. Just be careful of the lemon juice, my daughter did manage to get it into her eye. Always wash hands before and after dealing with food/drink. ENJOY!

This is a great idea for learning just about anything, if there is flash cards for a subject  I suggest doing this. What is even better is I found everything needed at my local dollar store(same as pound shops in the UK and Dollarama in Canda). Also try online for these supplies before dishing out a lot of money, I know some office store sell these items for way more then needed.  Anyway on the to the project...For this you need the flash cards, book rings, and hole puncher. You hole punch a hole into each card and just simply ring them together. It is great for keeping cards together and stop them from disappearing. Just make sure you hole punch each card in about the same area and on the same side so they all face the same.  Keep our kids learning this summer, try giving these on long road trips! Have a great Morning, Afternoon, or Evening!  Thanks for reading! :)

Fun outside game to get kids thinking! Let each kid take a turn drawling something and have everyone else guess what it is. Great easy game to keep kids guessing and having fun....and parents can easily get involved. I am still trying to guess what my son drew in this picture....can you?

I love reducing, reusing and recycling so when a new dinning table was being built and scrap wood was left over it was only natural for my mind to stay turning and thinking of ways to reuse this scrap wood.  The answer was simple...building blocks! My kids love building so I went to work on this scrap wood. First sanding down the sides, making sure no sharp pieces were left, then dying them in food coloring water. Once done you just leave them out to dry and that is it.  Notes if you try this at home~ Gel food coloring works better then liquid (purple was gel and rest were liquid) Make sure the wood is dry before dying (If you want bright colors this matters, my kids really wanted to play so waiting for wood to dry.... witch could take days ...was not a option...maybe putting them in a oven could have helped this...unsure)   I did not do this but if you want these blocks to last a long time it might be worth looking into covering them with a weather stain or paint to help pr

We always have lots of neighborhood kids around during the summer so I am always looking for new ideas that gets them sharing and most of all being creative. This idea was a new one to try and its a big dry erase mat using a dollar store clear shower liner. Now for other this may be even cheaper but I had to buy the markers(we are still in that not closing the markers stage) too so really it cost me $4 for everything.  After we are done doing this activity witch can also be done inside we brought out the dollar store water squirts, colored some water in bins and let them squirt the liner to make a different piece of art. That worked fine and washed away after but I am thinking it would look cooler with a white shower liner instead.  (will be doing a post on this shortly) Another way to play is to make car tracks and a city and use little cars to play. Another thing it is great for is play doh! keeps clean up a breeze and off of any carpet. Great for any craft time to keep cl

Recently I made my way to my local dollar store(same as Poundland in UK) and I am so happy I did. There was so many bins and buckets in many colors. So here is how I cleaned up my kids summer toys. For small balls, chalk, and bubbles I grabbed 3 small bins as seen above. For water toys I grabbed a big blue bin and I made sure all bins I bought had holes rather they were for wet toys or not. We got small bugs in our storage room and I am hoping the holes would kept bugs from setting up home in the bottom of the bins. Some other ideas we like to use but have not yet are... Trash bin for bigger balls or large shoe rack works too Clothes hamper for pool toys & Mesh bag for sand toys Before we really even got some what organized we use to use crates but I found that with many kids going threw creates to find certain toys it quickly got messy so I really like the idea of having bins for certain toys. I also like that the bins are smaller then the crates we were using so that

One way  to reuse them Easter eggs instead of having them collect dust. Grab some soil and seeds and let your child start their own garden. These eggs make for good seed starter containers(make sure the eggs have the little hole before planting, it is needed for draining water)  and once the sprout is big enough can easily be taken out and placed in a garden or pot.  I will updated as our seeds grow but this is a idea we have done before and know it works. HAPPY EASTER! P.s. this idea works great with real egg shells too! and once the sprouts grow they can be planted as is in the egg shell.

Easy to make origami cup that can hold food or water, or  can be a bird feeder! for fake or real birds lol Step one~ Fold a piece of origami paper in half so you make a triangle, seen in pic 2 Step 2~ then fold one tip over to meet the one side as shown in pic 3, then do the other side as seen in pic 4 Step 3~bend down one flap of the top to go over one side as seen in pic 5 To finish  flip the other side over the same as before and open the cup up to use. 

I am a Philly born and raised girl so coming to this area has been different for me, I am trying to learn of new fun places to explore. Any places let me know! Pic1 Pic2 Pic3 Pic4 Pic5 Pic6 Pic7 Pic8 Pic9 Pic10 Pic11 Pic12

Need~ Room temperature water (has to be room temperature and it is easier to do this in a bowl then a cup)  nail polish in different colors plastic eggs A place to let them dry Firs thing to do is drop some nail polish in the water, if the water is not room temperature then it will sink and you need it to float to work. Try using a tooth pick and swirl around the nail polish to get a different effect. Once you have a pattern you like dip the eggs on the top of the water and roll them around till covered. We tried to use gloves for this but it ended up very slippery and found just wiping hands between dipping eggs worked just find for clean up. Set out to dry in a well vented room and that is it. Me and my daughter both loved this craft and wished we had more spring colors to work with but really they still came out beautiful! Highly recommend for any older kid, they make great room decor. 

Plastic eggs seem to  multiply between Easter seasons, while they wait in a storage bin I am not sure what goes on. So every Easter season I let my kids play with them, in hopes some break and need to be thrown away. lol This year we are focused on reusing them any way we can. Besides just letting them play egg hunt, we tried out this stacking game. The way to win is to make our stack the highest using the most eggs.  It ended up being a lot harder then it looked. Another way to play is to take turns stacking one half of a egg at a time and then who ever drops the tower is out. The game ends when only one person is left. Great game for fine motor  skills!

Easy to make but I would suggest making it a parent/kid craft and using hot glue to put it together, if that can not happen regular glue works also. It is a universal craft that can be done in many ways!

All you need for this is puppy/dog treats and a cupcake tin. Training treats are best because they  are not fatty so a pup or dog doesn't gain much weight form eating these. Place a treat in each cup and place a ball on top. That's it, let your dog or puppy have fun trying to get the treats out.  It took our puppy about 20 mins to get them all and my kids enjoyed doing this activity with him and cheering him on as he tried to remove the balls.

Getting threw any road trip can be tough on kids and even harder on the parents. So recently we took a road trip to pick up our new puppy and this is how we survived. :) ~First thing we did was make busy bags. Cheap little things went into a bag to keep kids busy during the ride. (I suggest staying away from the balls and bubbles some people add, balls can roll and get caught under the drivers peddle and bubbles seem to never go out the window for us and we tend to end up with a soapy car.) ~Second thing to remember is snacks! Plan ahead if you will stop for food or will pack snacks. We decided to pack snacks. Each kid got their own bag with small snacks for along the way. Try using organizers to store food for trips. ~Something to look into is games like~ I-Spy Road trip Bingo (search for free printable ones) License Plate game (try to find a plate for mall 50 states) 20 Questions The singing game (one person starts a song and the others have to connect the song and keep

Need~ Candle wax ( I normally have pieces left over from old candles) glue liquid starch This is a adult helping craft!(this is not edible no matter how nice it smells lol) but once it is done it is great for play and for testing your sense of smell. The first thing to do is pour one bottle of glue into a bowl. Then melt a little bit of wax either on the stove or in the microwave. Once melted add it to the glue and mix. Last slowly add in liquid starch and mix till slime forms. It does not take much starch. Once done it should not be hot and should be ready for play. We used a old cupcake candle and when we were done playing we used the candle jar for storage. As long as it is air tight the slime will last for a very long time! Here is a video showing how I made it~  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPjYJMTJXu4

Fun game for summer All you need is sponges, chalk and water. Make goals and have each kid take turns throwing a wet sponge to see what number they hit. Who ever gets the highest amount of points win. Trying moving a foot back each time you hit a number to make the game harder. 

This is one of the best slime recipes ever! List of things you will need~ iron fillings (easily bought online) glue liquid starch strong magnet Step 1~ Pour one bottle of glue into a bowl or cup and mix in iron fillings.I used about half a small bottle. Step 2~ SLOWLY add liquid starch, it is best to start with a small amount and only add more if needed. Otherwise it will come out like rubber. It should still work but I personally like it more following. Mix till slime forms, it is best to mix with hands. That is it. I also suggest buying new magnets as old ones might not be that strong after sitting. I found ones like these at my local craft store, we did try kid ones but they were not strong enough. Adult supervision required, as always :) Nothing about this craft is edible but it is all really neat! Note~ This can be turned into a science lesson! Expand this activity and talk all about magnets.  Video will be up shortly for this activity.

School work is something that just collected in one bag or the other for years. This school year I was determined to do something with it all. So the first thing I did to get this all organized was go threw it all and decided what was worth keeping. I kept things like progress reports, first day items, any awards, and some things my daughter has had trouble with learning. (I keep that in case she needs to look over it again in the future.) Anything else went into recycling.  This is step will be a lot easier when you dont have piles to go threw and only have to go threw what your child brings home. Then I hole punched anything that could go in a binder and anything that couldn't went into the front or back pocket. This has made keeping personal papers for future use so much easier and my daughter enjoys looking threw the things she has made and done now. :)

Growing  gummy bears is a fun experiment for any gummy bear lover. First collect everything you will need. For us this includes water, oil, soda, gummy bears and  cups. Place some gummy bears in each cup and fill with a different thing. Then take guesses on what will happen in each cup. Give it a few hours then look at the results!

Need~  Paper paint stapler glue First step is to make the clovers that will go on top of the picture. To do this cut strips of green paper, stable the ends together and push down the middle to make a heart shape. If you want you can make a stem but ours did not work out well so we ended up just painting them on. Next let our child paint a rainbow however they want. They can not go wrong with this step. Each picture will be as unique as each kid. Now let the paint dry. Once the paint is dry I used hot glue and glued the clovers on where the kids choose. I guess you could use other glue but I did not know if it would stay as well. When finished try hanging the picture up where the sunlight will hit it, maybe even in a window. 

All hearts dog card Made from paper, glue, and paint Candy hearts uplifting door When your kid needs a reminder of how amazing they are! Done with paper, markers, and tape.Had sayings like you are amazing, you are smart, and you rock! Tin foil kisses Made with tin foil, paper, glue, and markers. Just glue tin foil to a piece of paper then cut out a kiss shape and add a top. Then decorate.  More crafts here  https://www.facebook.com/pg/FunThingsToDoWithUrKidz/photos/?tab=album&album_id=487797971262464