On Hiatus

Sorry for my absence lately.  I’m in Florence Nightingale mode for a bit.

My sweetie got a new hip last Friday at the Mayo.

He’s had arthritis since he was two years old, and as a child he was told that he’d be in a wheelchair by the time he was 18.  He lasted a lot longer, but the time came when his hip was too demolished to hold up any longer.

So last week we had a family vacation of sorts in Rochester while the doctors worked their magic. 

Surgery was tricky.  His femur splintered when they inserted the artificial hip so they had to wrap it with cable, and then his pelvis was so disintegrated that they had to put part of his femur behind the new hip to build up the space.

Leave it to my hubby to keep the Mayo on their toes. 

He came through great, though, and as soon as he was back in his room he asked for a phone so he could call and wish his dad a happy birthday.

We’re home now and we’re all helping out while he recovers.  He is doing wonderfully, but because of the complications it will be a little longer recovery. 

Lucky for us, winter is a little slow around here anyway.

Oh yeah, and we have sick kids now, too.  Never a dull moment.

I might be a little quiet for a while.  I’ll be back soon. 

Go make some magic and come back in the comments and tell me all about it! 

See you soon!

A Little Snow and Cold Fun When You Don’t Have Snow and Cold!

If you’re lucky enough not to live in one of the freezing cold places right now, you can still take part in lots of fun with snow and ice!

Here’s a list of ten ways to make the day magical, warmer style for warmer climates.  And here’s a little round-up of online snowy fun.  Help the kids make some snowmen, “cut” some snowflakes and more. 

10 Ways to Make Today Magical

Happy Monday!  I hope you’re staying warm in your little corner of the world.  We have some crazy temperatures here lately (even for Minnesota!).  I’m hoping it gets above 0 today.  How’s that for a crazy wish? 

Cold, snow or not, here’s a few ways to make some memories with your kids this week….

1.  Make watercolor snowballs.  Just bring in a pan of snow and give the kids some watercolor paints and paintbrushes.  They can pack the snow into snowballs and then paint them.  Store them in a bucket in the freezer until you’re ready to return them to the wild.    You can decorate the yard with them or the kids can toss them, but let the kids know they should toss at targets like trees and not people since they freeze a little hard.

2.  Go sledding inside!  Get out a big towel and drag the kids around the kitchen floor.  Kids can pull each other around, too.

3.  Make a “gingerbread house” for the birds and squirrels.  Get together some graham crackers, peanut butter or sunbutter and a variety of bird seeds and then assemble like a regular house with peanut butter as the icing/glue.  Take a picture of your masterpiece and then leave it where it’s visible from inside so you can watch to see who visits.

4.  If you’ve got snow where you live, head to one of the spots where the snowplows dump it off to play.  It makes for instant mountain ranges!

5.  Get glow in the dark paint and help the kids write secret messages and pictures on their ceilings.

6.  Use kitchen gadgets to make supper fanciful.  For instance, use a cookie press to pipe out mashed potato stars.

7.  Make giant ice suncatchers.  Here’s the easy instructions.

8.  Make up a couple dozen fortunes and stash them in cereal boxes, snacks, the cookie jar, etc.  Make some especially silly (Beware of odd rabbits today.  You will have a monkey on your head….) and some sappy (Your mama loves you more than peanut butter cups.  I’m proud of you…).  Slip some in drawers and leave some for your sweetie, too.

9.  Take advantage of the cold and do some cold weather science experiments.  Vaporize hot water in the air, blow frozen bubbles, experiment with salt and water on colored ice, and more.

10.  Start a pride jar.  Every time you’re proud of your child, write the reason on a slip of paper and put it in a pretty jar. Encourage the kids to peek in their jars!

And with that, my pretties, I’m off to do the magical job of catching up on laundry!  Perhaps with a whimsical side of kitchen cleaning…  And a bit of hugs and kisses and crafts and silliness with some marvelous little people scurrying about. 

Have a magical week!

 

 

 

Colorful Shaving Cream Fun!

I’m very sorry for my long absence! 

Five year-old Alex had a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy last week and the recovery has been really hard on him.  We’ve also been out of town to celebrate my birthday and to meet with doctors at the Mayo for my husband to get a long-overdue new hip.  Also, a friend (and magical mama to six kids) died suddenly (click here if you would like to help the family), and I just didn’t feel up to writing for a long time.

But times like these mean we need more magic for our kids (and us), so I’m back on my feet to do my best.

This morning, I got out the shaving cream and food coloring for Alex to have a bit of messy fun. 

I sprayed his name in shaving cream and then had him smooth it out, then dropped about 3 drops of each color (red, blue, green, red) on various parts. 

He used his finger to swirl the colors, then used chopsticks and spoons, making colorful mountains and experimenting with lots of color mixing.

It was a huge hit!  His brother joined in the fun for a while too, and then helped clean it all up. 

I hear it’s good for wood tables, too.  I have no proof, but our 50 year-old wood table can pretty much handle anything at this point. 

This craft works marvelously well in the bath, too, of course!

Hug your kiddos, count your blessings, and make the most of every second that you get with these amazing little people (and the amazing big ones, too).

Happy 2013!

I have written an awful lot of New Year posts on this blog and for the Magical Childhood newsletters over the years.  I started A Magical Childhood when my Annalee was just a baby in my arms as I typed, and next month she is turning 13! 

I am so glad that life kept throwing us unexpected blessings and right now I get to make some magic with just about every age group (my “babies” are now 1, 5, 9, 12 and 14), and that I can still yap at you all in the middle of the night with a little person asleep in my lap.  Thanks for understanding when there are weeks between those yappings, too! 

I, for one, am kind of happy to see 2012 on its way out the door.  This was a rather intense year for our family, especially with Victoria’s cancer diagnosis, sepsis, surgeries and some continuing immune issues.  At the end of it all, though, we’re so blessed and we know it.

I wrote this for New Year’s Eve in 2003, with my baby Jack in my arms.  It seemed appropriate to post again.

I wish you and your families all the best for the new year.  It’s so easy to get caught up in the mayhem and the clutter and the lists of what we ought to be doing.  Don’t forget what the biggest things on your to-do lists should be– having fun, loving the heck out of your children & relishing life.

Slow down.  Give things up.  Laugh it off.  Make each day count, with at least one thing that is magical or truly matters.  And give yourself a break!

And when life gets crazy this year, take the advice of those wisest of people (aerobics instructors) and don’t forget to breathe. 

Happy New Year!!
Alicia   (December 29, 2003)

PS  Click here if you want 10 awesome ways to ring in the new year with kids.  Again, it’s stuff I’ve recycled from various Magical Childhood posts in years past.  I do that a lot!

Here’s wishing us all a truly magical, happy, healthy new year.

A Little Snowy Fun

Got snow?  Here’s a delightful way to use it!

Wouldn’t it be fun to sneak outside tonight and do this to the family car?  Or even all the cars in the parking lot?! 

Happy Sunday!

 

Easy, Sturdy (Free) Building Blocks!

Here’s a little project that we’ve been doing for years.

These fun blocks are so easy!

I was planning on making a set of building blocks for Fiona for Christmas, but she kept trying to manhandle the presents under the tree so I decided to make her a set of “presents” of her own. 

It worked like a charm!

Here’s all you do:

1. Save your cartons of drinks like almond milk and orange juice.  You’ll need two cartons for each block.
2. Cut off the top.  Rinse and dry.
3. Fit one carton into another (open ends facing each other), so that the block is closed on all sides.  This also makes it very sturdy, since it’s basically doubled up.
4. Wrap with wrapping paper or cover with contact paper.  If you use paper, you can seal it with clear contact paper.  You can also tape on family pictures, magazine pages or other fun images before sealing with contact paper.

That’s it!  You can change them whenever you like by simply wrapping them with a new wrapping paper or covering with another layer of paper and contact paper. 

When my bigger kids were little, I made a “marble” set with marble contact paper so it looked like they were building stone buildings. 

You can also use little individual milk cartons (like school lunch size) to make alphabet blocks.