10 Ways to Make Today Magical

Happy Monday!

Sorry to be MIA for so long again.  Let’s see if I can do better this month!  🙂 

Here are a few ways to make some memories with your kiddos this week…..

1.  Head outside to enjoy the spring weather for some simple, old fashioned fun together.  Blow bubbles (the photo above is from about 8 years ago when the local paper caught me playing with Jack and Victoria in the front yard).  Fly kites. Toss the frisbee.  There’s a reason those things have lasted so many generations.  They’re just fun!

2. Paint some walking sticks.  Head out to the woods and found some good specimens, and then bring them home and decorate them.

3. Play magic eight ball radio.  This silly game is something my husband and our sixteen year-old, Victoria, came up with on their way to play practice together last month.  All they do is ask the radio a question (How is opening night going to go?  Should the family go to Sioux Falls tomorrow?  How is Alex going to act at the restaurant?) and then press “seek” on the radio.  The first line or sentence that someone says or sings after it finds a station is the answer.  Sometimes they have to press seek a few times to get a proper answer. The answers tend to be pretty funny, and our whole family was laughing when they taught us how to play last week.  🙂

4.  Make some yarn eggs together.  We first did this craft when my Annalee was a preschooler.  She’s now fifteen!  Here are the instructions.

5.  Do some dice drawing!  Here’s a free printable to play this fun art game, or you could make up your own together.

6.  Go for a walk in the rain (or after the rain) and go puddle stomping together.

7.  Make some Ivory soap clouds in the microwave and then paint them.  Here are the easy instructions and the science behind what happens.

8.  Do some chalk art around the house and yard together.  Parents magazine says:

Walk around outside your home with a piece or two of chalk and look for interesting patterns — eyes in knots of wood, oddly shaped cracks in the sidewalk or driveway, a nail hole in the wall — that can be turned into a little picture with a few quick strokes. Let your imagination lead you; chalk isn’t permanent. Take a photo for yourself, then leave your art for someone else to find.

9.  Do a photo shoot together.  Kids of all ages love to pose for photos, and then you can play with filters and photo apps to perfect the shots.  This is also one of my kids’ favorite ways to make memories with each other.  My big kids are always getting the little ones to pose for them.  🙂

Photo by Jack (age 9), edited by Anna (age 12)

Photo of Fiona (age 3) by Anna (age 14)

10.  Make some DIY cardboard box kits!  I absolutely love this idea from Inner Child Fun.  Head over for the easy instructions.

And with that, chickadees, I’m off to try to catch up on the next 150 things I’m behind on!  Have a magical week!

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10 Ways to Make Today Magical

(March nature calendar by J.A. Partridge in Natural Science Through the Seasons:  100 Teaching Units, 1946, via A Holy Experience. Click to enlarge)

Happy Monday!

I’m back from my blogging hiatus.  Daryl is recovering well from his hip replacement surgery.  It will still be some time before he’s fully mobile, but it’s all going great so far.

Here’s a few ways to make some memories with your kids this week.

1.  If you’re lucky enough to live in the right climate, go maple syrup tapping.  This is a can’t-miss experience for those of us who live near sugar maple trees this time of year.

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We got a gallon of sap the first day we tapped our back yard maple but the weekend's blizzard should put it all on hold. . . . . #mapletapping #forageandharvest #wildfood #maplesap #wildkids #naturestudy #natureschool #oldskills #diykids #homeschool #homeeducation

A post shared by Alicia Bayer (@magicandmayhem) on Apr 13, 2018 at 7:58pm PDT

 

 

2.  Use recycled newspaper to make plantable muffin tin pots for seedlings.  Visit Hands are full, Hearts are full for the wonderful tutorial.

3.  Make some whimsical finger puppets.  Check out das-wolkenschaf’s photostream for more wonderful inspiration (edit: it’s no longer online, unfortunately).

4.  Tape a length of string across the room as a net and play balloon volleyball inside. 

5.  Do some nature studies.  This is the perfect time of year for lots of spring nature fun.  Here’s ten ideas to get you started.

 

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The littles and I head back to Minnesota in the morning. We had a wonderful week of foraging, playing, talking, laughing and learning with some of our favorite people. ❤️ . . . . . #goodfriends #homeschoolers #magicalchildhood #homeeducation #foraging #unpluggedchildhood #lastchildinthewoods #kidsforaging #foragingfamily #wildandfreechildren #freerangekids #natureclassroom #homelearning #funschool #handsonlearning #letthembelittle #foragers #springforaging #getoutside #waldorfhomeschool #charlottemasonliving #eclectichomeschool #learningbydoing #learningbyplaying #learningbyliving #friendsthatfeellikefamily

A post shared by Alicia Bayer (@magicandmayhem) on Apr 4, 2018 at 1:34am PDT

6.  Buy or make a blank book and start a family cookbook.  Make up a new recipe for it each week together.  Some good simple dishes include smoothies, soups and jazzed up grilled sandwiches.  Encourage the kids to think up really fabulous names for each recipe.

7.  Make a painter’s tape maze and then have the kids dribble or kick a ball through it.

(Original source unknown)

8.  Make a sticky spider web.  Hands on as we Grow came up with this wonderful activity where you make a painter’s tape spiderweb and throw newspaper balls at it and try to make them stick. 

Visit http://handsonaswegrow.com/halloween-activity-a-sticky-spider-web/ for more information and to pin this idea.

9.  Make some hand puppets from old stuffed animals.  Simply cut a slit in the back or cut the legs off an old stuffed animal, remove most of the stuffing (or all), and let kids start putting on some shows.  🙂

 

10. Let the kids play with their food! Give them an assortment of fruit pieces and let them go nuts.  This idea is courtesy of my son, Jack.  He and his little brother even set up a store and made everybody fake money so we could all buy the ones we liked!  Look at the lovely creations my boys made this morning.  🙂

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Jack and Alex made these! They even made fake dollars so everybody can buy the ones the like. 🙂 #cookingfun #cookingwithkids #homeschoolers #happymonday

A post shared by Alicia Bayer (@magicandmayhem) on Mar 4, 2013 at 9:24am PST

 

And with that, my pretties, I’m off to tackle the next 99 things on my to-do list.  Have a wonderful week!

10 Ways to Make Today Magical

Happy Monday!  I hope you and your kiddos enjoyed Halloween (for those who celebrate) and you enjoyed your weekend (for those who don’t)!

Here are a few ways to make some memories with your sweeties this week….

1.  Announce to the kids that you’re all going to wear the alphabet!  Go on a family adventure to dress each other with every letter of the alphabet.  For instance…

Apples on baby’s shirt
Blue pants
Corduroy jumper
a Dress on Mama…..

You’ll have to get really creative and silly for some of the letters!  See how many you can do!

2.  Keep dressing in costume all week.  Why put away the dress up stuff after just one day?  Have pirates, monsters, movie stars and other fun characters around especially at mealtimes and such.

3.  Bake fresh rolls for supper.  It’s easier than you might think, especially if you make the dough together the night before.  Then experiment with ways to prepare them (Parker House rolls, crescent rolls, fan tans…).

3. Adopt a person.  As a family, decide on somebody who needs some magic.  Find an anonymous way to do a good thing for her or him.

4.  Mix some pumpkin pie spice in a batch of homemade playdough for a wonderful fall scent.

5.  Be randomly silly at least once a day.  Suddenly stick your tongue out at your child at dinner time.  Make faces at your hubby while he’s not looking and see if you can crack up the kids.  Leave a groaner of a joke in your child’s lunch box…

6. Do something fun with leftover Halloween candy, like science experiments or decorating cupcakes to deliver to a local fire station.

7.  Be the Roundbottoms.  Or your own version of a nutty family.  This is especially silly in public, if you get into character together and make it up as you go along.  🙂

8.  Bake up some pumpkins to make your own puree and bake some fresh goodies.

9.  Bob for apples.  It’s harder than you think!

10. Hammer the  jack-o-lanterns.  You’re not going to let them go to waste are you?  Show the kids how to pound golf tees or nails into them in patterns, and then when you’re all done, just ruthlessly bash.  I tell you, there’s something surprisingly satisfying in bashing a pumpkin.  🙂  If that means something deep and terrible about me psychologically, I don’t want to know!

Have a wonderful week!

10 Ways to Make Today Magical

Hello magical people!  It’s the start of a fabulous new week and here’s some ways to make the most of it…

1.  Buy a pack of toilet paper for the sole purpose of goofy fun.  Wrap your kids up into mummies, make toilet paper streamers and run through the yard, toss it and see how long you can get the tail as you throw, experiment with getting it wet and having “snowball” fights with it… If you can, compost it when you’re finished.

2.  Take a field trip to someplace you’ve never been in your community– a factory, museum, or even an old graveyard.  Really explore it and talk about what you find.

3.  Play detective.  Take the kids to a “scene of the crime” like an empty lot or quiet park.  Give them notebooks and have them really look at the surroundings, then have them make up a story of what happened there based on the evidence.  There are two tire tracks but only one set of footprints, so one person never got out of the car…. have them come up with their own stories.

4.  Make a canopy out of fabric, sheets or lace curtains over your child’s bed.  You can make something for the night or something more permanent.  Kids love the privacy and the fun of canopies!

6.  Sit down and paint, sketch or sculpt with your kids.  Sure, you give them crafts to do but how often do you sit down for an hour and join in?  They’ll love the extra attention and you might not realize how much fun you’ll have!

7.  Look at old videos of your children as babies, and even of the times before they were born.  Talk about how you felt during those times and retell the stories that go along with them.

8.  Do three sweet things today for each family member.  They can be tiny little things, just something to show you love them that you know will make them happy.  Buy your honey a big bag of his favorite treats and bring it to him after supper.  Leave the dishes and go read a story to your toddler.  Give extra monkey hugs (in our family, we dip kids upside down and holler “monkey hug!” and swing them back up– then repeat until exhaustion), and so on.

9.  Have the kids put on a show for the family.  They can dance, sing, act, you name it.  Ask them to spend the day preparing it, then offer to charge admission after supper (to you, older relatives, whoever).  It can be a talent show, variety show, or whatever they like.  Help them put together costumes, music, and the works.  For little ones, you can do the same thing but scale down the preparation.  Let them wear tutus and spin around with scarves, then sing “I’m a little teapot” for doting onlookers.

10. Find a park that offers something different like paddle boats, horseback riding, or even horseshoes.  Spend a lazy day connecting and having fun.

What are your plans for making some magical moments this week?  Please leave them in the comments!

Don’t forget to take care of you!

Ten Ways to Make Today Magical

Happy Monday!  It’s that time of the week again.  Here’s another list of things to do with your kiddos to make some memories.

1.  Go on a neighborhood treasure hunt.

2.  Wake up an hour early and go for a breakfast picnic together before work and school.  It doesn’t have to be anyplace fancy– up on the roof, in the stairwell, in the back yard or any place different.

3.  Get out the hula hoops and see how long you can each keep them going.  I can’t believe how much harder it is for me now than when I was a kid!  It’s silly fun and you get a good workout too.

4.  Give your children corners of the yard for their own gardens.  They can plant easy seeds or purchased plants or even transplant plants from other parts of the yard.  Even weeds can be treasured in a child’s garden!

5.  Make up customized CD’s with songs with your children’s names in the titles, sentimental songs from when they were little and other sweet memories.

6.  Make up some task treasures. Paint or write numbers on small round rocks or dragon’s tears.  Write up a list of little tasks that correspond to each number.  They can be educational (spell your name, say the 4 times tables), home related (sweep the stairs, wipe the counter), family related (tell me something good that happened today, say something nice about another family member) or silly (cluck like a chicken, spin in circles till you fall down).  Add one special one for a treat your kids will really covet (an hour of doing anything you want with mom or dad, movie night, etc.).  Kids can take turns drawing treasures and completing the assignments, and can do as many as they like to try to nab the prize one.  My kids love even the chores, just because of the novelty of picking them out of a jar.  🙂  Change the master list as often as you like.

7.  Have a tea party.  Invite dolls and teddy bears if the kiddos like.  Don’t forget to wear hats!

8.  Leave your child a list of things you love about her on her pillow.

9.  Go puddle stomping.  No puddles?  Hose down something that needs some spring cleaning and create your own.

10. Get out the face paints (or use makeup) and do clown faces on the kids.  Then go on a walk and see how many smiles you get!

Have a magical week!  Don’t forget to take care of you!