New Home Makeover 2 (Reading Nook)

We love to read and our kids love to read, so we wanted to create a kid space just for them.  A reading nook. 

We pinned some ideas from pinterest and it ended like this:

The Reading Nook

1.  We turned the old crib into a reading couch and covered the crib mattress with some extra fabric we had from our chairs.  Placed some random pillows on the back of the crib.  A few we had and a few we found on sale at Target!

2.  Got a comfy rug from Target to put on the floor, added pillows and stuffed animals.  

3.  Hung a pallet bookshelf on the wall that we purchased from a talented friend. Thanks, Ty Thorne, love it! 

4.  Put dust jackets of our favorite books in dollar store picture frames and added all of the kids favorite books to the bookshelves. 

5.  Painted some wood letters from the craft store to spell READ and hung them on the wall. 

6.  Also, put a few pics of the kids reading in frames on the bookshelf. 

Maybe this will be Pinterest worthy one day?

Here is where I found inspiration from Pinterest.

We have enjoyed this space a lot.  Hoping it inspires me to start reading again.

Reading time

 

 

New Home Makeover 1 (Wood Floors)

Okay, it has been awhile, but I will blame it on the move to the new house and settling in to a new city.  Here is a fun, frugal thing you CAN do!  Of course, I cheered on my husband and watched the kids while he labored, but it is something anyone can do.  You just need about a week to do it right and let everything dry.  So much cheaper than paying someone and what a great feeling of accomplishment!

My husband has become a handy man.  Paying for someone to do the wood floors was too expensive.  So hubby watched some you tube videos, pulled up the carpet, sanded, stained, and added polyurethane.  The result: beautiful hardwood floors!  Oh yeah, and he painted the wall a neutral color to replace the turquoise too.

So here is the before:

Floors before

Here is the in between:

Working Hard!

And here is the after:

After

If he can do it, you can too!  Rented a sander, picked a stain, polyurethane and let it sit for about a week to dry!  We love them.  Thanks to my hard-working hubby, who was willing to try it.  Now time to rip up some more carpet and do it again! 

Project 2: Reading Nook!

Also, a big thanks to the folks that helped him sand, rip staples, and cut and nail in quarter round.  Home Depot folks were very helpful in passing on valuable information to get the right tools and gave him some good advice on how and what to do.

Melissa & Doug Terrific Twenty Giveaway is Back!

Melissa & Doug is doing it again!  You can win some Christmas gifts for your kids!

Melissa & Doug has great toys for everyone on your list! They are made well and very affordable. We love Melissa & Doug!
They recently celebrated 20 days of giveaways on their Facebook page and are doing it again!!
You only need to enter once to be eligible to win one of Terrific Twenty Holiday toys being offered every day! Go here to enter!

Good Luck!

Melissa and Doug Terrific Twenty List and Giveaway!

TIME FOR A GIVEAWAY THANKS TO MELISSA AND DOUG!

 

Melissa & Doug is having a “20 Days of Terrific Twenty” Giveaway on their Facebook page! Every day (starting TODAY, November 6) they’ll be giving away one item from their Terrific Twenty list to at least one of their lucky Facebook fans!

Head to the Melissa & Doug Facebook page for more information about how to enter! Good luck!

We love Melissa and Doug and to kick off your holiday shopping, I am going to host a giveaway for their My Own Mailbox toy on their top twenty list!  This would be a great gift for any boy or girl this holiday season.

Leave a comment below on who you want to win this for or your favorite Melissa and Doug toy! 

For extra entries: (1 comment for each)

Like Melissa and Doug on FB

Like Music Making Momma on FB

I will a choose a winner using random.org  on Dec. 1st!  RANDOM.ORG chose #27 JERRY Congrats you won!  You have 48 hours to redeem before I choose a new winner!  Enjoy!

Good Luck!

Thanks to Melissa and Doug for providing this wonderful giveaway! 

P is for Pirate

We had P week this week and had lots of fun with Pirates and searching for treasure.  We also did a lot of Pirate activities from 2 Teaching Mommies too!

We found the treasure and dressed up.

We went to see one of our favorite books come to life, How I Became A Pirate at the Derby Dinner Playhouse.  We could not take pictures at the play, but we got one by the poster!  Thanks to a great friend, Donna Lyerly for sending us this book!  It has been a wonderful treasure!

The acting and music were great.  My boy absolutely loved it!

AARGH!

Winter “School” Days

Winter Fun

I have been lacking in my posts due to the holidays and such.  But this is what we have been up to the past couple of months with school.  We have been working on our letters and have really enjoyed a new site with great lesson plans called www.abcjesuslovesme.com.

Kinley has been starting some Tot School activities and doing some busy work:).  Here is one of her favorites.  Pushing pom pom balls through circles in a tupperware bowl or putting them on her head. 

Here is one we found on Pinterest: Pipe cleaners in a colander.

Eli has been working on his letters and numbers.  We have also been doing some fun winter crafts and art.

We had a caterpillar theme one week and here are some fun crafts he did.

Fingerprint Caterpillars

 

 

Toliet Paper Roll Caterpillar

 Thanks to my parents for keeping this wonderful Bed Bugs game all these years.  It helps us work on fine motor skills and colors.  Eli loves it!

Bed Bugs

We played in the flour (snow) and made letters and shapes.   We also did a little face painting.

Flour on your Face

He had fun making these simple marshmallow toothpick sculptures.

We have really starting working on using scissors and cutting too. I forget that it is the little things that I have to teach him too. I love when they stick out their tongue our open their mouth. It shows how hard they are working to use the sisscors.

I have been working with Eli on good behavior and earning smiles on his Melissa and Doug Responsibility chart. This week we went to the dollar store, and I gave him a dollar to choose whatever he wanted.  He chose glitter glue to make some fun pictures.

Glitter Glue Creation

I was washing the dishes one day and realized there was silence.  I ran to find the kids sitting in our room doing this:

Brother & Sister

These are the moments I treasure and I know they will too!:)

Christmas Advent 2011

This year we are doing Truth in Tinsel it is a great 25 day Bible an ornament advent with a special activity each day. We are doing the  Book Advent theme with some new books this year too.

I also got some great advent ideas from some of my favorite blogs like A Year With Mom and Dad and Passionate Homemaking.  I have been finding a lot of great ideas on Pinterest too! 

We are doing some free Christmas Printables from 1+1+1=1,and  Confessions of a Homeschooler.

Light Bulb Letter Match

I printed up a Holiday Bucket List from here.

Every night we will be doing our Chocolate Advent and Star Advent from My Hubbard’s Cupboard.

Star Advent

Day 1:

We made our candle ornament, wrote Santa a letter, and sang carols by the Christmas Tree.

Santa Letter

Day 2:

We made our crown ornament and some Christmas cards with fingerprints.  We visited our new favorite cupcake shop Jamie’s 14K Cupcakes and got a holiday treat:).

Crown

Christmas Lights Card

Day 3: We made our Zechariah ornament, went to see some trains, and watched a Christmas Movie. Santa Buddies was a big hit.

And a cute pic of brother and sister.