Joyfully Weary

This past week has been full of cold cloudy days. On days like those I prefer to curl-up on the couch and read/nap. My kiddos usually have different ideas though and they talked me in to making some sweets. We decided to tweak the traditional rice krispie treat recipe and make something a little more festive.  Ingredients   stick of butter 2 - 10oz packages of marshmallows  1/2 cup of pumpkin 1 t pumpkin spice 1 t vanilla  1 box (12oz) rice cereal tootsies rolls 1 T butter   Directions Melt butter in large saucepan. Slowly add marshallmallows and stir until melted. Stir in pumpkin, pumpkin spice, and vanilla. Slowly stir in rice cereal. Coat hands with butter and create small balls with the rice mixture. Place balls on wax paper and push a tootsie roll into the top. Let cool. Mini Man and Little Lady are pretty self sufficient in the kitchen and made the recipe all by themselves with just a little g...

To celebrate the beginning of October we've been reading a few pumpkin themed books * and tried our hand at making our own clay pumpkins. Michaels had a fabulous sale on Sculpey clay a couple weeks back so I stocked up on some orange, green, and black. I thought pumpkins would be a great beginning clay activity since all you essentially have to do is roll "balls" and "snakes". Our Supplies: green, orange, and black sculpey clay, small clay knife (optional), parchment paper  (optional), cookie sheet, and an oven preheated to 275'. Step 1: I cut the orange clay in to small blocks and then the kids rolled it in to a pumpkin shape. This was hard work for their little hands but they enjoyed it.  Step 2: I also cut the green clay in to small blocks and then the kids rolled it first in to a ball and then in to snakes/vines. Step 3: Break off a small piece of green for each pumpkin and press it on to the top. Step 4:  If desired ...

Roasted pumpkin seeds weren't too big of a hit at our house so we decided to craft with our seeds instead.  We divided our seeds in to four zip-loc bags and then each of the kids used liquid water color to dye a bag their favorite color.  little lady: pink, mini man: orange, big buddy: blue, v: violet After the seeds had dried the kids glued them to foam board - we have lots of this laying around but I'm sure study paper would work just fine.  The kids all did one picture where they placed the seeds at random anywhere they wanted. Then I encouraged them to fill in the first letter of their names.  As you can see from the picture above Little Lady didn't quite get concept of placing the seeds inside her 'K'. She did however amaze me with how she handled the glue. I started by showing her how to squeeze out a small amount of glue out and put a seed on top. She kept at it, quietly whispering "dot, seed, dot, seed" as s...

Last year the boys and I spent a day at a local pumpkin farm and had so fun much we decided it was definitely going to be an annual event. This year we went with Maca and a group of neighborhood friends - they made a good thing even better.  The place is pretty impressive with tons of things to do: farm animals, mazes, rides, games, playgrounds, etc. It looks like it could get expensive if you go on the weekend so we always go on a weekday when admission includes everything.  little lady found the animals very intriguing.  all the kids crowed around this pig for a couple minutes. when everyone else left i heard little lady whisper "hi" - my heart burst into pieces this tunnel slide in the barn was a big hit big buddy decided to scare all the other moms and climb up the outside i know it looks like a horse but big buddy saw a gun - boys!  another moment that almost caused my heart to explode everybody lov...

The boys and I skipped nap time today in favor of a trip to a local pumpkin farm . Here's some pictures of our day. big buddy's favorite animal: chickens mini man loved all the animals but this goat was his favorite they bonded  there was also lots of non-animal fun the corn pits is where we spent most of our time charlotte's web big buddy loved the giant orange, jumping pillow - mini man and I jumped too but he started to get cold and tired... so we took a little cuddle and kisses break which quickly ended when he saw big buddy conquering this mountain of tractor tires he's not one to be left behind :) there were lots of tractors p;kl; of all shapes and sizes i had to take the obligatory height picture before we  left which they actually posed for - big buddy is currently obsessed with rulers and mini man is currently obsessed with copying big buddy It was ...