My advent calendar

As the month of December approaches seems like faster then I can blink my eyes. I have decided that instead of buying the kids those chocolate advent calendars that seem to stay on top of the counter or the fridge and we forget to eat them and We eventually end up eating 3 or 4 of those little chocolates on one day. So this year I am making an advent calendar and each envelope has a task or activity to do each day of the month. Some are just simple things like decorate sugar cookies, or wrap presents together, and some are write a Christmas card to a soldier, do the operation shoebox to understand that Christmas is about giving, I also included to read the true story of the true meaning of Christmas so they understand that santa isn'[t what the true meaning of Christmas is. I really think this will be fun to do as a family and spend time with each other. I think that the kids will really enjoy these activities. These envelopes took a little bit of time to make but I did each and everyone of them by hand so I hope that they hold up until then. We shall see though.

review of chocolate frosted flakes

Guess what came in the mail today? Yes, we received our bzzagent package that had our chocolate frosted flakes. I hope they taste as good as they look, we shall see. I gave the kids the chocolate frosted flakes the following morning for breakfast, aiden gave them a thumbs up he loved them said they turned the milk chocolaty yum. I had a bite of the kids, and thought they tasted pretty good they tasted a lot better than I had expected them too. Madisyn is not a huge fan of cereal but I wanted her to try them to see if she would eat them. She said they were good but she liked them better without milk. I will more than likely buy this cereal again in the future, and put it in snack bags for Madisyn to eat as a snack. So I will get two purposes out of the cereal one for breakfast and the second for a snack. Most people would think yuck that sounds disgusting but it kind of tasted just like crunchy chocolate cereal. If you have a chocolate lover in your house like we do our son, I suggest trying this yummy but delicious cereal.

The Gig harbor history museum

I feel like spring break has had no ending this year, I don't know if its because we are staying with my parents or what. But my children have been driving me bananas this time. With that being said I was able to read a book for about an hour this morning but then they started to act crazy and being really loud and obnoxious so I figured it was time to take them to do something. We headed to a&w to get lunch and then to the history harbor museum that's in Gig harbor we had coupons to use :-) so we got lunch for 6.00 which fed all 3 of us and then the museum was 6.00 for all three of us so 12.00 for all of us for the day. The museum very kid friendly and was pretty impressed with it. The kids had fun, they had a special exhibit that was digging for fossils which they really enjoyed doing in that. The school house outside was pretty cool and the boats that we were able to get in and tour them and what they looked.

Learning site words

As we all know that life sometimes is pretty hard being a mom and trying to teach your children the best that you can. We have a son who is 7 yrs old and has speech apraxia For many of you who don't know its basically a learning disability. Aiden knows what he wants to say but he can't form the words to get them out the right way, so his brain has to find a different path to learn. SO learning to read and memorizing site words is a pretty hard task for him. I was looking on pinterest to see if I could find anything that I could make or use to help him make this memorization fun for him. I found something similar to this but I made my own, I was able to let maddie also play so she could learn also. I would call out the site word and the kids would have to find them and put the car in that parking spot. It was more like a bingo type of game but with cars and parking spots. They seemed to have fun with it. I also put velcro on the back of cards so that way I could switch out the words with different ones.

somethings that we are going to try and do that are around kitsap

As a mom of two rambunctious kids a boy whose 7 years old and a girl whose 5 years old. I'm always trying to find things to do that doesn't cost a fortune to do or involves being outside since it seems to rain constantly here in the state of Washington. I have compiled a list of somethings to do some of these things we have done and some we haven't tried yet but will be soon. Keyport naval undersea museum-We did this one last weekend on Sunday the 10 March 2013 aiden was a little scared at first because we came in the diving suits that the Navy used were right there and that freaked him out a bit. He started to warm up after a bit. The museum was nice it was kid friendly had an area for kids to play and dress up in navy uniforms with covers as well. The kids also goto to talk on sound power phones which they thought that was awesome. The best part was there was an area that they got to pretend they were in a submarine and be in with the controls and drive the submarine, My kids got to see kind of what their daddy did as part of his job when he was in the military. The cost was free there wasn't really busy at all and they got to take coloring pages home to color, They had a blast so I would recommend this place also and the best part its free. The bug museum- We went and discovered the bug museum which is in bremerton and across from the shipyard. The bug museum was free and it was pretty cool the kids had a lot of fun looking at the ants, spiders and different types of bugs. It also had some reptiles in another room that housed snakes and lizards. I was pretty impressed with this place, it took us about 30 minutes to walk through. They also had a tortoise that was in a fenced area that was just roaming in that area, the kids got to touch his shell, they were pretty psyched about being able to touch the shell. The library which we frequently visit since its free to borrow books gives the kids something educational. Kidimu which is banbridge island looks fun and not expensive 6.00 a person and there's a coupon for a free admission bogo. So we plan on doing that one. poulsbo marine center this looks pretty cool to do. We did do this on a weekend it was pretty cool the kids really enjoyed walking around and looking at all of the fish and sea life that we have here around the Puget sound. The cost was free and then took them to ice cream at a local ice cream shop. Which was very good, it was creamy and delicious I have to say. We will be doing this outing again in the near future. It took about 20 minutes to walk through, there was a coloring/activity area at the end which we did stay at that part to color and play with some of the things they had in there.The staff were very helpful and educated they had a lot of information to share with us. play kitsap looks like a place that we went to in Ohio and we loved it so gonna check that place out. imagination station Port orchard its an indoor play center for kids 0-6 cost is 7.00 per child and 5.00 for sibling and that's for all day. We did this yesterday March 15 2013 I didn't get any pics of maddie playing but I would recommend this for everyone. Maddie had a lot of fun playing in the houses, grocery shopping with the pretend food and grocery carts, also they had a playset that had a huge slide that she could have gone down. They also had tables that were set up on the side so I was able to drink my coffee and study for the nclex while she played. It was all enclosed so she couldn't leave without someone opening the door from the opposite side. We did have a little bit of a problem everyone has to have socks on so we had to buy her some socks from the dollar tree, and her sweatshirt got swiped so I would advice to not put coats or sweatshirts on the hooks, next time I will take her stuff inside with me to wherever I am sitting at. the Victorian tea house I want to take my daughter her for tea I think she would really love having a somewhat of a tea party since she is at that age where she wants to have tea parties. Jump Gig harbor inflatables admission 7.00 siblings 5.00 another place we are going to try. play a latte just my place drink a latte while the kids play and have adult conversation. Admission is 7.00 and 4.50 for each additional child

The Fishy Sandwich

Went to the store the other day to get bread with Aiden I had saw this fish shaped bread online and decided that I wanted to try it with the kids. It may make my life a little bit easier since I have to constantly use cookie cutters and sandwich cutters to shape their sandwiches. And with this Fish shaped bread from Pepperidge farm the shaping of the animal was already done for me. So we tried it kids loved it madisyn loves the bread she calls it her fishy bread so I think we are stuck on this bread for awhile. I will be buying this bread probably all of the time.

What me shopping at thrift shops and consignment stores and putting second hand clothes on my kids

                                                             St.vincent De Paul trip today 10.00

When I was younger my mom used to tell me how much good stuff you can find at yard/garage sales, thrift stores, consignment stores but I never believed her. I always wanted to be in brand new clothes and there was no way was I going to put second hand clothes on my children. I thought that it was disgusting to wear used clothes. But as I got older and had kids they grow pretty quickly and how clothes don't really get much use out of them that was than that I realized how many good name brand clothes you could get at a consignment shop holy cow was I in heaven. But still didn't set foot into buying thrift store clothes even though its the same thing. My kids were always dressed in name brand clothes and majority of it was brand new with some finds at consignment shops. It wasn't until we moved here to Ohio I found some really good children consignment shops, and high end resale boutique which is one my fave stores for my kids. I started to look around at the goodwill and found loads of practically brand new name brand clothes at the goodwill, st.vincent de paul. So I realize now that I should have taken my moms advice years ago about thrift shops and consignment stores. After also discovering Thredup.com I have been more on the lookout for good quality clothes for my kids to wear and look cute but at an affordable price, and after today when I went to St.Vincent De Paul on a lookout for vintage pillowcases to make some dresses for maddie that they sale fabric holy cow I found my new passion. To check out the many different thrift stores and consignment shops in my area. I got on the computer the other day and just googled to see how many stores like that in my area theres a lot so I visited one and was pretty impressed. Of course my kids still get brand new clothes but when I can find a good deal on some name brand clothes I am all for it. Hope that many of you checkout your consignment shops and thrift shops you never know what you may find.

No sew fleece blanket

1 1/2 yards of 2 pieces of fleece
yard stick
good pair of scissors



Put both pieces together and trim the outer parts to make both pieces the same.

cut the corners out, I used 4x4 dimensions



and then cut stips

then tye the stips into knots

and then you have a finished no sew tye blanket