Our Weekend

On Saturday morning, I had a bridal shower to attend for a good longtime friend of mine but didn't want to leave the husband with all four kids so we split the ranks. I took two of the girls—Logan and Trystan—with me and the husband took the other two—Harrison and Kailey—since they were a bit under the weather and we wanted to avoid them being around too many people. Little did I know that the husband would get motivated and take them to Home Depot with him followed by their first adventure in putt-putt! My cuties look so serious in the photo below, clutching their clubs and thinking of game strategy perhaps? Ha! Either way, it was awesome that they got a new and unique experience with their daddy and one that he could enjoy with only two kiddos in tow.

I enjoyed briefly catching up with my friend and the girls liked watching her open gifts and also indulged in a cupcake or two. Afterward, we went over to my mom's house and ate a afternoon snack followed by naps for everyone. I passed out on the couch—third day in a row I've napped! That is so not normal for me. But I have been exhausted every day for the past week or so, like I wake up in the morning and am super tired before I ever get out of bed. Nobody has time for that! I've been sure to take my daily dose of B12 and my prescription dose of Vitamin D this week and drink lots of water, I think I've just been a little more run down than usual. That happens every now and then, like hitting a wall when I've run out of gas and I have to catch up on some extra R&R to recharge then I'm good to go again. What are your energy-boosting tricks??

The kids enjoyed some sticker action later on thanks to fun little sheets of stickies that my Aunt Deanie sent them for Easter. I quickly printed out coordinating coloring sheets (thanks Google!), like a monster truck page for Harrison to accessorize with his monster truck stickers. They loved it and asked me to hang them each on their art boards in the play room when they were done.

And it's safe to say that Bandit, our recent new family addition, is adjusting to life here quite well. He's had no qualms about spreading out and getting comfortable. ;)

After church on Sunday, I met up with some of my girlfriends for a little wine tasting followed by Mexican for dinner followed by a few leisurely drinks and more girl time and convo! It was so needed and I loved getting to catch up with one of my besties who was in town for the weekend. Good friends and down time are often the perfect remedy for anything, right!?

It's felt like a long weekend though, because the husband had today off from work. Perfect! I could sooo get used to this. He took our suburban into the shop for new tires while I worked from home this morning then we went to lunch together followed by (bulk) grocery shopping at Costco. I went back to work on my computer afterward and he picked up the kids at school for me, snapping this adorable photo of them lined up for story time with their wonderful teacher. (I blurred her face for privacy reasons, but trust me, we love her and she's awesome with our kids!) 

They were listening intently to the book she was reading when the husband showed up and he hung back to watch for a second. They have a larger class during regular hours, but they stay in after-school care for a little bit after so there's only a few kids left by then. This gives me a whole day on Mondays to accomplish things child-free. We are so blessed to have such a wonderful Mother's Day Out program at our church and look forward to them starting pre-school there this fall!

Now I'm gearing up to tackle a busy albeit short four-day week and am grateful that the kids ran it out on the play ground today and shall sleep deeply tonight...

{Littles Learning} Ocean Week

I've officially added a new category to my regular posts called "Littles Learning." I'll be filing everything that has to do with educational activities, crafts and outings for the quad squad under that so hopefully it's easier to find and refer back to as we share our experiences on the blog!

A couple posts ago, I mentioned the book-and-craft combos I kickstarted each week, inspired by my fellow quad mom, Amber, who also shared her own literacy-based craft ideas on her blog, Four to Adore. Things have sort of taken off for us from there and last week we did an ocean theme with various associated crafts, books and activities.

Before you start thinking I'm all organized and on top of things, please know that just because I'm showing you photos of all these things we did in a week that the rest of the time my house is clean, my kids are well-behaved and I live behind a white picket fence. Some of these activities lasted five minutes while others lasted an hour, some were met with smiles and unfettered interest and others were met with cries and protests and throwing of things. So, you know, to each his own and stuff like that. ;)

I am no chalk artist but I did try to get a little creative with our chalkboard fireplace cover! I figured I might as well find as many ways as possible to incorporate the theme or lesson or book I'm focusing on each week in as many ways as possible. So I drew a couple sea animals on the board and was one proud momma when my little red-head, Trystan, could easily identify each one by the end of the week!

We read our beloved Pout Pout Fish books several times that week...

And I also went out on a limb and tried an activity I'm not normally drawn to, which is to make any kind of "goop" for my kids to get all over them, much less one that required I use my kitchen accessories to do it! But the sea foam activity proved a success and the kids loved it. I put 1/3 cup water, 1/3 cup dish soap, 1 tablespoon corn starch into my mixer and put it on high for several minutes until it got nice and foamy. I used washable finger paint to add a little color without running the risk of staining everything within reach of 40 little fingers. Then I realized that my leisurely pace wasn't going to cut it as foam began morphing into soppy colored water in the bottom of my plastic bin, so I churned out enough bowl fulls of whipped soap as fast as I could and hauled the bin to my front porch for the kids to explore.

I hid some sea shells, plastic sea animals and plastic spoons in the bottom of the bin for them to find, and also switched bins halfway through my foam making-process because a shallow, longer container worked better for toddler access.

Another afternoon, while Granddad read Pout Pout Fish, I gave each of the kids an empty water bottle, some small sea shells and little colored gemstones (which were a buck for a sack from Wal-Mart) to start their ocean bottle craft. They spent a good ten minutes emptying the shells out of their bottles then putting them all back in.

After both books had been read, I turned on a slideshow of underwater animals that I'd quickly compiled on my laptop and played this ocean wave soundtrack while I went down the line and helped them each scoop a few tablespoons of sand each into their bottles. (Yes, we got sand elsewhere besides the bottles and yes, I tried not to sweat all the sand that Bam Bam managed to sling everywhere in 2.5 seconds!) Then I added a little glitter, two drops of blue food coloring and some water to finish it off. I used a hot glue gun and squeezed some glue to the inside of the cap before screwing it back on so that the quads couldn't open their bottles and tie dye the carpet in their play room! When I handed each one back their bottle, I also gave them a small sheet of fish stickers to add to the outside since I couldn't find any small toy fish to go inside the bottles. They actually really enjoyed decorating with the stickers, even if they started peeling them off their bottles a few days later. Whatever gets the longest attention span and keeps these toddlers happy!

After the craft was completed and while I vaccumed up some of the wayward sand, the kiddos each got a Bubble Guppies cup of goldfish—I know, so theme-perfect right?!—and settled in on the couch in the play room to watch The Reef, a cute little animated underwater adventure.

We also watched a couple Bubble Guppies episodes throughout the week that dealt with sea animals or the like as well as our Baby Einstein Baby Neptune DVD, our Baby Genius Underwater Adventures DVD (where they learned about seals and can now identify those as well) and any other show I could find that coincided with the ocean. All this replaced our usual afternoon animated TV watching since we try to keep the TV off during the morning and save that little nugget of entertainment for post-naps. Momma needs all the help she can get!

Other activities that I'd considered but did not get to included these adorable handprint crabs, seashell matching, a construction paper underwater scene and a fishbowl paper plate craft.

All in all, I think the quads really enjoyed the activites and I felt good knowing we'd do some new things and new experiences for both sensory and learning. Look forward to sharing our color series with y'all!

Up next: a delightful Weekend Recap...

{Quad Squad} Simple Book & Craft Combos for Toddlers

Today we tackled our very first book and craft combo, and....it went well! I had a few somewhat cranky babies this morning and Harrison might have cried and yelled through half of our beautiful and peaceful learning experience. Kidding. But we did get the craft completed and no two-year-olds were harmed in the process. I call that success, people!

My good friend, Jo Ann, was on hand this morning to help, which was a benefit since I hadn't prepped anything yet for this craft. And there was impending mutiny on deck in the play room. So she hurriedly put them all in the quad table while I gathered up all the supplies as fast as I could. We're doing a craft, damn it!!

The inspiration came from Pinterest, naturally, which I now have saved to my new Quad Crafts & Learning board. But the original instructions called for black paint to paint the head and the ladybug's dots—and I had absolutely no black paint. Plus, I figured sticking to one paint color would keep things simpler for the eight busy little hands I needed to entertain. So I ad-libbed and cut out circles from black construction paper.

First, Jo Ann read our book, The Peek-A-Boo Ladybug and Harrison cried through every other word. Then we put art smocks from Ikea on everyone, partially covered the table in wax paper and gave them all a paper plate half, a brush (I love ours by Melissa & Doug) and some red washable paint. Then they went to work!

As soon as they had covered the plates with enough paint—all minimally assisted by the grown-ups—I gave them the dots for the ladybug to stick on while the paint was still wet, thus omitting the need for glue. Less material, better for everyone! Then they stuck on the larger black circles for the ladybug's head, to which I'd already glued a set of googly eyes. I also gave them two black strips of paper each for antenna, but I don't think those made it onto everyone's bug.

After that, everyone got four pieces of yarn, cut at random lengths, and we taped them to the backside of the plate for legs. Ta-dah! A ladybug, folks, in all it's charming toddler-esque glory.

I truly love this idea and am incorporating a literacy-based craft once a week into my new plan to create slightly more structured mornings for my crew. And my sweet quad momma friend—who also shares my same first name and is a wonderfully talented school psychologist—was the one to instigate the idea and encourage me to do literacy-based crafts as they help toddlers better learn and recall new concepts. We regularly display new artwork so we'll revisit the ladybugs and the book often. She does the same and explains details and shares other ideas in her literacy-based crafts blog post, as well.

Now to decide on next week's book and craft combo! (Look for future posts under my new category label, Toddler Crafts & Learning.) I'm thinking something like this caterpillar craft and a couple reads on caterpillars and butterflies...

Ah, the ever-thrilling life of a momma. ;)