Vrooomm with letters!

Today's letter game came from Pinterest.  I had seen in a while ago and I finally got around to making it up last night.  I found it here.  It is pretty east and straight forward.
Little Monkey was very excited about adding the wheels to the car....until he realized that the car wouldn't actually drive anywhere.  We powered through and he did pretty good.  I have a better idea of what letters he still needs to work on (thankfully not as many as I thought).  I think we will be sticking to letter games for a little bit as Little Princess is very interested in letters as well.

It feels like Fall

Wow summer came and went so fast!  We had so much fun this summer.  There were lots of beach days, family visiting, playing at the park, and bike rides. It was a full summer and I feel like it was over way too soon.  Little Monkey and Little Princess both have birthdays in the summer so I usually feel like we just finish one and the other is upon us! We tried to get out to the beach as much as we could.  Now that the kids are a little older I find it so much easier to head to the beach.  They are pretty good about sticking close enough for me to see them and if they wonder off all it usually takes is a quick name call and they come slowly back.
It has been raining for a few days now and I fear summer is really over.  Now that we have gone from being out of the house most days to being stuck inside I have been getting back into idea mode!  Little Monkey goes back to preschool in the middle of September and Little Princess will be taking some activity as well.  I need to get organized so when it all hits I will be prepared.  I am waiting for all the orchard apples to appear in the stores.  They are our favourite.  They are so flavourful!  We will be doing some apple things as well as back to school things!
Here is a little snippet of our summer. :)

Monsters

Sorry it has been a long time since I have posted!  We have been busy.  Summer has hit and we are spending the majority of time outside enjoying it.  I am finding going to the beach or lake a few times a week makes the kids sleep so well! :)
Little Monkey turned 4 this weekend!  He was so very excited to have his birthday party with all his friends!  Everyone called him on his actual birthday but he kept telling them 'you know it's not my party today'.  When today finally came he was beside himself.  We decided to go for a monster theme this year.  He wasn't too sure about the theme (which he picked) until we got our amazing printables from Eight Hearts Design.  He was so very excited about them all.
It was a fun afternoon filled with lots of friends and family.  Of course there were a few games as well. We did a 'Pin the Eye on the Monster' and a 'Monster Toss'.  The Monster toss was the most played with game.  The monster cake was also a very exciting part of the party!  All in all it was a great way to celebrate being 4!
Little Princess' birthday is up next month and minnie will be making an appearance. :)

This was in the kids goodie bags.  A monster face crayon, build your own monster, and a monster ball.

Monster Pops

Flowers everywhere

I found these flowers a few years ago at the dollar store.  They just resurfaced.  When I took them out of the container I realized that the flowers also included all the things to make necklaces.  YAY!  Little Princess has been taking all my necklaces and wearing them all over the place so I thought this would be a fun thing for her to do.  It turns out the string was really floppy and the holes were really small.  I ended up melting the end of string to make to go through the flowers.  It ended up being a Little Monkey and Mommy project.  Little Monkey really liked it and decided it should be a family necklace. Right now Little Princess is running around putting it on everyone.  I think I am going to do some colour matching with the flowers for Little Princess later.

Tomorrow might be a beach day so I don't think I will post anything.....unless I make a beach scavenger hunt tonight. :)

Ladybugs

Little Monkey has been on the hunt for ladybugs for a little while now.  So far no luck.  So I decided why not make our own.  Little Princess was napping so I made up some counting ladybugs for Little Monkey.  My printer decided to slowly run out of ink, so that is why the first few look a bit faded.

Little Monkey really liked using the q-tips to paint with.  They make perfect dots on the ladybugs.  Next time we do a counting activity I am going to cut them all out and mix them up so they aren't all in order....that seems too easy! :)  This one was a lot of fun and went quite quick.  You could also laminate them and use them as playdoh mats.  They could make the spots all sorts of colours.  

P.S. Have I told you how much I love that I finally got around to painting the kids table with chalkboard paint?!  I LOVE IT!

Little Monkey also made me a flower necklace today.  I will try and get that one posted tonight. 

Spring has sprung

I feel like I haven't blogged in forever and I guess it has been a while!  We have been doing lots but most of it has consisted of being out enjoying the sun.  It has been nice enough out lately that we have been to the beach a few times!  I love watching the kids explore and find new exciting things.  It turns out Little Princess has no fear.  She picks up crabs without batting an eye and also has no problem going into the water all the way.  It isn't that nice out yet!  I have learned to take many changes of clothes and let them have fun.  We also managed to make it to a Bug Zoo a few weeks ago.  Little Monkey got to hold a lot of different bugs and thought that was the greatest thing!  Little Princess was also very excited to see all the different bugs.  I thought she might shy away (I don't know why) but she was all over it.  I think I might have been the only one that was ok with not handling any of the bugs!
With that trip being so exciting I decided to try and do some craft and activities based around bugs and spring.  So far the kids are loving it.  I have quite a few ideas going on in my head right now, so hopefully we will get to them all!
Here are a few of the fun things we have planned to do:

Here are some of the bug pictures we got.  

Up next, flower necklaces and ladybugs! 

Easter fun

Well Easter is coming up really fast!  I am not sure how I feel about Easter at the end of March!  Little Monkey had his last day of preschool until after spring break today and it just sunk in that he is home all next week with no activities to go to.  I need to get planning! :)  We have already started a few Easter themed things around our house and I plan on doing many more before next weekend.  I made an Easter themed sensory tub last weekend and the kids have been loving it.  I did however underestimate how much of a mess easter 'grass' can make!  The kids really love it though, so it can stay until next weekend!

It worked out perfectly that I already had everything for it.  The bunnies hanging on the side are like A Barrel of Monkeys but bunnies instead (they are so much fun), the bunnies laying in the grass are stretchy ones, the picture of the bunnies on eggs are memory cards that are hidden throughout the tub, and there are also blue and pink dyed dried beans in there.  I kept the plastic Easter eggs out because Little Princess loves to stick them in her mouth and I don't want her to choke on them!

Up next we are doing letter and colour matching with plastic Easter eggs.