Microwave Chocolate Cake

We have made this several times and it always hits the spot. Tonight, we used butter though instead of oil because I ran out and it turned out fine. We found it at Her Cup Overfloweth.

Ingredients:

1 Tall Coffee Mug
4 Tablespoons flour
4 Tablespoons sugar
2 Tablespoons baking cocoa
1 Egg
3 Tablespoons milk
3 Tablespoons oil (I used melted butter today because we ran out of oil)
3 Tablespoons chocolate chips (optional)
A splash of vanilla extract

After you mix all of the dry ingredients, you add the rest and stir completely. Get into those corners of the bottom of the mug or you will have pockets of flour when you get the cake out. Then microwave it for 3 minutes.

One mug of cake has at least 2 servings (or enough for two kiddos and their mommy). We covered ours in Chocolate frosting and some conversation hearts. Tasty!

Valentine Bug Magnet

This little love bug turned out so cute. We stuck the wings on, which was easy since ours were stickers. You could very well cut out your own hearts from craft foam. Then we made the antenae and put the beads on the end and glued them on as well as the googley eyes. Finally, we put a magnet on the back so that we could put it on our fridge to clip things on.

Supplies needed:

glue or glue gun

pipe cleaner

clothes pins

Foam hearts (ours were stickers)

googley eyes

beads

magnet

Valentine's Day Mobile

We have been taking a snowman break and focusing on Valentine's Day. The temperatures are below zero and school around here is cancelled because of the cold. It is time to focus on things that will warm your heart....get it...heart? HAHA!!

The first thing we did to make our mobiles was turn hand prints into hearts on some craft foam. Then I cut out a heart shape around it and punched some holes in the bottom.

Then we made finger print hearts using ink pads on some little foam hearts (we did both sides). Then I punched some holes in them and attached the little hearts to the big heart with yarn.

Too Cute!

Supplies needed:

craft foam

foam hearts (or you can just cut some from the craft foam)

yarn

paint

brush

ink pad

hole puncher

Heart Crayons

I found this silicon heart mold in the Target dollar aisle! I was so excited when I found them! Using the same method I did before, here are some cute little heart crayons. My kiddos will love them! They would also be super cute in a clear bag attached to Valentine's Day cards for kids' classes.

Home Made Valentine Gifts

Here a couple of Valentine's Day gifts ideas:

We did this one last year (pre-blog). We got some plain terra cotta pots and used some paint pens and felt heart stickers to decorate it. Then we put a cute little plant in it from the store. Notice there is no plant in it now. Ours didn't stand a chance. I am just not good with indoor plants. :)

This year we made these cute frames. Happy early Valentine's Day honey!

I put a close up of each child in their frame. Sooooo cute.

Here, we just bought an unfinished frame from Michael's and used acrylic paint. When the paint dried, they put some foam heart stickers on them. My son wanted something written on it, so we personalized it a little bit with a cute little message from each of them.

Paper Plate Snowmen

IT IS FREEZING OUTSIDE!! The kids want to go play in the snow, but this is really the best I can do right now. We made snowmen out of paper plates and gave them ear muffs and a scarf. Don't the snowmen look happy being inside?

Supplies needed:

paper plates

buttons

pom poms

construction paper

googley eyes

glue

pipe cleaners

Bottle Snowmen

We made some snowmen today out of yogurt smoothie bottles. I covered them in batting and hot glued it on so that it would dry faster.

Next we made the hats. For that we used some black craft foam. We turned the bottles over and pressed the opening of the bottle on the foam to make an imprint (I'm too lazy to look for a pencil). From looking at the imprint, I eyeballed it and cut about 1/2 inch bigger than it all the way around. Then we cut out the outside of that circle. Try to leave that inside circle intact, you will need it. The black halo shape fit over the mouth of our bottle with the lid off. Then we took the lid and glued the circle that we cut out of the halo on top. Then we cut out a rectangle that would fit around the lid. We glued that rectangle and put the lid on....voila, a hat.

We used felt to tie on a scarf and a bunch of our other craft items for eyes, noses, buttons, neither child wanted to make a mouth. I glued the pipe cleaner arms on because I used my hot glue gun so that they would stick out.

Supplies needed:

Bottle

batting

brown pipe cleaners

hot glue gun and/or craft glue

black craft foam

felt or fleece for scarf

buttons, beads, sequins, pom poms, googley eyes--obviously not all of these are needed.

FINALLY SNOW!!

We finally got enough snow to make snowmen! The kids were so excited! They are right off of our deck and the kids can see them from inside the house. They keep checking on them to see that they are OK. They love to make snowmen because they got a snowman making kit last year and they LOVE it! I must admit that it is so much easier to grab the kit than look all over the house for things that can dress them up. They are going to have a very nice and satisfying nap this afternoon. ;)

Edible Bracelets

As I was standing in line at the grocery store the evening before a huge snow storm was predicted, I was looking at the candy. They had big packs of Gummi Savers candy. I grabbed 2 rolls of them and added them to my snow storm emerency items like milk, bread, and eggs. Well, the storm never happened, but the kids still used their Gummi Savers. They put them on the plastic craft string and made bracelets. One end was taped to the table so they all stayed on the string. They ate a few and then we put them in plastic bags so that they would stay soft and they could eat more tomorrow. Such a yummy treat! They loved it!

Painting Ceramics

The kids were admiring their pottery they painted at a "paint your own pottery" place we went to over the summer and asked if we could go back. At that moment I remembered something....At Michael's, they have little ceramic shapes you can paint and I grabbed some for $.50 a piece one time I was there. I ran to my craft stash and pulled out some acrylic paint and these little ceramic shapes and they got painting. It was a lot of fun, and they weren't the least bit impressed that I produced such an activity so quickly. :)

My son painted 2 cars, one of which he painted like the bat mobile and my daughter painted a lady bug and a butterfly.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Most of this recipe is from Martha Stewart. I added chocolate chips because our family LOVES all things peanut putter and chocolate. You could very easily leave out the chips and put the cute little fork marks on the top and sprinkle them with sugar...makes my mouth water just thinking about it.

1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 cup butter

1 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

2 1/2 cups flour

about 2 cups of chocolate chips (more if we are feeling crazy)

We usually do this in our standing mixer and just start tossing things in. We put the first 4 ingredients in first and mix it until smooth. Then we add the eggs, baking soda and baking powder and mix a little more. Then we put the flour in and mix it. We stir in the chocolate chips by hand.

refrigerate for 4 hours (this is VERY hard)

roll dough into 2 inch balls--i use a 2 inch ice cream scoop

bake at 350 degrees for 18 minutes

Delicious!!!

Ooblek!

When I taught second grade, we did this activity when we learned about matter. When you make Ooblek, you can pick up chunks of it and put it in your hand and then it will "melt" and drip between your fingers. Is it a solid? Is it a liquid?

I let my kids explore with craft sticks at first and then they were loving getting their hands in it. One of our favorite things to do was put our whole hand, palm down, in the middle of the pie plate and have the Ooblek suck your hand down and then it was hard to get your hand back out.

I threw some buttons from our last snowman craft (can you believe that I hadn't cleaned up yet ;) ) in the Ooblek, pushed them down so they were covered, and had them have a treasure hunt. They had a ton of fun.

Ooblek

1 cup corn starch

2/3 cup water

you can add food coloring in as well if you want

This is a VERY MESSY activity. My suggestion is to do it right before you plan on cleaning anyways HAHA!

The Snowman Melted

My son did this activity at preschool and thought it was hilarious, so he wanted to do it again with his little sister. You get some wax paper and make a puddle of glue in the middle. Then you place googley eyes, yarn for a scarf, orange pipe cleaner for nose, sticks for arms, felt or construction paper for a hat, buttons etc in the puddle. Wait a few days for it to dry and peel off of the wax paper. You can fool your friends by tossing it places and pretending it is an actual melted snowman. Such a HOOT! Ours haven't dried yet, but you get the idea.

Supplies needed:

wax paper

glue

orange pipe cleaner

buttons

felt

construction paper

googley eyes

yarn

Our Plan Might Be Working!!

Look what is happening right now...SNOW! I don't have the heart to tell the kids that we are supposed to get less than half an inch. They are so excited though. :)

Glittery Snow flakes

Do you see a theme with our crafts lately? The kids are dying for some significant snowfall here. We decided to make some snowflakes made out of glue and glitter. I outlined a snowflake in glue on some wax paper and we glittered the heck out of it. Again we waited until the next day for it to dry and I gently peeled it off of the wax paper. I actually dabbed a bit of glue from the hot glue gun and glued it to our kitchen window, but couldn't get a good picture of them to save my life. So close your eyes and imagine a sparkling, clean window with some beautiful glittered snowflakes. HA! If we can't have snow and snowmen outside, we'll make our own inside. :)

Supplies needed:

glue

glitter

wax paper

Puffy Snowmen

We made 2 dimensional snowmen yesterday and today we decorated them. The snowmen are made out of:

1/3 cup salt
1/3 cup flour

1/3 cup water

you can also add paint if you want it colored

We used brushes and a mustard bottle (from my son's football birthday party) to put it on the poster board and we let it dry overnight. Today we used play doh for carrot noses (we made them yesterday so they could harden as well), felt, googley eyes and sticks from our bushes outside for arms. They turned out really well and the kids really enjoyed making them! The salt even makes them glitter.

Supplies Needed:

puffy paint for snowmen (see recipe above)

play doh

googley eyes

felt

sticks

Our very own printing press :)

All you need to do is use a bunch of foam stickers on a piece of cardboard and then use a roller (the small foam craft size) or a foam brush to brush on some white paint and then put a sheet of paper over it and press all over with your hands. I think we will use hearts for Valentine's Day. Note to self...try making wrapping paper with it next Christmas. It turned out so cute!

Supplies needed:

paint

foam stickers

cardboard

foam brush or roller

Setting the Table...

The kids love to help set the table. In an effort to not have a pile of utensils and napkins on the table, I figured they should learn to do it properly. We now each have placemats that show where everything goes. I used a manilla file folder to cut out the pattern for the utensils, plates, cup, and napkin and could then just trace them and cut them out. We used foam sheets as the placemats and colored paper/scrapbook paper. I then used my label maker to identify what everything is in words (who knew a discussion about the why the word knife starts with kn- instead of n- could go on so long ;) ) Then we covered everything with contact paper. This way we can actually eat on them and they will be a snap to wipe up.

supplies needed:

foam sheets

colored paper/scrapbook paper

scissors

manilla folder to trace the things

contact paper

Patterned bird feeder

While my son was with my husband at the Home Depot kid's clinic this morning, my daughter and I decided to make a snack for the birds with her Fruity Cheerios cereal. We put her cereal on pipe cleaners and then put them on the branches of our tree by our deck so we could also enjoy some bird watching. We put the cereal in the pipe cleaners in simple patterns and she loved it. She also loved having a snack herself. :)

Supplies needed:

cereal with holes
pipe cleaners

Crazy faces!!

I gathered some catalogues and magazines a few days ago and cut out some hair, eyes, noses, mouths, and ears. These parts were from people, animals and cartoon characters. We put piles of these parts on our table and the kids made their own crazy faces. They thought it was hilarious!

Supplies needed:

magazines and catalogues

scissors

glue sticks

paper