Behold Your Little Ones

For Christmas, from my little brother, I got the LDS nursery manual "Behold Your Little Ones." I think it is a must have for any family trying to plan FHE with young children. Even if your kids are in nursery and will be learning from this manual, repetition in how the gospel is taught. You just need to switch up the order is all. The whole lesson is planned out for you. Even your children out of nursery will still enjoy these lessons. FHE made easy. And you can purchase it for only $5.50. Chick here for the link to purchase it. We are starting to use it for baby D this Monday. I know he's only 14 months, but I think it is a great idea to start a habit of FHE, more for me and my husband R than for D.


If anyone has any other FHE ideas, please email us at fun4mommies@gmail.com

Note: I just discovered that you can print them out for free at LDS.org. Click here for the link to that page. Now you have no excuse not to have an FHE this Monday. :)

Christmas Breakfast

These are such cute ideas!!!
Go check out some fun Christmas Breakfast ideas from Ramblings of a Crazy Woman. They are all so cute. I think the French toast tree is my favorite, even though she didn't think it was one of her best. If any of you have some fun family traditions, please share.

White Stocking

It wasn't that anyone had really been forgotten, not children had been slighted or made unhappy and no adult had been forgotten. The presents had all be distributed and all the stockings were beautifully filled, all that is except one; It was the stocking intended for the child of Bethlehem. Of all the people belonging at that Christmas gathering, only he had been forgotten. Only he had been left out of the festivities. This didn't seem quite right, inasmuch as it was his birthday that was being celebrated. This year. The little white stocking will be hung in a special place in our home. On Christmas Eve, we will gather the family together and each of us will write on a piece of paper, a gift for Jesus to be placed in the stocking. It will remain in the stocking until next year's Christmas Eve, when we will pass out the papers from the year before. Then we will see how well we gave to the Savior through our gifts.

This is a new family tradition of ours. This story is placed in a white stocking and hung up.You don't have to share what you are giving the Savior, or tell everyone how you did on your gift last year. We don't. It's personal to us. Aand you don't have to use a stocking. Use a gift box and place the gift under the tree. Or, make a family gift, like more regular FHE or more reverence during church. What a great tradition to bring the Savior closer to your Christmas celebration.

Neighbor Gift

OK, so a neighbor gift is not so much a fun activity to do with your kids, but I saw this idea last year on Studio 5, thought it was a great one, but could never find a great tutorial later. That is, until now.
Personalized soap dispenser. What a cute idea!!! Your older kids could help with the project if you wanted. Click here to see the full tutorial. Thanks to Schlosser Designs for sharing this great idea. When I saw it on TV, they put the family's name on the transparency.

Microwave Fudge

I love fudge, but have always been to scared to make it. Now I make microwave fudge! It's easy and not too bad either.

The basic ingredients are :
one bag of chips (chocolate, peanut butter, white chocolate...)
14 oz can of sweeten condensed milk
1 Tablespoon unsalted butter
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
Extras (nuts, marshmallows, craisins, etc)

First, line a 9x9 pan with aluminum foil. Spray the foil lightly with PAM.
Place chips and sweetened condensed milk in a microwave safe bowl. Microwave until melted, stirring ever 30 secs or so. Add butter cut up in small bits. Stir in till melted. Add salt and vanilla (NOTE: if you don't have unsalted butter, try using your regular butter and not add salt) Now you add whatever extras you want. Pour into you pan and sprayed smooth. Place in your refrigerator for 3 hours. Once the fudge has set up, flip the pan upside down on a cutting board, peel off foil, and slice into bit size pieces. Enjoy!

I made chocolate walnut, pistachio craisin, and peanut butter. The peanut butter is way yummy!

Neighbor gifts are now done!

If you have any questions or if you try different "extra" that turn out great, email us. We would love to hear from you.

Edible Christmas Wreaths

You need:
1/2 cup of butter
3 cups of miniature marshmallows
1/2 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon of almond extract
green food coloring
4 cups of corn flakes
red hot candies (or another red candy)

I made it in the microwave, but I am sure you can do it on the stove too, just like rice krispie treats. First, in a microwave safe bowl, microwave your butter until it is melted. Then add the marshmallows. Cook in increments of 45 seconds stirring every time until they are melted. Then add the extracts. You can use all vanilla if you want, but J and I are big fans of almond extract, so we add it to a lot of stuff. Then add the food coloring. Make sure you make it a deep green because once you add the cornflakes, the color will lighten a lot. Then add the cornflakes. Make sure to just coat them so that they don't get crushed. Cover a cookie sheet with foil and then spray with Pam. Then just plop the mix by the spoonful onto the cookie sheet and shape into wreaths. This recipe doesn't make very much, so I did 6 medium sized wreaths. Cover with red hots and let stand until set. I hope you could follow that. I am obviously not cut out for writing recipes.

Salt Dough Ornaments

A Feathered Nest has a cute idea to make salt dough ornaments with you kids. Check out her recipe here. I's a cheap and fun holiday activity.

Count Down Till Christmas

Check out thirtyhandmadedays.blogspot.com and littlebirdiesecrets.blogspot.com. They have combed the internet and have found tons of great ideas for advent calenders. I also want to share a couple links from some favorite blogs of mine (If you aren't already check them out on a regular basis.)

skiptomylou.org talks about an advent book series. I've never hear of them before, but it is an intriguing idea.

And another idea I just LOVE is from makeandtakes.com. I found this idea back in February and have just been waiting till the holiday season to share it with you guys.

One more to share... lovelandmisc.blogspot.com has a free download for an paper advent calendar. All you have to do is add fun activities to the back of each day.

If you have any holiday traditions or count down ideas, please share.

Tex-Mex Turkey Tacos

I got this yummy recipe for turkey leftovers from familyfun.com. Enjoy!

	1 tbsp. vegetable oil
	1/2 cup chopped onion
	1 8-oz. can tomato sauce
	1/2 cup water
	2 tbsp. chili powder
	1 tsp. ground cumin
	1/2 tsp. salt
	3 cups shredded cooked turkey meat (use a fork to shred the turkey, pulling it apart against the grain)
	12 taco shells
	3/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese
	Chopped lettuce
	Chopped tomatoes
	Chopped avocado
	Sliced olives

1. Heat the oil over medium heat in a large skillet. Add the onion and cook for 1 to 2 minutes. Add the tomato sauce, water, chili powder, cumin and salt.

2. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook for 2 to 3 minutes. Stir in the turkey and cook until heated through.

3. Place 1/4 cup of the taco filling in each taco shell. Top with 1 tablespoon of shredded cheddar, lettuce, tomato, avocado and olives. Serves 6.

Thanksgiving Links

So I've been pretty busy this month. I've done nothing for Thanksgiving yet. I have found tons of ideas online that I want to try. Maybe some will have to wait till next year. I thought I would link them for you.

Cereal Box Turkeys- My Plum Pudding has a great way of using old cereal boxes to make fun puppets for your kids. Or you could use them as place cards.

Traditions & Gratitude- Tip Junkie has a post with tons of great ideas on how to teach you kids the idea of gratitude during this time of giving thanks. The Thanksgiving Tree is my favorite. For another take on the Thanksgiving Tree go to Skip To My Lou.

Speaking of Skip To My Lou....here are some great ideas from here- Aromatic Garland, Turkey Finger Puppets, and Pilgrim Hats. Skip To My Lou is one of my favorite blogs.

And since we are mentioning favorite, Turkey Treats is a great idea from Make and Takes.

If anyone has any ideas they would like to share, please email us. Have a Happy Thanksgiving

Candied Popcorn

This is an easy treat. My mom received as a neighbor one year for Christmas. It is easy and cheap. All you need is popcorn and candy melts. You can purchase candy melts at most craft and/or baking store. I always get mine from Michaels because it's close to my house.
1. You pop your popcorn. If you don't have an air popper, you can use the butterless microwave popcorn. It works too.
2. Melt your candy melts according to the instructions. I use about half a bag of candy melts to one batch of popcorn.
3. Pour the melted candy over your popcorn and gently stir until all the popcorn is coated. It is better to not add enough candy melt at first. You can always add more, but if you put in too much, your popcorn may get soggy and shrivel up. NOTE: I always pick out all the un-popped kernels before pouring on the candy. No one like to break a tooth when eating a snack.
4. Spread the popcorn out on wax paper to dry.
It doesn't take long to dry. Once it is dry, break it up and store in Ziploc bags. You can use any color of candy melts you want (they are all vanilla flavored). I have not tried the brown chocolate candy melts. If anyone tried it, let me know how it tastes. When I first had it, it was white and I thought for sure it was white chocolate. It was Yummy! For neighbor gifts, place it in plastic cellophane bags (I saw them at my dollar store - 12 for $1), tie with ribbon, and place a tag on it....something like "We hope you have a 'poppin' good [insert holiday]"

Here I made it for my cousin's non-farwell lunch. He's going to Italy. Good Luck J.

Nylon Headbands

Every wonder how to make those cute nylon headbands you see for sell everywhere? I always think to myself that I don't need to buy them. I could just make them myself. But them I never know quite where to start. I found this great tutorial on how to make them at elizabethkartchner.blogspot.com. Check it out. And if anyone else knows of different way to make baby headbands/bows, please share. It's no fair keeping it all to yourself. :)

Frozen Pizza and Month Of Meals

So, I have been working on two things lately, trying to save money and trying to save time. I know the cheapest way to cook is from scratch and to plan meals in order to avoid going out to eat on a whim, but it is so time consuming. With me and my husband working full time and with church callings, it seems like there is always a meeting to be to or someone to pick up.... Who has the time? This is way I was very intrigued by the women who do that month of meals in their freezer. I'm sure you have all heard of this idea, but, in case you haven't, I'll tell you how it works. At the beginning of the month you set aside one whole day to do nothing but cook. You make enough meals (that can be placed in your freezer) to last you the whole month. Of course you need a big freezer, which I don't have as of yet. So my plan is to try different recipes and make a few things to keep in my freezer on the days that I don't feel like cooking. As I find ones that I like, I will share them with you. If any of you have any that you have tried before, please email the recipes to fun4mommies@gmail.com

First up...Frozen Pizza

We like pizza at out house, but the order it is expensive and most of the good frozen kind are not too cheap either (Unless you get them on sale). So we decided to try and make our own. They turned out good.

You make your pizza dough recipe like you normally would. When you get to the part where you roll it out, you have a choice to make. You can either freeze it without toppings, just as a plain pizza crust, or you can place all your toppings on it before freezing. We tried it both ways. The first time I tried this I didn't have any good toppings at home, so I just froze the crust. The nexy time I planned ahead and got all my toppings ready. Both way turn out fine. But if you freeze it with the toppings, that is one less thing you need to do on the night you bake it.

Once your dough is ready, instead of placing it in your oven like you normally would, it goes in your freezer for later :) I placed mine on a cook sheet covered with wax paper. In a few hours, when it is completely frozen, take the pizza out and place it in a freezer bag. Try to get all the air out of the bag. You can now store your pizza in the freezer for up to a month. Any longer and you might get freezer burn.

When you are ready to cook it, preheat your oven to 450 degrees. Place your pizza on a cookie sheet or pizza stone. I would suggest spreading a small amount of corn meal under your pizza. The dough tends to get very sticky after it has been frozen. Bake for about 25 minute or until your cheese is bubbly and you dough is golden brown. Enjoy!

I'm sure almost any pizza dough recipe will work, but this is the recipe we use and it works great.

Herb Pizza Crust
makes 3 10-14 inch pizzas

2 tablespoons sugar
2 1/4 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 1/2 cups warm water
4 cups flour (I used part whole wheat and part all purpose to make it a bit healthier.)
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon basil
1 tablespoon oregano
1 tablespoon thyme
3 tablespoon oil (Olive oil is the healthiest to use. It's good for your heart.)

Dissolve sugar and yeast in warm water and let stand for about 5 minute. Combined dry ingredient in a large bowl. Kneed in yeast mixture and oil into the dry ingredients. (I used my Kitchen Aid with the dough hook attachment.) Once a dough as formed, shape in into a ball and place it in a greased bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise till it doubles in size, about 45 minute. Punch dough down. Place dough on a floured surface and divide into three balls. Brush the balls with oil and cover with plastic wrap. Let rise for 30-45 minute. Shape dough into your pizza crust by working from the center of the ball outwards. 1/4 inch for crispy crust. 1/2 inch for soft crust. Now you freeze it, with or without toppings.

NOTE: You can omit the herbs in the recipe and it would still turn out great.

Princess Hairdos

I was looking online for some cute Halloween ideas and came across a fun hairdo blog, shedoeshair.blogspot.com. If your daughter is a princess this year, you might want to check out some of these great tutorials.

Snow White Hairdo
Jasmine Hairdo
Cinderella Hairdo
Tinkerbell Hairdo and my favorite,
Belle Hairdo

Even if your little girl isn't a princess this year, still check out her blog. She has some great ideas. And she takes pictures of her creating from all angles, so you can see what they are suppose to look like. Some of them look hard to me (but what do I know, I have a baby boy) but others look easier. All of them are definitely worth trying.

Happy Hairdoing. (Is that a word? :)

Halloween Dinner Ideas

Here are some great ideas for Halloween food. Some of these I have tried, some I have yet to try, but all of them look fun.

First, we love Goumet Mom on-the-go! And she has some great posts you need to check out. She is full of fun and spooky diner ideas. And make sure to check out a lot of her other ideas while you are there.
Ghostly Shepard's Pie
Ghostly Pancakes
Spooky Snake Pizza
Not Your Mummy's Meatloaf
Mom?! There's Something In My Dinner

I got a copy of Woman's Day Magazine from a friend of mine. It had some fun dinner ideas as well.
Spider Web Pizzas
Pumpkin Patch Bites (I like it better with Crescent roll dough instead of pie crust.)
Serpent Sandwich
Bloody Soup Shots (goes great with the Pumpkin Patch Bites)
Spiderweb Nacho Spread

I also love a lot of the name brand food sites, like Kraft.com and Jello.com. These recipes came from Pillsbury.com.
Crescent Mummy Dogs
Jack-O'-Lantern Chicken Taco Cups
Witches Finger Sandwiches
Cauldron of Chili With Spider Bread
Toad's Eye Soup With Witches Broom Breadsticks

If anyone tries any other these recipes, please let us know how they are. If you have any ideas to share, please email us at Fun4Mommies@gmail.com. One thing I have learned is green olives make great eyes for any meal.

Happy Halloween!

Fruit Sorbet

For my birthday, my mom and dad bought me a lot of canning stuff. One thing they bought me was Ball's Blue Book Of Preserving. The whole book is about different ways to preserve foods.
In the "Freezing" section there is a great recipe for Fruit Sorbet. It's a great dairy-free alternative to ice cream. It's like sherbet, but more tart. I thought it would be a good way to use those baby food jars I have piled up. You can freeze individual servings. Plus, it's a good way to get some extra fruit into your kiddos.

Fruit Sorbet

4 cups sliced fruit (I used peaches)
2 cups of sugar
1 cup orange juice
2 tablespoons lemon juice

Puree your fruit in a blender. (You could use a food processor of you don't have a blender.)
Combine sugar, OJ, and lemon juice and cook over medium heat until the sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and add fruit puree. Pour on a 9x13 pan and freeze. (I let mine freeze over night, but if you want to do it all in one day then you need to keep in mind it will take over 4 hours to completely freeze.) Working in small batches, blend your frozen puree in your blender (or food processor) until creamy. Scoop into the jars you will be freezing your sorbet in, leaving 1/2 inch of space on the top for freezing expansion.

Mine made about 3 pints, with a little left for tasting. It was yummy. I thought next time I would try it with less sugar and see if it is as good. Never hurts to try and make it a little more healthy.

NOTE: the book says to store in your freezer up to a month. Also, any soft fruit such as peaches, strawberries, raspberries, or melons can be used.

Free Movie Rental

So, did you know your local library likely has tons of movies for you to check out that you and your kids will love? I had no idea till recently. On the radio, they were talking about how local libraries were busier than ever because of the poor economy. So I thought I would see if my library had any good movies to check out. They do!!! The trick to getting the good movies is to get online and request movies. If you just show up at your library, often times the good ones are gone. If you don't know how to request books/videos/music online, ask your librarian. When I was looking for movies, I typed in Disney and got 11 pages on different Disney movies, from Peter Pan to Mighty Ducks to School House Rocks. You can even get the old Disney educational movies. My husband and I got some interesting movies for us too. This week we are getting a NOVA and a Planet Earth. They may not be an action/adventure, but they are interesting, educational, and FREE.

UPDATE: I discovered that if I search "feature films" I get over 900 full-length movies. Some are really good ones, such as Annie, Apollo 13, Beautiful Mind, The Indian In The Cupboard, My Fair Lady, and Second Hand Lions (Just to name a few :)

Jump Start Creativity

One way to get children to use their imaginations is through writing. When I was in fourth grade, my teacher had a story starter book similar to this one:
The book had many different story starters. Each story starter had a picture and the first few sentences of a story. It was our job as students to finish the story as we felt it should go. Even though we all started with the same picture and beginning, we all had very different stories in the end.

Of course you don't need a book for this activity. You can make your own story starters. You can start a story from pictures you have in books at home, or from the library. Or keep you eye out for fun and unusually pictures from books at the DI. They have cheap books and you can rip out pictures you want to keep even if the book is hammered. Show your child the picture and ask them what they think is going on. Have them tell a story about it. Example:

This picture came from Vladstudio.com. It's a wonderful and whimsical picture that sparks the imagination.

Or you can start a story from just a few lines you wrote yourself. Just write a small paragraph and your kids can finish up. Here's an example:

It was a cold winter morning. I thought everything was normal, but boy was I wrong. First of all, It had snowed 2 feet in the middle of the night. That may not seem to strange to you, but I like in Arizona! Then I heard a strange tapping on my window. I opened they window. I couldn't believe my eyes. Standing there was a polar bear! Things just got weirder from there. Next, when I went outside...

It's easy! And fun to see what your kids come up with. If you have young kids, you can write a story they dictate to you. Or do a picture starter instead. It's also a great way to help increase creativity. Here's how it works. You draw a few lines, shapes, and/or squiggles on a piece of paper.

Have your child finish the picture. You will be surprised what they see and imagine. I'm sure they will be a lot more creative than I was. I just wanted to show you an example of what I meant. I thought it would be easier to understand than me just explaining.
HAPPY WRITING!

Power Of Parents

I came across a website with tons of information to help keep your children safe from abduction. It's called PowerOfParentsOnline.com. It has tips on how to keep you kids safe, how to talk to your kids about how to keep themselves safe, and what information you should have available and updated if you child should ever be abducted. I know this topic isn't really Fun 4 Mommies, but it is Important 4 Mommies to know.

Hello, Cupcake

So I've seen a book that has been talked about on many of the cooking blogs I read. Hello, Cupcake. I have been interested to check it out. Luck for me, it was available at my local library. Yea!! So of course I had to go get it. It is a great book!!! There are tons of great ideas and the best part, you don't need any special cake decorating tools.


There are tons of different ideas I want to try out before my book is due back at the library. I decided to try a very simple and fast design, so I did the pumpkins. What do you think?




I'll post pictures of my other attempts later. If anyone tries out the book, let me know how it goes. And if anyone has any ideas of other great books, please share! Have fun baking.

You Can Cook Scholarship

Gourmet Mom on-the-go shared a $25,000 scholarship opportunity for your children related to making a PB&J sandwich. It's for kids between 6 and 12 years of age. Go to Jif.com to get all the info. And make sure to check out Gourmet Mom on-the-go's post for some ideas she is willing to share. Or use them to inspire your ideas. I would have D enter if he was old enough. Too bad. And check out all the fun posts at GourmetMomOnTheGo.blogspot.com. She is full of tons of ideas. I plan on trying some of them in the future.

Contest Dates: August 4, 2008 and November 14, 2008

German Pancakes....Sort Of

At MakeandTakes.com, she calls the Pop Up Pancakes. They are basically German pancakes, baked in cupcake tin instead of a casserole dish. I suppose you could use any German pancake recipe, but I used the recipe from Makeandtake.com. All I changed was I used 1/2 cup all purpose flour and 1/2 cup of ground wheat that my father-in-law ground up for us. They still turned out wonderful!

We also made some mini-cakes in my mini-cupcake pan. Those were fun. I baked them for 7-8 minutes instead of 15. We tried all sorts of topping on your pop-ups. My favorite was syrup. My husband's favorite was butter and jam. We didn't have any fresh fruit/berries. I think that might have been the best, maybe with a little whip cream. Yum, yum! Just a note: if you've never had German pancakes before, they don't taste like regular pancakes. They are a little more egg-y but still really good.

To my Sis: You should try making them for B. And if she is still stuck on round pancakes, let her know I'll make her some next time you guys come down. My mother-in-law has the pan.

NOTE: If you've never checked out Makeandtakes.com, you should. She is way creative and has tons of fun ideas to try out.

Museum Day 2008

Two post, two days in a row. Crazy! But I have to share a post I found. I know I have talked about imommies.com before. Today I found a post about about Museum Day 2008. It's an opportunity to go to museums all over the county for free on Saturday Sept 27th. Click here to read the post from imommies.com. It will explain how to get your free pass and give you a link to to find out what museums are participating in your area. If baby D where older I would definitely take him to our local activitiy. It's Fort Beuanaventura. The exhitbits include fur trade era merchandise, information and exhibits. Entrance into the park and 1/2 hour of free canoe rental available for card holders. Doesn't that sound fun!

Christmas Candle

This Christmas candle was a project we did for Super Saturday at my church. It is way easy, cheap, and I thought it would be a good family tradition. All you need is a candle, candle holder, and puff paint (or something similar). We got all of our supplies from Walmart. You place 24 dots of paint on the candle. Make sure you figure out how much of the candle is in the candle holder. You don't want to place any of your dots too low.

The count down starts on December first. You light the candle and let it burn down to the first dot. Be warned, I have been told it takes longer to burn down to each dot than you think it will. So don't think it will be a quick 2 minute activity right before bed.

As you let your candle burn, you read about Christ. I have a paper that has 24 different events in Christ's life, the scripture reference of each event, and what we learn from the event.

Example: Day 1-Raising the daughter of Jairus- Luke 8:41-56- Jesus Christ was compassionate
Day 12-Was baptized- Matthew 3:13-17- Jesus Christ was obedient to God's law

If anyone would life a copy of all the day's let me know. I will send you copy. You could also come up with your own tradition with the candle, such as ready a children's Christmas book every night or talking about Christmas memories.

Storing Kids Papers

OK, so here is a problem all parents have: What papers from school do we save and how do we save them? This is a solution I heard on a Manic Mommies podcast. A person called in the idea. Unfortunately I didn't catch the lady's name, so I can't give her credit. I'm sorry about that, but she had a brilliant idea. She buys on of those large accordion file folders. (Mine actually has 13 slots which is perfect) Each slot is for a year in school. Whatever you decide to keep has to fit in the slot. It will help you get rid of a lot of paperwork and pick the most important to save.

Another idea I heard a long time ago (I can't recall where) involves how to save you child's art. You can make a small scrapbook to save your child's favorite art, but if you have a hard time throwing away any of their art, scan in onto your computer. Then you can save a jpg file of the art. Save it on a disk, and you will have it forever.

Anyone else have any ideas?

Grocery Shopping List

OK, I hate grocery shopping. I'll confess, my husband does it most of the time. But sometimes I have to go. And it is even harder when you have to take the kids. Here is an idea to make shopping with your kiddos a bit easier and maybe teach them a bit too. Make shopping into a game. With your preschoolers, make a grocery list using pictures. You can use your grocery store ads. Cut out pictures of items you will be purchasing and paste them on a paper. This allows your children to help find the items. Once they are older, have them add up the price of items. Once they are even older, allow them a set amount to "spend" on some groceries. Allow them to figure out how much they can buy with that amount. The grocery store can be a great place to teach kids about how to be responsible with money.

Journal Jars...And A Couple Of Blogs

OK, so as you all may know, I use Google Reader. One of the blogs I have subscribed to is The Plaid Post. I really like it. One of the posts she shared the other day was about Christmas being just around the corner. She also shared a website (which I am now also subscribed to) called Organized Christmas. It is great!!! Full of great ideas to help you with the busy holidays. I really suggest you check it out.

I just want to share one great idea I found there. It is an idea about Journal Jars. The idea behind a journal jar is to fill it with strips of paper with prompts, such as "What is your favorite game to play and why?" or "If I could have any super power it would be..." or "Five things I am most thankful for today are..." If you go to the website, you can download a bunch of great journaling prompts. (click here) Once you have a jar all full, it helps the child with daily (or weekly) journaling. It will become something you child and you can treasure for years to come.

When D gets older, I hope to start a family tradition of journaling. I would like to start a family journal. Also, I think journaling a great Sunday activity. Even when your kids are small, and too young to write, use PIE Night as a time to journal. As your child meets with Dad for one on one time, have Dad help them record their thoughts and feelings.

Let me know what your family does to record your own histories.

***Note: The prompt link was for a child's journal jar. Click here for some adult journal jar prompts. We need to be journaling too. :)

Word Walk

Fall is coming, and that is one of my favorite times of year to take walks. And I can't think of a better time to take a word walk with your kiddos. This is how a word walk works. You make word strips with a bunch of descriptive words.

Example words:
soft
rough
smooth
small
large
blue
green
(These are just a few ideas to get your brain working. You can think of a lot more.)

You place these words in a bag. As you take your walk, hike, or go to the park, you have your kids take turns pulling out a word. Once they have picked a word, have them find objects around them that are described by the word. It's fun for the kids, but it is also a teaching opportunity. And let's not forget the exercise you get from the walk. :)

As your kids start to have a better understanding of many descriptive words, you move on to comparisons. Your strips start to say things like:
"What is smaller than a cat?"
"What is larger than a car?"
"What is taller than your Dad?"
"What is shorter than you?"

FHE Exchange Group

Just a quick post. I know when I was growing up, my mom always had lots of FHE lessons all ready. I asked her once how she got so many. Her answer: She belonged to a Family Home Evening Lesson Exchange Group (FHELEG for short. Ok, so that's really not so short.) The idea of and FHE exchange group is that everyone in the group chooses a topic, created a whole lesson (handouts, visual aid, everything) for each member in the group. Then you all exchange. That's the quick version. Click here to read all the details. LDSabout.com has more details. I would love to start a group, but I will admit I'm too shy to approach people and ask them if they are interested. (My husband doesn't believe me when I tell him I'm shy at heart.) So if anyone who lives in the Ogden area is interested let me know. If not I will just keep on keeping on with with I was doing before. If anyone is part of a group now or in the past, please let us know any suggestion a "pro- exchanger" might have for the rest of us.

ZELMGID

This one one of my favorite FHE lessons growing up. I loved it so much that I made laminated copies for myself and my sister. It's the story of ZELMGID. It's really a story about living the Golden Rule. Here is a picture of my ZELMGID. (Note: I don't have a flannel board or magnet board, so we use tape and a cookie sheet.)
The story came from the Friend in 1987. Click here to go to the link on LDS.org.

Since Baby D is still very young, for FHE my husband, D, and I just tell different stories from the Gospel Art Kit. But I am trying to plan ahead for when D, and future kids, are able to better understand the lessons. I have been trying to pick topics that I want to teach my children. I then search the archives at LDS.org or other sites for stories and clip art. I then write the lesson using the stories, scriptures, and other gospel resources. I include song suggestions and game ideas. I try and keep it under one page , front and back. Everything is copied on card stock, colored if needed, and laminated. I place them all in folders labeled with the topic. So when we are running late on Monday nights, FHE is all ready!
I would love to hear about FHE ideas from all of you. I know there are a lot of creative people out there.

Crayon Holder Made Easy

Well, I finished my crayon holder for my niece B. This one was harder for me. I think because the sparkle fabric was stiffer and not as easy to work with. Live and Learn. Also, next time I think I will make the crayon slots a little bigger. Some of them are kind of tight. My sister may have to help them put the crayons away, but at least it will be an easy way to take crayons to church.

If you were intimidated by this project, Skip To My Lou has come out with an easier felt tutorial. Give it a try. And while you are there, check out the rest of her site. She's got some great projects.

Hopefully I will get these crayon holders in the mail this week. I was going to wait till next time I see them. but I'm impatient. Plus, all kids like to receive mail, right?

School Time!

School is just around the corner. Everyone has plans of making the school year more organized than the last and helping your kids keep on top of their school work and hoping your kids really enjoy the year and hoping they will talk with you about any problems they do have. (Obviously I didn't learn a thing about run on sentences when I was in school) The question is how to start off this next school year right. I found a great post at SimpleMom.net. She has some great ideas on how to start the school year off right. Click here to read it. She also has some good links at the end of the post. Anyone else have any traditions or habits that they have created for the beginning of a new school year?

What Is FHE?

I think that most of our regular readers know what FHE (Family Home Evening) is, but for those of you who don't, this post is for you.

LDS.org defines FHE as this, "[LDS] Church leaders have instructed members to set aside Monday night as "family home evening." This is a time for families to study the gospel together and to do other activities that strengthen the family spiritually, create family memories, and increase unity and love....A suggested outline for family home evening follows: opening song, opening prayer, scripture reading, lesson, activity, closing song, closing prayer, refreshments."

Monday night is the designated night, but any set night can work for your family. And FHE doesn't need to be gospel related if you are not religious. It is an opportunity to teach your children your family values and other important things (money, fire evacuation plan, stranger danger, etc.) It is an opportunity to grow closer as a family. As your have FHE regularly in your home, your family will become more united. It can be hard, but well worth the effort.

We are always looking for good FHE ideas here. Please email us with any ideas you may have.

Crayon Holder

So, I made this cute crayon holder yesterday. I found a tutorial at a neat blog called Skip To My Lou. I made this one for my nephew S. It's not perfect, but I don't think it's so bad for my fist try, especially considering I'm not really a sewer. I doubt S will care anyway. I'm going to be making one for my niece B. Hopefully I'll get a chance to fly out to see them soon.

Another Plug For Stephen

A while back I told you I had listened to The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families. I have to share another audio book of Mr. Stephen R Covey that I love. It's called How To Develop A Family Mission Statement. I loved it! It teaches how to write a mission statement with your family, even young children. And how to use this mission statement to help keep your family focused on the family goal of becoming a happy and loving family. If you get a chance to listen to this I would highly recommend it. I was able to check it out at my local library. It only took me about and 1 1/2 hours to listen to it. I learned a lot and it got me really excited about writing a mission statement. Since baby D is only 9 months old, my husband and I have decided to write a marriage mission statement. This will help us be focused on the same goals for raising our children and strengthening our marriage.

If anyone else has any good book that can help in day to day life as a mother, please email us and let us know. I always a love good book recommendation.

Flower Pot Cake

*Note: I know I'm a lousy photographer, so please forgive me. Maybe one day I'll get a better camera. Right now I'm poor, so this will have to do. :)

A friend of mine baked some cakes inside of terracotta pots she got at Wal-Mart for a quarter a piece. They turn really cute and tasted great. I'll share with you what she shared with me on how to do it. It's better to learn from other people's mistakes.

She placed a small piece of greased parchment paper on the bottom of each pot, to keep the batter from leaking out the bottom holes. You want o fill the pot about 2/3 fill, just to the "cuff" of the pot. She placed the pots in her muffin tin, for extra support when put them in and pulling them out of the oven, but she said a cookie sheet should work fine too. Just make sure you only put pots along the outside (of either the cookie sheet or muffin tin). The ones in the middle never seemed to cook all the way through. Cook them for about 45- 50 minutes. After about 30-35 minutes, turn the pots so that whatever side was facing outwards is now facing towards the center. When checking them to see if they are done, use a long skewer. Toothpick can be deceiving. You need to make sure they are cooked all the way to the bottom.

If anyone gives it a try, let me know how it goes. We frosted ours and put cookie crumbs on the top. Good, but next time I'm leaving the crumbs out. They made them hard to eat without making a huge mess.

Don't Eat Pete!

As kids we used to play this game all the time for FHE. It is a silly game, but we loved it. For those of you who do not know how to play, these are the rules:

1. You send one person out of the room.
2. The remaining people pick one number to be "Pete."
3. You then place M&Ms on all the numbers. (Cheerios if you want to be a bit more healthy)
4. The person who left the room now returns.
5. That person then proceeds to eat the M&Ms off the game borad.
6. The purpose of the game is to see how many M&Ms you can eat before you try and eat "Pete." When the person picks up the M&M on Pete's number, you all yell "Don't eat Pete!" And the person's turn is over.

I know it's not the typical type of game, but kids love it. Especially young kids because they don't have to remember many rules but they still have fun.

Note: If you want a PDF file of the game board, email me at fun4mommies@gmail.com. Let me know if you want the 25 or 100 card (Or both). But, a board isn't hard to make either.

A Couple Of Blogs

Just a couple of blogs/websites I wanted to share with everyone.

First, imommies.com. They have this ability to find some major deals for you. Just this week I was able to order 2 free DVDs from Fisher-Price. I got the info from their blog. And when I say free, that includes no shipping or handling either. They also recently had a link to a website to get gift cards to some restaurants for 70% off. I subscribed to imommies a couple of weeks ago (I use google reader. It is a must for anyone who checks blogs often). It seems to me they don't post often, but when they do they have great information.

Second, seriouslysoblessed.blogspot.com. This is a spoof blog.

The Deseret News' Mormon Times: "A clever twist on Mormon mommy blogs," it's "a hilarious spoof...so true to form, you might not catch that all those exclamation points are meant to be ironic."

I just read a bit, but even just reading the "about me" section made me want to pee my pants I laughed so hard. Only because it is all true. And I feel I can laugh because I have one of those personal blog they are making fun of. Some my feel offended by the blog, or just think it's dumb, but I liked it. Comment and let me know what you think.

Tooth Fairy Jar

Lost Button Studio has a really cute tradition about a "tooth fairy jar". It's a simply twist in the traditional "under the pillow" technique. Go check it out.

Email us with any fun family traditions you may have.