Tula Pink Quilt Along: Blocks 16, 17 & 18

I am trying to play catch up and it helps when I can get a couple blocks done in a day... I would like to spend more time sewing, but with a fussing little man, that is not possible...

Fun with Colors {watercolor crayon resist}

So, since my Virtual Book Club For Kids post on Brown Bear, Brown Bear, Nikolai has been totally into learning colors and playing with them. More specifically... paint...

yay...

So, I've been wanting to do crayon resist with watercolor for some time now and had the perfect opportunity to do it. We are going to celebrate my niece and nephews birthdays on Sunday. I found this awesome idea to turn kids artwork into greeting cards on pinterest. Perfect!

I am really excited how they turned out. Super Cute! Watercolor crayon resist greeting cards...

2 Babies Vaccinated = 1 tired Momma...

Now that my 2 babies are both asleep. I have some peace to myself! Can I sleep? No, that cup of coffee pounded before the oldest actually drifted off into a suddenly silent slumber has started to take it's effects. I can feel my hands shake with the need to move, to do something... Aah, the sound of wakefulness... Not more than 5 minutes...

Since the littlest one is still swinging in peaceful sleep, and the migraine is still tempting the base of my skull threatening pain in the ears, I am going to attempt to provide the most recent doctor update from our foray into the city just for a (ahem) 2 hour doctor visit. A little long, don't you think? But, alas, necessary...

It was a visit strictly for Baby Girl. Of course, not how it ended. Both my babies have been vaccinated; now I have a constant crier and a tempestuous toddler... Yay for me, and my nagging migraine...

I just love her facial expressions, now if only I can get one of her adorable smile!

Tula Pink Quilt Along: Blocks 13, 14 & 15

Finally have done some of the blocks for the Tula Pink Quilt Along over at Sew Sweetness! I am so excited because today I managed to get 3 done ! Yay!

Block 13

Block 14

Block 15

I do not like Block 13 so much as the rest. I think that my favorite out of these is 14. It is hard to tell in this picture but the corners of that block are blue, the sun was too much. But, block 15 is pretty cool too!

Hurrah for using scraps! :)

Brown Bear, Brown Bear: Fun With Colors {Virtual Book Club}

When I first saw this I knew I wanted to follow it...

Then I saw that others could participate too and I knew I wanted to join in on the Blog Hopping fun!

This month's featured author is Bill Martin Jr. and we have several Bill Martin Jr. books here in our home. So far our favorites are "Brown Bear, Brown Bear", "Panda Bear, Panda Bear" and "Baby Bear, Baby Bear". Nikolai can pretty much recite "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" if given the color. I discovered that when shopping at Joann's for my long awaiting DIY Color-Sorting Mat  project. I say long awaited because Nikolai wanted me to finish it and I wanted to finish it! It goes right along with him wanting to find matches for everything and asking "what's this favorite color?"

So this is what I have to share with you for this month's featured author!

Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do You See?

Color Sorting, Matching and a DIY Board Game

Color Sorting and Matching

Using the color sorting mat (either make your own or use squares of construction paper, I am all about doing what you can with what you already have) sort out objects like buttons, felt, beads, etc into the colors talking about the name of the color. Nikolai loves doing this and can last about 15 to 20 minutes just sorting out these objects! Yay!

We then incorporated a spinner that I had made previously (using cardboard, the printout I made, glue, a brad and washer) and pointed to the matching color (and placed anymore unsorted objects onto that color) to the animal from Brown Bear, Brown Bear. It was great fun spinning the spinner and pointing to the matching color, naming the color and the animal, and had to throw in animal sounds too! 

We (of course) had to move this mat to the floor. Nikolai was tired of sitting at the table and since Samara was sleeping (not like she is mobile yet) I figured "why not? It's more comfortable on the floor anyway.'" Nikolai went around looking for toys that matched the colors, "look mommy! they match!" He was so excited to find matches.

DIY Board Game

One of the things I wanted to go with the spinner was a game. I have been waiting to be able to teach little man to play a board game and, though he is not quite ready yet, this was a perfect opportunity to get him started! The link has what I used in PDF format along with my thoughts on different ways to play...

What do You See?

We are still working on this part of what I have to share with you. We have fun each time we play this game and it changes every time! That is one of the things that I love about stuff like this, they are so versatile!

We talked about colors as we I colored the squares, though he picked out the colors. He helped color the manila folder too. When we played, we mostly just matched the animals to either the drawn card or the spinner.

Check out these other sites contributing to the Book Club, and if you have anything you want to share too, feel free to contribute!

There are a few rules for this blog hop that we ask you to follow, so make sure to read them: 

1. Link up only posts inspired by Bill Martin Jr. that share children's book inspired crafts, activities, recipes, etc. Any other posts will be deleted.
2. Visit other blog posts on the linky and comment on or share the ones you love!

see you next time,

DIY: Color-Sorting Mat

I am so excited about this color-sorting mat. Nikolai just has so much fun playing with it! It doesn't matter how he plays with it I think, he is learning! So excited!

I found several nifty ideas for sorting colors online and on pinterest. Some of them were options that needed to be paid for. I figure I have *some* talent with sewing that I may as well give my own version a try! I even attempted embroidery for my first time too! So fun! And now, I want to share this with you in case you want to make your own. :)

Purse - Camera Bag

So, a while back I bought this nifty green purse from Walmart on clearance with the full intent of using it as a camera bag. My camera bag for the Fuji-film point-and-shoot was just too small for the Samsung.

I usually am one of those people that has a purpose for things like that, but rarely follows through. I am trying to follow through more.