Moms' Coffee Date

The final day of dressing up for camp is here!  Overall, creating costumes was not as awful as I anticipated but I have to admit I am glad that I don't have to think about it again until next year!  Today's theme was dressing up as a superhero.  You could create your own superhero, or you could dress up as Batman, Captain America, etc.  My girls have never been interested in superheros, so we did not have any costumes to use at home.  I decided to go back to Dollar Tree (luckily I have one really close to my house)!  We bought a plastic tablecloth to cut into a cape and stickers to decorate the cape.  I also bought ribbon to use to attach the cape around her neck.   (I cut 2 small slits at the top of the cape, fed the ribbon through, and tied it.) My daughter decided to be a superhero that helps dogs and cats that are in trouble.  She chose dog, cat, and star stickers to decorate her cape.  Then, I used face paint to create a mask on h...

Day 2 of my daughter's camp required her to wear an outfit representing somewhere she would like to go in the world.  We looked through the items that we had at home and decided that she needed to be a hula girl!  She wanted a grass skirt to complete her look, so I checked Dollar Tree and found a cute one. (Dollar Tree is one of my favorite places to find items for my kids and my classroom.  They have a little bit of everything and all for $1!!!)  I think that her costume turned out great! After camp, we decided to make our house look patriotic in preparation for July 4.  My husband saw a great idea where you use spray paint and a star cutout to paint red, white, and blue stars in your yard.  Of course we had to try it!  First, we had to make our star template.  We used a box that we had in our attic for the cardboard.  Then, we used a ruler to draw stars on the cardboard and cut them out with a razor blade.  (We cut 2 stars becaus...

My daughter Emma is going to a theater day camp this week.  She is so excited!  I was excited too, but I admit I was a little anxious when I saw that each day is a themed day.  Which means that she has to dress in a new costume for each day.  The first day she is supposed to dress up as an exotic animal because they are doing their own production of Aladdin.  Now, I am a mom that wants to be crafty but many of my attempts do not turn out as planned.  I did not want my child to be the one that showed up with a costume that had people asking, "What are you supposed to be?"  Emma decided that she wanted to be a zebra. We went to Pinterest, which can lead to Pinterest fails but it is a good starting point!  I found a site that gave directions on making a zebra out of a paper plate.  I decided that we could print those out and attach them to a headband. http://www.dltk-kids.com/animals/mplate-zebra.htm Once we printed the ears out on cardstock,...

This is Trina...finally joining in on the blogging fun!  Not only am I a busy mom, but I also teach kindergarten.  If there are other teacher's out there reading this, you know that the end of the year is one of the craziest times of the year.  Now that I am on summer vacation, I have more time to blog! My daughters and I decided to celebrate by making chocolate covered strawberries.  First, let me tell you, I am no Martha Stewart.  In other words, if I can do it then you definitely can too!  I have tried melting chocolate several different ways, but the best way (in my opinion) is by using the Wilton Chocolate Pro. It is so easy to use and the chocolate melts quickly and evenly,  My favorite chocolate to use is Ghirardelli.  I used milk chocolate this time since my girls prefer it, but dark chocolate is my favorite. *I am not sure why this picture will not turn the correct way!   Once the chocolate has melted (about 10 minutes)...

Hello!! Iced coffee for me today on this hot summer day! What are you drinking? My family and I just returned from a family trip to Cancun! We had a great time! Partly because this is the first trip in a long time that no one got sick while on the trip. Yes, a very low standard, I know. But this is huge for my family. Someone always gets sick. We stayed at the Royal Islander which is part of the Royal Resorts  (check them out!). What is that, you might ask? Well, it is actually a time share. We used to own one at another resort called the Royal Mayan, but its lease ran out and the hotel and property it was situated on, returned to the Mexican government. Anyway... my mom still has a unit in the Royal Islander and she invited us to join her and my aunt this year. There are too many of us stay in her unit, so we rented our own. Why do you care and why am I trying to sell you a time share? I'm not! You can actually stay there as if it were an all suites hotel! It is quite a nice s...

Hi! Grab your favorite cup o' joe, pull up a comfy chair and let's chat about traveling with kids! So, my kids have been out of school for a couple of weeks now. And like most people, we want to travel more while they are out of school for the summer. So here are some things I have discovered make traveling with kids a bit easier. I find that the more prepared you are, the smoother the traveling part goes. You are happier for it and so are they! My family and I just returned from a vacation to Cancun! (I hope to post more about the trip soon!) So, we traveled by air rather than in a car. Can you imagine driving from Virginia to Cancun!?!?! These tips may differ a bit from a road trip, but I think most can be applied to both.  My sons are older (8 and 12), so they entertain themselves pretty well. We have made it a tradition to buy a new video game for them to play when we go on long trips. Now, they look forward to picking out a new game. (Full disclosure: my kids l...