Homemade Rapunzel Costume

 Something that Primus has been asking Santa for for a couple years is a Rapunzel dress-up dress.  So this Christmas I finally decided to make that happen.  But to my chagrin, they just don't make dress-up clothes in her size!  I could find them (REALLY hard to find and expensive) in size 7-8.  But I want her to be able to enjoy it for a while and she is so tall so she is starting to move into size 10 already!  I found some really great nightgowns in her size that would work but those things are 50 bucks!

So I had to figure out how to make my own.  Here's a picture for reference.

You can see a good tutorial on how to make this super easy tutu here.  I think I bought 5 or 6 yards of tulle.  Instead of a regular elastic waist, a friend suggested I use a crochet elastic headband.  I really like how it looks!  You can buy it by the yard at Jo-Ann's.

For the top, I just sewed ribbon onto a shirt.  It would have been a lot better if I had used a regular T-shirt, but I just used what she already had.

Our Daily Routine

 I've been meaning to do this post since the beginning of the school year.  But I guess it's good that I procrastinated because now it has been proven to be an effective method for us.  Yay!

This is our third year homeschooling, and my first year with two official students.  In the past, I was very fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants.  I didn't now what assignment Primus was going to do next until the moment I assigned it.  I was the only one who knew what the plan was for the day.  It worked out ok.  But it was obvious that now with two students, a preschooler, and a baby, we needed some more order, routine, and independence. 

 The first step was to decide on a daily routine and print it out for all to see.  The Monday schedule stays on the wall at all times.  Then I can clip the other days to the front.  For example, if you look at Tuesday below, the paper actually starts with 9:45am because before that, the schedule is exactly the same on Monday so I just clip it to Monday, leaving the top part visible.  The schedule is also laminated so I can easily make any adjustments with a dry erase marker. 

I then set up recurring alarms on my phone to keep on schedule.  When the kids hear the alarm, they know something is supposed to happen.  If it wasn't for those alarms, I don't think we would ever eat between meal snacks.  My kids definitely like the alarms!

You'll notice above that I have Science, History, and Literature scheduled at certain times.  Those are the three subjects that we all do together. We do Science on Tuesday and Thursday, History on Monday and Wednesday, and Literature on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. 

For science we use Evan Moor's Science Works for Kids.  This school year we chose 5 of the books in the series.  Each book has 9 topics.  So I figured if we studied 1 topic per week, then we would have almost exactly the right amount of weeks in the school year to do everything (some weeks we would have to study 2 topics) .  Well, it's become clear that that was an unrealistic and frantic pace.  We are a couple weeks behind.  I think I'm going to take a day or two soon and dedicate them to science.  We'll just do nothing but fun science experiments all day and get caught up and ahead.

For history we use Story of the World.  I have no specific goals for this.  We just take it at a leisurely pace and spend as much time doing enrichment activities and reading books about a certain chapter as we want.

Until two weeks ago, for literature we were studying Folk Tales and Fairy Tales using a book from Evan Moor.  The book had 3 activities for each story so we would study one story per week.  Each day we read a different version of the story and then do one activity. 

Now we are studying one Caldecott winning book per week.  We read it on Monday and discuss to check for comprehension and pick two new vocabulary words from it to define.  Wednesday and Thursday we do two art projects from a book called, Art Through Children's Literature.

You'll notice on the chart above that we have "List" scheduled several times.  That means it is their time to work on their daily list of tasks.  They each have their own clipboard.  I don't care what order they do their tasks, as long as they are done by the end of the day.  They even occasionally work ahead and do the next day's pages. 

These lists make for easy record keeping.  And Primus is getting really good at working independently.  She doesn't have to wait for me to tell her what to do next.  She just looks at her clipboard and decides what she feels like doing.

Finally, you might be able to see that on their lists it says "Pick a Stick."  This is one of their tasks almost every day.  This means that they chose a large craft stick from their own jar (those are little peanut butter jars hot-glued together) and do the activity that is written on it.  These are all fun and educational things that I want them to have an opportunity to do, but I am too scatterbrained to remember to assign them. 

The kids love this!  I really need to reevaluate their daily lists and make it so they can pick-a-stick everyday, maybe twice on some days.  Some examples of stick activities are: tanagrams, pattern blocks, take a magnifying glass outside and explore, phonics bingo, play "store," explore with our magnet science kit, origami, puzzles, math fact practice with 10 sided dice, and fine motor skills practice with tweezers or eyedroppers.

So there you have it, a peak into our school day.

9 Things You May Not Know About Us

In honor of our 9th wedding anniversary coming up, here are 9 things you may not know about us…

1. While we were dating, we broke up for 5 weeks because God told us to.

2. Hubby was my first boyfriend (well, second if you count those 5 weeks we were broken up.) I was 19, he was 23.

3. We went through a really rough patch about 4 years ago. A counselor we saw even suggested divorce. Neither of us went back to see her after that.

4. We were both virgins until our wedding night.  If I could go back in time to when I saw that gyno before our wedding who told me I was lying about being a virgin and that my fiance was lying to me and definitely sleeping around, I would punch him in the face.  Jerk.

5. He stood me up on our first blind date. But we didn’t put the pieces together until after we were engaged.

6. We got married 9 months after we started dating. That's about a year after we met.

7. We took an Xbox with us on our honeymoon and played Halo together.

8. He blames me for the fact that he got sick and had to come home from his mission early. If he had served his full 2 years, we may have never met because I had plans to transfer to a University out of state and would have been gone when he got home.

9. We are best friends and can’t imagine life without each other. So thankful for our Temple marriage and the promise of Eternal families!

Play Dough Kit and FREE Printable

 At the beginning of the year, I shared my favorite easy play dough recipe.  Well, I have an opportunity to participate in a small craft fair coming up so I decided to whip up a few more of those kits and see if anyone would buy them.  And lucky you, you get to know how they're made for free!

1. In a small jar, combine 1 cup flour and 1/2 cup salt.  The little 16 oz jars of peanut butter are a perfect size. 

2. Use a small roll of masking tape to attach a package of Kool Aid to the outside. 

 3. In a really small jar, put 2 Tbs vegetable oil.  I used little 2 oz breast-milk storage bottles.  These ones were especially perfect because they have a groove in the middle, which made tying the two jars together easier.

4. Tie the jars together with a pretty ribbon.

5. Print out the instructions on a regular 8 1/2 X 11 paper.  (My first ever attempt at a printable.  I hope it works!  You can right click the image and select "copy image" then paste it into a word document.  Set the margins as really small (.25inch) and adjust the image so it fills the page.  I know that's a pain and it may not be the best quality, but I have no idea what I'm doing!  lol)

6. Cut them out in a circle to fit the lid of your jar and use Mod Podge to attach. 

There you have it!

Keeping the Kitchen Clean

"Honey, I propose that we try and keep the kitchen this clean all the time."  

Hubby said this to me after he spent a large chunk of his Monday getting us caught up on dishes and  scrubbing the kitchen while I took a much-needed break.  

I'm a horrible homemaker. Add to that  frustration and feelings of "what's the point?" when it seems like I'm the only one who cares about living in filth.  I hate doing chores at night after the kids go to bed so sadly I was greeted most mornings with a disgusting table still covered with dirty dinner plates, crumbs all over the floor, and every counter filled and filthy.  That situation just puts me in such a foul mood!  

But I was stuck and didn't know how to change things.  It was common for me to express my anger at stepping on tiny pieces of dried rice and then huff and puff as I got out the broom while ignoring the baby who wanted out of the high chair and delaying the start of the school day (two things that make me feel like a horrible mother and cause the rest of the day to go even worse) while Hubby would say something unhelpful like, "Just calm down; it's ok.  The floor is just going to get covered with more Cheerios next mealtime.  You can sweep later."

I needed a reset and when Hubby made it clear that he understood how much work it was to keep the kitchen clean and how lovely it feels when it stays that way, I jumped at the opportunity!  

Now every night before bed the entire family does chores together.  On our list of things to do: dinner put away, dish washer emptied and filled again, counters and stove wiped, table cleaned, floor swept, and living room picked up.  For every job they do, they earn media time.  The girls are a lot more capable than I've in the past given them credit for.  It only takes us about half an hour to get the whole kitchen spotless and the living room completely picked up. 

 I have woken up to this wonderfully clean kitchen for 3 mornings in a row now and it is awesome!  I hope the novelty doesn't wear off!

Scatterbrained or Genius?

Yesterday everyone woke up late.  Then even when we were awake, we were still lazy and tired (staying up late after a full night of trick-or-treating with cousins will do that to you!) so we didn't stick to our normal Friday morning school routine. 

After breakfast we lounged around and watched a couple educational DVD's we got from the library.  Then we left for all day theatre class.  As I was frantically trying to get everyone packed up to go, I realized that Primus should at least do a spelling test.  So I grabbed a clipboard, her spelling list, a blank paper, and a pencil and away we went. 

Once we got on the freeway, I handed the list to Secundus and had her call out the words for her sister.  She had to sound out the word, give a sentence with the word, and then say the word again (that's the way I give spelling tests.)

Secundus was so excited because she loves to be in charge and she was proud of herself for being able to read third grade spelling words.  She stopped half way through and said, "Mommy, I'm being the teacher!  Maybe I could be a teacher when I grow up!"

I thought I was just being scatterbrained (for not doing the test myself earlier) but turns out I was executing a genius plan!  Not only did Primus get her spelling test done, but Secundus had a valuable reading and comprehension lesson.  Also, I was able to bring her joy for indulging her "I want to be the boss" tendencies and maybe even helped her to discover her calling in life!  :) 

The morning started with laziness but ended with Winning!