Puddles and Bugs

Last weekend we went to the most creative birthday parties ever.  It was our best friend Halle's 5th birthday party.  Her Mom Elsie sent out seeds and inside the seed package was the cutest little invitation to Halle's garden party.  At the party Elsie set up stations...the main station was painting a flower pot.  Another station was play-doh...it wasn't just any play-doh...it was home made and it had sparkles and it smelt so pretty...just like a flower.  There was a cookie decorating station.  Face-painting and the last station was shaving cream fun.  At the end of the party the kids got to plant there flower in the adorable little pot they painted.  Caden had so much fun...Hannah...well wanted to get down and play.  Of course she did what every little kid loves to do...eat play-doe.  

The whole point of the story...in our little take home bags were shovels and a container to collect bugs in.  It was such a pretty day today so that is what we did.  Caden liked looking for them but did not want to put the bugs in the container!  Hannah wanted to put the bugs in her mouth!  Then we found a puddle from the next door neighbors sprinkler.  Boy was that fun!!!!  We have really enjoyed being outside since the weather has been so nice.  I can't wait to see what is in store for us this summer!

Weather Classification

I made 3 pictures:  rainy, sunny, and snowy.  I discussed with Caden what each of the pictures were.  Then I used the weather pictures from The Itty-Bitty Bookworm and had Caden stick them under the correct picture.  He did really well.  He really enjoyed sticking them on the wall.

Puzzles

Today was a sick day for both of the kids.  They both have a cough and runny nose!  Yuk!  Yes we did just get over the stomach bug.  Boy am I tired!  

Caden is really good at puzzles.  I help him put the side pieces together and he does the middle of each of the puzzles all by himself.  It is so funny, one of Hannah's puzzles has 3 pieces and Caden says, "too easy".  One of the puzzles we used today I got online.  It's pretty cute!  It has cards that you  try and find what is on the picture.  Kind of like Where is Waldo, but a puzzle instead.

When Hannah "does puzzles" she just takes all the pieces out and puts them in her mouth!  She is very good at that!

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

On Monday's we go to story time at the library and return old books and get new ones.  What fun!  I feel like I am buying something and then get to return it.  This week Caden picked out his books.  What I mean by that is he just pulled them off the shelf and put them in Hannah's stroller.  I didn't really care what he grabbed.  Well I told him to pick one out for Hannah and this is the book he chose:  Row, Row, Row Your Boat.  Both kids were sitting in my lap and we read that book over and over, I think about 15 times.  By the fifth time we did the motions and the sounds.  It was fun.  Hope you enjoy!

Easy Chicken Cordon Blue

Easy Chicken Cordon Blue

Ingredients:

• Chicken Breast sliced in half so they are thin
• Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 2 cups Italian bread crumbs
• 1 cup Parmesan cheese
• Diced ham
• Mozzarella cheese
• 1 egg
• 1/2 cup of milk

Directions:

• Preheat oven 400 degrees and get a casserole dish and drizzle extra virgin olive oil at the bottom of pan so the chicken will not stick.
• Slice chicken so it is thinner
• Prepare wet and dry batter.  Wet batter-in a bowl crack one egg and add milk.  Dry batter- I guess about 2 cups of bread crumbs and 1 cup of parmesan cheese.  (Sorry I never measure I just eye ball it).
• Dip the chicken in the wet batter and then dip it the dry batter and place it in the pan.
• Do the same for the rest of the chicken and then drizzle a little more olive oil over the top of the chicken.
• Place chicken in oven.
• When the chicken is 5-10 minutes from being ready (my chicken took about 30 min. and the last 5-10 minutes was when I added the ham and cheese) sprinkle the diced ham over the chicken and then sprinkle the cheese.  

Coupon Savings

This weeks savings was a little less than last week but this week was diapers and wipes week.  Yuk!  Can't wait until both kids are out of diapers or at least one.  Remember I just started useing the Grocery Game to help me get all these great savings.  I just started playing so I am sure I will get better with time.  

Coupon savings: $14.65

Bonus coupon savings:  $2.65

Kroger savings:  $26.13

Total: $43.43

My total bill was $184.27.  I go grocery shopping once a week and I spend about $130-200 a week depending what we are out of that week.  I cook dinner everynight with the exception of one night a week we go out to dinner or good old Grandma's house (Mee-Maw or Nona).  Which is our very favorite!

Umbrella-The Itty-Bitty Bookworm

Umbrella Activity-

• Used the umbrella cut-out with the 3 on it.  I also had 3 raindrops that I cut out and we counted them together.  I labeled them 1, 2, and 3 so he would recognize the number. 
• I asked Caden what color the raindrops were and we also colored with the same color (blue).
• We discussed when we use umbrellas and if it helps us stay wet or dry.  

Rainboot- The Itty-Bitty Bookworm

Rainboot Activity-

• I had Caden use two different tools to paint his rainboot.  The first was a cu-tip and the second one was a sponge in the shape of a raindrop.  
• We pretended that we were splashing in a puddle (yellow paint) and that it got all over our boot.

Listen to the Rain-Rainbows

More fun with the Itty-Bitty Bookworm today!  In case you aren't aware of what Itty-Bitty Bookworm is I will explain:  It is a Literature-based Preschool and Toddler Curriculum For Young Minds Everywhere.  Caden is a very active 2 year old and he loves books and loves hands on activities that are fun and challenging.  This curriculum does just that.  

Right now we are reading Listen to the Rain.  Today our lesson was about rainbows.  

Group Activity:

• Sorting Rainbow colors-  I bought Fruity O's cereal at Kroger's for 99 cents (what a great buy).  I put the Fruity O's cereal in one large bowl and had little dixie cups and labeled them with a picture and the color of that picture.  I asked Caden to put the correct color in the correct cup.  He enjoyed it at first but was more interested in pouring the cereal from one cup to the next.  Hannah was interested in eating them.  Haaa!

Creative Art:

• Cereal Rainbow- With this activity we were asked to make an arc with glue and take one color of the cereal and have them put it on the glue and continue with the other colors.  But I was searching the internet for coloring pages of rainbows and found this rainbow.  So Caden was able to place the correct color cereal on the correct color of the rainbow.  Then we used cotton balls for the clouds.

Hannah's sleeping and eating

Hannah is now 10 months old and she is still not sleeping through the night.  The weird thing is she has just been on and off her whole life (sleeping through the night).  It is not like she is waking because she is going through a growth spurt.  With Caden it was very easy to know that he had enough food during the day so I knew he did not need a bottle at night.   I would let him cry and by day 3 he slept through the night.  To this day Caden is a great sleeper.  Never wakes in the night.  With Hannah if she wakes I let her cry for a bit just to see if she will go back to sleep and if not then I will give her a bottle because she is soooooo little, she needs to eat.  She is 10 months old and only weighs 14lbs.  Little bitty thing.  So that means she is only twice her birth weight, so any chance I get to give her food I do.  But it is soooo wearing me out.  

We have tried give her a meal replacement shake for her to gain weight but she got some kind of stomach bug so we stopped.  I may start back again but she has got to get some rest.  She is also eating all table food, she will not eat any baby food.  Her top teeth are broken through so I feel a little more comfortable giving her more of a variety of table food, but just worried about what not to give so she doesn't get a stomach ache.  Any ideas for anyone?    

Cuties

The kids did a lot of cute things this week.  Hannah loves getting inside of things.  I caught her playing in a little basket.  She got in and out of it for about 20 min.  

Then Caden wanted to wash dishes with me.  He pulled the chair over to the sink and played in the water the whole time I did dishes.  He got very upset when I turned off the water.

When we went to out to the country last weekend Caden opened one of Nonnie's cabinets and found some screwdrivers and boy did he enjoy himself fixing her kitchen cabinets.

Itty Bitty Book Worm Listen to the Rain

We have been talking about wet and dry.  Other topics we have discussed are umbrellas, raindrops, clouds, sun, and the weather. This week we made clouds out of cotton balls.  Raindrops out of coffee filters.  I did not have water color paint so I used water and food coloring.  It worked just as well.  We also made a sun!   We sang a song called "What's The Weather".  

What's The Weather?

What's The Weather?

What's The Weather Everyone?

Is it windy, is it cloudy?

Is there rain or is there sun?  

Then we would go outside and check the weather.  

I also bought him a cute doggy rain coat and rain boots at a resale shop for $10.  I can't believe he actually let me put the boots on.  It was hilarious to see him walk around in boots that are 3 sizes too big.

I also posted a picture of Caden standing by a bulletin board of all of his March art.

Piggy Bank with Paw-Paw Virg

Paw-Paw Virg gave Caden some money to put in his piggy bank.  Caden got so excited!