Graphing with Easter Candy

One of our favorite things to do with seasonal candy is use it as a math manipulative. In the past we've used candy hearts for math games, counted with pumpkins, and done math play with jelly beans.

So when I saw these SweetTart Easter Candies at the grocery store I knew they would be perfect for math play.

Since the candies were both colorful and different shapes, we decided to graph them! I made up two graphs: a color graph and an animal graph. We want you to be able to play too, so at the end of the post you'll find the link for the graphs!

Playdough Invitation to Build a Rainbow

The other day we had a friend over and I decided to set up an easy and colorful playdough invitation. Although the boys all created their own versions of a rainbow, because of the high energy they had that day, it wasn't quite as peaceful as imagined when I set it out. (There was a lot of monster and smashing talk while they built the rainbows . . .) But, there creations were colorful! And we were a little bit calmer afterwards.

Earlier this winter we adapted our basic cooked playdough recipe to make a white sparkly snow playdough for our snowmen at work playdough invitation. This white playdough has been a great base for other playdough invitations, including this one. 

20+ Rainbow Recipes For All Times of the Day

A few years ago we discovered Rainbow Pudding Cups, and somehow they have become a St. Patrick's Day tradition for our family, even though they are not at all traditional to the holiday. But we also enjoy making them at other times of the year, because they are just so fun and colorful.

This inspired to search around the web and find even more creative, fun, and colorful Rainbow Recipes. In fact, we've found over 20 of them for you to enjoy and spread across the day!

Crepe Paper Rainbow Collage

We're stuck in this funny place: winter but not really winter at the same time. Very little snow outside but enough so that we can not go out without snow pants. Too cold to really spend the day out there, but nice enough to feel like we have to get outside for something. Everything is brown, white, and gray. So this week we've decided we need to add some color to our world which has included some fun rainbow play.

Last year around this time we made St. Patrick's Day Windsocks using crepe paper streamers, and as we still have the crepe paper, we put it to use again.

For this project we not only used the crepe paper, but another favorite material: contact paper. We've used contact paper to create a rainbow before too, in an original Sticky Rainbow Collage project. For this collage we used a similar process, although we knew we wanted it to hang the finished product in the window. 

Golden Nugget Cotton Ball Smash

I'm not going to lie, these didn't come out quite as pretty I was hoping, but they were fun. I've been wanting to try baked cotton balls as a project for a while now, and our recent snow day was the perfect time to try it out.

Trying to make it a little more fun, I decided to color them gold and add gold glitter  . . . but it's true they turned out a little funny looking.

Veggie Print Valentine's Cards

I absolutely love seeing all the creative ways other bloggers have come up with to create Valentine's Day cards. Although the "big day" is officially here, I wanted to share one more sweet way we made cards for family members this holiday.

Actually, maybe it would be better to say one more not-so-sweet way we came up with making Valentine's Day cards in that we used vegetables. In the past we've enjoyed using potato prints to make Snowmen Cards and Printed tea towels. This time we included potatoes and branched into other types of vegetables.

Heart Play on the Light Table

Valentine's Day is coming, which means it's a great time to create and play with hearts. A few years ago I bought these fun plastic hearts at The Dollar Tree. We've used them in other sensory play ideas before, like this Valentine's Day Sensory Bin.

But the other day I was inspired to try them on the light table. 

Little Brother and I were home on a pretty dreary and rainy afternoon, looking for some ways to brighten up the rest of the afternoon when we got out the Valentine's supplies and remembered these colorful hearts. 

February 2016 Goal: Use the Slowcooker on Busy Nights

So somehow January flew past me. Even though I chipped away at my January Goal of Decluttering and Organizing, the busy pace of a usually quieter month meant I just didn't get as far as I wanted to. (Although happily we did make some progress  with cleaning out toys, clothes, and several cabinet spaces.) As I've discovered in the past with this goal, sometimes this is one that takes a few months of focus to really make a difference.

When times get busy though, it helps to focus on ways I can find some balance in an otherwise chaotic spell. For February I'm deciding on one simple way I can create a little more balance within our busy weeks: use the slow cooker more.

In the past I've loved using our slow cooker, especially in the winter. But for some reason this winter we haven't been pulling it out as often. Yet I know that when we get home from a busy day at work or I find myself headed out to an evening meeting the slow cooker can be a true sanity saver.