Tissue Paper Forsythia Bush

Nothing is making us happier than the fact that spring has officially arrived here in our part of New England. One of my favorite parts of early spring is seeing the bright yellow flowers of the forsythia bushes. I've pointed them out so often as we drive around town now the boys are eager to spot them too.

Unfortunately, we don't have a forsythia bush in our own yard so we decided to create our own tissue paper forsythia bushes.

Lilac Scented Playdough

I love the sweet smell of lilacs in the spring time, but it always seems like the flowers last for such a short time.  We wait through early spring and by the time they open it's usually hot enough that they don't last for long.

So to savor the smell a little longer, I made up a batch of Lilac Scented Playdough! We still love a cooked playdough and used our basic cooked playdough recipe as a base for this batch. 

Photograph Paper Plate Flowers

Every year it's fun to think of something handmade and sweet we can make for the "grandmothers" for Mother's Day. But, we usually have to wait a little bit to share the project as my mom regularly reads our posts. (Proof that moms never stop supporting you, no matter your age or endeavor.)

We made these photograph paper plate flowers to decorate our Mother's Day gifts last weekend, and I just love how they turned out. Although we made them at home, this could be an easy classroom project too! 

In fact, the former preschool teacher in me would love to see a whole bulletin board of these in a classroom. 

May Day Tissue Flower Wreath

It's been so amazing to have some green color pop up in our world this week, it truly and finally feels like spring. And while the green has come, we're still awaiting those colorful May flowers. But as we probably have a small wait still (although really, I think it's only small) we put together these May Day Tissue Flower Wreaths.

We enjoyed making paper plate wreaths at St. Patrick's Day, so these were a great spin off for a new season. 

Wax Paper Flower Garden

When you were a kid did you ever do the project in the summer time where you pressed flower petals between two pieces of waxed paper? I can remember loving getting help using the iron to press two sheets of wax paper together with pretty petals in between. I was reminded of that craft this winter through a school project. As we don't have any flowers to gather and press, we made our own flowers with tissue paper scraps.

Our desire for something colorful came with a return to the very wintery weather we've had this week. As it snowed again the other day, we realized we needed to see some color as we looked through our windows.

10 Classic Ways to Enjoy Spring (April 2016 Monthly Goals)

Whether it's the unusual winter we just had, the sporadic temps we're still experiencing, or just a touch of late cabin fever - I am so ready for spring, a real spring, to arrive!

Something about this spring also has me thinking about those classic activities that families and kids get to experience during the warming spring months and I find myself just wanting to slow down and enjoy those experiences as much as we can. I'm sure some of this comes from the fact Big Brother turns 6 this month and officially is in the world of BIG KID. A time is going to come when we're more focused on sports, school, and friends and have even less time for these family focused moments.

So for my April Monthly Goals I've come up with 10 classic ways we can enjoy spring as a family. (Although of course I'm still chipping away at my January goals of organizing household clutter, my February Goals of using the crockpot more, and my March Goals of fitting in more exercise for myself.)

Red Clover Painting Exploration

We're really excited to be participating in the first "Tour the World by Flower" blog hop as hosted by Playground Parkbench. Bloggers from all over the world are sharing their state or national flower and a fun kid project idea focused on that flower. It's been really fun to see all the different ideas pop up from the amazing group of bloggers.

This week the spring flowers are in their full glory here in Northern New England. Everything seems to be blooming, each day the boys and I are excited to see something newly opened up. And although some of the currently blooming flowers (lilacs, tulips, apple trees, irises to name a few) are family favorites, none of them are our Vermont state flower: the Red Clover.

The red clover is such a simple, almost practical flower. Of course it makes sense to be our state flower when we think of all the farm fields full of the clover plants, blooming a little later in the summertime. Perfect for animals and insects like bees, adding just a pop of color to the green fields. 

Frog Pond Playdough

Truly one of my favorite sounds in the world is the sound of the spring frogs in the woods around our home, especially that first night I hear them as it means spring is here. I was pretty excited to notice it for the first time last week. So now that the frogs are here, it means it's time for the boys and I to start exploring the world of frogs.

We started that exploration by reading a few books and playing with some frog pond playdough this week.

Easy Easter Sensory Bin

The other day I was looking for something fast and fun for the boys to do, and quickly put together this Easy Easter Sensory Bin.

All month I've been inspired by several different posts where people used plastic Easter eggs in sensory bins. We already had ours out for our Jelly Bean Math Play, so it was easy to add them to our bin. 

Easy Easter Egg Pop-Up Card

I woke up the other day thinking about spring and what we could do to get ready and bring a little spring into our lives. Which of course made me think of Easter being right around the corner.

We love making pop-up cards for different occasions. Check out our Easy Christmas Pop-Up Cards and our Easy Flower Pop-Up Cards. This method worked a little differently.

20+ Ways to Play and Explore MUD!

We've been excited about the warmer temps lately because it means spring is on the way. And as the snow melts and the ground thaws, the MUD arrives. Now on one hand mud can drive a mama crazy; living on a dirt road means it tracks its way into the house no matter what we do. But on the other hand, it's only here for a short while, although long enough in New England to be considered the fifth season, so why not embrace it?

Here are 20+ ways to play and explore with mud, including creating your own mud sensory play even when there isn't any mud.

Pigs in the Mud (Pretend Sensory Play)

Spring is almost here, but before we get there we need to get through our fifth season here in our part of New England: Mud Season. With the warmer temps this week we're getting closer to "mud season," but we're still not there quite yet. So we created some pretend mud to help us as we wait a little longer for the real thing.

And of course, where there is mud it's always fun to include PIGS!

Spring Flower & Coffee Playdough Invitation

As we're still in the throes of winter we are definitely getting ready for some color in our white landscape. A recent trip to the dollar store inspired us to try some playdough play with a spring theme. 

At the dollar store we stocked up on colorful fake flowers, florist rocks, floral butterflies, and small plastic pots. Already the colors started to make us smile!

And in an effort to create a playdough that looks a little more like real dirt, we got creative with Daddy's left over coffee.

Hand Painted Reusable Shopping Bags (Mother's Day Gifts)

We are very blessed to have many different mothers we celebrate on Mother's Day. We have several great grandmothers to honor and three grandmothers. Last year for the grandmother's we enjoyed making our Mother's Day Flower Pots. This year we wanted to make another hand painted project and decided to create reusable shopping bags.

A few years ago we had made butterfly prints with our hands and decided to base our bag theme on the same butterflies. We added in some grass, flowers, and a sun to create a more colorful bag. 

Rewriting a "Time to Sleep" for Spring

The author for this month's Virtual Book Club for Kids is Denise Fleming, and while we love her more spring and summer themed books we also really enjoy Time to Sleep which takes place in the fall.

When we reread the book this week we knew that the animals were no longer going to sleep for winter, but waking up from their long winter nap for spring!

Egg Carton Tulips

In the past we've had fun using egg cartons for projects, we've made caterpillars and love bugs. So we were looking for a spring themed project and decided to make egg carton tulips!

Mud Season Monster Truck Bin

Everywhere I look there are reminders that spring is coming: Facebook, all the stores, Pinterest . . . that is everywhere I look that is not outside our windows. Last week's storm dumped another 18 inches on us, which has settled on top of what we already had to place us back in a Winter Wonderland. And these weeks cold temps are not helping.

Of course, in our part of New England before we get to spring we need to get through Mud Season. It's the fourth season here in Vermont. At this point I'd love to see that bare, brown time of year with just a hint of green; but you can remind me of that in a few weeks when I'm groaning at how the mud keeps getting tracked into the house.

To have a little fun with that idea I set up a Monster Truck Mud Season Bin for Big Brother. It's already gotten him excited about the idea that spring may actually be coming.