Potty Training tips for the Independent child.

Ok so my little miss V is one of those kids that wants to be sooo independent. She has been showing interest in potty training for EVER but every time I step in to potty train her it totally back fires on me so I had a break off of work and finally told her, "Here you do this yourself." And gave her some panties and let her wear them with no pants around the house, and what do you know she did great. Only like one accident a day sometimes which was great! The only problem was I did this 2 days before I had to go back to work. She hasn't done so well when I put pants on her so during the day when I am home I leave her in just panties and at work I put her in  a diaper. Great I don't think she is ever going to be potty train A) because it is not socially acceptable to let your child run around in her underwear all day and B) it is starting to get cold so my poor little miss V can't run around naked. Luckly I was cleaning her room and found one of those little diaper covers that came with an old dress and decided turn them into "Pretty Panties" so that I could continue the potty training at work. All I did was sewed some small lace in rows on the butt then got a bigger lace to go around the entire waist part and viola pretty panties that people will think is a skirt. Now for the cold part, I had made these leg warmers for Itylee when she was a baby but these work perfect for potty training. They keep her warm and she doesn't have to take them off to go potty! Score!!! If there are people interested in learning how to make the leg warmers let me know. I'll do a tutorial if people are interested. They are super easy! I put a panty liner in her panties because there have been times where she pee's just a little bit and this way it doesn't totally wet the panties and keeps her feeling like she is wearing big girl panties. Now some other tips you could do it a visit from the Potty Fairy. I did this with Itylee and she was good to go. Fill a basket with little prizes or treat wrap it up all cute and knock on the door and run. Tell your little one that the potty fairy dropped off this package so every time they go potty they get to choose a prize. Now with Vienna being all independent this did not work instead one time I got upset and told her "Fine you pee pee in the potty you get your potty treat. But you pee pee in the panties and I get your potty treat." Then I ate her treat right in front of her. Oh man did this get her mad. So with the "pretty panties" and the "i get your treat" I think we will be totally done with diapers soon. YEAH!!!!! Don't mind the little stain on the pretty panties I should of taken the picture before she had lunch. dang spaghetti ooo's.

Simple October Gift

Ok so here is what I did for just a little gift for the ladies I visit teach.  Here is the link for the cute witch shoes and for the treat I made some chocolate dipped strawberries and the card I made with digital scrap booking program I have. If anyone would like to share with me on how to upload of file I would be more then willing to share my card with all of you

AND THE WINNER IS..............

Ok first thank you everyone who participated and for the staff of mymemories for sponsering this give away. I have had so much fun with this digitial scrap booking software. I am learning something new everytime I use it. Plus the staff at mymemories is awsome. On their blog they do a different challanges and on their facebook on Sundays they do this thing called speed scrap sunday were in an hour they teach you a different technique but they give you steps every ten minutes for an hour then you post your picture and of course they give out prizes. It's so fun to see how we all had the same instructions but how differently everyone around the worlds tunrs out different. Ok ok ok I'll stop blabbering and get to the good part. AND THE WINNER IS.............ASHLEY!!!!!!!!!!!!! Congrats Ashley I know you will love this and A.J. can deal with the neglect. Ok I do still have some good news for everyone else If you really would like to still try out digitial scrapbooking mymemories crew has given me a promo code so that you can use get 10$ off of the digitial software plus another 10$ to use to in the desgin shop. The software is only 39.97 so with the promo you only pay 29.97 which seriously is a good price especially for what you get.  If anyone would like to test drive the program too you are more than welcomed to come on over and give it a shot. For those that are interested the promo code is STMMMS99421


They also have also have a cool wedding software if you are in the wedding business or just about to have your own wedding and want to save money you can create thank you cards, invitaition, place cards, ect. Now I just need to find someone I know that is engaged so I have an excuse to purchase it :)

This was my speed scrap sunday picture

This is a card I made to go along with a little gift for the ladies I visit teach. I will post this with the gift in another post since I have not delivered them yet

This is something I made for a friend who is getting married today and again I'll have another post to show you what I did with this

MyMemories digital scrapbooking software give away

Ok so I am sooooo excited to do this give away. Now if your like me you take a lot of pictures and never get them developed or when you do they sit in a box for ever until you finally get the urge to scrap book all of the pictures and you spend countless hours on it and when you have finish it's only one page. Yup that's me and dont forget the huge mess you have to clean up afterwards. I have been wanting to get to digital scrapbooking so I can make a book for every year. My goal is to do a page a month about what we did that month. Can I just tell you how much I love mymemories suite software. I had so much fun and it only took a half an hour out of my day to make this cute page of my girls. The nice thing you can do is just use an already made template where you can just drag pictures into or you can make your own. This page I made myself. No template involved. Not to bad for my first page. The program isn't just for scrapbooking either.You can make birth annoucments, christmas, cards, or even b-day invitaions!

Okay okay now time to get on to the good stuff. The giveaway for a free Mymemories Suite Software. Now it is simple all you have to do is go to mymemories.com and then choose a layout that you like best and post a comment telling me what you favorite layout is.  My favorite one is the glamour and glitz pack. That package is what I used to make my page. Also if you like to add another entry follow them on facebook, blogger, or twitter and leave in your comment which ones you have done. I will pick a winner next Monday so good luck everyone!

Blog- http://blog.mymemories.com/


Facebook- http://www.facebook.com/pages/MyMemories/140359372717593

Twitter- http://twitter.com/#!/mymemoriessuite

A is for apple

These are our apple faces and stain glass apples. We will be putting our stain glass apples on our halloween tree

ABC Halloween Countdown

Okay so today is the last day before my favorite month! Yeah I am so excited for October to come. Halloween has been my favorite holiday off all times and I wanted to help make my girls excited too. So I made an ABC Halloween countdown. Remember that vase that I stuffed my extra screen scraps into well I was taking a walk around my neighborhood and found a dead tree in one of the empty lots. SCORE I cut off a couple branches and put them in my vase. Then I found these cute little bags at the dollar store and wrote a letter on each of them and the number of days left till Halloween. Inside of the bag is just a little piece of paper with a word relating to the letter of the day. I have a sheet explaining what we are going to do for the day for each letter. Most of them are decorating crafts so that by the time Halloween comes I will have lots of cute little homemade decorations from my girls.

These are the bags with the letter of the day and how many more days until Halloween. I then hole punch at the top so I could just put them on a branch easily

This is our ABC Halloween countdown tree















I will also post a picture everyday of our activities in case they don't fully make sense in my description.


Here is my Halloween alphabet that I came up with

A-     Apples

B-      Bat

C-      Cats 

D-     Donuts

E-      Eyeball

F-      Frankenstein

G-     Ghost   

H-     Haunted House

I-        Icky

J-       Jack-o-lantern

K-      Knight

L-       Lantern

M-   Mummies

N-     Night

O-     Owl

P-      Pumpkins

Q-     Quivering Queen

R-      Raven

S-      Spider

T-      Tombstones

U-     Ugly Face

V-     Vampire

W-   Witch

X-      X-ray

Y-      Yucky Yummies

Z-      Zombie

27- Halloween wreath

28-Flying purple people eater

29- corn maze

30-MOVIE

31- Halloween breakfast

And here is the explanations

A-     Apples Stain glass apples*, apples faces, pull and peel for hair and mouth and m&ms for eyes and nose stick together with peanut butter

B-      Bats Stain glass bats* and bat cups but use children’s hands for the wings bat puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/ http://www.thebestkidsbooksite.com/craftdetails2.cfm?CName=1758

C-      Cats and costume Stain glass cats* Cat finger puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/

D-     Donuts play the donut on a string game

E-      Eyeballs edible eyeballs http://familyfun.go.com/recipes/edible-eyeball-treats-685115/

F-      Frankenstein  Frankenstein Paper plate http://www.dltk-holidays.com/halloween/mplatefrankenstein.htm

G-     Ghost Ghost Foot print trace foot and cut out two hot glue them together but leave enough space to stuff with cottonballs then seal it up and hang  and ghost suckers

H-     haunted house Build a ginger bread haunted house

I-        Icky Icky game. Blind fold children and have these things in a plastic bag and have the kids guess what “body parts ” they are touching  Hot dog chucks: nose, Peeled grapes:eyes, Cooked spaghetti: guts Pistachio shells: finger nails,  

J-       Jack-o-Lantern Jack-o-Lantern egg carton http://www.allfreecrafts.com/halloween/egg-carton-pumpkins.shtml Felt jack-o-lanters Make a pumkin and small shapes out of felt. Let the kids put the shapes on the pumkin to make a jack o lantern, Jack o lantern puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/

K-      Knights Make Knight customes out if paper bags from the grocery store and a shield from cardboard and helment from an empty gallon milk jug

L-       Lanterns Make black and orange paper Lanterns

M-   Mummies Glue two googly eyes on a toilet paper roll(if you don’t have white toilet paper rolls paint them white first.) wrap in white streamers fill with some yummy mummy treats. Make hotdog mummies http://familyfun.go.com/halloween/halloween-recipes/halloween-dinners/hot-dog-mummies-715031/

N-     Night paint empty milk jugs black poke some small holes all over the jug if you are going to put these outside, put some dirt in the jug. Place a tea candle or the little fake tea candle lights inside of the jug.

O-     Owl Build an owl out of shape http://www.dltk-kids.com/animals/mshapesowl.htm

P-      Pumpkins Stain glass Pumkins* and visit a pumkin patch make pumkin snacks http://familyfun.go.com/halloween/halloween-recipes/halloween-dinners/pumpkin-roll-ups-684822/

a.       Gumdrop pumkins-  get two orange sliced-shaped gummies and trim the semi straight side on both gummies to make straight sides so that you can put the two together to make a full circle. Now get a green gumdrop and trim the bottom off and press it on top of the candy pumpkin.

Q-     Quivering Queen  Quivering Queen game. Have the kids dress up as queens or kings and fill a plastic teacup with jelly beans or other small candies and they have to quiver until their cup is empty. When they quiver they cannot have their feet leave the ground because that would be jumping and also they can’t move their arm they have to quiver with their bodies

R-      Raven Hand and foot Raven. Trace one foot and both hands on black paper. Use foot for boy and hands for wings glue googly eyes on and glue a yellow triangle on for beak

S-      Spiders  Trace two hands on black paper and overlap the thumbs for the spiders head and glue on googly eyes Egg carton spiders http://www.dltk-kids.com/crafts/insects/mspidercarton.htm spider finger puppet http://www.craftjr.com/halloween-crafts-finger-puppets/

T-      Tombstone Paint empty cereal box gray to make their own tombstones

U-     Ugly faces- Make a felt face with separate facial pieces that the kids get to put together to make ugly faces

V-     Vampire Vampire suckers http://familycrafts.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&sdn=familycrafts&zu=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.craftster.org%2Fforum%2Findex.php%3Ftopic%3D272046.0

W-   Witch Make witches brew (homemade root beer made in a cauldron) Make witch hats http://4crazykings.blogspot.com/2009/09/halloween-kids-craft-witches-hats.html

X-      X ray x ray gingerbread men http://familyfun.go.com/halloween/halloween-recipes/halloween-desserts-cakes/gingerbread-skeletons-929720/

Y-      Yucky yummies- Make Halloween treats to share and to save for movie day.

Z-      Zombies Make zombie silhouettes.  Get a large piece of cardboard and trace your childs body in a zombie position . cut out and paint it black. We will be sticky these in our window.

27-Hand print Halloween color wreath

28-Recite the Flying purple people eater poem then play game Draw a large one eye one horn flying purple people eater on cardboard and cut a big mouth out of it. Make circle bean bags out of white fabric or felt and let the kids draw faces on the bags. Now toss them into the purple people eaters mouth.

29- Go to a corn maze

30-MOVIE DAY! Watch Kid Halloween movies all day

31- Happy HALLOWEEN have a Halloween breakfast http://hoosierhomemade.com/halloween-breakfast-food/

*Instructions to make stain glass
Supplies
       -Jolley ranchers
       -Metal cookie cutter in the shape you need cats, pumpkins, etc
       -Aluminum foil
       -Canola or safflower oil
       -wooden skewer
Pre heat oven to 350* F

Line the bottom and interior sides of the cookie cutters with aluminum foil and brush lightly with oil, set on baking sheet.

Arrange the jolley ranchers in a single layer in the cookie cutter and bake until the candy is melted about 10 min.

Remove from oven, let cool for 1 min. then poke a hole in the top with the wooden skewer. Cool then pop out the stain glass shape and peel off the aluminum foil. Thread some thin ribbon through the hole, and hang where ever you would like.

Homemade Halloween decor

So Halloween is my all time favorite holiday and last year I did not decorate so this year I want to make up for it. Now since I don't have any money to spend on holiday decor I am going to be making all the decoration from stuff lying around my house. When James went on his business trip awhile back I was at Lowes and they had these HUGE screen sliding doors for 95% off they were only .78 cents! I had no Idea what to do with them I just knew I couldn't pass them up. Now I am glad I grabbed them. I bought like 4 of them and with one of them I took out the screen and put it on my front door. I then drew a spiderweb with chalk and cut it out. Then with another one I had my two girls and a neighbor girl lay down and I traced their bodies to make some shadow people, and topped it off with some of my cornstalks I dried from my garden. With the little black scraps of screen I put them in a vase and put it on my front entry table. So far I have liked the decor and I can't wait to make some more!