Letter D/Dinosaur Preschool Theme

 Today we talked about the Letter D and dinosaurs!  Such a fun theme for my little boy and so many great ideas out there to pick from.

Visit Starfall to see their letter D activities

Here are a few activities from our Letter D as in dinosaur pack from Confessions of a Homeschooler.

There are lots of great dinosaur packs for preschool/kindergarten.  We also did some from Over the Big Moon.  Lots of great activities besides these as well.

3 Dinosaurs also has a lot of dinosaur printables.

We also did a dinosaur shape matching activity you can find here.

We did this fun file folder dinosaur matching game.

We did a fun flannel board story, "Dotty the Dinosaur".  It is a good story about colors.  My son helped me put the correct color of dinosaur up at the appropriate time. 

I made these dinosaurs with my Cricut Machine and we made them into stick puppets. My son loves doing this and making up his own stories and playing with them.  Great for the imagination!

We did this cute paper plate dinosaur.  My son loves to paint as always! There are templates for different dinosaurs on the link.

Here is a list of great dinosaur books.  I know my kids love the "How Do Dinosaur" books and also "Dinosaur Vs. the Potty".

Seasonal Shirts

For Halloween I bought a plain black sweatshirt for my oldest spider costume and a plain white sweatshirt for my 4 year old's ghost costume.  I also had a lot of white fabric from his ghost costume so I decided to make the sweatshirts a little more interesting.  I pulled out my Cricut Machine and cut out some snowmen with my left over ghost costume and used some blue fabric I had on hand for my snowflakes.  My youngest had a plain black onesie so I decided to make it more fun too.  

I used the Joy of the Season cartridge for the snowflakes and Christmas Cheer cartridge for the snowmen.  This is a fun project to do.  I just need to get a better variety of fabric so I can do more!

"On The Go" First Birthday Party

For my little guy's first birthday last week I decided to do an "On the Go" theme featuring trucks, planes, boats, and trains.  I thought it worked well with a first birthday since they are getting to be quite mobile and always are on the go around that age.

Here is the table with all the little goodies.  I put a picture of him the day he was born up to by the cups.  They grow so quickly.  Sniff, sniff...

Here is a close up of the decorations I put on the wall using my Cricut Machine. (love that thing!)

My oldest loves party hats so I made these hats for them to wear.  You can read my post about them here.

I decided to do something I hadn't done before and make cupcakes instead of a cake.  I used my Cricut Machine to make these as well.  It was a lot of fun.  The transportation was all from the New Arrival Cartridge.

Here are my boys in the airplane shirts I made for them.  You can find out more about these shirts here. Oh, and of course they are sporting their party hats.

I also did this little subway art and framed it and put it on the table.  It was a lot of fun to do as well.

Here is a my sweet birthday boy!  I love him so much.  We had a great first birthday celebration!

Airplane Onesies and Shirts

I will be honest, I have been a little timid about cutting anything but paper and card stock on my Cricut Machine.  I have tried doing vinyl and even did some glass etching projects last summer, but I finally decided to try cutting fabric with it.  I am glad I did.  I watched or read about a dozen tutorials on how to do it and most did it a different way!  I guess you can pick which way works best for you.  I started with a onesie for my little guy.

My oldest son loved it so much he asked me to make one for him to and I couldn't very well make him one without making our other son one.  I've done two onesies now and two t-shirts.

I used Heat N Bond Ultra to iron them on.  I have seen a lot of people sew around their design, however I am not much of a seamstress so I am hoping ironing it will work well enough.  If that is not the case over time I guess I will be asking my mom for some help sewing around them!

For anyone wondering exactly how I cut my fabric I used a brand new blade and mat.  I ironed on the Heat N Bond following the directions on the bag and put it on the mat fabric face up.  I put my blade at 4, speed at 2, and pressure at 5.  Then I followed the rest of the Heat N Bond instructions to iron them on to the shirt.  Simple and Fun!

Handmade Holiday Decorations

All of our Holiday decorations were made by hand with just a few exceptions- our Christmas Tree, the tree skirt, and some of the ornaments.  I thought I would share some of the decorations we have at our house. 

Origami:

My husband is really good at origami and so I use and abuse his skills at Christmas time (among other times of the year.)  You can visit his blog, Stephen's Origami to see more.

This is a tree he makes that I love plus this fun star.  You can see a tutorial on how to make one yourself here.

 Then we have an origami wreath.  It's really cute!

 This star we put on top of the tree.  My son was so excited to put it on top of our tree this year.

 My husband has also done a variety of smaller wreaths we have on the tree.  They are pretty cool too.

He also makes a Santa Claus that I don't have a picture of.  Last year we put up some origami ornaments, however my sons couldn't resist the temptation to take them off the tree and destroy them.

Cricut Machine:

Another thing I use a lot to make decorations is my Cricut Machine.  Here are some things I've made.

A little greeting on our front door above the origami wreath.

 Santa, his sleigh, and his reindeer.  Silhouette style.

 A Christmas Countdown I do with my children.

 I have a variety of snowflakes hanging around our windows as well.

Child-Made:

The biggest part of our decorations are things that the kids and I make throughout the month.

Here is a chain to go around our tree.  See my post here for instructions.

 A paper torn Christmas tree.

 Christmas Tree ornaments from our Christmas tree day

 A Gingerbread house

 Gingerbread ornaments both of these gingerbread activities are from our Ginger Baby Day

And we have much more to make throughout the month!

Made By Others:

Lastly, we have several things that were made and given to us by other people.

This cute Santa was made by my mother.  She gave it to me the first Christmas I was married.

 These absolutely adorable stockings were made by my mother-in-law.  We also have two advent calendars she made.  I need to get a better picture of the stockings because they are awesome.

Well, that gives you an idea of what we've got going on around here for the holidays.  The best part is that not only are most of these things kid-friendly they are also budget friendly!

Christmas Countdown

We have three Christmas Advent Calendars at our house.  I made this one last year and thought I'd repost it.  Each day we put one of these items up and do the activity listed below.  It was a great hit last year.  I used my Cricut Machine any kind of clip art would work.  I am looking forward to all the Christmas Activities we will be doing in the next month.
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We will also be doing the following each day. I made this little Nativity scene with my Cricut Machine.

1. Merry Christmas- Song “Picture a Christmas” LDS Children’s Song book no. 50
2. Stable- Song “Once Within a Lowly Stable” LDS Children’s Song book no. 41
3. Manager- Song “Away in a Manager” LDS Children’s Song book no. 42
4. Star- Scripture Matthew 2:2
5. Mary- Scripture Luke 1:30-35
6. Joseph- Song “When Joseph Went to Bethlehem” LDS Children’s song book no. 38
7. Star border(1) – Poem “Star Poem”
8. Shepherd- Scripture Luke 2:8
9. Shepherd’s staff- Poem “The Symbolism of the Candy Cane”
10. Sheep- Song “While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks” Hymn 211
11. Star border (2)- Song “Stars Were Gleaming” LDS Children’s song book no. 37
12. Donkey- Song “Silent Night” Hymn 204
13. Sheep (2)- Song “With Wondering Awe” Hymn 210
14. Wiseman (1)- Scripture Matthew 2:1-4
15. Gift (1) –Scripture Matthew 2:11
16. Camel- Song “Hark! The Herald Angels Sing” Hymn 209
17. Wiseman (2) Scripture Matthew 2:5-8
18. Gift (2)- Scripture Matthew 5:23
19. Camel (2)- Song “Angels We Have Heard on High” Hymn 203
20. Wiseman (3)- Scripture Matthew 2:9-12
21. Gift (3)- Song “The Nativity Song” LDS Children’s Song book no. 52
22. Camel (3)-Song “O Little Town of Bethlehem” Hymn 208
23. Angel- Scripture Luke 2:10
24. Baby Jesus- Scripture Luke 1:31

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