Piano player

After taking piano lessons for ten years of my childhood, I was excited when my 7 year old son wanted to take lessons.  It has been so much fun listening to him as he begins his piano studies.

Learning toys

I like having learning toys for my kids to play with.  They have fun playing, but are also learning in the process.  Learning through play can often be more fascinating for little ones than learning through a book.  I am excited to see that Michelle at Delightful Learning is having a giveaway for some chunky little lacing buttons.  You can go here, to check out her giveaway.  If you don’t already read Michelle’s blog, you should.  She provides lots of great inspiration for me when it comes to homeschooling and homemaking.

10 things that make me happy

Heather at Itstwinsanity is giving a happy award to any of her readers who want to post 10 things that make them happy.  I thought I’d play along.  Anyone reading my blog who would like to play along can put this on their blog as well.

In no particular order, 10 things that make me happy:

1. my dear husband
2. my wonderful children
3. knitting, beautiful yarn, and the Addi Click set
4. a cup of hot tea in my favorite pottery mug
5. a fire in the fireplace
6. my favorite magazines – Mothering magazine and LLL’s New Beginnings
7. Askinosie chocolate
8. hearing my 7 yr old son play the piano
9. seeing my 16 mos old daughter get excited about her new baby doll
10. a soak in the tub with lavender Aura Cacia bath salts

favorite necklace

I admire jewelry that others wear, but when it comes down to it I don’t wear much jewelry myself.  Maybe it’s because I never had any favorite jewelry that I just had to wear or maybe I’m just not the jewelry wearing type.  Enter Lisa Leonard Designs Jewelry!  In one word, beautiful.  Last year, I treated myself to an especially meaningful necklace.  It has the initials of my 4 sweet kiddos.  I love this necklace!  If you haven’t seen Lisa’s jewelry, you should check it for yourself.  If you hurry over to Sara’s blog, you can have a chance to win your own piece by the incredibly talented Lisa.

Above is the necklace that I own.  It’s called the teeny tiny initials necklace.

Inspired

I enjoyed Sara’s post today about making sure to photograph everyday life.  I don’t always do a very good job of it, but would like to do more often.  Speaking of which, where did I misplace my camera?

Sonicare kids toothbrush or $100 Visa card Giveaway

Getting 4 kids to brush their teeth twice a day, can be a challenging venture at times.  Enter this cool looking toothbrush from Sonicare.  I would love to have this for my kids.  I have a chance to win this or a $100 visa card.  You have a chance too.  Go to the following bloggers to get entered to win:

Swistle Reviews

The Joyful Chaos Reviews

The Karianna Spectrum

HomeGrown Reviews

Miss Merrittocracy

This Woman’s Work

It’s Twinsanity

The Smock Lady

Painted Maypole Reviews

Wordless Wednesday

Instant Challenge Supply Giveaway

As I wrote about in my last post, we are participating in a weekly instant challenge over at Delightful Learning.  Michelle is having a giveaway this week for a box of supplies that you can use for the instant challenges.  To find out more about the giveaway, head over here.

Instant Challenge #1

Michelle at Delightful Learning recently started hosting Instant Challenges.  This week was the first challenge.  These challenges all use common household materials.  The purpose of the challenges is to help kids use critical thinking skills, work together, and have fun in the process. 

This week’s challenge was to build a bridge.  The bridge could not touch the table between the two squares.  It had to be able to hold weight.  The kids had 5 minutes to build the bridge.  Our bridge collapsed before I could take a picture of it.  It was only 1/2″ from the table.  Even though, we didn’t have much success with bridge building, we still had fun and worked well together.  I am eager to see how challenge #2 goes. 

Oh, the possibilities!

This is the Excalibur Dehydrator.  There are so many possibilites of things you can make with a dehydrator – fruit leathers, dried fruits, dried veggies, granola, crackers, dried herbs, and the list goes on!  I would love to own one of these.  I bet you would too.  Stephanie at Keeper of the Home is giving one away for her final giveaway of the week.  Go here to check it out!