Moving...

We are in the process of moving Glitter Mommies over to Wordpress. Our new name and url will be...

Seven Little Monkeys

http://sevenlittlemonkeys.wordpress.com

Bear with us during the move. Hopefully it won't take too long!

A Rainbow of Colors

Is it just me, or is everyone posting about rainbows lately?? Maybe it's a March or St. Patty's Day thing to do? Well I decided jump on the bandwagon... kind-of. Today the girls and I talked about primary colors and the color wheel, and then made our own.

Paper Plate Rainbow...

We started by painting a rainbow to get us in the mood. Cut a paper plate in half, paint with correct colors (in order).

Primary Color Circles
I took a large sheet of paper and a bowl and traced 3 circles at the top. The girls painted the circles the primary colors.

I then traced overlapping circles and the girls painted the primary colors and then the color that those two colors make.

Age-Appropriate Color Wheel...

Finally I traced a pizza pan and then divided it into sixths. We painted the primary colors first, so it was easy to figure out where the other colors fit in.

Educational Art... Love it!

Cute (home-designed) Frame

I am having a lot of fun adding simple accents to things around the house to really make it personal. We are going to Cancun in May, and I wanted a fun, "summery" frame to put a picture of the kids in, but let's face it, I didn't want to spend a fortune!

So I bought a simple wood frame from Michael's, and 2 ready-to-go knick-knack things (I don't know what the official name is). I paid less than $5 for everything.

I painted the frame white (removed the glass, left the paper in attempt for less mess), let dry, and glued the knick-knacky things on.

Simple, cute, and inexpensive!

Simple Message Board

Here is a fun and simple way to *spice-up* a message board!

We started by tearing small-ish pieces of tissue paper (perfect for little fingers to do!). I then painted Mod Podge all over an old picture mat I wasn't using, and the girls covered the mat with the tissue paper pieces. When they were satisfied with their work, I then covered the entire mat with another coat of Mod Podge. Let dry for about 45 minutes, then turn over and Mod Podge the pieces to the back that are hanging over (don't worry, you won't see the back).

I found a magnetic white board on clearance at Target for $4.68, and it just happened to be the right size (11"x14"). Score!

Next step was to remove the pen holder at the top of the white board (it was in the way of our frame) and then hang the white board to the back door where we will see it everytime we go somewhere. I used the double-sided foam sticky tape that came with the board. I also had some dry erase markers that were attached to magnets from another random shopping trip.

Attach several pieces of double-sided foam sticky tape around the edges of the white board...

Stick your fancy border to the board, write a little note, and....

Ta-Da!

A sweet little message board to write special notes.

(My girls were *oh*so*excited* to write a note to Daddy as soon as the board was finished!)

Kid-Friendly Salads

Family Fun has posted some incredible salads to try this Spring & Summer. It makes me even more excited for fresh fruits and veggies! Here are a few of our favorites... {Click on the picture for the recipe}

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{Red, White, and Blueberry Fruit Salad}

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{Citrus-Sesame Noodle Salad}

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{Granny Smith Slaw}
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{Confetti Couscous Salad}
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{Peanut Butter, Banana, and Berry Salad}
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Organizing Cubes

I've had these wonderful shelving units with cubes/bins for over a year now. They are perfect for stashing anything and everything into. However, the kids never had any idea what was in them, so they would...

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(a) go ignored (meaning toys were not played with) or

(b) get dumped out to see what was inside (meaning a nice big mess for me to clean up) or

(c) my lovely "helpful" husband would shove anything on the floor into any bin looked good that day (meaning yet another unorganized hidden mess).

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A couple months ago I had the idea to take pictures of the inner contents. Great idea, right? Sure, but I couldn't come up with a way to attach the pictures with anything but packaging tape (too tacky, I wanted cute!). A couple nights ago it hit me: contact paper and ribbon! I put contact paper on both sides of the pictures, hole-punched, and tied ribbon to the handles of the cubes. It's cute, it's organized, and (everyone cross your fingers with me here) will help my kids play with and put away their toys!

President's Day, by Anne Rockwell

We really enjoyed this book.

ABC Pretzels

Maybe I'm new, but I just found these at Meijer a couple days ago... ABC Pretzels. They are nothing short of fabulous. My kids love spelling names and words, looking for letters, playing "I Spy", etc. The novelty of the pretzel is back!

Last Minute V-Day Ideas

Jell-O with (frozen) raspberries in heart cups
(found these at JoAnn's - $6/12 cups)

Homemade pink mint ice-cream
(using same heart cups)

Heart Cake!
(1 cake mix, 9" square pan, 9" circle pan, conversation hearts)

Valentine's Strawberry Brownie

This is what Jacob's preschool teacher is getting for Valentine's - an extra large heart shaped brownie, topped with pink frosting (8 oz cream cheese mixed with 1/2 cup jam and 1/2 cup pwd sugar) and decorated with candy hearts. I saw giant heart pans like this for $5.99 at Target this week - good for birthdays and "thinking of you" gifts, too.