Teacher Appreciation: Crayon Initial in a Frame

Teacher Appreciation Week is May 7th-11th!

Here's a cute gift you can make for your child's teacher, to let them know how much you appreciate them! This is something I had seen all over the blogosphere, so I'm sure you can find a full tutorial with step-by-step photos & tips. I'll tell you this, it may have taken some time & effort, but it cost less than $5 to make it, with a frame & crayons from the dollar store! It takes a fair bit of time to get it right, but I was really happy with it in the end! Like the Tangled Barbie cake I recently posted though, when it was complete, I was really feeling like once was enough for this project ;)

Gaddy Nipper Crayons Giveaway

I've seen several moms around blogland making homemade crayons (taking old, broken crayons and melting them down into fun shapes). I love this idea & it's been on my To Do List for quite a while. Problem is that I haven't been very good at saving up broken crayons.

Someday I'll do it... I hope. I think it'd be a fun project!
Well, if you're like me & it'll be a while before you get to that point, but you still want to enjoy fun-shaped crayons, I recently found Gaddy Nipper Crayons - they have a ton of fun shaped crayons for sale!

They sent us a Crazy Easter Egg filled with bunny shaped, easter coloured crayons & paper easter grass.




Now, this was just a regular sized easter egg with a few little bunny crayons inside, but man! What a reaction from my girls! Talia looked at them & tried to figure out what they were for (I didn't tell her they were crayons right away) & when she figured it out, she thought they were awesome & got right to work with them. Katrina on the other hand, had a blast with the PAPER EASTER GRASS! lol Now I know what her easter basket needs in it ;) Oh, but she later thought one of the bunnies was a candy- we narrowly avoided disaster! ;)

You can get these little easter eggs in packs of 20 to use as gifts for the kids in your child's class at school (I think that's a really fun idea).

Well, we had fun with them & I think they're a great idea for easter baskets (especially if you're avoiding candy). Gaddy Nipper Crayons wants to send one Raising Memories reader a 2-pack of Crazy Eggs (with 3 bunny crayons in each.. complete with easter grass- important if you've got someone like Katrina in your life ;)

Sooo... You want to win??

How to Enter:

Leave a comment for each entry!!
(no mandatory entry this time- just do as many and whichever entries you want)

Be a Follower of my blog (scroll to the bottom of the blog to find the widget & click on the Follow Button)

Visit Gaddy Nipper Crayons, and tell me your favourite kind of crayon that they sell.

"Like" Raising Memories on Facebook

Follow Raising Memories on Twitter

Comment on another post on this blog (leave a comment here, telling me which post you commented on). You can do this as many times as you want.

Post about the giveaway on twitter, your blog, or facebook, with a link back to the blog. (You can get 2 entries for each of these, so post two comments to let me know you did it! :)

Giveaway Details: This giveaway closes on Wednesday, March 30th. The contest is open to Canada & the U.S. A winner will be chosen randomly from all of the comments. Winner will be contacted by email (please include your email in your comment if I can't find it through your profile). If you do not respond within 48 hours after I email you, a new winner will be chosen. The winner will be announced on the blog on April 1st.

Measuring Your Hands & Feet

I just found this post from a year ago that never got posted:

We measured our hands & feet today. Did you know there is a whole blog dedicated to crafts with hands & feet?

First we traced Talia & Katrina's feet & hands, then Talia used a measuring tape to measure them.

She learned about:

- where to start with the measuring tape

- how to read it

- how to write some numbers

- how to write the " for inches.

She also continued after we were done by tracing her hand on the other side, colouring it in, measuring it, writing the measurement, and then suggesting that she could cut it out.

Melted Crayon Wax Suncatcher

We went over to a friend's house for a playdate on Friday, and did a fun valentine's day project! My friend found the idea on Martha Stewart's Craft of the Day here. Follow the link for instructions on how to do this craft.

Family Tree Poster & Other "Maps"

I've been thinking about doing a family tree type of activity with Talia for a while...
So today, I rolled out the art paper, and we got to work making our family tree (well, we just did Ken's side of the family this time, we'll do mine next time, now that she knows what a family tree is).
Here's Aunt Rushy & Uncle Aaron who fell in love & now they're having a baby girl! (Note Talia's illustration of their baby ;)
And Gummy & Poppy, where it all began ;)
Talia was quick to understand what we were doing, and I think this is a good way to help her visualize how the family works.

I drew another type of "map" earlier today. This one was of a day. Talia cannot seem to grasp the idea that when she wakes up from her nap it's not a new day. So, I drew a detailed "day" for her today, showing her the things we do each day & discussing them as I drew them, along with a sun showing when it is light & a moon and stars for when it's dark. Then I pointed to each thing and I explained that the nap is in the middle of the day and it's not a new day when she wakes up. "See??"

Talia: "That doesn't make sense."

*sigh* Okay, so the map didn't work for that one ;) Does anyone have any other ideas or success stories for helping your child understand that a nap is in the middle of the day? Or do most kids just get that? :)

Homemade Wrapping Paper

In my blog-searching, I came across the idea to wrap up all of your Christmas books and put them under your tree. Then your kids get to choose one book to unwrap each day leading up to Christmas, and you read a book each day.

I think this is a great idea, because it lets your kids unwrap things before Christmas! It also adds a little more excitement to reading the books. Unfortunately, we don't have very many Christmas books! However, we do have quite a few Christmas CDs, so I'm going to try this with music this year.

So, this morning I rolled out our big paper (a roll we got at Ikea for $10- it has come in SO handy, SO many times!) and we decorated it with red and green crayons, Christmas stickers, etc. We're going to use it to wrap the CDs later.

Leaf Rubbing

As soon as the leaves started to fall, I had been planning this one. We finally got a few rainless days, and gathered some nice leaves to use for leaf rubbing.

You just need a paper, a leaf, and some crayons.

Place the leaves under the paper, hold the paper in place, and rub over the leaf with a crayon, to get the leaf pattern on the page.

Magic Paint Pictures

I found this idea on Learning Vicariously. It's great for Hallowe'en, but could be used for anything! I like the idea of having Talia draw some pictures or designs herself & then painting to see what she did. I think we will do that another day, but this time she was ready to stop by the time we finished the page of Hallowe'en pictures I had drawn ahead of time for her.

How To Do This:

- draw pictures on a white paper with white crayon
- use watercolour paints to paint over & reveal the pictures!