Planning for Thanksgiving

Two things you should know about me.

1. Before I joined Pinterest a couple years ago, Martha Stewart was my go-to for craft, holiday and even recipe inspiration.
2. I love binders, checklists and to-do lists.  I think I might be a little OCD.

In 2004 Martha Stewart published on her website a free printable Thanksgiving Planner with checklists and recipes.  Since being married, my husband and I have often hosted or assisted with much of the preparation for Thanksgiving Dinner.  I loved using the printable planner to help us get ready.  The planner is in a nice little binder stored in the cabinet above my mom's stove, complete with hand written notes and recipes.

This year I decided to create my own version of the Thanksgiving Planner since mine is tucked away in mom's kitchen 1800 miles away.  This planner reflects our family's version of a traditional turkey dinner.  I created a timeline, shopping list and several blank worksheets to help plan.  Please feel free to use this for your own dinner planning!

Download the pdf Planning Thanksgiving Dinner worksheets.

A New School

My kids started a new school last week, more than 1700 miles away from their old friends and familiar territory.  They were beyond excited to ride the school bus and to make new friends.  They are already in love with the school and the playground that was installed just a month or two ago.

Here at home it takes a little more than a school bus and a shiny new school to get things running.  That's why it is so important to me that the kids have a dedicated backpack zone, homework station and paper bin.  I am all about setting a routine for consistency and so that everyone knows what to expect.  Since the Summer Fun schedule seemed to work so well, I made a schedule for the School Days too.

 I also enlisted hubby's help to create the perfect backpack zone.  There is a hook for each child (even the ones who aren't in school yet), bulletin boards and a magnetic dry erase board to keep track of school activities or other reminders.

  

Patriotic Cupcakes

For the Fourth of July we were headed to some close friends' house for a parade, bbq and fireworks.  I decided that whipping up a red, white and blue dessert would be my contribution.  Cupcakes are fun, quick and easily customizable, plus who doesn't love cupcakes?  So I gathered my helpers and made some super yummy vanilla cupcakes with vanilla frosting.  But like I said, I wanted to make a red, white and blue dessert, so these were no plain vanilla cupcakes.  I split both the cupcake batter and the frosting into three separate bowls each.  I dyed one blue, one red and left one white.

This creative dessert would work with your favorite vanilla cupcake recipe or even a boxed mix and can be customized with any colors you want!  Once the colors were to my liking (I use gel colors because it is easier to get a true red without diluting the batter or using ten times as much food coloring as necessary) I layered the three batters into the cupcake liners.  Sometimes I started with white, other times blue or red.  Sometimes the colors were on top of each other and sometimes next to each other.  The more creative and crazy, the better!

When the cupcakes cooled, I frosted them with my three colored frostings.  I filled the piping bag with all three colors at once, side by side.  The result was triple swirled frosting!  The colors did start to mix a little, so I think next time I will try another technique.  I've seen a couple that I am dying to try.

 



 

Ooblek

Kids are sticky, messy and sometimes smelly.  They love to get elbow deep in the mud, dirt, sand or even a bag of flour.  They love to explore how things feel.

example A:

example B: 

So to feed this love of sensory play, I decided to make my kids some good old fashioned ooblek.  I remember making this at preschool when I was little and then asking my mom to make it at home so I could show my little sister.  It's really quite easy and will entertain your kids for a long time. The recipe is not an exact science, as I am sure humidity and altitude might affect it.  If the mixture seems too thick, add more water and vice versa.

Ooblek
1 cup water
2 cups cornstarch
3 drops food coloring

I mixed it up in a cookie sheet with the kids out on the porch to save my kitchen another mess!

Pinteresting Summer (part 2)

After our big move from California to Iowa, I became a stay at home mom for the first time.  In the almost eight years that I have been a mom, I have always worked at least part time.  So I was thrown into not just being home with my kids every day, but home with them all day during summer vacation!  This called for a plan.  I again searched the internet for some daily schedule ideas and then created one in Publisher for our family.  Our Daily Legacy blog has a great themes for each day of the week (plus a daily schedule and a summer checklist with fun things to do), but I really loved the bright rainbow colors of a schedule I saw on Pinterest (with no link to original post).

Here is the schedule that I made for the kids this summer:

 

I wasn't super strict on following the schedule each and every day, it was summer vacation after all, but the schedule really helped cut down on the 18 million questions like, When is it gonna be snack time? or When can we watch tv?  All I had to to do was direct the kids to the schedule and then they knew what to expect.

 

Pinteresting Summer (part 1)

It's pretty evident that I am not very good at keeping up on this blog (It's been a year since I last posted!).  And after adding baby number 4 last spring, going to work full time last summer and moving across the country this summer (read about the move here), the blog fell lower on the list of priorities.  So here's a little catch-up post on all the fun things the internet, and Pinterest in particular, inspired us to do this summer.

My youngest sister Natalie (10)  has been dying to make chocolate playdough since she saw it on tv years ago.  She was here at the beginning of summer helping us move, so I decided it was time to search the internet for a recipe.  There are plenty of ideas out there, but I was looking for an edible version.  I mean, what's the point of chocolate playdough if you can't eat it?

I found this recipe on cdkitchen.com that looked pretty easy.  The kids had lots of fun making the dough and playing with it. And eating it.  It tastes like tootsie rolls!  The only problem was the consistency.  The dough was a little lumpy (which could be because we mixed by hand) and it was pretty sticky.  We used extra powdered sugar on the table to keep it from sticking.  We will definitely try it again and make a few adjustments. 

Chocolate Edible Playdough

3 cups powdered sugar
6 tablespoons baking cocoa
3/4 cup powdered milk
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1 teaspoon vanilla extract