SwagBucks

Tips for Moms:
Do you know Swagbucks?
It is an easy way to earn points that can be used for amazon.com gift cards and other cool things!!
You can earn points simply by searching online through  Swagbucks, shopping on their partner sites or through special offers!
I have been using it as my "search engine", instead of google, and have been able to redeem $5 from amazon (but it did take me almost 2 months, to be honest with you).

Hope you like it!

Ringling Bros and Barnum Bailey Circus

Yesterday we went to BJCC to see Ringling Bros and Barnum Bailey Circus and it was so much fun!!! I think the last time I went to a Circus was years ago in Brazil with my Aunt Erika and all my cousins. I will tell you about her one day, she was the best.

Lucas and I got there when the show was starting. Getting there was the first adventure of the day. Believe it or not, I did get lost in Birmingham Downtown. After a few minutes driving in circles I finally got there. The second adventure of the day was to find my friend. Thanks to my friend that not only got the tickets for us, but she also helped us to get there at BJCC and to get on our seat. Thank you!!!

The show started and Lucas loved it. He was clapping his hand, imitating the lion, pointing to every single thing that he was seeing there. He was having a blast and mom too. I wonder sometimes how those people that work there can do all that stuff, I can barely seat with my legs crossed. They are very good. The contortionists always amazed me, are they made of rubber or something like that?
The animals were a plus too. The elephants and lions were Lucas favorites!!! Did you know that an elephant spend 6 hours a day sleeping and 18 hours eating? I would love to have some "elephants days" sometimes, LOL!

During the break we went for a walk and of course we ended up eating popcorn, cotton candy, taking some pictures, playing with all those fun toys that they had there.
That is a must for this weekend in Birmingham, AL. Kids of all ages will love it and parents too, because there is nothing better than seeing your kids having fun!!!!

Fun Facts about Circuses:

• Pink Lemonade was created accidentally by a circus vendor who used a bucket of water that another performer had used to wash her red tights. (It does not sound so good anymore, LOL)
• Circus balloon sellers are called rubbermen.
• A lion trainer cracks his whip to distract the lion so he will forget about attacking.
• To get elephant skin really soft, caretakers sometimes use furniture soap.
• Elephants must hold the tails of the ones in front of them during a parade to stop them from plucking things from spectators.

Let's play outside!!!

 After all those days inside our house Lucas and I had a chance to go to the park. Lucas was sick last week, and on top of that it was tooooooooo cold to go out. He loves playing at the park and I do love to go there with him too. It is a great way to talk to other moms, to let your kid play with other kids and the best of all watching him playing with other kids.

I love watching Lucas, how he respond to other kids, how they play together. It is funny how quick they learn from each other. Lucas was following a little boy (he was about 4 years old) at the playground. He would try to talk to him (on his own language), the little boy would try to answer him back and they kept playing for at least 30 min together. Lucas saw his new friend swinging at the playground bar, and there he went too. I thought it was so cute to see him learn new things and making new friends. Seen his proud face of  I DID IT!!!! was the best of all.

Play Dough Lollipop Cookies

A few weeks ago I posted about a homemade play dough that I made to play with Lucas. A few days later I visited The Idea Room blog, and they had posted this great play dough lollipop cookies. I love it, like everything else she has on her blog, so I decided to share it with you guys. I will try it one day with Lucas and maybe post it here too.
Hope you like it!!!

Animal Board Game

Back in Brazil, I used to be a teacher. I loved it so much. I loved spending time with my little group, playing and teaching then at the same time. I used to create a lot of different fun games to teach them basic things, and they loved it.

Now, living here in the USA I know that even though me and my husband just speak Portuguese with our son, chances are that he will lose it on his way, and that is something that I want to prevent it from happening. I decided that I am going to teach him how to read and write Portuguese.

I made this fun board game for him and since then we have been using it to play so many different games.

Here is a list of a few games that you can play with this board.

1-      Matching words and pictures

2-      Which animal makes this ….. sound? Imitate a dog barking for example and ask you kid to tell you which animal is that. If he gets it right, he can keep the animal. In the end whoever has more animals wins the game. After playing ask your kid to tell you something about the animals that he got, which one he likes the most, how big is this animal, where does it live, what does it eat….

3-      Sensory Memory game.
 (    Put all those animals in a bag, ask your kid to close his eyes and try to find inside the bag one animal that has a big tale, 4 legs and barks. He cannot see it, he needs to feel it. When he gets it he can match the animal with his name on the board.

4-      Question of the day.
      Make a list of simple questions about those animals, things that you have been talking about with your kid when you guys are playing it. Write it in a paper and keep adding more questions every day. You can help your kid to formulate the answers. Write it in your paper.  In the end you will have an Animal book.

I will keep posting more activities to do with this board game; there are a lot of then.

To make a board game you will need a paper board, colored tape, hot glue, and some pictures of animals. I got those at Hobby Lobby.

Hope you like it!!!!

Amish Friendship Bread

Amish Friendship Bread

A friend of mine gave me a friendship Bread a few days ago. If you don’t know how it is, I will tell you.

My friend gave me a bag with bread dough inside it. She wrote the date that she made the dough on the bag so I could keep track of the recipe.  Basically we keep the bag for 10 days, following the instructions on the recipe and on the last day  you will need to add all the other ingredients and it will be ready to be baked. Here is the recipe in case you want to make some. I add a bag of chocolate chip to my and it tasted very good. If you want more Amish recipe, here is a good cookbook to buy!

Today was the baking day at my house. I have 2 bags of Friendship bread, which makes 8 cakes. Yes, you read it right, 8 cakes!!!  I decided to make the first cake of the day with Lucas. I knew he would like to help me, he is a very good helper, but I did know that we would have so much fun and such a great time together.

He helped me count the eggs, mix the ingredients, and pour the flour into the bag… He is the best helper ever!!! He is learning how to count; yes I know he is only 16 months old that is why I am saying that he is learning it, so I got the eggs and told him that we need just 3 and asked him to help me to count it. He started looking to his hands and counting his fingers while I was pointing to the eggs, he is so cute!!!

Well, he not just helped me today, but he learned a little about math, new vocabulary words, how to follow instructions and the best of all, had a great time!!!

After all that work he took a well deserved nap. While he was taking his nap I baked all the other 7 cakes and froze it. (My friends will laugh when they read it; I well know for freeze everything!!!)

To finalize our activity we had a picnic at our backyard. The weather was great and the cake even better, but best of all was Lucas face eating his cake!!!

Versatile Bio gel!

Kids learn a lot buy experimenting things, touching it.  When Lucas was 4 months old, we went to Brazil for a vacation and my mother in law had a vase with those funny little balls. She let him play with it, and he loved it. He loved to touch it, step on it; so my father in law got me some to bring with me.

Today I decided to make some with him. This is how it looks like when you buy it.

The only thing we need to do is put it in a bowl with water and wait, wait, and wait.

How do you thing the waiting part went with a 17 months old??? LOL Well, after telling him hundreds of time that we needed to wait and come back later to see what is going to happen, he finally let it go.

After a few hours we went back to check it and the magic had happened. Lucas played with it, smashed a bunch of them, stepped in a few others, tried to eat some, but I was right there to make sure he would not do it, LOL.

It does feel good to touch it, and play with it. After hours of having fun, we ended up using those funny balls to decorate a vase.

Let's paint!!!

Lucas loves colors, things with texture, smell.. . Everything is new and fun for him. He is discovering a new world everyday and I try to let him experiment as many things as possible. He is very curious about everything around him, and that is how he learns new things. He learns by touching things, holding, looking, listening, tasting, and feeling everything in sight.  Today I decided to let him touch, smell, make a mess in our house and I love the results of it. We had a lot of fun together and I am sure, he learned a lot today.

I mixed a little bit of glue with colored sugar and water. I had only two colors in my house, I wish I had more, but that was ok. Next time we will have the entire rainbow here.

I prepared the mix while he was taking his nap, but if your kid is a little older than mine I would suggest you mix it with him. I am sure he will like to see the white glue turning red, blue, green…

What did you do today with your kid?

Homemade Playdough

Since it is too cold to go outside, I better start thinking about fun activities to do inside the house with Lucas. You do not need too much to entertain a kid. A bunch of pans in the floor and a plastic spoon become a rock band in one second. A empty box, become a garage or a car, or a house…

I worked for years with young babies in Brazil and now I am trying to remember all the fun activities that I used to do with them. (Those were great years; I will tell you all about it one day). Today I decided to make playdough with Lucas. He actually helped me to do it and he really liked it. The texture, the smell, the color...everything!!! I kind of knew by memory but I decided to search online for a recipe and here I found a good one.

I changed the recipe a little. I did not use boiled water, since Lucas was helping me and I used jelly to give color to our playdough.

He had a great time!!!! I am sure your little one will love it too!!!

Share your playdough experience and recipe with me.

McWane Science Center

That is a great place to go with your kid, specially in days like yesterday. Like I mentioned before, we are not used to this cold weather and I do not like it. I am counting the days for the hot Summer, but while I am waiting, why not have some fun right?

We took our son to McWane Science Center today. He loves it. His favorite part is the big piano. I am still trying to figure out who likes going to McWane Science Center the most, my husband or my son.
If your kid is already walking, that is a place to go. They have areas reserved for little kids to play as for the big ones too. Get ready to play and go!

Throw your own painting party

A few weeks ago some friends and I decided to have a painting party at my house. We have been trying to go to sips and strokes for a long time, but with my husband working long hours and having no one else to stay with Lucas, I decided to bring the party here.
One of my friends went to wall mart and bought all the stuff that we would need, what ended up being around $6 dollars per person, a lot less than we would pay going out. You can also find pre-stretched canvas online for a cheap price.
We went online, picked a picture that we liked and that was it. We had so much fun, we laugh a lot and,  I really think that it turned out pretty good. I even kept my paint. Maybe I will hang it somewhere one day! : )

Snow Event

I am from Brazil, and there we have no winter at all. It is summer all year long, I saw snow for the first time a few years ago in Philadelphia when visiting some friends.
Snow for me still a magic thing. So, yesterday here in Birmingham, Al the schools were closed because of  a chance of having some snow.

I was so excited and ready to go out and play with Lucas and Bela. I have it all painted in my mind. I could see us rolling in the snow, making some snowman, snow balls.....
It was around 1PM when I saw some Snow Flakes coming. I was waiting for more, and waiting, waiting....,when I decided to go out with Lucas and at least show him what it looks like before it was gone. He did like it, and had a lot of fun.
Lucas was trying to catch the snowflakes and watching him watching the snow was beautiful.

Money Saving Tips

A friend of my created a great blog with lots of tips on things that you can get for free. I visited her blog today and I was surprised with all her great tips. I have already visited 5 websites from 5 different free thing that she suggested. My favorite is the Dolly Parton's Imagination Library where you can get free books for you kids every month. Lucas will love it too. He loves books.
You should take your time and visit her blog. You will find something free for you too!!!

Happy New Year!!!

For many people the New Year is just a change of a calendar, for others it is a chance to start over, to forget the past and live the present, to dream, to live that dream that you put behind a long time ago. I see myself with the second group. I believe that each new year is a new chapter in your life and you decide how you will name it. I wish to all my friends a better tomorrow and lots of good things!!!
Happy New Year!!!

 This picture was taken today, at my backyard.
Exposure 1/2000, Aperture f8, Iso 400