oil pan magnet board

My love-hate relationship with Pintercrack marches on.  Some days I want to kick the whole website in the nuts, some days I am not sure how I'd survive without it.

Today is a good day ... for now.

Have you seen this one?

While I don't see me posting my kid on the internet in nothing more than a diaper, I do dig the idea.  You can nab one of those oil pan thingies at Walmart for like $12.

So I did.  Then I had to figure out how to get the stupid thing home in a Corolla with two kids and a driver.

It wasn't pretty.

But then I brought it in the house and freaked Paul Bunyan out by saying I was just going to Gorilla Glue the crap out of it.

Eventually, he is going to realize how easy he is to manipulate, right?

Anyway, he took over the hanging of the thing (which involved pre-drilling holes and using bits I wouldn't have known existed so it was for the best I didn't want to do that anyway) and just wanted me to tell him where.

And taaaa daaaa...

Apparently there is something weird in our wall and the bottom left hand corner of the pan didn't hit a stud, so he had to do it over just a bit to the right, which left a ridiculously sharp metal hole in the darn thing.  The cure?

Slap a cute pirate sticker on it and BAM, all better.

Beans loves playing with his "numbers" ... they are letters, but hey, he is two and we are working on it!

magic cubes

The call them "the terrible twos."

Need I say more?

Beans has discovered that he has a tremendous ability and even gift at driving people insane.

And by people, I mean me.

We really start melting down about 4:30ish each night.  Hungry, sleepy (especially since he is willfully missing his nap 50% of the time) , and just grouchy, makes for an unpleasant evening.

So I have started trying to come up with things I can do that throw him for a loop and knock the grumpies out of him before we hit the full tantrum, from which there is no return.

Brilliant brain child number one: Magic Cubes.

Because it is warming up this one works pretty well, Beans doesn't mind a cool bath at the start.  I think we will also do this in his little play pool, though I will have to make more of them so that they last a bit longer.

What are Magic Cubes?  They are ice cubes, with food coloring.  Cheap, simple, and effective?  Love it!

You can see the patient Beans waiting in the background here

I have also tested this on my kid a few times and can tell you that I have not yet turned him into a smurf, though I still worry every time the water gets all dark ...

Once they go in the water they immediately begin melting and releasing the magic.  Once Beans is older we will use this as more of a color lesson, now its just a fun mess.

Since I use all the colors it makes the water a dark teal when they are completely melt.  Just pull the plug, drain the tub, and we usually fill the tub and take a real bath at that point. 

I also let Beans play with the tray in the tub, which gets it clean.  Yay!

Neither my bathtub nor my child have been dyed in the process of making these or using them.  I will warn you that you need to be careful when making them, however.  You will smurf up your hands if you aren't careful.

Figures, if someone was going to get tattooed in the process it was bound to be me.

an ode to super glue

So when I left off with you, I had successfully made a "calming bottle" ... but it wasn't so calming for my youngest.  Go figure.  The child has defied all odds (spoken like a proud mama of a child who has faced medical adversity and a worn out mama who knows this little goofball can do anything to age me rapidly) so naturally he could handle a calming bottle un-calmly.


We were going out of town and I wanted good car toys, so I made a second one the same way I had with the first, but in blue with some different glitter so that the kids could each have one.  I figured the change in color may make interest last longer.


I was right.  Initially anyway.  


What I hadn't taken into consideration is that if your baby gets uber pissed off being in his car seat and throws one of the bottles out the door at you while at a gas station, and it falls from the ridiculous height of your husband's rather tall truck with all the pent up frustrated velocity a one year old can give it ... the cap of those pretty Norwegian bottles almost explodes.  However, in a true testimony to the sheer strength of super glue, the bottle stayed sealed.  However it now had these sharp horrible knife like pieces sticking off the lid, and was not good anymore.    

I may not be mother of the year material, but even I know that is not a good thing to hand the kiddo.


But being me, I couldn't throw it out.  I mean, really, look at all the glitter, glue and water in there man!  I can't just toss this much stuff!  So I decided to dismantle it, but again, I was thwarted by the awesomeness that is superglue.  That damn cap was not moving.  No matter, I busted out my surgical tools.

After like ten minutes of me swearing at it I had worn a small hole in a section and scored around the top.  I would have been there forever, but my husband took pity on my cheap stubborn ass and swooped in with a saw.

It still took a while, now I know why those Norwegian bottles are so expensive, suckers are dense!  We did get it torn open, and we got the contents mostly poured into a new Voss bottle.  What didn't make it in the bottle was sparkling all over my husband's hands, which he totally loved.  He was sparkly!

Then I used some Gorilla foam glue to fill the void inside the cap, making it less hallow and hopfully a bit more shatter resistant.  When it comes down to it though, really I have just learned I need to be careful about when and where the Beans plays with the bottles.  He was not unsupervised with it before, I watched the destruction take place with my eyes wide open, but he won't be holding them when the car doors are open in the very least.  

oooo so pretty

The Beans is a darling little monstrosity.  I mean it, people stop me all the time to tell me how beautiful he is -- most of them confusing his pretty long lashes rimming his startling blue eyes for those of a girl -- but he really has a true capacity for sheer evil brilliance.  I assure you.  Apart from the heinous bat shriek he has perfected to a degree I anticipate militarily contacting any day now, he can climb in or out of anything.  Nothing holds him safely, so much so that we actually made his bedroom door a Dutch door as opposed to dealing with the continual dismantling of a baby gate.  

I find that keeping him entertained is not only critical for his safety but also for my sanity.  So when I see anything on Pintercrack that appears to be entertaining and cheap/easy to do I am all over that.  Cue the adorably simple Time Out Jar or Calming Jar.  

from creative little daisy

Adorable, no?  I fell in love with the idea of a timer that was both entertaining and soothing.  As a kid I adored those goofy glitter wand things and would tip them back and forth watching the glitter swirl and fall ... heck, if I had one still I would do it.  This reminded me of those, so I wanted to make one.  For the baby, of course. *ahem*

But the thought of giving my child ... any child ... a glass jar ... uh, not a plan I was cool with.  

In my other obsessive wanderings on Pintercrack I had stumbled upon (and of course pinned) a homemade lava lamp (which I will do and post about another day).  Here they had used a Voss water bottle because of their nifty shape, so I figured that would be a totally awesome container to use.  

So I looked everywhere for those bottles, and when I finally found them I was floored that they nearly cost me $3.  FOR ONE!  Cuh-ray-zee.  Too in love with the idea to see reason, I bought the expensive Norwegian bottle of water anyway.  Side note: the water was tasty.  

supplies all ready to go

squish glitter glue into the bottle
... and this part takes a while

while sprinkling regular glitter into the bottle
do not drop the damn cap in there
*sigh*

lots of sparkle, and no glitter shaker cap anymore

add some water

begin mixing

and keep shaking

the glue will bubble, so I kept trying to get
the bubbles down so I could add more water

ooooo purdy

finished product
on a dirty table in my backyard

seriously, I could watch it for hours

So it was a simple craft, it was cheap all things considered even with the expensive bottle.  I will add that I super glued the cap on this bad boy.  Highly recommend that immensely critical step, or you might have a hellova mess on your hands, and floor, and furniture, and child.

In fact, it was so successful I made a second one.  It was/is blue.  It lived, then died and then lived again.


Ever so handily we have already problem solved what might happen if your monstrosity of a one year old outsmarts you and manages to make a plastic bottle a dangerous thing.  So not only can I tell you what could go wrong, but I can also tell you how to fix it.  


Tomorrow.  ;)

dollar store excavations

Mom, I am soooooooo bored!

As a teacher, I so loved summer; as a mom, not my favorite time.

The chore sticks posts are almost done, and I will have a much briefer (is that even a word?) post for the "bored" sticks soon too.  But I had to share this ridiculously easy idea I had and subsequently made into a "bored" stick since it went so well.

Chances are I saw it on a blog or Pintercrack somewhere, but I can't remember seeing it, just thinking it.  So while I take credit for the thought, I do so tentatively.

This cost very little, but gave me peace and quiet for nearly an hour.  An HOUR.  If I could do it daily, I would, but I think it would loose some of its appeal.

Supplies:

• Some dollar store toys (I had plastic army men, dinosaurs, and frogs)
• Tupperware or other freezable container
• Water
• Excavation tools (we used a kids tool set and a paint brush)
• Surface that can get wet (outside table)

I took my Tupperware, tossed in some toys and filled it with a bit of water.  Froze it over night. 

Okay fine, I admit I was impatient.  I froze it for like three hours and tried to do the next layer, but the water from the tap promptly thawed the layer that had frozen over, which collapsed and all the toys sunk to the bottom.  The point is to do this in layers so that they have to really excavate it and not be done once they hit one section.  So I did the bottom layer again.

Then the next day, added some more and more water.  Froze for another 24 hours.  It may not need that long, but I wasn't messing with it anymore.

Set up the table outside with the tools in the shade and pulled the container out of the freezer.  Set it in a sink of warm water to loosen it, and that baby popped right out.  One big ice block of cheap toys.

I told the Meatball that he was an arctic archaeologist (say that five times fast) on the verge of discovering a new race of creatures that had apparently adapted to the harsh conditions of the climate.  He needed to very carefully extract these creatures so they could be further studied.

He ate that crap right up, loved it!

And I had an hour of peace.

The "mess" of this was mostly contained in the  lid of a storage container (dubbed the specimen tray) and everything else evaporated even though we did it in the shade and in the morning.  So it was a piece of cake to clean up.

Score!

sparkly squishies

Summer is rapidly approaching.  We live in a local that registers temperatures well over 100 daily in the summer months, and sickly enough we are already hitting those gawdawful numbers.  Its going to suck a ton come May ... I don't even want to think about June or *shudder* July yet.

Combined with the ungodly temperatures is the simple fact that I will also have the oldest minion home all day too.  Bored.  And it is even too hot for him to go outside for more than a few minutes at a time.  The need to find ways to fill these hours combined with the fact that the Meatball has had some issues with school this year I decided to do "summer school" with the kiddos this year.  Usually I am too burned out from my own teaching-school-year to really consider this, but not having taught for the entirety of the last school year for the first time in a while makes me feel much more charged about this prospect.

For three months this year, I will be a homeschool mom.

So whilst planning how I am going to do this without a blatant mutiny on the part of the minions I realized that I would need to make this a lot of fun too -- but that I would be able to do fun stuff I could never tackle as a teacher of 30 children.

So while excitedly planning some stuff (I will share later) that Meatball and I will be working on this summer I realized that I will have to entertain the Beans or we will get a whole lotta nuthin' done.  Cue the mad Pintercrack search for fun toddler/baby toys, tasks and games.

Holy shmoly, there is a lot!

First on the list to make, because it was cheap and I had some of it on hand already, was what we are very seriously referring to as the Squishy Sparklies.  The original intent of these DIY item was to inspire pre-writing skills in preschoolers.  Obviously at one the Beans is younger than that so my intended use is different.

Original idea was pinned from here (a place I think I will be referencing a lot! Awesome site!) and the complex instructions that not even I could mess up are as follows ...

Supplies:

• 2 bottles dollar store hair gel
• 2 plastic sandwich size bags per Squishy
• 1 gallon size plastic bag per Squishy
• glitter
• food coloring

Directions:

1. Squeeze a less than precise amount of hair gel into one sandwich bag.  I didn't measure it, just squirted enough in there so that the baggie would feel gooey when sealed.

2. Add some food coloring and glitter.  I had to adjust amounts a few times with this until I had the effect I wanted.

3. Really important step -- seal the baggie!

4. Squish the Squishy until its mixed up, then double and triple bag that suckah!

even I found this satisfying

triple bag that bad boy

I put each baggie in a second sandwich bag then inside of a gallon bag.  I did this because I am not using it as a pre-writing tool yet, someday we will.  I know that there is a good chance the Beans will figure out how to open the bags, and if he has to do it three times prior to actually getting to the gooey stuff I stand a chance at circumventing most of the mess.  These are only given to the Beans when he is in his highchair with me at the table or in the Gulag while I am there with him.  Only a moron would give a child food coloring and glitter laced semi-liquids and hope for the best.

Yeah, I totally fear that last statement will be quoted in a future post accompanied by a really awesome picture of my baby looking like a sparkly Smurf with a mohawk.

green with green food coloring

blue with blue

yellow food coloring and copper glitter

red food coloring and rainbow glitter

baby toys, round one

So after the massive and pathetic pity party I threw myself the other day I have been trying to knock the sorry-for-myself crap off.  I have always been a fixer and a do-er, so this mopey stuff just isn't me.

Sometimes ya gotta let yourself wallow a bit, just a bit.  I think finances can be something that truly overwhelms you if you let it.  I feel like I do it all wrong sometimes in terms of how I allocate budget monies for food especially.  I don't know how these lunatics can supposedly get $100 worth of groceries for $5.37 because they coupon the shit out of their purchases.  Reality is, I think, that those people are merely stocking the crapity crap up and merely visit their bunker house for the zombie apocalypse when they grocery shop.  I could be wrong, but it makes me feel better for the time being, so its the plan we are going with.

We did have a birthday party for the Beans, and I managed to do it on the cheap.  I am also making him some "toys" I found on Pintercrack ... but in true me-fashion it ain't goin' like I planned ... for example DIY plastic bottle bowling pins that I saw on another blog.  So she has these beautiful bottles that look all pretty like this ...

And me?

Yeah, I so nailed it.

So I will be trying that again, soonish.