The Great Backyard Bird Count is an annual event run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the National Audubon Society. It runs February 13-16, but you can get started now by learning how to identify birds. If you have older children, you might want to check out their site for kids and their free homeschool unit. You can even start counting birds now through eBird.

From No Time for Flash Cards – all you need is scissors, markers, glue, stickers, and colored paper. Perfect for toddlers.

We have very few Christmas tree ornaments, and those we have are easily broken. I wanted to have a few ornaments that the kids could play with at the bottom of the tree, so Emma and I made some salt dough, got out the cookie cutters, and made these:

We used cookie cutters to make all of the shapes except the wreaths, and then I used a skewer to make holes for hanging. It’s important to do this before baking the clay.

We made the salt dough by mixing 1/2 cup of salt, 1 cup of flour, 1/2 cup of water, and 1 tablespoon of olive oil together and then kneading in food coloring to make the different colors. Emma really enjoyed kneading in the different colors. Bake the clay on parchment paper at 300 degrees Fahrenheit for one hour.

I used gold embroidery floss (all six strands) to hang the ornaments on the tree.

Thinking of making an advent calendar? The Crafty Crow has the most diverse collection of ideas for advent calendars I’ve seen, all collected from different bloggers. Made with fabric, toilet paper rolls, candles, chewing gum, and those cute baby socks your child has outgrown, there’s something for everyone! See the post here.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thank you for reading my blog!

I thought I’d participate in Chocolate On My Cranium’s Wordfull Wednesday assignment this week. The topic is, “I Am Grateful”, fitting for Thanksgiving week. Since today is the 26th, I thought I would list 26 things I am grateful for:

1. My husband Mike. He’s sweet, funny, and always loves me – even when I’m not being nice
2. Two adorable, healthy kids
3. Parents who I can always look to for ideas of how to be a better parent myself
4. My amazing grandparents, who are all still alive and have played a huge role in my life
5. My nine brothers and sisters
6. Extended family
7. Friends
8. My own good health
9. Faith
10. Mike having a good job that allows me to stay home with our kids
11. The fact that Mike loves his job
12. The fact that I love my job
13. Being able to live in a beautiful, safe neighborhood with other young families
14. My local mother’s club
15. The internet
16. Playgroups and playdates
17. My local library and all the activities they run for kids
18. The way Emma tells me things she liked about that day every evening
19. The way Johnny always makes me feel loved and appreciated (very much a mama’s boy)
20. Watching my kids learn to play together
21. Laughter
22. Smiles
23. Nature
24. Cell phones
25. Books on CD
26. Music

Incidentally, this was Johnny’s due date last year. He didn’t show up until 12 days later. At the time I was very annoyed. Now I’m grateful, because I’m not ready for him to turn 1.

Practice shapes and colors while making this simple turkey with construction paper, scissors, markers, googly eyes, and glue:

Have fun with potato prints for this turkey! You’ll also need construction paper, glue, scissors, paint, markers, a plate, and one potato.

Make a turkey puppet using scissors, a glove, felt, glue, googly eyes, and pom poms.

This play-doh turkey looks like a great way to keep young kids happy at a family Thanksgiving get-together. You’ll need play-doh (Deanna has a recipe on her site), an orange foam sheet (to cut into beaks), googly eyes, orange pipe cleaners, feathers, and googly eyes.

And finally, some cute pet rock turkeys. You’ll need some rocks painted brown, felt cut into feather, beak, and wattle shapes, glue, and googly eyes.