Letter M

I feel like we've been concentrating on the letter M for a month since we've been moving for that long! We are so ready to have all of our stuff in one house and be unpacked and settled. Most nights we don't sit down to relax until 9:30 which gives us enough time to watch 2 DVR'd (totally a word, right?) shows before I'm fighting to stay awake. We just keep telling ourselves that one day, hopefully sooner rather than later, we'll be able to relax and enjoy our new home instead of unpacking or in James' case - building a fence or painting cabinets.

Eventually (hopefully, maybe??) we'll be settled and then we can take some pictures to show how a little paint, a lot of patience and hard work (and new appliances) can take a kitchen from drab to fab!

Ok, back to the point of this here post...the letter M.

For our first craft we made a marshmallow M, smaller marshmallows would have been a better choice but we had big ones in the pantry so that's what we used. Savannah really enjoyed this one, she did a very good job of covering each of the spots where I'd put glue. It was really cute to watch her do this, she kept smashing the marshmallows onto the paper because she really wanted them to stick but since the glue was wet she was only making it more difficult for herself.

From October 19, 2011

From October 19, 2011

From October 19, 2011

She also enjoyed eating the marshmallows.

From October 19, 2011

Since it was a raining and we couldn't play outside, we went ahead and started on the next letter M craft which was making a mailbox. We cut out the pieces, she decorated them and then we taped it together. She's getting very good at drawing circles, up until a couple weeks ago all she could do was scribble but now she makes circles. And her imagination is also developing, if you ask her what she's drawing it ranges from an airplane to the whole family to butterflies.

From October 19, 2011

From October 19, 2011

From October 19, 2011

From October 19, 2011

Corn Maze & Pumpkin Patch

A couple weekends ago we (me, James, Savannah, ZZ and Uncle Andy) visited a somewhat local corn maze and pumpkin patch. Savannah is still a little young for it so she didn't really get into the whole corn maze part but she seemed to enjoy it regardless

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

These things are more uncomfortable than they seem!

From 27th Month

Instead of sand boxes they have big plastic tubs, which are probably just above ground pools, filled with corn kernals. Knowing how much she enjoys playing with the colored rice I made for her I figured she would really enjoy the corn...yeah, not so much. It got in her shoes and she was not happy about that.

From 27th Month

After testing out the corn we decided to ride the cow train. At first, before it started moving, she wanted nothing to do with it but I had already wedged myself in that little seat so we were definitely going on a ride. After we got moving she loved it and wanted to go again immediately.

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

It was then decided we needed funnel cake and some time on the playground and swings, after which it was finally time for the corn maze. We were a little disappointed with most of the maze, we were taller than the corn and could clearly see the right way to go so there was no real getting lost but towards the end, after we had hit all the checkpoints, things got a little trickier. The corn was thicker and taller and we weren't really paying attention to anything except trying to get some fun pictures so we may or may not have walked in a big circle.

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

Is this not the CUTEST dress ever?  Thanks Gammie!

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

She was mostly interested in running and encouraging everyone else to run as well.

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

We had intended to go on the hayride next and see the cows and horses up close but someone was getting a little restless so we decided to head over to the pumpkin patch. Luckily we were able to get some fantastic pictures before it started pouring down rain, thankfully they had a little shop adjacent to the pumpkin patch that we were able to hang out in while James ran and got the car, what a gentleman!

From 27th Month

From 27th Month

My new favorite picture of her.

From 27th Month

Letters J, K and L

We got a little behind on our crafts with the big move but we’re back on track now and all caught up.


I could’ve sworn we did more than one craft for the Letter J but I can’t seem to locate any evidence of more than one so maybe I just thought of doing another. Anyway, for J we made Jello and she was not a fan as evidenced by the photos below…

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

So, moving right along to Letter K. We made a kite out of paper and decorated it with sequins. We have a Buzz Lightyear kite to actually fly but it rained ALL weekend long and ever since we’ve had very little wind. Eventually the weather will cooperate and we’ll get to test our kite flying skills.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

For the letter L we collected leaves (unfortunately it started raining just as we started collecting leaves so we didn’t get too many) and then decorated them with glitter. She was a HUGE fan of the glitter! I’m going to have to find a somewhat less messy way for her to apply glitter to things because she was having an absolute blast.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

We also made lollipops, but not in the traditional sense. Melted, boiling sugar plus a toddler doesn’t sound like the best idea so we decided to make marshmallow lollipops. As you can see she thoroughly enjoyed dipping the marshmallows and eating the chocolate off of them, I think she did eventually at a little bit of marshmallow too.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

Letters G, H and I

It's been a busy few weeks in our house but we still managed to get in our letter crafts, so what if it took 2 weeks to cover the letter I...

James and Savannah made a golf course for the letter G, they did it while I wasn't home so we didn't get any pictures of the craft in process but as you can see it turned out very cute. They are both quite proud of their creation.

From Jul 9, 2011

We also made a giraffe, once again she was more interested in smearing the paint everywhere instead of using thumbprints like I had intended but the only thing that really matters is that she has fun.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

For the letter H we made a house, I cut out all the pieces and then let show me where to put the windows and doors (and then I may or may not have straightened them up a little) and then she got to use the glittery paint to decorate which was definitely her favorite part.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

We also made a hippopotamus, luckily we had packing peanuts lurking in an empty box and they proved to perfect for hippo teeth!

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

Coming up with crafts for the letter I was quite difficult! The only thing I could really think of was ice and even if all our ice cube trays weren't packed (more on that in a minute), I'm sure that Savannah wouldn't find filling up trays and sticking them in the freezer to be all that exciting.

Then I remembered that we had some ice pop trays hiding in the island so I put a few drops of food coloring in them before I filled them up and froze them, the result was colored cylinders of ice which we put in the bath tub with her. She wasn't sure about them at first because they were so cold but she got over that pretty quickly and was able to play with them for a few minutes before they melted in the warm bath.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

And thanks to a great idea from Gammie and Papa, we also made an indian headdress. I cut out everything and glued it together then let her decorate it, she wasn't able to squeeze the glitter paint as well this time so I squeezed it into random designs and then let her smear it around with a wooden skewer (again, pretty much everything is packed) and then let her decorate some more with a paint pen. She wasn't interested in modeling it herself but James was happy to show it off.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

She also painted her nails with the paint pen, I think that might have been her favorite part.

From Jul 9, 2011

From Jul 9, 2011

And this is one of the very few genuine smiles we have ever been able to capture, usually we get the CHEEEEEEEEEEEESE grin, and it is a result of me hittng my head on the corner of the chair when I bent down to pick something up, she found it to be hilarious.

From Jul 9, 2011

So, if you haven't guessed - we are moving! We closed on a new home late Friday afternoon and I spent the weekend painting closets and Savannah's bedroom while James got the kitchen cabinets ready to be painted. Big thanks to ZZ for watching Savannah on Saturday so we could get started on that!! And we did all that in a house with no electricity - it was supposed to be turned on Friday but I missed a field when I filled out the request online so it didn't get turned on until today. Poor James had to sand all the cabinets by hand and I had to paint closets in the dark, thank goodness for that handy flashlight app on the iPhone!