Author Archive
Fun Friday Links – Books for Boys edition
Posted by: | CommentsTeresa’s recent post on books got me thinking about what WE read around here on a regular basis. I am homeschooling my oldest son (who just turned 8 and is in second grade), and doing a lot of informal preschool activities with my almost 5 and almost 3 year old kids as well. This means we do lots and lots of reading!
One of the things I looked forward to most when becoming a parent was the idea of reading to and with my kids… and sharing with them the books *I* loved as a kid. It took us awhile to get there (for some reason, they were not all that interested in Laura Ingalls Wilder when they were babies), but we’re finally starting to read books I read as a child.
Today’s links post will include a few of some of the books I read (and recommend) for boys! (I’ll tackle the girls next week)
Encyclopedia Brown
The Great Brain
The Hardy Boys
The Boxcar Children
The Chronicles of Narnia Set
And I could go on and on, but I’ll hush for today! Next week, I’ll do my best to keep the list of GIRLS books to only three pages. 
Happy Friday, everyone!
Crafting With Mema – Making Homemade Paint
Posted by: | CommentsWe’ve started a new Monday series here at NanaHood, called “Crafting With Mema“. These posts will include patterns, recipes, and fun craft projects to do with your kids or grandkids. The ideas won’t be difficult (if anything, we’ll err on the side of SUPER EASY), and we hope we’ll inspire YOU to do more crafting!
This week, Allan and Mema are making homemade paint!
So, to recap… to make homemade paint, you need:
- 1 tablespoon of baking soda
- 1 tablespoon of vinegar (it will bubble up when you mix them)
- 1 tablespoon of cornstarch
- 1 teaspoon of liquid soap
- food coloring (your choice!)
Mix it all together, and you have PAINT! Coming next week… painting with the homemade paint!
Happy crafting!!
Don’t forget… if you and your children/grandchildren create something from one of our Crafting posts, we’d LOVE to see photos (or videos). Along those same lines, we are also interested in posting YOUR video or photo tutorials, so if you have crafty kiddos and want to share, please send an email to admin@nanahood.com.
About “Mema”: Cheryl Booth has been crafting for more years than she cares to remember, and has shared her love of crafts with kids in her home, in Bible classes, at summer camp, and elsewhere. You can visit Cheryl’s craft shop online at http://www.mycraftbooth.etsy.com
Friday Links
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s time again for Friday linkage… and I think I’m going to stick with my “random” theme, because that seems to be working well for me. (Please say it works for you too?)
- Have you subscribed to GRAND magazine yet? if not, you should go check it out, and sign up! (Pssst… Teresa has an article in this month’s issue).
- Just watched this really cool music video. I didn’t listen to the words much (was too enthralled by the video), so I apologize if there was anything iffy in the lyrics.
- Compassion International has it’s latest team of bloggers in Kenya right now. You can click on over and read about their trip (and previous trips) on the CI website, and then click on the bloggy links too.
- Speaking of the Compassion International bloggy links, don’t miss this one by MckMama.
- Just before I started to write this post, we had a little incident with my laptop. The incident included Samuel… a glass of water… and my laptop. I’m not sure yet what the fate will be for my laptop, but in case you ever have a similar incident, this link is helpful.
- I tried really hard to be kind during this laptop incident. But, as it was happening, I knew I was failing to be as kind as I should have been. Samuel didn’t mean to fry the laptop… it was an accident. And he is far more valuable to me than a computer, although based on my reaction he may have been wondering about that. An hour or so after I finally calmed down, I spent a little time reading this verse in James. And then I read these. And then I went ahead and read this whole chapter. And then I spent some time praying about my reactions the next time we have an incident.
Here’s hoping for a brighter, calmer, less stressful Friday… and for YOU TOO!
Crafting With Mema – Making Homemade Play Dough
Posted by: | CommentsWe’ve started a new Monday series here at NanaHood, called “Crafting With Mema“. These posts will include patterns, recipes, and fun craft projects to do with your kids or grandkids. The ideas won’t be difficult (if anything, we’ll err on the side of SUPER EASY), and we hope we’ll inspire YOU to do more crafting!
Today, Mema and Martha join forces to show you how to make homemade “flour dough” or play dough. It’s a lot easier than you might think!
Video One – Making Playdough:
Video Two – Making Playdough:
So, to make super easy homemade play dough, you’ll need:
- 1 cup flour
- 1/2 cup salt
- 1/2 cup water
- food coloring (optional)
Mix flour and salt together. Add food coloring to your water, and add water to the mix. Mix it all together until it’s a soft, sticky ball. Flour your table, and then knead the dough for a few minutes until it’s no longer sticky. Then, play, play, play!
Happy crafting!!
Don’t forget… if you and your children/grandchildren create something from one of our Crafting posts, we’d LOVE to see photos (or videos). Along those same lines, we are also interested in posting YOUR video or photo tutorials, so if you have crafty kiddos and want to share, please send an email to admin@nanahood.com.
About “Mema”: Cheryl Booth has been crafting for more years than she cares to remember, and has shared her love of crafts with kids in her home, in Bible classes, at summer camp, and elsewhere. You can visit Cheryl’s craft shop online at http://www.mycraftbooth.etsy.com
Fun Friday Links – going random again!
Posted by: | CommentsRandom seems to be my new middle name. Or maybe that’s frenzied. Harried. Too busy for my own good? Yeah, those all fit. It’s mostly a GOOD frenzied/harried/too busy… but still!
- DON’T FORGET – On February 27th (that’s tomorrow), Compassion International and a whole host of fabulous folks will be putting on a benefit concert to help Haiti. Check out Help Haiti Live for all the details. And if you aren’t lucky enough to live in Nashville or LA, you can watch the concert live on their website. 100% of the donations made through the website will be going straight to Compassion International for Haiti.
- Did you know that scientists have finally determined what killed the young King Tut, AND they now know who is father and mother were, thanks to DNA tests? You didn’t know this? Well, let me link you to an article ALL about it: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/ml_egypt_king_tut We’ve been reading, and re-reading, and RE-READING this article for the last week and a half. (And by “we”, I mean the 8 year old boy in our house).
- Many of you have probably learned these lessons already, but for those of us still learning them, I thought the “Top 10 Things I Have Learned From My Children” post by JennyOnTheSpot was a really good one. (Except for #6 – we can’t do that one around here, although I do agree with it in principle!)
- I’m not very good at decorating for the holidays. My husband actually likes to do that more than I do… but I’m TRYING to get better and get more in the “spirit” of things around here. (Yes, I can tend towards the grumpy/scrooge type of personality). ANYWAY, I did some searching around etsy this week, trying to find something cute for the house for spring. I didn’t actually find anything that jumped out at me, BUT I DID find this and this. They made me smile…
- Oh, and I also found THIS on etsy… (click if you have little girls with cute hair). My daughter has been taking her sweet time growing hair, but I think I can finally start purchasing these kinds of items. YAY!
And I think that’s about as random as I can get! Happy Friday, folks!
Crafting With Mema – Making Mosaic Magnets
Posted by: | CommentsWe’ve started a new Monday series here at NanaHood, called “Crafting With Mema“. These posts will include patterns, recipes, and fun craft projects to do with your kids or grandkids. The ideas won’t be difficult (if anything, we’ll err on the side of SUPER EASY), and we hope we’ll inspire YOU to do more crafting!
It’s time for this week’s “Crafting With Mema” post. This week, the kids and Mema will be making paper mosaic magnets to hang on the fridge!
A little “video” disclaimer – when filming for these posts, we quickly discovered that taking short breaks during the segments worked best for everyone. However, that means that each craft project ended up with two or three videos. By NEXT week, I’m hoping to figure out how to “connect” the segments into one video for each post, but for THIS week, I’m just going to post the three segments below. OK? Good! Here we go…
If you want to try this at home (and we hope you will), you’ll need:
- black construction paper
- various colored construction paper
- glue sticks
- magnets (preferably with pre-stick on the back to make it super simple)
Now, Mema actually pre-cut all the various colored pieces into triangles, but if you have older or ambitious kids, you could let them cut the triangles (or other shapes) themselves.
These are really simple little mosaics, but they look great on the fridge!
And by the way, if you and your children/grandchildren create something from one of our Crafting posts, we’d LOVE to see photos (or videos). Along those same lines, we are also interested in posting YOUR video or photo tutorials, so if you have crafty kiddos and want to share, please send an email to admin@nanahood.com.
About “Mema”: Cheryl Booth has been crafting for more years than she cares to remember, and has shared her love of crafts with kids in her home, in Bible classes, at summer camp, and elsewhere. You can visit Cheryl’s craft shop online at http://www.mycraftbooth.etsy.com
