Paper Dragons

Alex and I made some paper dragons last week as a Chinese New Year project and as you can see, they were a bit hit!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Super special valentine for Daddy.  Alex was the creator, I was just the one who helped to spell the words.

Having a great time making alentines on Friday

Special elephant valentines for his friends at school.

With all of the finished product

Alex and I had a fun morning making valentines on Friday.  His school party is on Tuesday, so we had 22 little elephants to put together for that.  Each one has its own unique characteristics, which makes them cool.  We also made some special valentines for Daddy and some of Alex's buddies, per his request.  Gotta love construction paper, stickers, glue and pompoms to make for a fun filled morning.

Ornaments!

Cutting out the ornaments


Baked and ready to paint


Artiste at work

Alex's favorite rooster


The hummingbird for the tree

Alex finished up his salt dough ornaments today and I think they look cool! I still remember a salt dough angel ornament which I made when I was probably pre-school age and it was still in mom's collection of ornaments until recently, when I believe it met it's demise, most likely just because it was so old and probably falling apart. I decided that it would be a fun project for Alex and I to do together, so we started the project on Monday, by making the dough and rolling it out and cutting the shapes, and then baked them. Today he painted, I put the shellac on and then put the ribbon through to hang them on the tree.

You'll notice that there is quite a variety of shapes in the mix. Alex picked out the cookie cutters at the store the other day, with the rooster and the hummingbird making it into the final cut. He picked out his favorite two ornaments to hang on the tree, one rooster and one hummingbird. Quite a fun project. He takes his painting very seriously!

Weekend Kitchen Renovation

Bathroom cabinet purchased six years ago at Target, which did not fit in current bathroom.


Sink/faucet installation-great job Daddy!!


Sides attached, sink/faucet installed.


Alex testing out the kitchen sink and faucet.

Nope, it was not our kitchen which was renovated this weekend, but Alex's kitchen is looking pretty sharp after the renovation. We have been thinking of getting Alex a play kitchen for awhile now and I've been watching Craiglist for a wooden kitchen, versus the plastic ones, but they never seem to show up. In talking with a few parents, it seems that play kitchens have quite the longevity with the kids, so perhaps that is why.

I saw a repurposing of an old entertainment center into a play kitchen on Apartment Therapy recently and ever since, I've been thinking of what we could repurpose. The other day it hit me. We had a cabinet which was previously in the bathroom, but since we moved it no longer fits, so it was being underutilized. I mocked up a "kitchen" scenario with it on Friday and Alex started using it right away. He seemed quite excited to have an "oven" and a "fridge", so it definitely seemed worth proceeding.

After some brainstorming, this is what David and I came up with over the weekend. It still needs some cosmetic touches, like new handles for the oven and stove, knobs for the burners and oven, the burners need to be affixed, and it may recieve a few more accessories, but Alex LOVES it already!! We took quite a bit of video and after some editing, we will share. Best of all, total cost was $17!! ($12 for the faucet and $5 for the loaf pan sink) Our little chef is quite happy and so are we!

Wow! Homemade playdough!

Four toddlers, at one table, happily occupied for about twenty minutes.

Ahhh....the miracle of playdough!

Alex's Platform

Remember last week, when I said that David and Alex were working on a project? Well, here's the finished product! A few weeks ago, while doing some reading, I saw a gadget called the Learning Tower advertised. It was basically a platform for kids to use in the kitchen to watch and participate in cooking activities.

I thought that this would be a great idea for Alex because he has always loved being in the kitchen with me and now he always wants to see what is going on, but is really too big for the Bjorn these days. The only drawback was the price, which I thought was rather high at $180. I mentioned the concept to David and he agreed that it was a cool idea, and proceeded to draw up plans to make one himself. So, he started on it last weekend and today he finished it up.

I think that it turned out very nicely. He used redwood and then used a beeswax and orange oil finish on it to bring out the color and grain of the redwood. As you can see it has a variety of heights which it can be adjusted to, just move the dowel to the appropriate holes. Alex loves it! He tried it out today and even donned his yet too large apron for the occasion. I am sure that he will get much enjoyment out of this project that Daddy worked so diligently on. Thanks Daddy, it looks great!

Helping Daddy

Alex was a great little helper on Daddy's woodworking project, this weekend. He was quite excited to try to use the tools, as you can see. What were they working on? You will soon see. Pictures to be posted, once project is completed. It will be fun and very useful!

A Changing Table for Peanut

Over the past few months, we have been working on many projects to prepare for Peanut's arrival. The latest, which was tackled last weekend was a
changing table. As many of you know, our apartment is not really large enough for alot of extra furniture, so David came up with the idea to make a changing table similar to those which you see in public restrooms---the ones which fold down from the wall. Really good idea! A search on the Internet showed an overview of something similar which was done on "Wasted Spaces" on the DIY Network.

So, David made a changing table from scratch and it is now proudly mounted on the wall in the hallway between the two bedrooms. It looks great, is efficient and will be used many, many times in our future. We tested it out, using one of Xena's toys, as you can see in the pics. Xena was very interested and helpful in the whole process.