Welcome, Friends! I hope you’ve had a great week. First, I want to remind you …
If you’d like to get more While He Was Napping, you can find me here:
Weekend Wander #117
If you’d like to get more While He Was Napping, you can find me here:
If you’d like to get more While He Was Napping, you can find me here:
{Top Three (plus thirty) Thursday} Easter Basket Stuffers
Post may contain affiliate links. All opinions and text is my own and reflect my honest and true opinions, and my opinions only.
I love giving gifts to my kids and all these holidays provide a fabulous excuse to do so. However, my boys definitely DO NOT need any more sugar! That would be a “saccharine-saturated nightmare” for sure (props to any of you that caught the Wreck It Ralph movie reference). So, what will I,er… I mean the Easter bunny be stuffing my kiddos Easter baskets with if not sugary sweet treats? Take a look below for some ideas of treats and gifts that aren’t full of sugar monsters.
GATOR’S EASTER BASKET
(Age 13.5 months)
(Age 13.5 months)
1. Cars and Trucks (single pieces with large wheels)
2. Teether Toys
3. Wooden Blocks
4. (Homemade) Teething Biscuits
5. Fisher Price Figurines
6. Shape Sorter
7. Musical Toys
8. Large, Single Piece Puzzles
9. Edible Play Dough (this kid eats everything… it’s gotta be the edible kind)
10. New Shoes (he’s outgrowing his old ones)
11. Board books. These are sturdy and fit little hands wonderfully.
MONKEY’S EASTER BASKET
(Age 3.5 years)
1. Hotwheels or Matchbox Cars
2. Markers, crayons or colored pencils
3. Water colors (DIY with this recipe)
4. Busy Books – coloring books, mazes, ect
5. Story books. Can you ever really have too many books?
6. Construction Paper, Glue Stick and Kid Scissors
7. Superhero Shirts to Match Gator’s Onesies
8. Dried Fruit or Nuts
10. Masking Tape Roll for creating roads, practicing letters, ect
MR. NAPPING’S EASTER BASKET
1. Beef Jerky
2. iTunes/App Store or Play Store Gift Cards
3. Movie or Other Event Tickets
5. Cologne, Deodorant, Shower Gel, Hair Gel, ect.
6. Nail Care Kit
9. Massage Kit
11. Love Tickets
What’s going in your Easter baskets?
Easter Egg Wreath
Our kids are just now getting to an age where traditions are actually meaningful and fun. Growing up, we didn’t have a lot of Easter traditions. We went to church and had a family dinner (we had family dinner every Sunday, though). We did get Easter baskets as well, but I remember the baskets more than anything I actually got in them. Mine was pink, made out of cloth and had a fun little stuffed rabbit head on it.
Mr. Napping’s Easter bunny would actually hide their baskets and they had to go find them before they could open them. So, we’ve adopted that tradition in our little family. Last year, Monkey (2) didn’t understand the hunt, he wasn’t really sure what he was looking for… but this year I think he’ll be super excited to hunt his basket.
We almost NEVER got to color eggs though. I really only remember coloring eggs with my grandma a few times. My mom didn’t like the hassle and the mess. It’s funny how some of the things we DIDN’T do when I was little are some of my favorite things to do with my boys and husband now. Maybe they are more important to me because I sometimes feel like I missed out on those things? Anyway, I wanted to do something with eggs, but the plastic ones were just a little too… cheesy, I guess. So, I came up with this:
EASTER EGG WREATH
Materials:
– Water balloons
– Yarn in colors of your choice
– Mod Podge or White Glue
– Spray Starch or Stiffen Spray
– Packing tape or Duct tape
– Jars or other bases to hold your eggs while they dry
Syrup is optional… as are the little helpers just outside the photo.
Just kidding about the syrup. It’s leftover from our breakfast adventures.
You don’t need syrup!
Directions:
– Blow up as many water balloons as you want. Make them as big as you want. Check out the shape and size and reshape them by gently squeezing the balloon a little until it’s egg shaped.
– Coat the balloon with a thin layer of glue or mod podge.
– Lay the end of one skein of yarn on the balloon and wrap the yarn around the balloon until it’s nicely covered. Wrap the yarn so the balloon is covered randomly or in a pattern. The more yarn you use the sturdier your finished egg will be.
– When the balloon is covered to your satisfaction with the yarn, apply a generous coating of glue or mod podge.
– Set the balloon on a jar or other base and let it dry.
– Repeat the above steps for all the balloons. Let them dry completely, approximately 24-48 hours.
– When the glue is nice and dry, pop the balloons and remove all pieces.
– Take a long strand of yarn (approximately 18-24 inches or more) and wrap a piece of packing or duct tape around one end, creating a make-shift “needle”. This will make it easier to tie your eggs together.
– Begin with two eggs and thread the “needle” through the side of one egg and back out. Repeat with a second egg and then tie the two ends of the string together in a knot.
– Trim the strings so the yarn doesn’t show as much.
– Repeat until all your eggs are connected in a circular shape.
– Hang and enjoy!
Tips and tricks:
* Use enough glue to thoroughly cover the yarn. The more glue the sturdier the finished egg. Be aware that the more glue you use, the more your balloons will stick and you may have to pull out more pieces of balloons when you pop them.
* Try to evenly space the yarn while you wrap the balloons, it will help you tie them together at the end.
* Let the glue dry COMPLETELY or your eggs will smash.
* Make your “needle” as long as you need. If it goes all the way through the egg it will be easier to thread the yarn through the eggs.
* If your wreath is droopy, use a wire coat hanger and shape it. Then thread the wire through the eggs and secure the end together. A bit of spray paint will help hide any unsightly wire, but paint it before you thread it through the eggs. Or attach the eggs to a wreath form.
* Not a wreath kinda girl? That’s okay! The eggs make fun vase fillers and garlands too! Blow your balloons up smaller for smaller eggs.
* Not a wreath kinda girl? That’s okay! The eggs make fun vase fillers and garlands too! Blow your balloons up smaller for smaller eggs.
This project was inspired by:
Click the link to see how Breanna made this wreath
using rattan balls and other things she found at her Dollar Tree.
Note: Breanna’s post is a couple years old and I haven’t seen the rattan balls at my Dollar Tree recently,
so that’s why I went with yarn balls.
{Giveaway} Conscious Box
Hello, friends! I’ve got a fun giveaway for you today! Have you ever heard of Conscious Box? Nope, well, I hadn’t either until this morning. But, I have done some checking and Conscious Box looks like a very cool company.
Let me say up front that I am not super eco-concerned, so my first thought was ‘Yeah, okay. Whatever.’ Don’t get me wrong, we shouldn’t be wasteful and irresponsible with our resources, but I haven’t thrown out all our chemical cleaners and the initial cost of jumping on the essential oils bandwagon has kept our medicine cabinets fully stocked with ibuprofen, benadryl and nyquil. But I kept looking and can I just say, I LOVE the idea of having products around that I don’t have to worry about my kids getting into?! My little boys are incredibly curious and my one-year-old still puts EVERYTHING in his mouth. So, the idea of safe products is quite appealing to me.
Conscious Box has a wide variety of products, from bath and beauty to food, health and even home and garden! When you sign up for Conscious Box you will receive a new box every month full of “some of the purest and most sustainable products on the planet.” (quote via consciousbox.com). They even have vegan and gluten-free boxes available. You will also have the opportunity to purchase full-sized products at discounted prices. You can earn points by taking polls, reviewing products, sharing pages, and giving gifts. Currently, point value is set at a point per penny, which can be applied to product purchases (not subscriptions) for discounts.
The contents of each box revolves around a theme that changes depending on the season or special events, and include content in the form of practical, daily living necessities. And yes, all boxes are suitable for all ages.
And the best part, here is your chance to try Conscious Box for 3 months! Enter to win with the Rafflecopter widget below. Giveaway open to United States residents, including Alaska and Hawaii, APO addresses, as well as US territories. Sorry all you international readers, but keep watching Conscious Box as they prepare to open shipping to Canada, Europe and more. Or use the code DICOVERNATURAL when you sign up and get 50% off any subscription!
If you’d like to get more While He Was Napping, you can find me here:
Mexican Haystacks
This is one of our new faves. Easy, delicious and everyone can put what they like on theirs. Oh, and it’s delicious!
Ingredients:
– 2 cups Rice, white or brown, cooked
– 2 Roma Tomatoes, diced
– 1 Avocado, diced
– 2 1/2 cups Chicken, grilled and diced
– 4-6 Green Onions or Shallots, sliced
– 1-2 Mango, diced
– Cilantro, sliced
– Taco Seasoning Sauce (recipe below)
Taco Seasoning Sauce:
– 1 packet of Taco Seasoning
– 1/3 cup water
– 2 Tbsp Corn Starch
– 1 Tbsp Water
Directions:
– Cook the rice. Dice or slice up everything else.
– Prepare the Taco Seasoning Sauce by combining the seasoning packet and the water in a small sauce pan on medium heat. Mix well. In a separate small bowl, combine the tablespoon of water and two tablespoons of corn starch. Mix until there are no lumps. Pour the corn starch mixture into the warm seasoning mix. Stir until well combined. Turn heat to simmer and stir occasionally.
Each person ca build their own ‘stack’. Begin with rice and sauce and add any extra toppings as desired. Enjoy!
Serves 4-6
If you’d like to get more While He Was Napping, you can find me here:
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 101
- 102
- 103
- 104
- 105
- …
- 231
- Next Page »
