Shower Curtain Book Nook

I have been obsessed with all these cute book nooks and teepees. So I’d been thinking of a way to make it work for me and my kiddos. I found it! Shower curtains! Why should shower curtains be restricted to the suddy, steamy messy room that houses the commode. No! I will liberate the shower curtain! Free it from its prison and present it as an offering to my messy kids!

Its water resistant fabric makes it easy to clean and the hooks make for easy take 

down as I re-model in the future. 

Really though this was the easiest, quickest nook ever and they love it!

DIY Bath Bombs for Kids

This past week was dubbed “Experiment Week”. Day 1 was DIY Bath Bombs. 

Here is what you need:

 Empty Christmas Ornament or a Bath Bomb mold

 1 Cup Baking Soda

 3/4 Cup Epson Salt (Blended until its a fine powder)

1 Tablespoon of lemon juice

1/4 cup water

Spray bottle

Wooden spoon

Food Coloring

Essential oils

Coconut Oil

Place all the dry ingredients into a bowl and mix with a wooden spoon.

Next place the water, lemon juice, 1 tbsp coconut oil and essential oil (add per fragrance preference) into a spray bottle. Spray the liquid into the dry ingredients until the mixture has the consistency of sand. At this point we added food coloring. 

Once the mix starts to stick together start placing into the molds. Close the mod and allow to dry overnight. Due the the size of the ornament molds it took a few days to completely dry out. 

We covered the following topics: life skills, science, and math. 

Questions and discussion. 

1. Can you measure out a cup? 1/4 cup? 1/2 cup?

2. Why is it important to rest and relax?

3. What happens when the wet ingredients mix with the dry?

4. What happens when the colors mix?

Wallpaper Border Cover-Up – With Fabric

This past year we moved into our beautiful home. Unfortunately in the kids room there was this horrible wallpaper. My son loved didn’t mind it but my daughter did not approve of the sports themed room. I knew I had to find a gender neutral alternative that fit both my kids personalities. 

My husband was not excited or motivated to go through the tedious process of removing the wall paper and I was not patient enough to wait so I had to come up with a solution.

I used a staple gun, scissors, and four yards of fabric. I folded the fabric in half length wise then in fours horizontally.  This gave me the width I wanted at manageable lengths. 

Here are a few project tips. 

1. Choose a fabric with little to no stretch. 

2. Choose a dark fabric that wont allow the wallpaper to show through.

3. Don’t start a fabric end at the corner. Staple in the corner.

The kids loved the boarder once it was finished. Next time I do a project like this I will use a taller ladder so I can cover all the boarder at the top.

 For my first time on a project like this I think it went well. 

DIY Recycled Car Tunnel

For the past week or so the kids and I have been storing and stocking up on empty food boxes and toilet paper rolls. We knew we were planning for a project but we hadn’t quite decided what. Well while KJ played with cars in the corner of the classroom genius struck. 

A car tunnel!

I quickly pulled out the boxes, a plastic container we don’t use often and a glue gun. 

SJ drew a map of where everything should go then we put it all together. 

Parents I have three words for you: hours of fun! HOURS OF FUN!!

This is a great STEM activity. 

Vocabulary: Velocity, engineering, acceleration and deceleration

Questions:  How many seconds does it take for the car to go through the tunnels? Will it go faster or slower as we tilt the lid? 

You can even have your kids decorate the boxes adding an element of art to the project. When we were done with the project we carefully removed the tunnel pieces and placed them inside the container to use another time. 

Have fun with this project and please share your pictures of your tunnels below. 

DIY Crayon Circles

We pick up crayons from everywhere! Back to school sales, dollar stores, restaurants, if they are offered to us or are being sold at a great price then we are getting them. This has led to an abundance of broken crayons. My son KJ has a real problem with things that are broken (though breaking things is his specialty) so he fights against using crayons that don’t meet his standards.

This activity was fairly easy to prep. I took all the crayons and put them in a pile on the table. I asked the kids to remove the wrappers which proved tedious so K and I joined in. After the crayons were unwrapped I had the kids sort them using disposable cupcake pans.

I then baked the crayons in the cupcake plans on 300 degrees for about 15 min. Once the crayons were completely melted I took them out the oven and put them into the freezer to harden. They easily popped out of the tins and the kids enjoyed being able to use them right away.