5 Ways to Reuse Magazines For Some Learning Fun

Do you wonder what to do with your magazines once you’ve read them? If you have children or grandchildren, save them for some learning fun! Or donate them to someone who has young children and share these great ideas with them. All you need for these learning projects is a used magazine that can be cut up, some paper, a few markers or crayons, some glue and scissors.

#1.)There are a few ways you can do these projects, but let’s start with “Animals”. On a blank piece of paper, write the word “Animals” at the top. Then let the kids go through the magazine and cut out any pictures of animals that they find. This is good for recognition of a particular item and great practice for those motor skills!

The cutting part will go better if you tear the entire page out before the kids start cutting. Here are the animals I found in my magazine…

Have the child glue the pictures onto their “Animals” paper. Now is a great time to chat about what animals they found, how many of each animal there is, what color they are, which one is their favorite and even some discussion about the differences between the animals. For instance, the 3 cats in this example all have different colored eyes. Fun fact! 😉

#2.) Following the same idea, you could have the kids do a page about 1 particular color. I chose the color red. Letting them choose what color to look for makes it more fun for them.

#3.) The next idea is to pick one letter and look for things that begin with that letter. And to keep an eye out and cut out the letter itself. I went with the letter “F”…flag, forks, flowers, fruit, food and fence. 🙂

#4.) You can also follow this same idea but use numbers. Have the child find 1 of something, and 2 of something else, and 3 of another thing…you get the idea…1 flag, 2 cats, 3 dogs, etc.

#5.) Now let’s work on letter recognition. Write each letter of the alphabet on a piece of paper and have some markers or crayons handy.

Have your child go through the magazine and find each letter of the alphabet. When they find a letter, let them cross that letter off their piece of paper.

If they would like to color in the letter in the magazine, let them do that. Or circle it…whatever they want to do to mark it.

Now you have 5 fun suggestions of ways to help your child learn while reusing old magazines! And you never know what fun fact or yummy sounding recipe you might come across for yourself. 😉

Fun With Food – Let’s Make Cookie Monster!

Wow, summer seems to be flying past in a big hurry! Are you super busy in the summer? We sure seem to be! Sorry it’s been so long since I posted, but here’s another fun idea to do with the kids! And it’s edible! 🙂 And it’s Cookie Monster! Everybody loves Cookie Monster, right?!

This is what you’ll need: a light colored plate (I used a white Styrofoam one), fresh blueberries, white yogurt (or cottage cheese, fruit dip, whip cream), 2 small cups or dishes, a piece of bread and some small cookies.

Cut a Cookie Monster shaped mouth out of the bread and lay it on the plate. I used raisin bread.

Fill 2 little cups with yogurt. Any kind of fruit dip, cottage cheese or whipped cream will also work. It just needs to be white.

Place 1 large blueberry in each cup of yogurt to make the eyes. Fill the rest of the plate with blueberries. And you have your Cookie Monster! 🙂

To make it a bit more fun, add a few small cookies close to the mouth.

Super simple, but a fun way to have breakfast or a healthy snack! 🙂 I hope you will enjoy making…and eating…yours too!

Amazing Lego Set That’s Educational too!

Hello, everyone! If you have followed my blog for any length of time, you have probably realized that I am a great fan of Lego! (I should maybe say fanatic!) I put a set together the other day and I absolutely loved it, so I just have to tell you about it! 🙂 The set I’m talking about is the Lego Tiny Plants set #10329.

What is so cool about this set? Ooo, I was hoping you’d ask! 😉 You can make 9 tiny plants out of this set, but it’s much more than that. This set TEACHES you about the plants in a fun way that your kids won’t notice that they are learning while building Lego! For example, the plants you make are fashioned after real plants. Let’s look at the first building booklet that’s included:

This set of 3 plants are found in tropical rainforests. Lego has included a few interesting facts about rain forests.

Then you’ll see pictures of what the real plants look like with their botanical names and their every day names. They have included just enough facts to be interesting, but not boring or overwhelming. It adds to the fun of building each Lego plant when the kids will be able to tell others what the plant’s name is.

For instance, let’s look at the first plant you’ll build, the False Shamrock or Oxalis Triangularis. Some kids will love being able to spout off the “fancy” botanical name. 😉

Building each plant is also fun! Look at these cute little pots the plants go in! Yep, you put the pot together too.

Here’s your False Shamrock! Isn’t that pretty?

Wait, did you notice something familiar about the purple flowers on the False Shamrock?? Here’s a closer look at those pieces…what do you see?

Yes, those are butterflies!! 🙂 Good eye! Some of the pieces Lego selected to use for these plants are pieces that have been used in other previous sets. 🙂 Look at what the booklet says about these butterflies…

It adds to the fun of building the tiny plants when you are on the lookout for other pieces that you will recognize as having been also used in other sets! I won’t spoil the fun by telling you about the others, but keep your eyes open as you are building! 😉 The 3 plants made from the tropical rain forest plants look like this…

They are quite realistic, aren’t they? Another fun thing you could add to building these tiny plants is a visit to your local greenhouse and see if you can purchase any of these as a live plant to grow in your home. While I doubt you can find all of them, you might find a Jade plant or a Venus Fly Trap plant. (Venus Fly Trap plants are very cool, by the way!)

This has to be one of the most fun Lego sets I’ve built and I can see where it could be a wonderful project to work through with your kids. 🙂 Oh, you can build the tiny plants in any order that you like. They do not build on each other, but are separate.

I hope you’ll try building this set! What a great rainy day project! Or if it’s as hot where you live as it is here, its a great staying-inside-where-its-cool project. 😉 Have fun!

Simple Patriotic Flag Snack

Here’s a simple but cute idea to whip up a patriotic flag snack in just a few minutes. We’re less than a month away from the 4th of July, so this might be an idea to save for next month too. You will need some blue fruit – like blueberries, some red fruit – like strawberries or raspberries and some white cheese – like white cheddar or baby swiss. Wash and prepare the fruit. I used a white plate so the colors show up well against the background. Begin by lining up some blueberries in the upper left hand corner. I did 4 rows of 4 berries in each row.

Add a row of your red fruit beside the blueberries on the right hand side.

I think this would look the best with small chunks of cheese, but all I have on hand is sliced cheese. If using sliced cheese, cut the cheese into thin strips.

Alternate rows of red fruit with rows of white cheese.

That’s all there is to it! You can vary how many rows you have in your flag according to how much your kids can eat at one time. This would be a great project for the kids to each make their own flag and practice their small motor skills. Then they get to eat a healthy snack too! 😉

The Latest Lego Minifigures Series

Hi there! Hope things are going well at your house! Things have been rather crazy here but I’m hoping for a few slower days now so I can get back to some projects for my blog. But for today, let’s talk about LEGO! (Yes, one of my favorite subjects!) Have you see the latest Lego Minifigures series 26? It’s all about space figures and some of them are kinda funky! Lol Here’s what the package looks like… There is 1 minifigure per package.

These are the 12 minifigures that are available in this series.

Now for a little closer in on details. First, you have M-tron Powerlifter, Orion, Blacktron Mutant and Alien Beetlzoid.

This picture shows Spacewalking Astronaut, Alien Tourist, Ice Planet Explorer and Retro Space Heroine.

Last but not least there are the Flying Saucer Costume Fan, Imposter, Nurse Android and Robot Butler.

These are the first 2 I found!

So far I have seen them in stores at Walmart and Barnes & Noble and they are also available online at the Lego website. Happy hunting! 🙂

Time Out for Laughing

Hello again! How is your week going? I hope it’s been good so far, but just in case its been less than stellar, let’s take a couple of minutes out to laugh. 🙂 As the old saying goes, “Laughter is the best medicine!” So here is your dose of medicine for today! 😉

#1.) What is the difference between a beluga and a guppy?

Answer: There’s a whale of a difference!

#2.) Why don’t bears wear hats?

Answer: They like being bear-headed!

#3.) Where does a rabbit catch a plane?

Answer: At the hare-port!

#4.) Why did the dog get into fights?

Answer: Because he was a Boxer!

#5.) Who does a frog go to when he needs an eye examination?

Answer: A hop-tometrist!

#6.) Why does nobody want to play games with the big cat?

Answer: Because they know he’s a cheetah!

#7.) What time is it when the clock strikes 13?

Answer: Time to get a new clock!

#8.) What type of dog makes the best artist?

Answer: A labra-doodler!

#9.) Who likes to eat hamburgers, fries and ants?

Answer: Ronald McAardvark!

#10.) What state has the most cats & dogs?

Answer: Pets-ylvania!

I hope these jokes cheered you up and made you smile! Now go share them with someone else and brighten their day too! 🙂

Back From Vacation!

Sorry to not post for so long, but we took a “beach” vacation down to Gulf Shores, AL and Fort Walton Beach, FL. It was so nice to get away for a couple of weeks, walk on the beach and soak up some sun! But we’re back to reality now and ready to get back to life. 😉

I just wanted to share a few fun things that we did in case you are ever in that area and looking for something to do. The condo we stayed in at Gulf Shores, AL was right on the beach. And yes, the beaches are beautiful!

The sand is a beautiful white!

And the water is clear!

We tried to take a walk on the beach every day. It was fun to keep an eye out for shells and whatever else might show up.

We saw a few of these and think it must be some kind of jellyfish, but not really sure. Pretty funky looking, right?!

We enjoyed trying different types of seafood at different restaurants.

The weather was beautiful, but we did have red flag and rip current warnings a lot of the time we were there. Gulf Shores is a rather laid back area with lots of friendly people. Fort Walton Beach is a couple of hours further east along the gulf coast and so the beaches look pretty much the same. The traffic is much heavier and everything is busier around the Fort Walton Beach and Destin area. But I suppose there are more things to “do” if you get tired of being at the beach. (Do people get tired of being at the beach?)

One thing that we did that would be extra fun for families is to visit Gulfarium Marine Adventure Park.

Gulfarium is not nearly as big (or as expensive) as say, Sea World, but it has some fun things to offer. There are extra encounters that you can pay to do, but we just enjoyed what we could see with the general admission price. We saw African penguins that live in warm climates and they were super cute!

We watched a sea lion show…

And a dolphin show at the Dolphin Oasis.

They rehabilitate injured gulf animals here but some of the exhibits were closed due to being worked on. There are exhibits to see inside buildings too. Like these very cool looking frogs. (Yes, they are poisonous.)

There were some really neat looking fish too.

We took a ride on a boat for a dolphin cruise and I would highly recommend this! If you get seasick easily you might want to take some Dramamine beforehand, but it was a ton of fun! We went with the Southern Star Dolphin Cruise and thoroughly enjoyed the captain’s narrative.

We did see dolphins, but because the water was rather rough at times I didn’t get any pictures of the dolphins. (I was busy hanging on so I didn’t join the dolphins!) The dolphins popped up and back down so fast it was hard to catch a photo. It was an evening tour and the sun sinking over the water was beautiful.

I guess I better stop for now, but it was a great vacation and I would highly recommend you take a vacation to the Gulf Shores of AL and Fort Walton Beach/Destin, FL area.

Rusty was glad to have us back home even though he got to spend his vacation with our daughter and her husband and kids in their home with lots of dog cousins. 😉

I hope if you take a vacation, you enjoy your time away to relax and recharge. 🙂

It’s All in How You Look at It

Hello! We are away on a vacation just now but I had to share this funny with you. I guess I have a weird sense of humor, but I saw a bowl of bananas the other day that made me laugh. Yep, just a bowl of bananas. Here it is…

Anything look funny to you? Just a bowl of fruit, you say? Well, here’s what I thought when I saw it…

Haha! There, you’ve had your chuckle for the day! 😁

An Adorable Update for You

Hello, again! Just wanted to share a very adorable update with you that I think you might enjoy seeing! Earlier this week for Earth Day I posted some pictures from our nature walk. One of those pictures was this Robin’s nest with 4 eggs in it.

I checked on the nest yesterday and guess what?! Yes, the eggs have hatched! 🙂

Look at those tiny baby birds! Awww, it makes my heart soft and mushy just looking at their cuteness! 🙂 Just wanted to share them with you to brighten your day!

Happy Earth Day 2024!

Yes, it’s Earth Day once again! That means it’s time for our annual walk to look for signs of Spring and see what flowers and other nature items we can find. Pop your shoes on and let’s go! 🙂 Here are some things we found:

Our Creeping Phlox flowers are blooming and they are so beautiful! Here we have light purple…

Also white…

And possibly my favorite colors, pink and white.

Next we found a bush with red and pink flowers. (Sorry, I don’t know what kind of bush it is.)

I bet you know the name of these bright yellow flowers! If you said dandelions, you are right!

Oh, look who is hanging out and gathering pollen on this dandelion!

These tiny little wild violets are growing in our yard. Yes, all by themselves. We didn’t plant them.

Here is another pinkish-purple flower that grows all on its own too. It even grows up through stones!

Speaking of stones…look what we found in our driveway, of all places! Two Killdeer eggs! From what we read, it seems Killdeer often lay their eggs in not very safe places.

While we are talking about birds and their eggs, look what else we found on our walk.

Care to guess what’s hiding inside this nest? This is a Robin’s nest and look what a beautiful color their eggs are!

Here’s another batch of pretty white flowers.

We’re almost done with our Earth Day walk today, but keep an eye out for trees that have blossoms right now too!

I hope you’ve enjoyed going on this walk with us, but I hope you can take time outside to go on your own walk and that you will find all kinds of beautiful things in nature that will amaze you! 🙂