Tutorial Tuesday: Fall Centerpieces using Bag Painting

This week's guest blogger is Tina from Mamas Like Me.  Her blog is packed full of all kinds of activities that she does with her children including crafts, letter and writing activities, math, science, recipes, and much more. Please stop by and get some wonderful ideas!

I saw the idea for finger-painting in a bag over at Open Hands and figured I'd give it a try with this activity. The bags made it easier (and less messy) for us to paint both sides of these Fall leaves - and I love how the colors blended. 

 For this activity, we used:

 Red, Orange, and Yellow paint 

Leaf shapes cut out of card stock 

(I highly recommend the card stock rather than regular construction paper) 

Ziplock bags 

Glitter Glue 

Ribbon 

A branch from outside 

1. To prep for this, I cut leaf shapes out of card stock for each child.

2. Then, I put one leaf into each bag, along with a squirt of red, orange, and yellow paint, and a few drops of water to help it mix. Make sure there is some paint on both sides of the leaf. Try to get as much air out of the bag as possible when sealing it.

3. Next the kids had fun squishing the paint around and covered their leaves.

4. (Now, for the messy part!) I took the leaves out of each bag and replaced them with another leaf so each child got to do more than one.

5. When the kids were done covering their leaves, I offered them the option of just finger-painting with the paint in the bag. Some of them wanted to continue squishing with the paint and some were finished :)

6. Once the leaves dried, we used glitter pens to write each child's first initial on their leaves. (I love getting letters into an activity).

7. After the glitter dried, we hole-punched each leaf and tied it with ribbon.

8. Then, we went outside and found a branch to hang our leaves on and make our own Fall tree inside.

Doesn't it make an adorable centerpiece? You could also use these for garland or hang them in a window.

Tina is a former Elementary School teacher turned SAHM to three active boys (with one more on the way)! She blogs at Mamas Like Me where she shares kids activities, recipes, tips on frugal living, and reflections on life as ‘Mommy’.

Have you been to The Underpants Zoo?

Just wanted to share this cute book I found at the library this week. It's by Brian Sendelbach. It is about all the different kinds of underpants the animals at this wacky zoo wear. For example, the hippo wears ones with hearts and the octopus wears 4 pair! 

Along with being hilarious, this book has rhyming and wonderful illustrations. Kids will enjoy guessing what animals are going to be next and what type of underwear they will be wearing. Also, this book provides a great opportunity for discussion about why each animal chose the underwear they chose. For example, the kangaroo wears boxers with basketballs on them because he needs plenty of bounce. 

This is definitely one you need to read with your preschooler(s) soon!

Thinky Linky Thursday

Conservatory Fun

Linking up at: Living at the Whitehead's Zoo and

Tutorial Tuesday: Setting up a Montessori Homeschool Classroom

Hello, this week's tutorial is graciously brought to you by Kerri from Momma of 4 Cutiez. Please stop by there and show her some love by leaving a comment. She has some good resources on Montessori and Autism. Hope you enjoy the tutorial!


Alright, I finally got the shelves up in our new school room downstairs. I still have to go through another laundry basket of "stuff" and put the maps and posters on the wall, but finally have most of it gone through!! So here it is....

OK, so the paint is out of place forgive me, but everything else looks pretty tidy!! :) To the far left is our sensorial shelf. Top shelf includes homemade keys and locks board, chalk boards, measuring cups, and pourers. I would not classify any of these items sensorial, but since we have our practical life shelf in the kitchen I needed a place for these guys to go during school time. The second shelf holds our current sensory bin, (which is the coffee sensory bin) our geometrical solids, (omit the paints hanging out there) our homemade sand drawing tray, and our oceans in a bottle we made with Mamma of Many Blessings. On the bottom shelf I'm holding my trays, smelling bottles, geometrical shapes, and our sound boxes.

The middle shelf is our language shelf. I only have my homemade sandpaper letters here for now. I usually keep my movable alphabet on top, but it's being held hostage by Lil Einstein currently.

Last shelf is our geography shelf. We haven't acquired much geography stuff yet. When I truly am in need of something Mamma of Many Blessings usually has what I need. :) I also believe you are able to  acquire as you go. At least that's what I've been doing and it's been working for me. It's also better on my pocket book to spend a little bit here, and a little bit there. On the top of the geography shelf is our new cultural finds. The next shelf holds our children of the world finger puppets and globe filled with the children of the world wooden dolls. The kids really enjoy these!! We purchased them for fairly cheap at  Oriental Trading Company. The next two shelves hold country flash cards and a map of the world puzzle I got from garage sales.

Our math shelf.

On the very top is our divisions board I got from Amazon and a clock I got at a used curriculum sale. The next shelf holds our division bead materials, base ten cube materials, our golden bead ten bars I made, sand paper letters I made, and more beading material I made also.

On this shelf is our spindle box and more base ten materials. You can never have enough base ten blocks!! You can use them in place of beading material.

On the bottom shelf I keep a basket with all my wooden cards 1-9, 10, 20, 100, 200, 1000, ect. Mamma of Many Blessing's husband so kindly cut these blocks of wood for me and I stenciled them in with the correct colors. Next is a learning puzzle, a basket of unix cubes, (Amazon) and our fractions board pieces (Amazon also).

The shelf on the right will eventually be our Science shelf. I haven't acquired enough Montessori Science material yet for it to be a "Science shelf". Right now it holds our odds and ends, a tornado twister, a microscope, and the lifecycle of a butterfly in a basket. All the rest are non Science related.

In the middle is our A through Z object box. This has little pull outs draws that hold our objects. I took a sticky label, cut it in half, and labeled A, B, C, ect. on the individual drawers. Next to that is our "Nature Table" which is not really holding nature stuff right now so I'm not going to bore you with details of the gardening stuff which it IS holding currently. It does have a cool water fall/rock garden. I originally had this at my peace table until I made a peace basket instead.

All my non Montessori materials on the top 3 shelves. Clear cut here. The next two shelves I put things that the kids can easily reach including polished rocks, basket of musical instruments, papers, crayons, basket of little kid books, and a bucket of sand they can play with.

Trip to the Art Museum

We took a little trip today to the Columbus Museum of Art. While I've read some reviews of the museum that say it doesn't have a lot or that it's not as good as Cleveland or Cincinnati's Art Museum, and keeping in mind this is the only art museum I've been to, I think it is a good one. I love how everything is interactive. Most of the exhibits have a station set up where you can make your own art with various materials such as foil or mosaic tiles or a puzzle you can do that matches some of the art on display. 

Also, I love the kids area. There is a place where kids can climb through a "fun house" with all kinds of tunnels, walls at odd angles and tubes. Kids can also create doors or forts with curtains and pegs that they can hang up.

The kids area has a section with wooden animal parts that kids can put together to make regular or make-believe animals. 

They have a huge wood sculpture of a head and a giant metal head that kids can use lots of magnetic metal items to try to make a head to match the wood sculpture or just a silly face. Also, they have a station set up with play foam that children can use to sculpt into a creation of their own. 

They had a table with dishes that kids could re-arrange to make art. And last but not least, they have an area where kids can make a mobile by hanging shapes from a central hook using metal rods and s-hooks. And the best part is, there are people from the museum walking around and helping and teaching the kids.

All in all, it was a fun time! L enjoyed it.

CLICK HERE TO SEE WHERE I LINK UP

Thrift Store Finds

Recently, I have been doing a lot of back-to-school thrift store shopping. Here are just some of my awesome finds.

Most of this was 50 cents or less. The 2 puzzles at the bottom came as a set for .75! Got some geoboards, a few games, xylophone and bowling set for the kid.

Here are my craft finds. Little of this and that. Also found some more scrapbook items for cheap at Ollie's that are not pictured here.

Books galore. Gotta feed my addiction. All these added up cost me only $13.00. I would say that's a deal, how about you?

Happy bargain hunting!

Thinky Linky Thursday

So sorry, friends. I am completely behind on this. But at least I did get it done before the end of Thursday! 

Most clicked from last week:

Teaching Math Skills through Play from Preschool Powol Packets

Caps for Sale from Mrs. Goff's Pre-K

Ohio's Amish Country Guide

Well this week I went with the fam to Ohio's Amish Country. If you know me, you know I love cheese! So, I fit right in with the Amish (other than their lack of technology use, lol.) Anyways, I thought what better way to describe the places we went than by making a link list. So here it goes!

Chalet in the Valley
This is an AWESOME restaurant that serves Swiss and Austrian cuisine (Although, I would categorize it as German food, LOL). Things such as schnitzel and sauerkraut with sausage are on the menu here. They also have a buffet, but I believe it is only on Sundays. We did not go here this trip, but last time, we sampled their Polka Punch, very tasty! And now they have chocolate fondue which I have yet to try, but assume that it's amazing.

The Farmstead Restaurant
Here is where we ate this time for my mom's birthday. They have an excellent buffet every day of the week, not just weekends. Also, they have a little bakery where I found some cheese bread for the best price.

Heini's Cheese Chalet 

Not sure which cheese to choose? Stop by Heini's. They have tons of samples of cheese and their cream cheese fudge. Dee-lish!!!

Kauffman's Country Bakery
This place has lots of samples of their breads and pastries. They have some unusual items as well such as purple grain bread. They also have cookies, candy, and cheese. Located right across the street from Heini's Cheese Chalet.






Walnut Creek Cheese
Everything you could possibly want AND the cheese, this place includes a grocery store and kitchenware section as well as a clearance loft. Oh, and don't forget the the little cafe and ice cream shop.

Guggisberg Cheese

The cutest little cheese factory ever!

Sol's
Lots of homemade crafts, foods, furniture, and much more.

Ashery Country Store
So far, THE lowest prices on bulk foods I have come across in Amish Country, it's a little out of the way, buy definitely worth it!


Walnut Creek Antique Mall (no website)

4872 Mckinley Place Dr.
Walnut Creek, OH 44687

I got a great coffee table there for $12 that I sanded and finished for about the same price!


Troyer's Country Market

In addition to their signature trail bologna, Troyer's has lots of other food and snacks including some great produce from their local farm. They always have many samples as well.

Here is an interesting little fact I have recently learned: 

Troyer's Trail Bolonga is actually made in a little town not far from Berlin, in between Walnut Creek & Winesburg on SR 557 in a little town named Trail Ohio where the same family has been making it since 1912... Troyer's Country Store is a fabulous store but they don't make Troyer's Trail Bolonga. 

Click here to see their Facebook page.

Berlin Village Antique Mall

Lots and lots of great antiques here, as well a cute little diner.

Share and Care Thrift Store

I also cannot find a website for this thrift store, but they have LOW LOW prices on everything. One time we were there, everything was 50% off! It's not a big place, but they have toys, kids and adult clothing, and housewares items as well as some tools and hardware. Also a little bit of furniture.

4663 US 62

Berlin, OH 44610

(330) 893-3890

For many, many more places to check out in Ohio's Amish Country, visit Holmes County's Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Bureau's website.