Nice weather here = time outside!!

Who is at my door?

Today is beautiful out. We got up early and played inside, though we hung a load of wash on the line this morning. Then we ran our errands--vote, library, craft store and dollar store, pet store and grocery store. Then we came home an played outside.I pulled out the box of clothes and clips I got and sewed for Hazel's swingset. Her first response was her normal one..."No, no! I don't want them. They will blow away!" But after I started hanging them she realized they wouldn't blow away and wanted to start help hanging them. She loves her outside house.

Our birthday party

We also played with her sandbox. I bought her a cake pan, a muffin pan and some measuring cups at the Dollar Tree today, so she decided to bake a sand cake and cupcakes and we had a birthday party. We left it set up to have another one for when Daddy gets home. We have moved her sand table into the garage so she will be able to play with it all winter. Our garage is well insulated so it doesn't get too cold in the winter. I think I'm going to make her an oven out of a cardboard box for the garage and outside (in the summer) for her mudpies and sand cakes. We have the box from her car seat saved so I could use it for something, and I think this is my something.

A quick craft to share. On Sunday we worked on some new napkin rings. Here are the ones we made for ourselves. Steve and I spelled out the names/words and helped Hazel get them on in the correct order, but then let her do the other beads. We made other personalized ones for our family and friends for Christmas gifts from Hazel and I also did other Christmas kind of words--joy, hope, faith, Christ, Thank God, etc. I may bring these to our church for the Breakfast with Santa Children's market. Maybe I'll make some nice cloth napkins to go with them.

Finally a few things to check out:

From Joyful Toddlers: Fall Celebrations: Martinmas. Great information about the Martinmas celebration including a story to share. Martinmas is on November 11th, so this Friday. We made a lantern at school and will be making more this week.

From Bending Birches a link to a film on vaccinations. It seems to lean towards not vaccinating but does try to show both sides pretty fairly. It is only being presented free through today, so go check it out. I know I believe in vaccinating, but am always curious about the studies, etc. Of course yesterday one of my friends posted something about parents buying lollipops on-line that were licked by a kid with chicken pox to give their kids. Which I thought was disgusting (and so did the friend). Who knows what other diseases, etc. are on the lollipop.

Thanksgiving Decorations

Today is Mingle With Us! Blog Hop over at I HEART CRAFTY THINGS. It is a great way to find new interesting blogs to check out and get some new followers for yourself. So if you are visiting from the blog hop, Welcome!! I hope you will become a follower.

Today's post will be quick as I'm having one of those crazy days. I'm sure by now you have all heard about the crazy October snowstorm. Although it didn't affect my town too much, unfortunately, I'm a storm widow since my poor husband works for the power company. He has been assigned the overnight shift again so I get to find ways to entertain Hazel and try to keep her quiet so he can sleep when he gets home. It has also meant no naps all week since he is waking up around her nap time and she of course wants to see Daddy. The nice part is that they do get to see each other whereas if he was working days they probably wouldn't. Then on top of it last night I received a frantic email about tutoring today so I had to find someone to watch her so I could actually go to work this evening. Luckily Steve's mother is happy to do it for us. So now, I have to get ready to go tutor, but wanted to share this little craft with you before I go.

In preparation for Thanksgiving we (well mostly I since Hazel couldn't focus that day) made some wooden bead and pipe cleaner napkin rings. Very easy and she actually did help with a few of them. String some large beads on half a pipe cleaner and then close it to make a loop.  Beading works on Hazel's fine motor skills so it is a plus every way you look at it.

I played around with letter beads as well and considered personalizing them for all of our guests (and possibly making some for Christmas gifts from Hazel), but I didn't have enough letter beads to spell all the names or words I wanted. I did get one "Thanks" done and figured I would buy more at some point and have her make them.

I think it will add a little more of a personal touch to your Thanksgiving table. What are you doing for yours?