Christmas Maxtivities

 

Gingerbread House

We took the easy route and bought a kit at Target.

It was easy and fun!

 

 Speedway in Lights

 

Visits with Santa

Maxton has had quite alot of face time with Santa this year.

He has stayed consistent with his wishes each time.

 

Making Play Clay Ornaments

I should be cleaning my house or doing something more productive but it is Christmas season so we have been crafting all morning.  I love Saturdays!

You will need:

2 Cups of Baking Soda

1 Cups of Corn Starch

1 and 1/4 Cups of Water

food coloring 

decorations of your choosing (we used glitter and craft gems)

I used this recipe:    http://www.armandhammer.com/solutions/solution-20/Play-Clay.aspx

 Mix together baking soda, corn starch and water in a saucepan. Heat on Medium 

  until it looks like mashed potatoes. Stir the whole time, it took about 10 minutes.

Place on a plate and let cool before kneading into a ball of dough.  We divided ours into two balls and added green food coloring to one batch and glitter to the other.

glitter batch

food coloring batch

 Roll out your dough and use cookie cutters to make whatever shapes you want.  Max wanted to make green trees and white snowflakes, so that's what we made.  Poke a small hole in each one so you can hang it later.

We decorated ours with little gems but you could also paint them.

 When you finish decorating let them harden for a few hours or you can heat them in the oven.

I preheated to 300 and then turned the oven off before putting them inside.  I left them in the heat for about 20 minutes.  I will probably brush on some Modge Podge to seal.

ABC & 123 Crayons

 Making Letter and Number Crayons

We first made these letter crayons  last February.  Prior to making these crayons Max was pretty much uninterested in letters.  After we made them I used them to teach Maxton his uppercase letters and numbers.  He loved matching them on  playmats I made for him.  He learned to recognize and name  all of  his letters and the numbers 0-9  in about 2 weeks at age 2! 

Since then we have made many more sets of these for gifts and of course to replace broken ones from our set.  We have extended this activity by  spelling our names and other high frequency words.  This is an activity he chooses to play with over and over. 

 

Peeling the paper off.

A completed set right out of the molds.

 

Letter and number playmats.

 

Pumpkin Playdough

Recently we made some homemade pumpkin spice play dough.  It smells wonderful and Max has really enjoyed playing with it.  We used the following recipe.

Pumpkin Spice Play Dough:

2 cups water
orange food coloring (or combine yellow and red)
2 TBSP vegetable oil
1 cup salt
4 tsp. cream of tartar
3 tsp. pumpkin spice
2 cups flour

This will make a lot of play dough.  We sent half of this batch to his preschool.

He used some fall inspired cookie cutters I found at the $1 Store.

                                                                                             

This same day we made some awesome Halloween Crayons for his friends at school.  We think they are super cool, Max can't wait to give these out.

 

old broken crayons

ready to melt

new spooky crayons

SHARPIE TIE DYES

Maxton has made tie dyes a few times.  In the past we have always used fabric dye.  It is fun but very messy and the dye stains everything it touches.  This past summer we made red, white and blue shirts for Independence Day.

Here Max and Savannah are using Rit fabric dyes.

My niece Ella was told us about using Sharpie Markers to create tie dye shirts a few weeks ago while we were on a family vacation.  We decided to give it try and I think they turned out really cool.

We used Sharpie Markers, rubber bands, rubbing alcohol, medicine droppers and some cups.  

Some of the shirts we used the cups to make circles for the boys to color inside of.  It helped them to focus on one area of the shirt at a time.  On other shirts we twisted, tied off with a rubber band and colored between the bands. After you color your shirt you squirt the alcohol on the colors to make the colors bleed.  When shirt is dry set the colors by heating in the dryer.  

Before, a blank canvas.

Maxton coloring his t shirt.

Here is the whole gang.  From age 2 to Mamaw, they all liked this Maxtivity.

This is a shirt before we added the alcohol.

Ella drew little pictures inside each of her circles.  Her shirt was my favorite.

All finished and drying in the beach breeze.

I loved how everyone's shirts turned out different.  There was very little mess and the little boys could do this type of tie die very independently.  We will be doing this again very soon.

Stationery card

Let's Party Boy Birthday Invitation

Create personalized happy birthday cards at Shutterfly.com.

View the entire collection of cards.

In the Woods

Today was a beautiful day.  Sunny and so much cooler.  I love fall and today you could feel fall in the air.  After nap time we decided to take a hike into the woods beside our house.  Before we left we talked about what we might see in the woods.  Max really was hoping to see a turkey.  We saw many of the things we discussed earlier and even discovered a few surprises.  We collected treasures along the way.  It felt good to be outside and do something simple as a family. I have a new lens so I took a bunch of "practice" photos.

Maxton is really good at spotting letter shapes in everyday items.  Today he found an X and a Y.

When we got home me made a "sticky board" to display our treasures.  To make a sticky board just use the sticky side of clear contact paper.  We had to use a little clear tape on some of the heavier pieces.  

 No turkey today, maybe next time.....

First Trip to the Fair

We took Maxton to the Fair on Tuesday.  He loved it.

Max is amazed by Ferris Wheels and was very much looking forward to riding the one pictured above.

He did not meet the height requirement and was kicked out of line.  He managed to NOT have a total meltdown and for that I was one proud momma.  

He rode everything else he qualified for at 37 inches tall.  While he was on the dragon ride the "operator" told me it was in real need of maintenance.  Just what every mother is dying to hear while her two year old is whirling around all by himself on a purple dragon.

We checked out all of the livestock, ate a $40 corndog dinner and watched the Monster Truck Show.

It was awesome, can't wait until next year!