Fun & Free: Homemade Crayons

Agnes loves to color. I mean really loves to color. She loves to color on the floor, and the door, and wherever else she can sneak her artwork. Her crayons were getting a bit broken, so I thought it would be fun to make her some new ones.

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She is learning her shapes and colors, so I used a set of silicone baking cups for the crayons.

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I set the oven to 200 F. I placed the silicone baking cups on a large cookie sheet, so I could safely remove them from the oven. I turned on the oven light, and all of the kids gathered around the oven to watch the crayons melt.

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The crayons take just a few minutes to fully melt. Once they were melted, I carefully removed the cookie sheet from the oven, and I placed the silicone cups on a rack to cool. I let the new crayons cool and set for over an hour. The silicone baking cups made it easy to remove the new shaped crayons.

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The shapes were too cute too.

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Agnes loved them! She kept shouting, “orange, yellow, triangle”.

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Dylan wanted to help her color too.

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I don’t think she needed too much help.

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It was sweet to see them working together.

Jun 18

Goodwill Trip

While we were in Carthage I really wanted to visit Goodwill. I haven’t been to a Goodwill store in years. I was in luck, they were having a huge sale on men’s and women’s clothing. Goodwill totally rocks! How I wish we had one locally.

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I fell in love with these vintage Pyrex bowls. They were too cute to pass up.

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I also found a nice large serving bowl, and a little green bowl. They will come in handy for the 4th of July BBQ.

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I found a lot of Summer clothes for Agnes. Goodwill’s prices on kid’s clothing is amazing. I think she is set for the Summer now.

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I found a few shirts for the boys too. They already had a lot of Summer clothes, but these were too cute.

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Agnes saw a pair of shoes that she fell in love with. They had to come home with us.

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I found a few shirts too. There was an awesome 50% off sale going on. Every top I bought was $1.50 each.

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The best part though… My mom offered to take the kiddos to Dollar Tree so I could shop by myself for a bit. It was really nice of her to watch the kiddos for me, and I really appreciated the quiet shopping trip. I hope to shop there again soon.

Jun 17

Carthage Picnic

We’ve been invited a few times before, but this year the kids were at the perfect age to go to The Assessor’s Office Yearly Picnic. It is in Carthage, MO and the park was beautiful. My mom’s super nice boss hostessed the picnic, and we all had a fantastic afternoon.

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There were many different areas of the park.

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The kids loved the playground that was close by. It was just the right size for my little kiddos. There was a great turn-out for the picnic too, and my little ones made some nice new friends.

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We had a delicious lunch too.

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The food was amazing. We had BBQ and everyone brought a dessert. There was delicious lemonade, and homemade ice cream too.

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One of the coolest parts of the day was that Kiddieland was reserved for our group for an hour for the kids to play.

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This was the opening day of the park, and the unveiling of the newly restored Carousel.

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There were lots of fun rides for the kids too.

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Agnes absolutely loved Kiddieland. This was her first time riding the rides at an amusement park. I couldn’t keep her off the rides, once she rode the cars. She would have stayed all day if I would have let her.

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The boys had a lot of fun too. Thade loves to ride amusement park rides, and Dylan loved the cars too. The Carthage Kiddieland is a great park if you have younger kids. My oldest had a blast, and the younger kids were able to safely ride the rides too.

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There was a train that drove through the park too. All of the kids loved to ride the train.

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The carousel was beautiful. I think the kids (and Nana) rode the carousel two or three times.

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Agnes loved the pretty little horses.

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After the hour at Kiddieland we met up with the group again for some fun games for the kids and grown-ups too. There was a pinata, and a bubble gum bubble blowing contest. The boys got a ton of candy. The picnic was so much fun. I am very thankful that we were invited, and I hope that we can go again next year.

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As the afternoon was passing by, we had a few more stops in Carthage. I love to drive around there. Carthage is a beautiful Civil War town, and it is full of old Victorian homes. We made a trip over to a sale at Goodwill, and then my mom took us out for ice cream. We sat in Braum’s for a bit, and enjoyed the air conditioning. The kids were pretty tired on the way home, and Agnes slept until we made it to Nevada. It was such a fun day. The kids can’t wait to go back to Carthage.

Jun 16

Rearranging The Boys Room

I know I said that I was going to leave the boy’s room alone until Summer was over. Two weeks in the Summer break, and Thade was demanding to have his own room. The boys have to share a room, so I asked him if he would be a little happier if rearranged the room instead.

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Their beds were on the same wall.

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I moved Dylan’s bed to one side of the room.

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I moved Thade’s bed to the other side of the room. I took one of the little tables from our room, and set it beside his bed. I still need to find a little reading lamp for him. Thade was really pleased with the new set up.

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They still have shared spaces in the room,

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but they love having their own space too.

The new arrangement is working out well. They both love to go upstairs and play. It is still a bit messy to me though.

Jun 15

The Terrible Two’s

Oh my goodness I have one screamy-loud-grouchy-grumpy-little girl that has taken over the house… The terrible two’s have hit, and I really don’t think I’ll ever leave the house again.

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