Parenting – Page 3 – Nightwolf's Den

Planning a fan-fairy-tastic 4th party

Miss K turns 4 this Sunday. Wow, feels strange typing that. Seems like yesterday I was still pregnant with her. Now she’s turning 4 and I’m pregnant with her little brother/sister (place your bets – I’m thinking a boy but I thought that last time round lol)

Anywho, I digress. When asked what she wanted for her party theme the answer was a very quick ”fairies” closely followed by her getting my well worn copy of the Women’s Weekly Children’s Birthday Cake book and saying “with this cake please”

Insert a huge sign of relief from me cause that should be a lot easier than last year’s cake

mine looked nothing like this. The jelly melted and ran everywhere.

So we have a theme & a cake. I did a search for free fairy printables and found lots. We decided on this cute fairy invite and after much looking decided to use some of these fairy party printables

Yup, this year I’m not making my own bits and pieces like invites & decorations. Don’t have the energy. Plus why reinvent the wheel 😉
Next on the list was food choices. Still keeping it simple but that’s another post.

P.S. Happy Valentine’s Day 🙂

Mother’s Day 2013

Disclaimer: I created and received 2 prints courtesy of PasterCandy. I’d share my poster but they are gifts 🙂 Unless noted, all wording and opinions are my own.

Mother’s Day is coming up soon (May 12 in Oz) and to help you out if you have a mother to buy for or just want to give you kids some ideas I’ve compiled a bit of a list. Hubby, if you are reading this – I’ll print this list and circle what I want 😉

For the Gardener

Digger’s Club membership
plants
gardening tools
Pre-pay for professional garden services e.g. gardening or lawnmowing

For the Scrapbooker

Project Life Mini albums
Project Life
scrapbooking tools – maybe something she’s had her eye on for awhile (like a Silhouette maybe)

For the tea/coffee drinker

Goodies from Rabbit Hole Tea or T2 or Art of Tea
A nice mug or cup & saucer
a delicious (maybe homemade) snack to go with their cuppa

For the geek mum

Beads from Think Geek
Soft Kitty anything (I have a hat & socks – want the hoody)
Doctor Who anything (or change Doctor Who for your Mum’s favourite show)
heck anything from Think Geek

For the tech mum

a tablet (iPad or Android or Windows equivalent)
cover for phone or tablet
iPod
portable speakers or new headphones

For the photographer mum

new camera equipment
photo printing vouchers
new SD cards

Other (only cause I couldn’t think of a suitable heading – yeah I’m lazy :p)

Pandora anything. I love the new beads (like this for example)
Scented soy candles
Dream Man Arm Pillow (?!)
a good book
an afternoon out
something handmade – by yourself or the kids
something handmade by a local artist (like the amazing ceramics by Kim Foale)

If you want something super special for your mum this Mother’s Day and you use Instagram I can recommend PosterCandy. They offer posters of your Instagram images. Sizes range from 30cm x 40cm (12, 20, 35 or 48 images) up to 70cm x 100cm (70, 117, 140 or 176 images) and prices range from $19.99 to $49.95) Currently they only ship to Australia and New Zealand. All posters fit into standard IKEA frames. If you don’t have an IKEA nearby (like us in Tasmania) you’ll have to shop around for a frame to fit. The quality is amazing too.

Creating your poster is easy. You select your poster size

The site then logins into your Instagram account (after asking for your permission) and you’re taken to the Poster Maker

From here you can change how many photos per print, print orientation, Background colour and how many posters you want to order. All your photos from your Instagram account are show in the middle and you just drag your photo to where you want it. There is also an option to create a totally random selection of your photos. You can also filter your photos by # tag. Once ordered, your poster can take between 3-5 days to arrive.

One lucky reader has the chance to win themselves a PosterCandy for their mum (or themselves).

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Fostering the love of books

Disclaimer – I received some Me Books books to try for free and I am part of the Me Books review team in Australia. All opinions and wording (unless noted) are my own.

I can’t remember the first book I read but I can remember always having hundreds of books around. One room of our house growing up had a wall of books – that room ended up being my bedroom, sadly minus the wall of bookshelves. Mum & Dad read to both my brother & I from a young age. Tilly and Tessa was apparently a favourite as was the Miffy books and the Mog books. My brother’s favourite was Grug. I remember reading Shakespeare when I was young – Midsummer Nights Dream is still a favourite of mine.

We’ve tried to install this love of books in Miss K. We’ve read to her since she was really little. Birthdays and Christmas are always a time to give new books. She’s inherited some of my books – big surprise Tilly & Tessa is one of those books (she loves it as much as I did) and we’ve downloaded some books for her on the iPad, mainly interactive ones but we’ve found she’s not as interested in them after the first or second read. When offered to take a look at the Me Books app, I jumped at the chance. Mainly because their library include favourites from my childhood – Ladybird books! I had a heap of these books when I was young, some which had been handed down from cousins and other family. Well read and well worn. And the Beatrix Potter collection. There’s also more modern reads based on favourite TV shows like Peppa Pig and Charlie & Lola.

Me Books offers children a great range of books that are interactive. Kids can read along; have the story read to them by well known personalities (like Sir David Jason, Rik Mayall and Richard E Grant); touch the pages for interactive sound effects; record the story themselves (or by a parent/grandparent/carer etc)

When you download the app from the App Store you’ll be given the following screen with your free book, Little Red Riding Hood.

To create a Me Books account, to access other books, click on the Shop button then click Account. Click Create Account, enter your email and a password and your done. When you create an account, you will also get the following three Me Books – Shopping with Mother, Talk about School and Sleeping Beauty.

So far Miss K has devoured them. Peppa Meets the Queen has been read and played numerous times, as has Talkabout starting school.

Me Books have also dropped the price of their The Land of Me book apps. They are now 99c each. “In this BAFTA nominated early learning adventure for 2 – 6 year olds, children encounter an enchanting cast of loveable characters. Join Eric the raccoon, Buddy Boo the bear and Willow the owl on an epic journey through your child’s imagination.”
I’d never heard of The Land of Me but after checking out their website I’ve decided they are very cute (and I think they should have plushies of the main characters – I would buy them all.)

The apps included in the super sale are:
The Land of Me – Shape, Size and Colour
The Land of Me – Making Things
The Land of Me – Songs and Rhymes

These have quickly become favourites too with The Land of Me – Songs & Rhymes on high rotation. And the good thing is, they aren’t annoying like some other apps aimed at kids.

The Me Books app is free to download, you get Little Red Riding Hood for free AND when you join the Me Books store you get another 3 books (Shopping with Mother, Talk about School and Sleeping Beauty) free as well. Books in the Me Books store range from 99c to $2.99 (most are $2.99). Books in the Modern section include Charlie & Lola and Peppa Pig. Classics include Beatrix Potter and lots of Ladybird Books.

And so it begins…

Miss K started day care at the local Early Learning Centre a month ago and we’re getting quite a pile of artwork.

I’ve been putting some of her art pre day care into a binder because it has all been A4 or smaller. Now she’s at day care we’re getting larger pieces and stuff that clearly won’t fit in a binder.

Now the question for you, dear readers, is what can I use to store all these bits of art?

I’ve been taking photos and archiving them using a great app called Artkive.

Artkive allows you to take a photo of your children’s artwork and tag it with the child’s name, grade and date.
You can create a Share Circle so you can share, via email, your Artkive with family and friends – a great way to share artwork with Grandparents (or anyone else you like)!
If you live in the US or Canada you can get books printed of your children’s artwork too. Hopefully that will be available worldwide soon. But if you would like to get a book you can email them.

Happy Father’s Dad

Mother’s Day ideas

Mother’s Day is upon us again (yup, its this coming Sunday, 13th May) and I thought I’d share with you some of the great ideas I’d found while looking for ideas.

It’s probably a little to late for this lot, but maybe next year.

1. Moments with Mum journal 2. Mother Daughter necklace 3. Mother Daughter necklace 4. Memory Book

Things to print or make

1. What I want for Mother’s Day 2. A handmade journal 3. Fingerprint pendant 4. Fabric Scrap magnets
5. Fingerprint canvas 6. Bath fizzies 7. Framed print 8. Mother’s Day printable cards

I’m making cards this year. These are my inspiration,

1. for the Mum’s 2. From Miss K

I’ll be back after Mother’s Day with what we gave my Mum & MIL (& what Miss K bought me)

What are you doing for your mum?

Family Time Activities

Today we’re taking a break from all things Christmas and I’m handing over my blog to guest poster Sophie of Delivery Hero.

image credit

Spending time with the family is one of the most rewarding things in life. It helps build and strengthen family bonds and establishes memories in the making. But what family time activities can you do on a daily basis that both kids and adults would enjoy. Here’s my top 5 things for keeping everyone entertained.

5 Great Family Time Ideas

Gardening. Get the kids involved in growing plants or vegetables in the garden. Take them to the garden centre and help them pick out their own seeds or plants that they can tend to. They’ll love to feel responsible for something and watch the progress of the plants growing. If you don’t have a garden or it’s the wrong season then consider growing some vegetables indoors. Buy some small plant pots and tomato seeds and get the children to water them everyday.

Eating dinner together. Of course eating dinner together is one of the most traditional ways for families to spend time in each other’s company. Even if you have no time to cook, order a takeaway (www.deliveryhero.com.au/takeaway/sydney/) and catch up on how each other’s days went.

Watch an old movie together. Films such as Gone with the Wind, Mary Poppins and Oliver are all family classics that everyone will enjoy. Or perhaps opt for the Star Wars trilogy if you’re children are a little older.

Baking. Brownies, cookies and gingerbread men are all relatively foolproof recipes and kids’ favourites. Also, check out Nightwolf’s great recipe for cookies and banana bread here. For something a little different try making fudge or toffee.

Build a Fort! A classic family time activity that the kids will love. Use pillow, sheets, cushions and the children’s imagination to build the best fort in the world!

The Many Benefits of Family Time

These are just some of the many family time activities that are a great way to keep kids entertained and help families interact. It’s been proven that the positive supportive relationships that often come from families spending time together are hugely important in the early years of a child’s life. They help with cognitive development, healthy emotional development and social attachment of children. All the more reason to rent out Star Wars and get building that fort!

Sleep issues

Just a quick pre-post. This month is NaBloPoMo (basically posting on your blog everyday). I’ve done this for the last couple of years.This year, I’m a bit meh with the whole thing. I’m loving Kelley’s idea

Basically it’s all about posting whenever & however much you want. Love it! Means I don’t have to feel obligated to post everyday. So now on to my main post….

Sleep, we all complain when we have kids that we don’t get enough of it (unless you are blessed with a super sleeper)

Miss M has in the last month taken to having some weird sleeping habits. From not sleeping during the day at all to sleeping all night to waking every 2 hours. The waking overnight I can understand at the moment, she’s teething.

And then there’s the sleeping on the floor. It started one night when she pulled her pillow and doona onto the floor and refused to get back into bed. Then the mattress was moved to the floor as well *sigh* She’ll sleep in our bed fine but not in her own. Then there’s this

Yup sound asleep in her gumboots.

Does your child have any weird sleep habits? Please tell me I’m not alone Winking smile

Oh and just for Kelley (ducks for cover now lol)

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