U is for Unicorn - Despicable Me

After a 10 month hiatus due to

the move, the funeral, & the holidays

Mommy School is back in session (:

Huzzah!

We left off with T is for Tiger: The Tigger Movie back in April,

which means that the letter U is up next...

U is for Unicorn.

I could have easily picked Toy Story 3 because of Buttercup,

but I already did a Toy Story theme so I thought I would switch it up a bit.

Vladimir collects ceramic unicorns in Tangled,

but that seems like such a small detail of the movie that I didn't think the kids would notice.

There is an animated short in Fantasia with unicorns,

"The Pastoral Symphony",

but I have other plans for Fantasia.

Although it's not a Disney movie,

when I think of unicorns I think of Despicable Me...

Why you ask?

Because of sweet little Agnes & her incredible love for unicorns!

Photo credit: openlettersmonthly.com

So this week was all about Despicable Me,
& of course, unicorns.

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Utah Pioneers

Primary/Church Song: 'Pioneer Children Sang as They Walked'

Preschool Song: chorus to 'The Unicorn Song' - (lyrics)

Book: Baby Unicorn & Baby Dragon by Jean Marzollo

While watching Despicable Me, we ate mini pancakes, a unicorn horn (ice cream cone dipped in melted white chocolate), a banana minion, orange unicorn horns (carrots), cookie robots disguised as coconutties, baby unicorn horns (bugles), a twinkie minion, & a Milano cookie minion in a mud pie.

Tumbling Tuesday:
We trotted around on my unicorn stick pony that I've had since I was little.
Living room dance recital.

Field Trip Friday (Wednesday):
After looking at the week's forecast, I decided to switch Wednesday & Friday this week.
Friday's -25 windchill didn't seem like safe weather to play outside in...
So on Wednesday, we went on a 'pioneer trek' pulling a loaded sled through the snow in our backyard.
Now that Friday has arrived, I'm 100% glad we switched days or we would be pulling that sled indoors.

Think About It Thursday:

U math sheets
Shaving cream moon craft

Word Wednesday (Friday):

U letter sheets
Decorated unicorn horns

I've really missed Mommy School
& so have the kidlets...
I don't know if I'll be able to do it every week like I used to
since we still have a lot going on right now,
but I want to try to pull it off at least every other week or every 3 weeks.
Hopefully I can make that happen!

xoxo

Halloween 2013

How was your Halloween?

Ours was windy & rainy all day long...

Because we've had such a crazy month:

I didn't get out any decorations,

I didn't have costumes ready,

we didn't carve/paint pumpkins,

we hadn't had our traditional Halloween dinner,
we hadn't watched The Nightmare Before Christmas,
(or any Halloween movies for that matter)

we hadn't enjoyed caramel apples,

(even though we picked 1/2 bushel at a local orchard)

& I didn't have candy until the day before.

It just didn't feel like Halloween.

So when it came time to make lunch for the kidlets,
I decided to pull off an impromptu Halloween muffin tin meal.
This is what happens when I don't plan ahead of time...

We watched The Nightmare Before Christmas while eating pumpkin shaped cheese, ghost shaped pb&j, apple slices, a banana ghost, a pumpkin orange with an apple stem, & of course caramel sauce to dip the apples in.

Simple, cute, & mostly fruit.
Not quite as 'themey' as my usual,
but I like how it turned out.

After the first couple handfuls of trick-or-treaters came by,
I finally pulled out our Halloween bin to decide on costumes.

I wasn't sure how well the paint on the Calvin & Hobbes costumes would handle the rain
(it might have been fine, but we didn't want to take the chance that it might run)

so we decided to take the simple route
& go as student witches & wizards.

Yes, I understand that our school uniforms are not up to Hogwarts standards.
We're working on adding to them little by little,
& eventually will have our complete uniforms.
We received plenty of compliments on them "as-is" last night,
but that was probably because of those adorable red-heads that were wearing them.

We lost a wand while we were out & about,
so today we're going to retrace our steps to try & find it.
If we can't find it while we're on our walk,
We may have to make a trip to Ollivanders in the near future for another one.

Tonight we're going to have our {belated} Halloween dinner,
then make caramel apples.
We're going to nix decorating pumpkins this year,
but I think that will be okay.
Don't you?

Oh, & if you missed my Harry Potter party posts last month:
Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3
Check 'em out!

xoxo

T is for Tiger - The Tigger Movie

T is for Tiger
Although I love Rajah,
the first Disney tiger that comes to mind is
T-I-double guh-RRR
TIGGER!

Yes, I'm aware that he's technically a tigger, not a tiger.
But he's the only one, and he & tigers have a lot in common!
I like to think that they're cousins of sorts.

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Tithing

Primary/Church Song: 'I'm Glad to Pay a Tithing'

Preschool Song: 'The Wonderful Thing About Tiggers'

Book: The Tiger Who Came to Tea by Judith Kerr

We had olives, a Tiger sandwich (I didn't want to attempt a Tigger sandwich because I knew it wouldn't turn out nearly as pretty with only 1 kind of cheese, but my tiger looks like a cat since I made the ears too pointy), carrots, cheetos, a Tigger tail from Disneyland (I only gave him a small smackerel so that our whole family could share it, but he didn't even like it... more for us!), & curly fries (orange & bouncy like Tigger's tail).

Tumbling Tuesday:
We bounced around the house since that's what Tiggers do best

Word Wednesday:

T letter sheets
Tigger coloring pages

Think About It Thursday:

T math sheets
We filled out & colored our family tree

I know it's not the typical easy-to-read family tree, but Hubby was adopted and both of our parents had a divorce.
That just means that the kidlets have 7 wonderful grandparents that love them dearly (:
We love them all the same and didn't want to leave anyone out,
so I figured we would make our tree this way instead of using a pre-made family tree worksheet.

Field Trip Friday:
We have a few friends with trampolines...
If the kids weren't sick with a cold right now, we would go play at one of their houses and practice
The Whoop-de-Dooper Loop-de-Looper Alley-Ooper Bounce!

Instead, we'll stay inside to catch up on cleaning
(ya never know when the other Tiggers will visit)

I thought about getting out our Tiger costume (Hobbes) that I made for Halloween last year,
but it's almost 80 degrees in our house right now.
Not sweatshirt weather by any means.

Anywho,
TTFN
ta ta for now!

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xoxo

S is for Snow - Penguins

S is for Snow.
We are a little lacking here in the desert when it comes to snow.
I have mixed feelings about that...
Anywho, snow reminds me of penguins & I just couldn't skip penguin week.
That would be devastating.
For me.
For the kids.
For everyone, everywhere.
Especially for the penguins.

and we just couldn't have that,

because I love penguins.

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Samuel the Lamanite

Primary/Church Songs: 'Samuel Tells of Baby Jesus' & 'Once There Was A Snowman'

Preschool Song: 'Oh, It Snowed Last Night'

Book: The Emperor's Egg by Martin Jenkins

Movies we watched:
Surf's Up
The Adventures of Scamper the Penguin
Happy Feet 1 & 2
The Pebble & the Penguin
Penguins of Madagascar - Operation: DVD Premiere
March of the Penguins

We decided to do a Surf's Up lunch this time around because S stands for Snow, Surf, Sand, Sun, & Shiverpool.

We ate shell pasta, a penguin pb&j, a surfboard sandwich w/ a gummy penguin, Chicken Joe's chicken sticks (they taste like... chicken.), olives (I was going to make olive penguins but realized I had no carrots), a one-of-a-kind Big Z necklace, a blue icee (representing icy cold Shiverpool, the blue ocean water, & a cool treat for a hot sunny day at the beach), penguin crackers, & swedish fish.

Tumbling Tuesday:
We waddled around like daddy penguins protecting our egg from the freezing cold snow.
I thought it was ridiculously difficult.
Kudos to daddy penguins everywhere...
It takes some major talent & dedication to keep those chicks alive!

Yep, it's a reversible egg/penguin.
Nifty huh?

Word Wednesday:

S letter sheets
We made a shape penguin

Think About It Thursday:

S math sheets
We 'waterproofed' a paper penguin using a crayon

Field Trip Friday:

I would love to go to Big Bear & play in the snow...
I knew Hubby wouldn't want me to drive up there alone with the kids though,
and all of our weekends are super busy right now, so that was out of the question.
If our kids were older & we had decent hills around here I would take them ice blocking, but that's not the case.
So what did we do?
We took a few ice cubes outside to see how long it would take them to melt on our sidewalk.
(It took about 20 minutes at 80 degrees in case you were wondering)
Not terribly exciting, but we had fun anyway (:
We should have tried it last week when it got up to 102 degrees here...
It would have been interesting to see how much faster they would have melted.
My sisters had a snow day in Minnesota a couple weeks ago & got even more snow last week!
I don't think the ice cubes would do a whole lot of melting out there.

Here's my uncle chilling with some penguins in Antarctica...

How awesome is that?!

I am so going there someday!

Oh, just in case you wanted to celebrate...
Penguin Awareness Day is January 20th
World Penguin Day is April 25th

As far as I know, Disney hasn't come out with any full-length penguin movies.
There are a few classic animated shorts or cameos in movies though...
Peculiar Penguins (1934)
Donald's Penguin (1939)
The Cold-Blooded Penguin (1945 in The Three Caballeros)
Mary Poppins also has adorable animated penguins it it

(Update: If you want to stick to the Disney theme for S is for Snow, you could always use Frozen.
I didn't use it because it wasn't out when I made this!)

Check out other awesome muffin tin meals @ Another Lunch

St Patrick's Day Food

 Hope everyone had a wonderful St Patrick's Day!

Ours was great, but really busy...

We got ready & made sure to wear plenty of green all day long.

We had church, then I stayed after a couple hours for choir.

What can I say... I love to sing!

Then we went to see Gram (Hubby's Mom) at her house for dinner.

We told her we would take care of food & made a green dinner for St Patrick's Day.

It's tradition.

This is what we had...

Green pasta with a 'creamy' green sauce, green jello, garlic toast, & green 7up.

If I had a clover cookie cutter, I probably would have cut the toast into shamrocks.

'Cause that would have rocked.

It tasted delicious though, & that's all that really mattered.

We also were going to have peas, but I forgot to cook them & everything else was ready to eat.

Oh well...

I found this recipe for Halloween Pasta & figured that we could just make green sauce instead of orange.

Well, our sauce didn't turn out nearly as creamy & that's probably because I didn't follow the directions...

Whoops!

We used 1% milk instead of whole milk (which I'm sure made a HUGE difference),

we used monterey jack instead of cheddar (I figured white cheese would look better with green food coloring),

I skipped the pepper (because I don't like pepper),

& we didn't use any black sesame seeds (although I'm sure that made no difference whatsoever).

Anywho, it was super thin so we added an extra tsp of flour to hopefully thicken it a bit.

No such luck.

You can barely even see the sauce in the picture.

It still tasted yummy though, & after tasting it I realized it tasted an awful lot like Welsh Rarebit...

So although Hubby thought I was crazy, I took the leftover sauce home & had Welsh Rarebit for breakfast this morning!

Yes, it's green Welsh Rarebit because of St Patrick's Day...

I'm aware that it doesn't look very appetizing, but I sure enjoyed it!

My Gramma used to make this for us all the time for breakfast (:

If you can get past the slightly different texture of the sauce & the soggy toast, the flavor is really yummy!

Not for everyone, but I love it!

After dinner last night was Oswald, but I'm not going to get into that right now.

No need to be mixing holidays & confusing you guys!

Let's just say I still have a sugar hangover of sorts...

Since we were so crammed for time yesterday, our St Patrick's Day lunch was postponed until today...

We had peas, a clover sandwich, green applesauce (not to be confused with green apple applesauce), green jello, gold coins, a jellybean rainbow, a cotton candy cloud, & lucky charms.

No, I didn't get a shamrock cookie cutter in that short amount of time...

I simply cut out a shamrock on paper, laid it on the bread, & cut around it with a knife.

Yes, skittles (taste the rainbow) would make more sense than jellybeans for a rainbow,

but I had jellybeans & was trying to be resourceful! :P

I have one last St Patrick's Day food picture to share with you.

This is what my family back in Minnesota had for dinner last night...

Roast, green mashed potatoes & green gravy, peas, & salad with green dressing.

Our traditional Sunday dinner meets traditional St Patrick's Day green dinner! (:

Check out other awesome muffin tin meals @ Another Lunch

Simply Seussical

Theo LeSieg has a birthday March 2nd.
He would be one-o-nine if he wasn't in heaven.
Who is Theo LeSieg you may question and ask?
Why, it's Dr Seuss' pen name or mask.
We got to celebrate his birthday this week.
In honor of books everywhere, so to speak.

We watched a few movies and read quite a few books
We ate some strange foods and were such silly cooks.

We watched The Lorax who speaks for the trees.
Both the old and the new versions of these.
Then we watched an elephant with rather large ears
protecting a minuscule speck that he hears.
We watched another one about The Grinch
that stole Whoville's Christmas one year, every inch!

"The more that you read, the more things you will know.
The more that you learn, the more places you'll go."
That is some wisdom a wise Seuss once said,
so we read,
and we read,
and we read,
and we read.

Some books that we read were Hop on Pop,
and also Ten Apples Up on Top.
Then we read these three Books you see,
The Eye,
The Foot,
The ABC.
All three great Books, we read all three.
Green Eggs & Ham,
The Cat in the Hat,
we sat as we read
and we read at we sat.
1 Fish, 2 Fish, Red Fish, Blue,
we then read Horton Hears A Who,
Bartholomew and the Oobleck too.
Oh, The Places You'll Go,
Oh, The Thinks You Can Think,
and The Lorax were read
all in printed ink.
Yertle the Turtle and Thidwick the Moose,
each book was written by dear Dr Seuss.

For our muffin tin meal this is what we had eaten
10 apple slices and eggs that weren't beaten.
They were deviled you see, and green ones at that,
then into our tummies went Cat's cookie hat.
We also had ham and some chocolate mousse
since Thidwick the Moose is in no way a goose.
One fish, two fish, red fish, green.
A Lorax sandwich can also be seen.
Green Oobleck pudding is quite a strange sight
but I'll have to admit, it tasted alright.
Last but not least a chocolate Yertle
Yes, Yertle the chocolate covered Turtle.
We were also to have some Pink Yink Ink Drink
but what would you know, I sure didn't think
We were all out of milk, not a drop nor a blink.

Another fun thing that we did as we played
was sort and count a fish cracker brigade.
We hopped and we popped on our bubble wrap,
searched for some specks, made Oobleck in a snap.

Some other odd happenings happened this week;
A hospital visit for a bloody nose leak,
Our car broke down on the freeway one night,
we're very thankful that we were all alright.
Our floors got mopped which does rarely occur,
All in all this whole week was somewhat of a blur.

All Things Dr Seuss link up

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xoxo

R is for Robot - Wall-E

R is for Robot,

Reduce, Reuse, & Recycle.

That's why Wall-E was the perfect fit for this week...

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Resurrection

Primary/Church Song: 'I Wonder When He Comes Again'

Preschool Song: 'I'm A Little Robot'

Book: Robots Everywhere by Denny Hebson
Movie: Wall-E

We were planning on doing this in March & not having Mommy School this week because Little Dudeman was scheduled to have Eye Muscle Surgery for strabismic amblyopia on Thursday.

However, on Tuesday he got sick, had a fever, & experienced throwing up for the first time ever.
Poor kid was miserable.
We had to reschedule the surgery because we didn't want to risk his eye getting infected afterwards since it could cause serious problems, one of which being blindness.

Wednesday he was feeling over all much better though so I decided to try to squeeze in a few fun things this week anyway...

For lunch we had ham & cheese squares condensed & stacked by Wall-E, earth dirt pudding w/ a gummy plant, a BnL strawberry-smoothie-in-a-cup, a milky way, star tots, space ice cream, & a chocolate Hal (Wall-E's pet cockroach) inside of his twinkie bed.

Thursday:

R letter & math sheets
Made a robot out of boxes & paper towel rolls

Friday:

I wanted for us to plant a tree but it was really windy, the kids were still stuffy, & I had really bad hayfever...
Besides, we didn't even have a tree yet since I wasn't planning on doing anything this week!
We ended up staying inside & Little Dudeman helped water our poinsetta that has somehow barely survived since Christmas.
We also had a small dance party & danced the robot.

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Check out other awesome muffin tin meals @ Another Lunch

♥ Twitterpated ♥

It's that time of the year again...

Love is in the air.

Nearly everybody is twitterpated.

Yeppers, it's Valentine's week!

We watched Bambi and talked a little about Valentine's Day & the four seasons this week...
Primary/Church Song: 'The Wise Man & The Foolish Man'
Preschool Song/Rhyme: 'Mr Sun'
Book: All the Seasons of the Year by Deborah Lee Rose
Movie: Bambi

I was debating between Bambi and Lady and the Tramp for this week's movie but couldn't pick just one... So I chose both!
Bambi for Mommy School
Lady and the Tramp for our family Valentine's night

"Eating greens is a special treat. It makes long ears and great big feet. But it sure is awful stuff to eat."

- Thumper

While watching Bambi, we ate frozen peas (couldn't forget our greens for Thumper), a PB&J deer sandwich, Thumper's carrots, Flower's pineapple & strawberry flower, strawberry hearts, and a heart cake since we're all twitterpated this week.

We went to the library for story time on Thursday to read Valentine books & made a cute I Love You card!

(I'll share that with the family Valentine's Day post next week since we aren't finished with ours yet)

A couple other ways we shared our love with those around us this week...

Hubby wasn't feeling well so I filled up his car with gas so he wouldn't have to the next morning.

We left a Valentine card & treat in our mailbox for the wonderful lady that delivers our mail.

We will be having our family Valentine's Lady and the Tramp dinner & movie on Monday since believe it or not we have no free evenings until then... Can't wait!

Check out other awesome muffin tin meals @ Another Lunch

Chinese New Year - Mulan

Happy Chinese New Year!

We celebrated this week by reading Bringing in the New Year by Grace Lin

and by watching Mulan while eating this tasty muffin tin meal...

We ate teriyaki chicken, chow mein, orange chicken, a fortune cookie, fried rice, a honeybun snake (because it's the year of the snake & in the movie Mushu says "Let's go kick some honeybuns!"), and a Chinese donut (you know, the deep fried sugar coated yumminess you see in Chinese buffets).
I was pretty excited to use my new deep-fryer (:

We also made paper Chinese lanterns & did a little bit of training so we could fight if the Huns ever attack...

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xoxo

Q is for Queen - Alice in Wonderland

Q is for Queen.
There tends to be a shortage of animated movies about nice Queens.
Don't get me wrong, there are a few good Queens in movies but the focus is always on the princesses.

With that being said and since Valentine's Day coming up
I decided to base this week on the Queen of Hearts from Alice in Wonderland...

Besides, she wants all things her way & I wouldn't want her to lose her temper or I might lose my head...

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Queen Esther

Primary/Church Song: 'Reverently, Quietly'

Preschool Song/Rhyme: 'Queen of Hearts'

Book: The Queen of France by Tim Wadham
Movie: Alice in Wonderland

Muffin Tin & Movie Monday:

While watching Alice in Wonderland we had 'eat me' cookies, a Queen of Hearts turkey & cheese sandwich, a 'drink me' kool-aid burst, the White Rabbit's carrots, an unbirthday heart cake with a candle, & candy hearts.
(To make the unbirthday candle I used 1 twizzler nips cut in half lengthwise & 2 white chocolate chips warmed up just enough to mold into a flame with my fingers.)

Tumbling Tuesday:
We played a game of croquet in our living room
but we used toy golf clubs & golf balls instead of mallets & croquet balls.
We made wickets out of strips of cardstock taped to the ground.

Word Wednesday:

Q letter sheets
We painted coffee filter roses red

Think About It Thursday:

Q math sheets

Field Trip Friday:

We went to Dairy Queen for some ice cream to celebrate our unbirthday (:
Oh, it's your unbirthday too?
I wish you a very merry unbirthday!
Unless of course it's your birthday... then I wish you a happy birthday!

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Check out other awesome Muffin Tin Meals @ Another Lunch

P is for Pirate - Peter Pan

P is for Pirates, Peter Pan, & Pixie dust...

So this was positively the perfect week to watch PETER PAN!

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Prophet

Primary/Church Song: 'Follow the Prophet'

Preschool Song: 'Yo Ho Yo Ho A Pirate's Life For Me'

Book: How I Became a Pirate by Melinda Long
Movie: Peter Pan

Monday:
I saw that it was supposed to be rainy Thursday & Friday so we did Field Trip Friday on Monday while we were out running our errands...
We dug for buried treasure (pennies) at the park. I hid them in the sand & Little Dudeman used his shovel to dig them out.

Tumbling Tuesday:
We played follow the leader while on a treasure hunt around our house.

Word Wednesday:

P letter sheets

We made a pirate hat, pirate hook, & spyglass so that we could be all piratey.

Think About It Thursday:

P math sheets
We learned about shadows & made shadow puppets on the wall.

Friday:

We stayed inside and watched Peter Pan while eating our Muffin Tin Meal...

It consisted of fish sticks (because Hook is a codfish), a pirate pb&j sandwich w/ pepperoni patch, a pirate hat tricorne cookie, pirate's booty, chocolate gold coins, & x-marks-the-spot pudding w/ vanilla wafer sand.

Hope you arrr having a great week!

O is for Ocean - The Little Mermaid

O is for Ocean & Octopus so this week's movie was...
THE LITTLE MERMAID

Not only does most of the movie take place in the ocean, but the villain resembles an octopus!

THIS WEEK...
Church Theme: Obedience

Primary/Church Song: 'Love Is Spoken Here'

Preschool Song: 'My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean'

Book: Tickly Octopus by Ruth Galloway
Movie: The Little Mermaid

Monday:
We pushed the muffin tin & movie back a couple days since Little Dudeman showed a random interest in potty training again. I wanted him to stay focused so that it could actually happen this time around!
He's "shown interest" a few times before, but it disappears & then he has no desire to go for weeks, sometimes months... I decided that him randomly waking me up in the middle of the night saying that he wanted to go was proof enough that this is THE time!

Tumbling Tuesday:
Potty training continues every 20-25 minutes, but is quite successful. Only a couple accidents all day!
Sebastian crab walk
Flounder fishie faces

Wednesday:

We used a dinglehopper to eat mac & cheese shells, an octopus hot dog, goldfish & starfish crackers, ocean shaped cookies, swedish fish in blue jello, & a peanut butter fudge starfish while watching The Little Mermaid.

Thursday:

O letter & math sheets
We made an Octopus windsock by coloring it & counting how many O's we could find on it, then we cut it out & taped it together.

Field Trip Friday:

We went to Beach House to eat some frozen yogurt & watch the ocean waves without having to drive 2 hours to get there... (:

Did you know that Ursula only has 6 tentacles?
This means she's technically not an octopus based cecaelia unless you count her arms...