Chore Card booklets

 

During January, we talked with S* & K* a lot about being responsible.

 

{I deleted a long winded few paragraphs here.  It felt good to type some thoughts out, but then I decided to keep them to myself so this post wouldn't be so long and boring.  Mainly, the classic struggle of parenting and that I don't want to disservice my children by not letting them learn to be responsible and motivated in life.}

 

So, I made up these chore card booklets for them.

 

I thought it would be helpful to have down what is really expected of them each morning, afternoon, evening, daily, weekly, etc.... I also thought that they might like to have a place listing various activities they have, what time they need to be ready so we can leave and what they need to have with them to be prepared.  I don't have to tell them, they can look ahead and know.  Hopefully this will mean I won't be "nagging" or "refereeing" as much.  And that I will have to let the natural consequences of not being prepared teach them lessons instead of me always trying to make it all perfect.  This of course assumes they will even look at the booklet and want to mark things off.  The booklet lists several things in certain areas because I want them to feel like they are making progress each day by being able to check things off.  Who doesn't love checking things off on a "to do" list !?! And hopefully in the future, they'll do these things automatically out of habit{most of the time anyway}.

 

 

With some of the leftover paper scraps I made these bookmarks with my silhouette and a Patty Young bookmark file.

 

Which, I then placed in these Valentine's mailbags{another item found in storage!!} that I made previously.  I tie them on the backs of S* & K*'s kitchen chairs at the beginning of February and they have fun putting little notes in there for each other. I try to put little things in there for them to find after school most days.  I just LOVE Valentine's Day.

Summer Reading Log & Ribbon Bookmark

For activity days this week we made:

Reading log from Simple as That

Book of Mormon reading chart from Food Storage and Beyond

The reading log cards are about 4x5.

I used paper from a solid colored card stock paper pack from Michael's called soda pop for the pocket holders.

Ribbon bookmark from Court Could Make That

Very easy.

 One of those projects that takes longer to gather the supplies than to actually make.  I cut my ribbon about 16 inches.  It seemed to fit most of the books in S*'s collection.

Today, I was thinking about the ribbon book marks and thought that more buttons could be added to accommodate a wider variety of book sizes.  Maybe two or three buttons total.   That could be cute, maybe I'll try it out.

A few weeks ago, for Mother's Day gifts, we made little clay dishes out of air dry clay.  I just cut out paper doilies and other lacy like shapes with my silhouette out of card stock to roll over on the clay for the patterned imprint.  Then, two weeks later the girls painted them.  I was really disappointed with how fragile the little dishes were after they dried.  Too many of them broke.  I haven't used air dry clay before,but I didn't think it would be as fragile as it was.  I hope the girls weren't too upset if theirs broke, I know they had fun playing with the clay and rolling the designs on.   Live and learn I guess.

Pictorial found here. 

You can also search the web for step by step instructions in English.