Egg Carton Ladybugs and Fireflies

I had been planning on making a version of these ladybugs I had seen on GoGreen, but hadn't got around to it.  Then last weeks story time was about fireflies which gave me the idea to make fireflies as well!  To make these you need a cardboard egg carton, scissors, paint, pipe cleaners,  medium pom poms, glue (we used hot glue), and  glow paint.

I started by cutting up my egg carton into what would become 12 individual bugs.  I saved the top to use as a paint tray.

Then I had the girls each paint 6 bugs. Bria only wanted to do 4, so I got to make 2.   I did end up cutting more off the bottom of them, so they would lay flat on the table.  

After letting them dry we started putting spots on them.  I had the girls use Q-tips to do this.  I tried adding the glow paint to mine, but decided it would be better to do it at the very end since it takes a while to dry.

I cut the pipe cleaners in half, folded the halves in half, and hot glued them to the egg carton.

Then I glued a pom pom on top of that for the head.

I curled the pipe cleaner anntenae, and had the girls paint the glow in the dark glue on their fireflies.

And we had bugs!

Ladybugs (watch out for that baby)

Fireflies

I tried to get a picture of one glowing, but they really don't photograph well (especially in the girls closet).

Patriotic Cinnamon Bear Popcorn

I love cinnamon bears, so when I found this recipe on Six Sisters' Stuff the other day I had to try it! Since we have been watching the Olympics all morning I decided to put a patriotic spin on it as well.

Ingredients

3 bags of popped popcorn

4 cups mini marshmallows

1 bag cinnamon bears (cut up)

11/3 cups sugar

2 sticks of butter

1/2 cup light corn syrup

1 teaspoon vanilla

Food coloring (optional)

Start by popping your popcorn.  Nathan didn't think buttered popcorn would work well, so we used regular popcorn and popped it in the microwave in paper lunch bags. Put 1/4 cup popcorn in paper bag, fold over top twice, and microwave around 2 minutes.  Spread the popped popcorn on 3 waxed paper lined baking sheets.  I realized after the fact that I should have picked out my seeds.

Sprinkle around 1 1/3 cup of mini marshmallows on each pan.

 Then divided the cinnamon bears between the pans.

Me ok your butter, corn syrup, and sugar over medium, stirring constantly until boiling.  The original recipe called for 2 cubes. I wasn't sure what a cube of butter was, and found that it was either a stick or 2 tablespoons. I went with the stick, so I used 2 sticks as my 2 cubes.  Once boiling, reduce heat to low and simmer 5 minutes.  Then add vanilla and food coloring.  I used blue food coloring to make my patriotic popcorn (with the yellow of the butter it turned a little green, but it is still mostly blue).

 Pour over the pans of popcorn and gently stir. After it was somewhat stirred we poured it all in a big bowl and stirred it a little more.  It helped even out the uneven pouring of the sugar solution.

I have to say I will change the recipe a bit the next time I make it.  I will either halve the recipe and keep the number of cinnamon bears the same or double the cinnamon bears and keep the rest the same.  I just think it needed more cinnamon bear goodness.

Another Fun Filled Week

Last week started with Bria's fifth birthday party (Bria's My Little Pony Party). Hard to believe my little baby is five already!  She was so excited about turning 5 and about her party. I think she had a great time!

When I came home from work Monday Bria was excited to tell me about the books she had read to Grandma.  However, she really didn't want to read any to me.  She got through half a book before she was bored and onto something else.

Tuesday the girls and I did am experiment with some of the many Skittles (Experimenting with Skittles) we have left from Bria's party.  They weren't as interested as they normally would be for some reason; all they really wanted to do all day was play.  It did give me time to catch up on some cleaning though.  At least when I wasn't being attacked by Eli.  He was very clingy this week for some reason and would follow me around saying, "Ma MA! Ma MA!" and then attack my leg if I was within 1 foot of him.

Our last story time of the summer was Wednesday, after a couple bos about fireflies the kids got to make a little craft out of a clear cup, glow in the dark paint, and aluminum foil.  Basically they put little dots of glow in the dark paint around the inside often clear cup and the put aluminum foil on the bottom.  After sitting in the light for a while the little cup would glow in the dark like a jar of fireflies.  That evening we went out to Chinese with family to celebrate some of the many July birthdays.  On the way their Bria yelled something about seeing a carnival, but neither of us saw it. Once we were there the girls were happy to eat their noodles, and Eli loved the little koi pond. He kept trying to climb in! Then as we were driving home we spotted the carnival! Bria was the only one awake, so we didn't get to do more then stop and check how long they would be in town.

Thursday the girls spent a lot of time "cleaning" in their room, so we could go to the carnival that evening.  Once the finally finished we head out.  It was a pretty small carnival, but the girls enjoyed the few rides they could ride.  They did go in the fun house a couple times as well.  Of course they weren't willing to come out through the turning hallway thing, so they turned around and came out the entrance.  Eli loved watching the ride especially once their lights were on.  He also loved funnel cakes!  We left right in time too; as soon as we got in the van it started raining.  We were certainly happy to finally have some rain. At home it was raining when we got out of the van, and Eli was a little startled by it.  I guess it had been so long since it rained while he was awake that he didn't know what to think.  As soon as a drop hit him he started to fuss.  Luckily it didn't last long.

  

I had a busy day at work Friday while the kids went back to the fair with Grandma.  Then once I got home  went back to see the rest of the fair.  It was certainly interesting.  It was called the Fly Wheel Reunion, and they did have a lot of old tractors   They also had crafts and basically a flew market set up.  Not really what you usually think of with a fair. The girls had fun riding in these little ducks being pulled by a tractor.  Nadia also got to see some horses which she always likes.  Eli most liked going down the slide that is always at the park there.

  

Saturday was Grandpa's birthday, so we were over there all day long.  They played croquet and the girls played with colored bubbles.  Eli was excited about the bubbles! Bria also found the seed ponds on the redbud tree and says, "Look, peas. Is this a pea tree?"  For dinner we tried making cupcake pizzas which worked pretty well; I will have to try them here sometime.  Then we watched some of the Olympics and headed home.  

Two Timin' Chicken Pasta Bake

I am sure many of you have seen the original recipe here: Two Timin' Pasta Bake, and I was not planning on writing a blog about it, but it was really good.  I added chicken to it as Nathan complains when I try to get him eat meatless meals.  Here is my version:

Ingredients:

1 box penne pasta
15 oz jar of alfredo sauce
24 oz jar marinara sauce
2 C shredded mozzarella cheese
2 C shredded Italian cheeses (its what I had on hand)
3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
salt, pepper, garlic powder to season
olive oil to fry chicken

Directions:

First pan fry your chicken in olive oil with a little salt, pepper, and garlic powder. While it is cooking start your water for your noodles.

Cook your noodles al dente. While the chicken and noodles cook, mix the marinara, alfredo, and mozzarella.

Once everything is cooked, cube the chicken and toss it and the noodles with the alredo/marinara sauce.  Pour in greased 9x13 pan (or for us I used 2 8x8 pans and froze one).

Bake 25 minutes (or until bubbly); sprinkle with Italian cheese and bake 5 minutes more.

Now you have yummy, cheesy goodness!  Even my kids ate it without complaining or questioning what it was!  

Experimenting with Skittles

I bought a huge bag of skittles for Bria's My Little Pony Party, and most of them did not get eaten.  Luckily I remembered seeing some experiments using skittles on Candy Experiments.  I decided on two of them (Density Rainbow and Floating S's), and we got to work.  For some reason I don't really have any clear bowls, so we used some wine glasses instead.  I also heated all my water in the microwave because I am terribly impatient and did not want to attempt dissolving skittles in room temperature water.

I started with 7 glasses (6 for the Density Rainbow and 1 for the Floating S's).  I sorted out my skittles for the Density Rainbow and set them in front of the appropriate glass: 2 red, 4 orange, 6 yellow, 8 green, and 10 purple).

Then I added 2 tablespoons of heated water to each of the 5 glasses and added the skittles that were next to the glass.

And waited. And stirred.

And waited. And re-heated.

And finally after about 40 minutes they were dissolved!  Time to make a rainbow. I started by pouring the purple into the empty cup.  Then very carefully using a syringe I added the green.  I had to place the tip of the syringe against the glass as I pushed the plunger slowly to prevent the liquids from mixing.

Then we tried to add the yellow by slowly pouring it over the back of a spoon held against the glass.  That didn't work too well for us.  So now we had a weird colored layer with some purple still at the bottom, so we went back to the syringe for the orange and red.

It didn't turn out perfectly since our yellow and green mixed a bit with the purple, but we had some layers at least.  Since it is just sugar water the colors did end up mixing together the longer it sat, but for a while you could see how more sugar made a denser water that would stay at the bottom while less sugar made a less dense water that would float on the top similar to oil.

Our Floating S's experiment was started at the same time as the Density Rainbow, but it wasn't as involved. I filled the last glass about 2/3 full with the warm water and had Nadia throw in some random skittles.  Then we just let them set while we worked on the other experiment.

Once we had finished the Density Rainbow we could clearly see that the skittles in the other glass sank to the bottom while the S's on the outside of the skittles floated to the top.  When you do this you have to be careful not to mix the water or you will break the S's!