Musical Balloons

Today's fun activity was music balloons!  I took several small items and put them inside a balloon.  Then I put those same items in a jar on the table so the kids could see.  

Then I had Finnegan shake the balloons and see if he could match the jar to the item in the balloon.  He got it right every time.  I will have to admit that he could almost see through the balloon if he held it up to the light, but hey, he still figured it out!  Oh...and you might have noticed that he's dressed as a rocket ship.  I have no explanation for that.  He just put it on!

Lorelai wasn't as interested in figuring out what was in the balloons.  She just wanted to open the jars and play with all the little choking hazards.

Here he is matching them up with the right balloon.

This is the "googly eye" balloon.

This is the "pony bead" balloon.

And this is the "bell" balloon.

And then he wanted to pop the balloon to see that he was right.  So here are the beads that were inside one of the balloons.

As I said, Lorelai just wanted to dump them all out.  So I got out an egg carton and she got to sort them all.  I use the term "sort" very loosely.  It was more like "dumping".

Getting out all the googly eyes!

Everything is all sorted (thanks to Mommy).

I finally got a good smile out of him!  He never gives me genuine smiles when I have the camera out.  And believe it or not, he was crying about 5 seconds before this.  Go figure.

He's a dare devil!  I don't think that's how you're supposed to use the trampoline!

Here he's jumping on the trampoline and bouncing Lorelai.  I think she likes it.

More dumping out the jars.

All in all, this was a good activity.  Finnegan loved that he could shake balloons and there was something inside.  He was proud of himself for figuring out what was in there.  Popping them was pretty exciting too!  My only problem with it is the number of small items!  Lorelai can't stop putting them in her mouth!

A Crazy Weather Week

In the past week we have experienced a massive tornado, 4 inches of snow and 65 degree sunny days.  It seems that God is having a little fun with us here in Central KY!  Last Friday we had to go hide out in our basement for a few hours (with all kinds of food, drinks and entertainment) in case our house was blown away in a tornado.  They called off school early and sent the kids home to hide in their basements.  Luckily, there was no damage in Lexington, but several other surrounding areas were wiped off the map.  We are very grateful that we were unharmed.  Here are a few pictures of the "bunker".

Of course Finn had his iPod with him.  You wouldn't go into a bunker without it, would you?  We all had our computers, there was the TV (Directv never lost the signal by the way!), movies, snacks galore as you can see, a mini fridge with drinks, a microwave and even a massage chair!  The kids definitely thought it was fun.

Lorelai enjoying her empty water bottle.

She loves that iPod too!

In case of a tornado, this might have been the safest spot in the house!  We made a tent and Finnegan and Lorelai played under there most of the time.

Here he is with the flashlight.

The tornado was on Friday and here is a picture of Monday morning!  What?  Wasn't it just 70 degrees on Friday and now we have 4 inches of snow?!  Crazy.  They called off school and we had a snow day!

By Tuesday night, all the snow was gone and we were back to 60 degrees and sunny on Wednesday.  Crazy.  I certainly hope spring is here and winter won't be creeping back in again.  Oh, and I hope the tornadoes stay away too!

Science experiments and pizza on the porch!

I decided to introduce Finnegan to a few "science experiments" today during Lorelai's nap.  First up was vinegar and baking soda.  I poured vinegar into a bowl and put some baking soda in a shaker.  Then we added some food coloring for fun!

Our second experiment was water, food coloring and oil.   

Here is the water with a few drops of food coloring and some oil.

We got out the turkey baster to move the oil and water around and play with it.  He thought it was cool how the "bubbles" kept going back up to the top no matter how hard we tried to mix it into the water.

Shaking some baking soda into our colored vinegar.

I didn't tell him what it would do and you can see he was surprised at the fizzing!

Pretty cool looking fizz!  This was my favorite of the two experiments.

Finnegan didn't care as much about the vinegar and baking soda as I thought.  He was mesmerized by the turkey baster.  He kept adding food coloring to the water and mixing the oil around.

This is a cup of oil that we dropped some food coloring into.  When we put food coloring in the water, it mixed right in.  When we put food coloring in the oil, it wouldn't mix!  No matter how hard we tried!  He loved it.

After our science experiments, we got Lorelai up from her nap and it was time for dinner.  We decided to eat pizza (Lorelai's request).  It was so nice outside today so we thought it would be fun to eat outside on the porch!  They were really excited to eat outside.  We haven't done that yet at this house (because we moved here in November and it's been cold).

Finnegan had to show off his three goggles!

She likes her pizza!

He said "Take a picture of me eating my pizza!"  And this is what we got.  LOL.

Then we got out the bubble gun!  Pretty cool!

Later we watched a movie.  This is how Lorelai sat on the couch.  She sat like that for at least 30 minutes!  What a diva!

Not a work day...

Finnegan's big thing lately is asking each morning "is today a work day?"  He loves when I have a day off or when it's the weekend.  Since I'm off on Thursdays, today was NOT a work day!  He was thrilled.  We went and picked up Lorelai from Nana's and brought her home.  Then we played in the playroom with all our new craft supplies!  These are just a few of the pictures from our play time today.

Awww...giving him a kiss and a hug.

He wanted me to take a picture of Mommy Bunny with him.

Let's go up to the play room!

Checking out all the new supplies.  She loved the bells.

I showed her the door hangers and this is what she did.  Apparently we're going to have to watch her with all these new "chew toys".

Another picture with Mommy Bunny.

I see you!

After Lorelai went down for her nap, we practiced cutting.  He thought it was pretty cool that I let him cut up on of the Mardi Gras necklaces.  He kept checking to be sure it was ok.  He said "I didn't think we were allowed to cut necklaces!"  I had to clarify that we can cut anything that is in the "cutting box".  We don't cut things that are not in that box.

Checking to be sure it's OK.

The necklace as he was cutting it up, bead by bead.

The cutting box!  

We had a good time playing and taking advantage of our "not a work day".  At one point Brandon came upstairs to ask me about something work-related and Finnegan stopped him and said "no dad, it's not a work day for her!"  LOL.  Too bad that isn't really how it works!