Boredom Buster: Water Balloons

When its hot outside, and the kids want to cool off and have fun at the same time, Water Balloons are the answer.  Here are some ideas that our family tried with little preparation and planning.
Water Balloons:
Volley: Throw the water balloons back and forth between 2 people.  When it is caught each time, without the balloon breaking,  that person takes a step back.  The winner is the one who doesn’t break the balloon.
Dodge Ball:  Split into two teams, try to dodge water balloons being thrown at you from the other team, as you throw them at them.
Toss (version of Hot Potato):  A group of people gather in a circle, and toss a water balloon to someone else, keep going as fast as you can until it breaks on someone, then that person is out.  The last one playing wins.
Fill the Bucket:  Form lines of equal amounts of people.  Have a bucket at each end of each line.   One bucket is full of water balloons, the other is empty.  The empty bucket has a line drawn in it to show how much water is needed in that bucket to finish the race.  The first person in line grabs a balloon from the first bucket and passes to the next person in line, and it keeps being passed down the line until the last person breaks it into the bucket.  The first team to have water filled to the finish line in their bucket wins. 
Have a safe and wonderful summer!  Hope you will be able to try this.  If you have any other ideas or suggestions, I would love to hear from you. 

Girls Night In: DIY Manicures and Pedicures

Girls love pampering.  Well I want my girls to be able to treat themselves, even if on a budget.  I personally have an addiction to nail polishes and lipsticks.  LOL!  I should say I have an addiction to buying nail polishes, I get in kicks where I will use them, but not often.  I have collected everything I need for a true manicure treat like a trip to the salon.
What we use for a Pedicure is:

• Nail Clippers
  
• Foot bath
  
• Foot Soak Salts
  
• Foot Scrub
  
• Favorite Lotion
  
• Toe Nail Brush
  
• Foot Grater
  
• Pumice Stone
  
• Cuticle Sticks
  
• Nail Buffer
  
• Toe Separators

Trim, and shape your toe nails.  Use the foot grater on the bottom of your feet.  Soak your feet.  Scrub them with the foot scrub and pumice stone.  Wash them and use the nail brush to make sure all of the scrub is gone.  Push back your cuticles.  Buff nails using a cotton ball remove any dust from nail beds with nail polish remover.  Using toe separators, paint nails, then coat with a top coat.

What we use for a manicure:

• Nail clippers
  
• Nail and Hand Brush
  
• Favorite Hand/Shower Gel
  
• Favorite Lotion
  
• Cuticle softener pen
  
• Cuticle Sticks
  
• For Tough Cuticles, Cuticle Remover
  
• Emery boards
  
• Nail Buffer
  
• Cuticle Trimmers

Trim, and shape your finger nails.  Wash your hands, and allow your nails to soak in the water for a bit.  Push back your cuticles.  Trim any hang nails, or any loose pieces of skin around your nails.  Dry your hands and nails thoroughly.  Buff your nails.  With a cotton ball, remove any dust that may be on your nails with nail polish remover.  Paint nails then apply top coat.  Allow to dry then apply lotion.

Recipe: Vanilla Ice Cream

A wonderful treat for anytime of the year, is homemade ice cream.  We love the simplicity of this recipe, and the great flavor it has.
Ingredients:

• 2 3/4 cup Half and Half
  
• 1 1/4 cup Whole Milk
  
• 1  1/4 cup sugar
  
• 2  1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
  
• 3 tsp. powdered pectin (found in the food supplements aisle)

Instructions:
Follow the instructions according to your ice cream maker on how to set up.  In a medium bowl, mix all ingredients with a stick blender, or stand blender to make sure pectin incorporates.  Pour into ice cream maker and activate.  Wait about 20 minutes until mixed well and a soft ice cream has formed.  Remove immediately and store in a tightly sealed freezer safe container, and place in freezer for at least 2 hours to harden.
Tips:

1. The pectin might sound like a strange ingredient, and can be skipped, but it does improve the texture of the ice cream and help it to not crystalize.
   
2. After using our stick blender, we place ice cream mix into freezer  for about an hour, then blend again.  This pre cooling helps to make sure that when the ice cream maker is used, it will have a chance to set up correctly in the ice cream maker.  Otherwise you might not always get to the soft ice cream stage.
   
3. Mix this up: add different things while ice cream maker is on, crumbled cookies, candies, fruits, or sauces are great.
   
4. Endless Possibilities:  add other extracts or flavoring oils to it to make it any other flavor of ice cream.

Boredom Buster: Showtime

One of my kids favorite games to play is “Showtime”.  They take some of their toys and take time to come up with a play or “show”.  They put it all together and put on a show for us.  This is what inspired me to create the puppet theater. 
This wasn’t something that I came up with.  My daughters started this with their major fashion show, they made tickets for everyone, made a runway, even had costume changes.  They took a couple of hours to plan it, and set it up.  My son is a bit more spontaneous and of course only 4 years old.  So 20 minutes putting it all together tops, but the girls helped him make tickets and so on. 
My son just went with my husband to a Monster Truck Rally, so we have seen quite a few monster truck shows lately. My daughters have done fashion shows with their Barbie dolls, with an elimination segment at the end like “American Idol”. The planning and theme is totally theirs to create, and they have a bit of independent time in doing this. This is something that really gets everyone involved at the end and a great time for everyone.
This is an activity that could be done either indoors or outdoors, and is always a sure hit to get kids to use their imagination.  Have fun and let them do as much as possible so they can have a wonderful since of pride and accomplishment in their masterpiece.  Have a fun!

Boredom Buster: Board Games

Over the years we have built up quite a collection of board games.  Some I don’t even remember acquiring.  Kids love board games, and super hot days, when you cannot get outside, are a great time to peek through all that you have.  Let the kids choose a few that they would like to try, this will keep their interest more than you choosing for them. 

• If you don’t have a collection to choose from, but you have a magna doodle, play Pictionary. We have even used our laptop in the paint program as well to play.  This is a great game that keeps everyone involved for hours sometimes.
  
• We have also played the computer games where you have to hunt and find the missing items.  I have connected my laptop to my TV, using an HDMI cord so everyone can join in the fun.
  
• Sometimes the kids even make their own games up, and we play trying to follow the rules that they make.  It doesn’t always work out the greatest, but the self confidence it instils, is reason enough. 

Make some snacks, settle in, forget about the housework for a bit and have fun as a family. The laundry will be there in a few hours, building memories that your kids can look back on is the key.