Mix-it-Up Monday: Sidewalk Chalk

Is it possible for snot to find it's way up into your skull? Because seriously...that's the only logical explanation for how stuffed up my head has been for the last few days. Ugh. So please excuse me for being absent. I've actually had stuff to write about, but I haven't been able to form a coherent thought due to the abundance of SNOT.

We finished our Clean-up Cards from last week and they WORK LIKE A CHARM. Here is what we did:

• The girls and I sat down together and decided what we needed to have cards for. We picked toy "groups" (i.e. Books, Balls, Ponies, Stuffed Animals, etc.), but you could do it by color, shape, anything that would help your munchkins and be fitting for their ages. (I could even see doing multiple versions of the cards by the different categorizations, just to keep things interesting.)
• I drew pictures of some representative items on one side of the index card (I SUCK at drawing so don't judge!) and wrote the toy group on the other side. (I thought about finding some coloring book type pictures on the internet for this part, but our printer is attached to the computer that doesn't have the internet. This was easier.)
• McKenna and Alyssa colored all the pictures I drew and as they colored we talked about what they would need to pick up for each card they colored.

Some of the finished cards

After that, I explained one more time (for the benefit of the three year old, mostly) and turned them loose. Guess what? IT WORKED! No crying and complaining. No, "I'm too tired to clean up" or "MOM, can you come clean this up". It was AWESOME. I highly recommend this activity - it's the gift that keeps on giving! Thanks Suburbiamom!

This week: SIDEWALK CHALK. I am going to let the kids thoroughly COVER the driveway and sidewalk. They love to draw and we all need to get out and enjoy the fresh (FALL!) air.