Muffin Tin Monday {Chinese New Year}

Here is our Muffin Tin for the week.

We did our own theme to celebrate Chinese New Year.

What we ate: mandarin oranges, potato and cheese pierogies, orange chicken, tea, fortune cookie, and fried rice.

Go visit Michelle's blogsite and join us for next week's theme.

PiCtUrE hOlDeRs!!!

When my son was born I made a picture holder similar to this for his nursery. The other one was made out of a syrofoam wreath. I painted it to match his room, added some baby tidbits and ribbon and some painted clothespins.
Now that he is older, I created this picture holder for his more sophisticated room.

I painted a wooden frame ($1 @ Michael's) and wooden clothespins. Next, I hot glued ribbon onto the back to hang the frame. I then hot glued the clothespins onto the front of the frame. I added the picture in the middle and hung it up. My son put the rest of his pictures around it.

Your imagination is the limit in this project!

I just did his super simple to match his surfboard room.

My daughters have a buggy room so this is their picture holder to match!

{Chinese} New Year

Chinese New Year in the Camacho household consisted of some great food and projects....!
Noah's Chinese Lantern

It has a dragon on it because he was born in the year of the Dragon.

Maelyn's Chinese Lantern
She was born in the year of the Ram.

{Handprint Ox}



Children in China are usually given red envelopes, red because it's a sign of Good Luck, with coins inside.

I love teaching the children about different cultures...!

Inauguration Day...!

We made placemats, listened and sang songs on our Patriotic CD, ate fried chicken and mashed potatoes and pudding with blueberries on top for dessert.

The 100th Day Of School....!

We've been keeping track of how many days we've been learning all year.

100 days has finally come...!

The girls wanted to dress up and wear 100 Day Necklaces.

 The kids painted a 100 with our number sponges.

Carmendee's is more like a million...!

  For snack, we made 100 day Trail Mix.

First we counted 100 Teddy Grahams, then 100 pieces of Popcorn, then 100 M&M's.

They threw them in a bowl and mixed them up.

They have learned so much within 100 days.
I'm so proud of them..!

Fridays Fixins' {Taco Pasta Shells}

Taco Pasta Shells

I found this tasty recipe here.

It's one of Noe's favorites!

Ingredients

16 Large Cooked Pasta Shells
1 lb. Ground Beef

1 (1 1/4 ounce) Package Taco Seasoning

1 cup Water

1 (16 ounce) can Refried Beans

1 cup Shredded Cheddar Cheese
1 (16 ounce) jar Mild Salsa
1/4 cup Sliced Green Onion

*Sour Cream*

Directions

~Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

~Cook beef until brown and drain.

~Add taco seasoning and water. Cook over low heat for 5 minutes.

~Add beans and 3/4 cup of cheese. Mix well.

~Spread 1/2 cup of salsa over a baking dish.

~Fill shells with beef mixture. Place in baking dish with filled side up.

~Pour the rest of salsa on top.

~Cover baking dish with foil.

~Bake for 40-45 minutes.

~Sprinkle with green onions and cheese.

~Serve with sour cream.
*
Homemade Chicken Noodle Soup

I made this soup recipe yesterday.

A perfect soup for a cold, winters day.

Letter Uu Week

We did the Letter Uu this week because it's been gloomy and rainy..!
Patience's Umbrella Uu's from No Time For Flashcards.
I taught them that poem "Rain, Rain Go Away" and "It's Raining, It's Pouring."
We looked through our weather books as well.

We cut out frames and glued them onto cardstock.
Next, Patience drew all her UNCLES in the frames.
Noe printed out 4 of these.
Patience and Carmendee LOVED coloring these UNICORNS.
It was their favorite activity all week..!
Patience cut out pictures from a magazine- with help from me, I should add. I try to let them do their own thing, but I helped her on this one. She completely glued everything UPSIDE DOWN by herself though. She did really well..!
 {Uu is for UTENSILS}

Our Uu week ended on a good note....!

{BiRTHdaY CouNTdoWn..!}

I'm pretty sure that I'm not the only Mama out there whose kiddos constantly ask when their birthdays are coming.

My daughter started asking me the day after her birthday last year! She is so excited to be getting bigger every year.

Her birthday party is next weekend and being excited this entire month, I have heard probably twice a day "When is my birthday party? Show me on the calendar!"

I decided to make her this Birthday Countdown Chain.

Everyday she removes a link and gets closer to her birthday party.

The best thing about it is that she doesn't bug me {err... ask me} about her party anymore!

Unplug Your Kids {Square}

SpongeBob Squarepants

All that kept coming in mind was this crazy cartoon when I was thinking of square projects for Unplugged this week. I must be losing it...!

We used a cheapy sponge that was a perfect square, dipped it in yellow paint and put it on cardstock. When it dried, Noah cut his square out and added it onto this piece of white paper. We then cut out his clothing and eyes and teeth. Yellow pipecleaners were used for hands and legs. When it completely dried, he used marker to make shoes and pupils, eyelashes, mouth and a nose.

Patience dipped her sponge in the yellow paint and applied it to this piece of carstock. She didn't cut hers out. She left it and added the rest of his body onto the cardstock.

Letter Cc Week...!

The kids are picking up the letters pretty good if I do say so myself.
These are our Letter Cc CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES.
{Cc is for CAT}

 CARMENDEE made a frame to put a picture of herself inside.

They stamped Cc's with our alphabet stamps.

{CATERPILLAR starts with the letter Cc} 

 We made a Camacho Family Tree.

Patience drew pictures of each family member inside the boxes.

{Additional Activity}

Apple Tree's out of felt and red pom poms to go with our Family Tree concept.

These are the books we read this week:

Muffin Tin Monday {Royalty}

Michelle has came up with the cutest themes for the next few Muffin Tin Mondays. This week's theme was Royalty!

Our muffin tin on just one side (it's duplicated for my two toddlers):

Royal Sceptors (fruit and cheese kabobs- I just buy the melon bowls at the grocery store because they're already cut up, it saves me a step!), Jewels (they were supposed to be strung on yarn as a bracelet but I bought the Fruit Cheerios instead of Fruit Loops because they were on sale, and the holes in the middle are teeny tiny and it was hard to string them), Diamond Ring (Ring Pop), Queen of Heart Sandwiches (peanut butter and jelly sandwiches), Princess Fruit Snacks, Crouton Shields.

Classroom Treats...!

It's my daughters 6th Birthday! Wow. Time flies...!

When bringing treats to their classes for birthdays, I usually bring granola bars, pencils, stickers, erasers or make some type of trail mix.

I just remember when I was teaching and there was at least one birthday a month and usually some kind of holiday as well. There was always cupcakes on my desk. It sounds bad, but I started dreading them. Parents would bring them to the class and our wonderful staff loved to bake treats for us and sometimes my secret staff member would bake me yummy things; all the while my family wanted cupcakes at home.

I've brought in cupcakes to my children's classes a couple of times throughout the years, but usually opt for another type of goody, especially when they just had their fill of holiday sweets.

The birthday pencils I get at the local teaching supply stores.

Maelyn is so excited to bring these to school tomorrow for her birthday!

Letter Pp.

Our first week back into our studies after the holiday season was a lot easier than I thought it would be for all of us.
We started out the New Year working on the Letter Pp for Patience.
 No Time For Flashcards has these alphabet letter ideas that she shared with all of us. They are so neat...!We're going to continue using these throughout the rest of the school year.
 These are the Purpley Pasta Pp's.
 Noe helped Patience make a PUZZLE Magnet.
He guided her hand using the hot glue gun. It stuck perfectly.
He just sat her on his lap and they got to work...!

 Of course Patience had to make a Self-PORTRAIT because her name starts with Pp.
She made herself look like a Princess. She's really into Snow White right now..!

People/person starts with Pp so we cut out people from manilla folders.
We were also studying body parts this week, so it was a great way to talk with the kids about where each of part of the body is. We did other activities with body parts such as singing songs and doing a poem to show where the different parts of the body are.

 Princess Patience...!

These are the books we read this week: