Summer Screen Time(r) Help with Individual Timers

Happy FRIYAY! It's the first Friday of our summer break!!! YAY! 

AND...it's when our new summer "schedule" kicks in. (I say Yay! here, but my kids aren't so sure. haha) What do you do in the summer? Is it free time, everyday, all day? Or do you have limited screen time, like we do, intermixed with time at the pool, reading, board games, etc.

In the past, we typically have had the kids EARN their screen time during the summer. I seem to do it a little differently every year, but they always have limited screen time. I have seen this help keep everyone much happier. My kids get grumpier the more they stare at screens. 

This past school year, I bought these little kitchen timers to help monitor the screen time in our house, and they are going to be great for the summer!

End of Year Teacher Gifts and Summer DIY Tshirts!

My kids were excited to be sporting these fun DIY Summer tshirts today (that we made last year for our summer vacation). SO SO excited for the last day of school today!

Cornbread Recipe {Gluten Free, Sugar Free, Dairy Free}

I find it interesting, how even though we all live in the same country, how different we can be from the environments we grow up in. This even applies to the food we eat and when we eat it. I grew up in the Northwest and we had cornbread for breakfast. My husband grew up in the Northeast and had it for dinner. We both moved to the South in high school, where they also have it for dinner and it is a sweet cornbread.

So, when I first made cornbread for breakfast, my husband thought it was really weird! Ha! However, it is a favorite of mine for breakfast...the non sweet kind. (I DO like the sweet cornbread for dinner with my chili though!)

Over the years, I have adapted lots of my recipes to be more allergy friendly and better for our overall health and this is one of them. So, I thought I would share my new(er) cornbread recipe with you today. It's super easy and quick!

DIY Lucky Clover Glass Pendant Necklace

Happy End of School to everyone with kids out there! I'm so excited to not have to wake my kids up so early every morning and to get into our summer routine!

Today I wanted to show you this fun little DIY glass pendant necklace I made! All you need is the glass tile, the hook for the tile to attach to the chain, the chain, some diamond glaze (all of which I got on etsy), and then a four leaf clover and some paper for the background (which is actually totally optional. It also is fun as a floating clover on the glass tile.)

Red, White, and Blue Patriotic Apron skirts (Basics in Sewing)

Happy Almost End of May! That's definitely a reason to celebrate around our house, because all of the end of school hullabaloo is ALMOST over! AND I get to have my kids home with me more soon! I also get to start thinking about fun summer things coming up, one of those being family fun on The Fourth of July! I love love LOVE the Fourth of July. In fact, that's the date my hubby actually wanted to get married on. Wouldn't that have been great?! Fireworks for you anniversary every year! Ha! We didn't get married that day in the end, but it's still a favorite holiday at our house!

So, today I want to share with you these super cute Fourth of July...Red, White, And Blue...Patriotic Apron Skirts I made for my girls. They love them and had so much fun playing in them already! I love how cute they are with the little attached aprons.

Spring Front Door Mat Re-Do {Stencil Tutorial with the Silhouette}

I was thrilled to get to be one of the guest bloggers over at the Silhouette School Blog recently, while Melissa attended the SNAP Conference for Bloggers. I love Melissa's tutorials and know they have helped me a lot when I have questions about my Silhouette, so if you haven't ever been over to her site, go check out all of her amazing tips and tricks she shares! I have a bit of an obsession with my Silhouette machines and have a secret worry...I'm always afraid that the inside of my house looks like vinyl threw up all over it! Ha! So, someone please tell me if it ever looks that way. hahaha

For today's post I want to share with you, how I took my old front porch rug (that I bought last spring), and used my Silhouette to redesign it, and to give it new life! You don't have to go buy a new one each year...just spend a little time and creativity with what you've got. It's so much fun and I love the way mine came out!

First thing I did was to choose the colors I wanted on my "new" rug/mat. This is what my front door mat looked like after the winter and what I started with:

Not so cute and fun anymore...lol. But...I liked the same colors, (AND I already had similar colors in my paint stock here at home) so I stuck with a light aqua, green and a dark brown. So, I got started and took some spray paint and painted the whole mat one color to begin with.

Super Summer Salads Round Up

Happy FriYAY! I am loving that it's Friday and excited to be able to do some celebrating with my family this weekend. My little brother is graduating with his Master's degree and it's going to be a great weekend! It's also ALMOST the end of the school year, YAY! Which also means...summer is almost here! I don't know about you, but I am ready! Ready for some laid back mornings, time at the pool with the kids, camping, fun with the family, and more!

Today I wanted to share with you my favorite summer food! Salads! I don't always have a huge appetite when it's hot outside, nor do I feel like cooking in the heat as much, so I am planning ahead with this round up of salads. I love how different one salad can be from another. It takes more creativity some days, so I love getting all kinds of ideas together in one place! They all look sooooo good too!

So many yummy ones, so here we go!

DIY Card Table Playhouse Slipcover

#playhouse #kids #summeractivities #summer #outdoorplay #funforkids #diygifts #gift #diy

Today I want to share with you this fun DIY Card Table Playhouse Slipcover. It's such a simple and fun idea, that can be made with just some basic sewing knowledge.

My mom made this for one of my daughter's for her birthday a few years ago, and it is still a favorite to get out. (Aren't grandmas the best?!) It's basically a playhouse, made out of fabric, that slides right over the top of a card table. So the card table provides the framing for the house. This makes it so easy to store, because everything can be taken down and folded up and put away in the closet. I love the way it can be stored in such little space, but still provides a large fun playhouse.

It's a Boy/Girl! {Faux} "Cigars" with Pirouettes

Happy Monday everyone! I hope everyone had a great weekend out there, especially all you women who celebrated your mothers and mothering others! Today, I am guest posting for Melissa over at the Silhouette School Blog here. I love all of her tips and tutorials and go to her site for any questions I have when using my Silhouette. So, come visit me over there today.

I also had something I wanted to share here today as well!

Do you know anyone having a baby soon? I think throwing baby showers can be so fun and I love it when it's a surprise if the baby is a boy or a girl and I love the different ways to celebrate that surprise. I used to think that the bubble gum cigars were so fun when they first came out years and years (and YEARS) ago! Ha! But I came up with another fun "cigar" replacement! 

I picked up some Hazelnut Pirouettes at the store, and decided they would make the perfect replacement, dipped in a bit of colored white chocolate or almond bark.

DIY Mother's Day Gift: Keepsake Handprint Towel

I've got a quick little DIY Mother's Day Gift idea for you if you're still looking for some last minute ideas. And this one is super easy and quick, but a fun one to make and keep!

All you need for this one is a towel and some colored sharpies!

One of my favorite gifts I get from my kids are the ones that last forever, and that I can keep or even better, use all year, every year. Well this is one of those kind of gifts! A Keepsake Handprint towel.

Keepsake Handwriting Rolling Pin {DIY Mothers Day Gift)

This shop is not compensated in any way for this post. All opinions are mine.

#mothersday #diy #gift #handwriting #keepsake #mothersdaygiftideas #mothersday2015

If you're anything like me, as a mom, I love to keep little treasures of how my kids' handwriting looks. I love the little handprint things they make me many years for Mother's Day too. But I thought it would be fun to do something different this year. So I gave myself a Mother's Day gift when I had the kids help me make today's project! ;)

I picked up this wooden rolling pin at the store...and decided I wanted each of my kids to write their names on it, in their own handwriting. So, here's what I did:

Fruity Bug Kabobs in the ULTIMATE Sideline Kit for Soccer Season! #SidelineHero

This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser.

All opinions are mine alone.  

#SidelineHero #CollectiveBias #cbias #soccer #hydrate #powerade #powerthroughit #soccermom #snacksforsoccer #snacksforkids #snacks

I LOVE spring! I love the new life in the animals you see, in the trees and blossoms, the tulips and daffodils, and the weather! BUT...spring soccer season is also a CRAZY time of year for our family! We have four of our five kiddos in soccer and sometimes I feel like we should just pitch a tent at the soccer fields for the weekend! OR even for the week! Ha! Maybe we could set up a potluck too with other families. Hee hee

(Keep reading to see how I created the Ultimate Sideline Kit! 

And I'm sharing a tutorial on how to make these Fruity Bug Kabobs too!)