Memory Verse, Big Girl Cup and Stamping with Pine Cones and Lego's

I've been blessed to take a few early morning walks on my own this week. It's been hard getting out of bed before the family but it's made me feel so good to wake up with the sun and walk at a faster pace than I get to do when Addy and I walk. 

I mean just look at this...

Addy loves her classroom at church and it makes us so thankful for the amazing teachers and staff that make all that she and the other kiddos experience possible. 

Our latest delight has come in the form of a memory verse. 

It's official. Addy has memorized her first verse of Scripture! 

"How you made me is amazing and wonderful." Psalm 139:14

I had the cutest experience with her that made us both giggle hard. I picked her up from Sunday School and her teachers said she learned a new verse. Of course in that moment, Addy played bashful and didn't want to tell me it. But as soon as we got to the car and all the way home and all the way through lunch, she wanted to tell it to me. 

"Tamazing and Wonderful!!!" (hands in the air).

And then she started saying other pieces of it. 

"God!"

"Made!"

"TaMAZING!!"

"WONDERFUL!!!"

We're just so thrilled and excited that she is retaining this and communicating it back. 

And what a great verse to memorize first! 

I've been trying to work with her on taking sips from a big girl cup. I will admit this is the sort of mess I don't like cleaning up. Give me paint and sand any day! I don't know what it is, but I just don't prefer drink spills! 

A new craft we have been doing has been painting with different objects. 

Today's art project involved a pine cone we found outside and a cube of lego's and ended with an item from her play kitchen: grapes.

We first picked out our Fall colors of paint: 

Orange

Red

Yellow

Brown

Green

We put one color at a time on a paper plate and rolled the pine cone in a bit of it. And then rolled on the paper. I loved the affect it gave. 

We added other colors and then tried stamping some paint on a lego and then stamping on the paper. I loved this even more. And she gets to learn two shapes doing this: circles and squares (the four circles make a square). 

Then we tried the grape cluster. We tried rolling and stamping with it. I didn't enjoy this one quite as much but it was still fun. 

Finished product. 

We added more leaves to our Apple Stamp Project we previously did. I had to fix a twig and it left it looking like a hot glue mess. Now I really like it! 

Lastly, Addy has been going potty on her big girl chair now really consistently for about 3 months. She'll go pee pee about 3 times a day and is just starting to go number 2! 

I had a little giggle when she recently was sitting on the potty chair and reading her new "Bible Book" she got for her birthday. She came to a part about Pharaoh and goes, 

"Pharoah...hmmm cute, yeah." 

"Pharoah's cute?" I said puzzled. 

"Yeah, cute." 

Ohhh goodness, this girl. 

Autumn Apple Painting

I LOVE FALL!!!

I'm actually a little bit obsessed with it. 

I get happy, silly happy. 

I have to start baking, lighting candles and listening to Michael Bubble. 

I have to point out all of the changing colors of the leaves outside. 

I get cravings for cozy moments...yes cravings. 

I LOVE FALL!! 

But more on that later. 

I found a fun idea for a Fall craft project to try with Addy. 

I'm always looking for ways to keep us entertained and learning. 

And I don't mind a good mess, as long as we're having fun...and things are washable...like paint. 

I LOVE WASHABLE PAINT!! 

(but not as much as Fall....)

I digress. 

I got inspired for this idea here. 

I realized that some parts of this project Addy wasn't quite ready for. 

Between both of us being sick and her wanting to do this project in increments, I believe we allowed ourselves a span of three silly days to complete this project. But it was worth it.

You'll need: 

1 Apple 

Paper Plate

Tooth Pick

Cardboard

Red, Orange, Yellow (whichever Fall colors you want) of Paint

Twigs

Construction Paper

Small Leaves

Hot Glue Gun

Glue

I started by halving an apple. It proved to be a bit hard to hold for Addy and next time I would try to cut a handle of sorts in the apple. 

Then I let Addy use a tooth pick and create a marble effect for our colors of paint on the paper plate.

Then I let her try dipping the apple in the paint and stamping it on the cardboard. The goal was to get it all covered.  

Part Two: 

Josh found me some twigs outside. I hot glued them in the shape of a tree. And then traced an actual little leave in three different colors: 

Red

Green 

Orange

I let Addy figure out where she wanted the leaves to go. I squirted the glue and she stuck them on. I love what we came up with!! 

Lookin' Proud!! 

Now it's livening up my kitchen window!! 

WELCOME FALL!!!! 

Painting with BIG marshmallows...

I got this idea from Pinterest (love that site!). It's so simple and lots of fun. Excuse my blurry pictures. I was using my phone and well my phone needs to take a looonnnnnggg walk in the park and get lost forever. But anyhoo...

All you need is BIG campfire marshmallows, paint, a paper plate and paint paper (I like to tape the paper down). I suppose you could also use old newspaper, cardboard, etc for different surfaces. 

I let Addy pick what colors she wanted and let her dip one end of the marshmallow in the paint and put it on the paper. She thought it was silly at first but then got into it. 

 Notice Alice (pink bear) sitting on her chair watching the action. 

 Totally fun activity. The marshmallow gets a bit sticky after a lot of use so it's a good idea to have a few available just in case! It's basically like changing paint brushes. When it dries, you could also add stickers or glitter glue, etc for extra pzazz! 

Painting the Fence

Our expanded fence has been painted!! Special thanks to Papa, Joey, Lizzie and Addy for their help with helping us complete this somewhat enormous task for us! 

Check out Addy's painting skills! 

 She looks proud of herself! 

Homemade Musical Shakers

Adelynne has been getting more and more into music and dancing these days. She looooves requesting songs. So I decided I would make good use of some empty club soda bottles that were on their way to the recycle bin. I wasn't totally sure how it would work but I had a general idea. I thought I had a skinny funnel, but I didn't. So, Addy's first attempts at putting lentils and rice in the top of the bottle wasn't totally successful. So I decided to hand fill them, which would have taken forever to fill completely, so we settled on just a partial fill. 

 I tape sealed the lid shut and decided one option for the bottles could be some markered art work from Addy. So I let her work on that while I worked on filling the bottles. 

 And then I let her paint the bottles, all the way around however much she wanted to. 

 I tied some ribbons on for extra frills and let them dry. 

 Addy likes using them now to make music!!