Hey, Selfies Are Fun!

Here's what we did the other day with an app on my laptop called Photo Booth. Good times!

I'm Afraid of Art

(Scroll down for this week's Sunday Parenting Party.)

I know I'm not alone in being a mom who heads for the hills at the very mention of doing a potentially messy or open-ended art or craft project with young children. In fact, I know I've read more than a few blog posts on the subject.

The completely embarrassing element of my mortal fear of kids plus art materials is this: I'm an artist.

I want to be creative with my kids -- I do. I even have a Pinterest board filled with the projects I'd like to do with the boys. I would love to sit in the front yard with Bug and Pie and do pastel sketches of the flowers. But I can't do it.

Just the thought of the mess and all the unknown variables sends me running for the Xanax. Bright colors all mixed together into a muffin tin full of muddy brown. Paint all over pants. Brand-new pots of Play-Doh smushed into a glob of smoky gray (but naturally not the same shade of gray of the carpet it will eventually be ground in to).

I can't even do my own artwork because I don't know what I would do when the kids started to grab at -- or even asked politely to use -- my pastels or charcoal pencils or sketchbook paper. I don't know what I'd do ... so I just don't do it. Every year my husband plants an award-winning entryway garden, and every year I want to paint pictures of it. But I can't, because I'm afraid of the potential mess.

This afternoon, my four-year-old asked if we could paint rocks. We saw some painted rocks last week while we were camping, and he's been asking almost every day if we could make our own. I would have liked to put it off indefinitely (even though I knew he really wanted to paint rocks). I recently read a great post on another mom blog about how to contain the mess when painting with littles ... I didn't have all the supplies to carry it out, but I did the best I could. Pie and I portioned the paint in a muffin tin. He helped me mix the primaries to make the secondaries. I showed him how to wash his brush before changing colors, and he paid attention. And we painted rocks out in the driveway. My five-year-old bundle of energy even ended up joining us (and I cringed as he decided to mix colors in our communal palette and proceeded to add black pinstripes to his rock, Jackson Pollock style). But it worked out. I didn't panic. I didn't necessarily like the twelve different shades of green that we ended up with, or Bug's action-packed brush handling, but we did it, and the boys were happy.

I guess I am capable of surviving a mess. If Mommy is an artist, I have to assume that at least one of my kids has talent, too, and I should be nurturing that talent. I just have to keep reminding myself of days like today when the boys and I made art and lived to tell about it.

Welcome to The Sunday Parenting Party! This week's hosts are denoted by the word {host} behind their link’s title in the list below. The SPP is place for readers to find ideas on nurturing, educating, developing and caring for children, as well as honest posts on the stresses of being a parent or caregiver. Reviews and giveaways are welcome as long as they are relevant to the topic. All parenting philosophies are welcome with one exception: please do not link posts promoting physical discipline, as this is something we would feel uncomfortable having on our blogs. (P.S. By linking up you agree that your post and photos are Pinterest, Sulia, G+ and FB friendly. We will be showcasing ideas on The Sunday Parenting Party Pinterest board.)

Some of my favorite submissions from last week's SPP:

• Kids Stuff World: Slash summer stress by staying home
• Connecting Family and Seoul: Finding your own happiness

Chalk Therapy

My four-year-old, "Pie," is a man of few words, so at times like these when he opens up, it's precious.

He still has a fierce attachment to his lovey, "Baby," ("Bubbles," the orange, expanding Angry Bird) who has become like a member of the family.

Pie and Baby were happily playing out in the backyard the other morning when I went out to check on them. The stone wall at the edge of the patio had been filled from end to end with chalk drawings. "These are all Baby's thoughts," Pie proudly explained.

It was cute--he had drawn his beloved Angry Bird as a crude circle with a big triangle inside for a beak, but I could definitely tell who it was supposed to be. I asked Pie to tell me what was happening in the pictures.

"This is Baby flying fast," he began. "This is Baby exploding [my brother's lovey]."

Hmmm.

There were a few more before the coup de grace: "This is Baby putting [my brother's lovey] in jail." It was an awesome drawing...but that's when it hit me that we seemed to be having an impromptu art therapy session.

Note to self: do more art and pretend play with Pie, and read up on sibling rivalry. And keep tabs on that Baby. I think he might know more than he's letting on.

Bringing Apps to Life

First of all, I want to begin by admitting I let my kids have too much screen time. They're 3- and 5 years old, and they know what Netflix is and that the TV has to be on Input 6 to use the PlayStation. We have multiple Kindles and each of my boys has his own Leapster and/or iXL handheld.

Prickly Dad and I both grew up with a lot of TV (he tells me about doing his homework while watching Godzilla movies) as well as the various other "screens" of the time period (Pong, the many incarnations of Atari, the Commodore 64, followed by all the Nintendos). I've always been a connoisseur of vintage television as well as being fascinated by the capability of computers--and ended up working in the digital media industry before becoming a stay-at-home mom (so my workstation always included at least two computers, a double-monitor, and a TV).

So being a no-screen family was probably never in the cards for us.

Anyhoo, my children's TV-watching habits are a whole 'nother topic...but I have to admit that I actually like some of the Android apps meant for grown-ups, and don't mind my little guys playing. Of course we have Angry Birds and all its incarnations (and even a spin-off, Bad Piggies), but we also like Cut the Rope, Where's My Water?, and now the grocery-packing game Bag It. In my opinion, all these games teach kids not only fine motor skills, but concepts like cause-and-effect ("I have to cut this rope at this time to get the candy to fall into Om Nom's mouth"), simple physics ("I need to pull the Angry Bird down lower in the slingshot to get him to go higher in the air"), or spatial skills ("if I stack these cereal boxes horizontally instead of upright, I can fit more of them in the grocery bag").

Yes, my boys talk and obviously think about these games a lot, but instead of playing on the Kindle for too long a time (which we do not let them do), my little guys take these games into the realm of reality. Yesterday afternoon, to my delight and amazement, Bug and Pie sat on the kitchen floor for almost two hours with the groceries I hadn't had time to put away yet (along with an empty egg carton I happened to have) and played their own grocery-stacking game, experimenting with different ways to balance cans and boxes, learning that heavy items do better on the bottom and lighter ones can balance on top. They practiced sharing, teamwork, and perseverance, and had fun doing it. I really enjoyed watching how their little minds worked (and had the added bonus of being able to get some housework done while they occupied themselves).

It just goes to show that screen time for the little ones isn't all bad, right?

The Long Weekend: Is It Over Yet?

The stars totally misaligned this past week. There was a major booger-fest (with a cough) that began last weekend and kept Bug and Pie home from school Monday and Tuesday. I had a brief kid-less respite Wednesday and Thursday to get some bare-bones housework and shopping done (as well as some bare-bones "me time" to veg out in front of CourtTV and the ridiculous Jodi Arias testimony and stuff my face with Valentine's Day chocolate). Then it was all over: I was face to face with a four-day weekend (what the boys' school calls "Mid-Winter Break"). To make matters worse, Prickly Dad is working this weekend...and now we're feeling under the weather.

As of right now (Saturday night), Prickly Family has made it halfway through! I wanted to share some of the things I've done with the boys during the past 48 hours (because I'm sure there are many other moms out there running out of ideas).

Prickly Mom's Long Weekend Time-Wasters

• Spend four hours at the nearest Chick-fil-A play-land
• Take the covers off the couch cushions (to wash them), and tell the kids they have to sit on clouds now (my cushions are covered with fluffy white batting)
• Let them take a 45-minute shower
• Let the kids comb and style your hair (especially if you have boys)
• Read the same book as many times as your little guy wants (today it was The Monster at the End of this Book, and it was four times)
• DJ a bedroom dance party (they dance around, you get to sit down) (FYI, according to Pie, "Locked Out of Heaven" is cool. "Diamonds in the Sky" is not cool)
• Show them Devo's "Whip It" video (circa 1980) and tell them how you and your siblings used to put on un-folded turtlenecks and flower-pot hats and rock out.

So that leaves 48 hours to go. What are you and your littles doing this weekend? Please share!

(P.S. We'd totally be making this super slide if I hadn't just thrown out the huge cardboard box that my new boot tray came in. I need to order something else big. Hmmm...a kitchen table?)

Purple "Pizza" Play Dough

This morning I came across Creative Playhouse's new "One Minute Playdough" recipe. I had just thrown out all our current play dough (I usually use this standard salt recipe) because my five-year-old has some sort of compulsion to break it into pea-sized pieces and spread it all over our play dough area. He then walks away for a while to play with something else (which is okay with me), but when he comes back, it's dry and in desperate need of kneading my an adult to get it back to the right consistency.

Last night, for some reason (probably hormones), I just couldn't stand the sight of all those crumbs anymore, or the thought of cleaning them up again. So instead, they were swept straight into the garbage. They could have been reconstituted (which is one thing I like about homemade play dough), but I was too crazed over the mess at that moment to think straight.

So when I came across this new, one-minute dishsoap-and-flour (or cornstarch) recipe, I decided to try it with conditioner (which I had bought three bottles of by mistake, thinking it was shampoo. Ug). It looked like it might have a less-crumbly consistency, and I have also been looking for a play dough that won't exacerbate our dry skin.

It was easy: 2 cups flour, 1 cup conditioner, 1 tablespoon cooking oil, and food coloring. Knead until it starts getting a stretch to it like bread dough (this is the gluten kicking in...so I apologize to the GF crowd).

When I brought it upstairs to the kids, Bug immediately identified it as "pizza dough" and started making a pizza for me (with leftover red play dough "tomatoes"). So far, there has been no pea-pinching of said new play dough, and the boys seem to like it.

So far, so good!

It's the Hand of Christmas!

(...you have to say that is a low, ominous-yet-goofy voice...)

I have a crafty aunt who has made many of the cherished ornaments I hang on the tree each year. Her creations are fabulous--my all-time favorites include an angel made from various macaroni shapes hot-glued together and an elf with a jingle-bell for an abdomen.

As one would expect, considering the sheer number of different ornaments my aunt has crafted through the years, there have been some duds. And in our house, the most famous dud of all is...the Hand of Christmas!

It's a knit white winter glove stuffed with poly-fill and decorated with felt and other doodads to look like Santa. As far as ornaments go, it's huge. Too huge for any Christmas tree that I'll ever have.

But of course, the boys loved it, and thus it has inadvertently become the centerpiece of a Prickly Family holiday tradition. When Bug hung it on the tree a couple years ago (when he was three), I plucked it off and started chasing him around the house with it, declaring, "oooooooo! It's the Hand of Christmas!" (and of course, the object of the game it to get away from it and avoid a fluffy love-spank!)

This year, Bug is constantly begging me to play (so much so that I'm actually looking forward to taking the tree down so I can pack the Hand of Christmas away until next year). I'm not usually a fan of chasing games, but my little guys love this one so much that I feel like I have to give in and play a few times a day.

'Tis the season to be silly with the kids, right? Merry Christmas!

It's Like a Party in His Mouth!

Last night, right before tooth-brushing time, Bug announced, "Mom! The sugar bugs are having a party in my mouth!" (Sugar Bugs is a cute Leapster app about dental hygiene, by the way). He opened his mouth and asked me to look inside. "See? Look at all of them!"

How often does an opportunity like this present itself?!?

I looked in his mouth and added, "hey! They're dancing! And I think one of them is playing music!" I stuck my ear near his mouth and Bug started to sing. I handed him his toothbrush and said, "get 'em!" As he brushed, I supplied sound effects and dialogue...the "sugar bugs" squealed, "hey! A toothbrush! Run! He's brushing away our party! Help!" I actually got him to do the best brushing of his life as the sugar bugs cried, "He's not brushing his back teeth! Everybody run back there! He's missing his bottom teeth! Everybody go there!" When the whole shindig had finally been brushed away, and Bug spit his fluoride rinse into the sink, we noticed the bubbles and decided they must have been the balloons from the party. Then we rinsed the whole party down the drain.

Of course, Pie decided he had a party going on in his mouth too, so we did the whole act all over again for him. But, hey, it was worth it...the boys both got a good brushing, and got to exercise their imaginations, too!

The Miracle of Toy Rotation

You know how people can tell you over and over to try something that will help you, but sometimes you just have to discover it for yourself?

Such is the case with me and toy rotation.

Okay, so first I have to admit that I've had a box of toys sitting by the front door since January (for the record, it's now November). In my defense, none of the Salvation Army boxes in our neighborhood accepts toys, and Goodwill is sort of out of my way. For some reason, the boys decided today was the day they would take enough interest in the box to open it--and I'm so glad they did. I just gave in and tipped the whole box on its side and let them at it. And I'm amazed--they've been entertaining themselves for an hour with old Transformers, Bakugan balls, Christmas finger puppets, and empty Pez dispensers. My five-year-old is playing with things that I would never imagined him sitting quietly and playing with (a magnetic doodle pad with easy Spider-Man drawing instructions and a construction site magnet set).

Obviously this "goody box" isn't going to hold their interest forever...but I'm impressed enough that I'm going to get a couple other big boxes of mismatched stuff together for another day. And another. And another.

TeachPreschool.org: Blogging On Demand!

I have been following (and admiring) Deborah from www.teachpreschool.org for several weeks now. She has written about the "discovery table" in her classroom: a place where her students can explore materials on their own without the usual grownup-imposed restrictions.

I've been wanting to use my kitchen table for "discovery" projects, as I find myself stressing out a lot when the boys want to be with me--but I have cooking or chores to do (and their "helping" isn't really helping). I want to set up her tin cans and magnets activity as well as "what's inside a gourd?" (I just saw bags of weird-looking gourds at the grocery store this morning...perfect!).

So, last night I left a comment on Deborah's blog asking about the thought process behind the discovery table and how she chooses activities. And this morning I found she'd written the best reply ever--it was like getting an "On Demand" blog post with just the information I was looking for! Now that's what I call service (tee-hee)!

Check out the question and answer at the bottom of this page. It's really good stuff.

If I Were the Mom from "Caution! Twins at Play"...

...I would be wheeling a cart full of $5 behind-the-door dorm room mirrors from Target out to the car so I could build a mega-mirror play area inspired by this mom-blog post.

I grew up in Buffalo, home of gratuitous school field trips to the Albright-Knox Art Gallery and the ever-popular Mirrored Room exhibit, where you'd line up, take off your shoes, and carefully walk through in your stockinged feet as slowly as possible (in an attempt to stay inside as long as possible).

Lucas Samaras (American, born Greece 1936). Room No. 2 (popularly known as the Mirrored Room), 1966. Mirror on wood, 96 x 96 x 120 inches (243.8 x 243.8 x 304.8 cm). Collection Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Gift of Seymour H. Knox, Jr., 1966.

These days, Prickly Family has a large walk-in shower stall--that we almost never use--that would make the perfect mirrored play area (but my inner cheapskate won't let me drop $50 on mirrors, and my inner procrastinator won't let me do anything, period).

So I'm giving you all permission to steal my idea. If you do, POST PICTURES!

I Hate LEGOs

Last night, exasperated, I updated my Facebook status: "I hate LEGOs."

No, I didn't step on one, as one of my friends asked. I just don't get them. I do like the basic concept: build something based on imagination. Take it apart. Make it better. Repeat. But now Bug is totally into LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean, which, I have to admit, is pretty darn entertaining as a mini-movie and video game, but as a toy (or increasingly-expensive series of toys), I'm confused. You buy a pile of LEGOs that Daddy has to put together. Then...do they really expect an almost-five-year-old to just look at it? He wants to play! Then, one by one, the components come apart and Mommy doesn't have the patience to fix them. Then everything ends up as a pile of LEGOs on the floor.

We could have just bypassed all of this and dumped the brand-new box of pieces directly on the family room floor, you know?

The reality is: I have little boys, and little boys like building with LEGOs. This means it's my duty as their mom to figure out some way to play with them that we can all enjoy. Here's what I'm finding so far:

• Build a marble maze, test structural stability
• LEGO balloon cars
• LEGO bingo (and other ideas)
• And when all else fails...LEGO boards on Pinterest

(P.S. Above all, as an editor, I can't stand when companies insist their product name appear in all capital letters when it is not an acronym. And we wonder why kids don't understand the proper usage of caps and lowercase letters. Just one of my many pet peeves. Grr.)

Lavender Sparkle Play Dough

I've been making an effort to actually do some of the activities I've pinned on my "Stuff to Do with the Kids" board on Pinterest...on Monday we made sidewalk paint, yesterday we did some sorting activities, and today we made play dough.

My last batch of homemade play dough was of the Kool-Aid variety. It was bright blue and smelled of raspberries--but it didn't match our neutral family-room carpet. (We need a new carpet up there, so I'm not that upset about the ground-in globs.) I decided it might behoove me to color the play dough bluish-gray this time; so to make up for the boring color, I added some soothing essential oil and glitter and introduced it to the boys as "Lavender Sparkle." They're loving it!

Lavender Sparkle Play Dough Recipe
2 c flour
2 c water
1/2 c salt
4 t cream of tartar
2 T vegetable oil
10 drops each blue and red food coloring
1 t lavender essential oil
2 T glitter

Mix all ingredients except essential oil and glitter in a medium saucepan. Whisk over low heat until mixture forms a ball (about five minutes), remove from heat. Turn mixture onto a cookie sheet, let cool slightly, then knead until smooth. Knead in essential oil and glitter. Store in airtight container once cool.

Happy Mud Day!

Only a mom of little ones desperate for something to do on a summer weekday would know that today is International Mud Day, right? We hosted a play date here at Prickly House this morning with a mud pool, a clean pool, and unlimited access to the hose. A good time was had by all--plus, Prickly Dad commended us on the noticeable absence of mud in the house!

Here is my contribution to the worldwide celebration (I served it with pretzels, apple slices, and strawberries):

Am I Some Sort of Clown?

As Joe Pesci asked incredulously in Goodfellas, "I'm here to [effin'] amuse you?"

I've asked myself this question many times during my career as a mom (with or without the F-word, depending on the mood).

I clearly remember calling my mom--probably around the time Bug was 18 months old--to ask about the mechanics of keeping him occupied all day (with the added burden of being a chronically low-energy, depressed woman who was also nine months pregnant, but I digress). Her answer, which I will never forget, was, "it's not your job to entertain him."

Dyngus Day for Kids (What? No Alcohol?)

Roll out the barrel...and don't forget the pussy willows and squirt guns. It's Dyngus Day! 

I was born and raised in the Buffalo, NY area, and am half Polish, so I grew up celebrating Dyngus Day (well, at least being cognizant of it). This holiday, apparently, is unknown (and bizarre-sounding) to the rest of the country (with the exception of Michigan and possibly Cleveland). I guess you could call it the Polish-American St. Patrick's Day. In Western New York, which boasts the biggest Dyngus Day celebration in the country, party-goers show off their Warsaw Falcon tattoos and drink until they puke. And you wonder: why in the world would anybody want to celebrate this with their kids? Well, in my case, the Easter season is one of the only times I celebrate my Polish heritage, which I would like to pass on to the boys.

When you get down to it, Dyngus Day, or Easter Monday, has historically been a day in Poland for the faithful to let their hair down after the solemnity and fasting of Lent and Easter weekend. In the "old country," girls traditionally chase and swat their sweethearts with pussy willows, while the boys retaliate by dumping buckets of water on the swatters.

Unfortunately, it's too cold and windy here today to celebrate properly...but here are some ideas for celebrating with preschoolers:

• Pussy Willow Tag: (You can usually find them at a florist shop or in the floral department of the grocery store.) The child who is "It" tags the others by touching them with a pussy willow. I'd recommend playing the variation of tag in which there are multiple "Its" (each kid who is tagged gets his own pussy willow and becomes another "It") so that evryone has a pussy willow by the end of the game.
• The Ol' Run-n-Squirt: My boys, at least, would be content simply chasing each other around the yard with squirt guns (in fact, Mommy and Daddy love to join in). Give each kid her own water gun and let 'em loose. I usually provide a big soup-pot of water for easy refills: just submerge the squirt gun until all the bubbles come to the surface.
• Learn to Polka: Watch some basic how-to videos (here's what I found on YouTube) and dance with the kids. Or, something I think would be more fun, would be to cut out some paper footprints and tape them to the floor/ground and let the children try to do the steps in order (you could write numbers on the footprints). Check out this Web page for a Polka tutorial complete with footprints.
• Music: As far as what to Polka to, there's actually a song about Dyngus Day (buy the "Everybody's Polish on Dyngus Day" mp3 or search for other polkas). If polka music is just too crazy for your taste, play some Chopin. He was Polish.

More playdate ideas to come. Miłego dnia!

Fun with a Cookie Sheet

In a room full of Christmas toys, what do the boys decide to play with? Their old toy cars, packing cardboard, and a cookie sheet. I'm actually happy to see them use their imaginations and their reasoning skills! If the cookie sheet ramp is propped up too low, the jump is too boring. If you add too much cardboard and make the incline too high, the pull-back cars won't make it over. When you race the cars down the ramp, the heavier ones go further...and all of them go further when you move the whole setup off the carpet and onto a smooth surface!

Wow--who knew a cheapo cookie sheet could be such a useful learning tool?