I can never have enough placemats. Between arts and crafts, play-dough , meals and snacks they get dirty fast. This is a fun activity that allows your child to choose their favorite stickers and turn it into a placemat just for them. Don't tell them but they are also giving their fine motor skills a good work out, by peeling and placing the stickers on the paper towel.

This art project couldn't be simpler. Even if you have never made a craft in your life you can help your child make this! Pair this craft with fishing activity below for a under the sea themed day.

Paper Plate Fish

My son and I made these photo frames for his grandmothers and great grandmothers last Mother's Day .They were such a hit I am sharing them here. The beauty of these frames are that if your family is like ours, we are scattered all over North America and shipping gifts can get expensive. Foam is light and they fit into a 6x9 envelope not problem with room for a card too!

For a long time, one of L.'s favorite books has been Robert Ingpen's The Afternoon Treehouse. It's not the story that he finds so compelling, but instead the detailed plans and drawings in the book. Ever since he first read it (some three or four years ago), he's wanted a tree house of his own.

If your household is anything like mine, when you go on a trip to the beach you end up bringing back bags and bags of shells and rocks. When we went to Greece two years ago, half of one suitcase was loaded down with ziploc bags filled with gorgeous rocks, which the kids and I had plucked from the violet-blue sea, many thousands of miles away from home.

I was all set to write (vent) a post today about grouchy people in grocery stores, who somehow feel the need to step in and discipline your children right in front of you, even though your kids aren't actually doing anything too terrible at the time. This happened to me at Harris Teeter on Monday, and it really got my back up--particularly since I thought my kids were behaving pretty well at that moment, all things considered, even if they were being a little loud and silly at the checkout line.

All weekend long our house was filled with family, and I just loved it. While I do like our quiet weekends and our just-the-four-of-us time, a part of me longs to have our house filled with family on a more constant basis. I like to entertain. I like to see the kids play with their grandparents. I like to cook for lots of people and have a packed dinner table, family sitting elbow-to-elbow, and lots of laughter and stories and lively discussions. Being so far away from our families makes the comings and goings so difficult.

No sooner had I posted my column yesterday about L.'s birthday than I thought I should write a more "practical column" about birthday parties and party-planning, and what activities have and haven't worked so well with my own kids. But as I sat down to write, I realized I might need tons more column space than I have here to really get into all the ins and outs of children's birthday parties. So I'm limiting myself to tackling what I think are the top four essential parts of any child's party: food, goody bags, crafts, and presents.

I thought I'd be too tapped out to write anything today--or anything in the slightest bit substantive, that is. This past week was a hectic, not-so-great week--you know the kind, where the fates seem to be conspiring against you from the minute your alarm goes off and you think--maybe I should just call it quits?

Back in September I signed up to volunteer at T.'s preschool Valentine's Day party and, when the "assignments" were doled out a couple weeks ago, I volunteered to lead the craft.  I like to bake and decorate cookies and cupcakes, but I also enjoy doing crafty things as well and would far rather spend my precious time putting together craft items then baking and frosting a dozen cupcakes.