Imperfect Organization: Circle Time

 

Meet our learning robot!  This super cool poster was a steal at Christmas time for $1.59!  I bought it at Darlington Holiday Outlet in Fort Wayne.  

The Learning Robot has really simplified and helped me organize circle time in our home with my preschoolers.  Now we can easily sit on the floor in the dining room and go over the skills it presents to my boys!  

This tool offers letters, beginning sounds, shapes, colors, reading a clock, months, days of the week, and numbers 1-30!  The boys love it.  They have so much fun checking it out.  It is a fun game when someone tells them what letter or picture to look for.  It's even more fun when the boys get to be the teacher.  They don't even realize they're still learning to identify these items!

Behind the learning robot is our thankful tree.  Each leaf has something that we are thankful about written on it.  It also has apples and flowers with numbers on them that we use at different times for practicing counting and number identification.

How do you organize daily learning time with your family?

Advent Day 5

Oh how beautiful the lights of Christmas!

Lights on one of the pedestrian bridges downtown.

It's hard not to love the breathy "WOW"s of my boys as we drive through the neighborhoods and see all of the decorated houses.  Our advent activity was driving around town to look at the lights.  I freely admit that I was hoping they would also fall asleep on the drive (they did not).

As we looked at the lights, we were reminded that Christ is the light of the world.  Thank you for the gifts of hope and light.

Possibly the last warm day of the year (photo blog)

Eating his first chocolate covered cherry in memory of great Grandma Billey

They love visitng the Grand Wayne Center.  These penguins are a special treat.

Crawling across the sky bridge.

A photo with the Grinch, in memory of Nonnie.

Merry Christmas from the Crum Family

Cassius likes to have his picture taken whenever he sees a bench!

Peeking into the Embassy Theater

Squishing Berries

 

Merry Christmas - checking out the big nativity.

Healthy Family Date: Review

Do you ever go on "Family Dates"?  We love to go out with our boys for fun activities.  They enjoy hiking, playgrounds, shopping (yes, weird boys), library visits, and so many other things that are going on around town.  We love it that they can get excited about healthy, cultural events!

Recently we decided to look for a different kind of healthy date.  The requirements for this "big event" were 1) healthy food (remember we are working on a vegan diet);  2) lots of movement that our 2 and 4 year old could enjoy together with us; and 3) a reasonable price.  You would never believe where we found it.  We found a restaurant with a salad bar and a LOT of fun games and play areas.  The best salad bar in Fort Wayne comes at a cost of about $7 per person for all you can eat (unfortunately there are not discounts for being a young child).

We decided that we would have the amazing salad bar for myself and Mr. Crum and let the boys slack a little on healthy eating, they shared a pizza.  The package for their pizza, drinks, and a handful of tokens was only about $20.  We could easily have shared this package with our whole family of 5 and had enough to eat.  The food was fantastic.  Side note: we ate here about a year ago and did not like the pizza very well at that time.  I think they have improved their formula over the last year.

Health: Chuck E Cheese offers a variety of food options varying from extremely healthy to not so much.  There are reasonably priced choices for the whole family.  They have also just begun offering gluten free pizza and cupcakes nation wide as an option for families who are facing gluten intolerance!  Way to go Chuck E Cheese!

Cassius getting his hand stamped.

Safety: Every person that enters the doors at Chuck E Cheese is given an invisible stamp on the hand.  This special ink glows in a black light to help the gate keepers make sure that all children leave with the adults they came in with.  There are also regular sweeps of the restaurant to keep it clean and free of debris that could be harmful for visitors.  Excellent job on safety!

The big climber/slide.

Entertainment:  Chuck E Cheese has always been high on entertainment, that's their thing.  They offer an excellent variety of activities to keep the whole family going.  Our 2 year old loved the climber & slide.  Our 4 year old loved the rides & games.  We enjoyed bouncing from activity to activity with them and helping them understand how different things worked.  On this visit, our children were not very interested in the show.  They did, however, participate in a costume parade with Chuck E Cheese and dance with him to earn extra prize tickets.

Mr. Crum teaching Manasseh about air hockey.

We happened to show up during "Chucktober", which is celebrated by inviting children to come in costumes and participate in extra ticket giveaway activities.

"Dr." Manasseh dreaming of his future car.

Take Away:  We left Chuck E Cheese with a few photos and a couple of plastic frogs.  More importantly, we left with children that have a fond memory of a great day interacting with their parents.  I LOVE that my boys have those memories.  I think that a few hours at Chuck E Cheese every once in a while is a great way to build some relationship with my boys (and stay healthy while doing it).

Azariah taking his first ride - this one snaps a picture.

Recommendation:  I think that if you're okay with crowds and enjoy high levels of activity, this is a fantastic family date.  The food is amazing (yep, I'm talking about Chuck E Cheese) and the games are a lot of fun.  All games and rides are 1 token (about a quarter each - less depending on how many tokens you buy) and they can promote family togetherness.  Consider taking a trip to Chuck E Cheese to shake off the winter blahs!

THANKS CHUCK E CHEESE FOR A FUN, HEALTHY FAMILY DATE!

***Disclaimer: I did receive a product or products in exchange for this review.  All opinions are my own.***

Phineas and Ferb Ticket Giveaway

THIS IS IT!

Your chance to win a family 4 pack of tickets to see Phineas and Ferb LIVE!!!

When: October 26, 4pm

Where: Memorial Coliseum, Fort Wayne

Who: You and your friends, or family, or neighbors...

Why: Because Phineas and Ferb is fun!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

I have received a product or products in exchange for this post.  All opinions are my own.

Phineas and Ferb is coming to Fort Wayne!

“Mom! Phineas and Ferb are going on a LIVE tour!!!” School’s out for summer and anything is possible as Phineas and Ferb create their biggest invention yet -- Disney’s Phineas and Ferb: The Best LIVE Tour Ever! Phineas, Ferb, and the whole Tri-State Area gang embark on a bold escape jumping out from behind your TV and onto the stage in a live action adventure – right in your hometown! And, before you can wonder, “Hey, where’s Perry?” the beloved pet platypus shifts to his secret double life as Agent P to foil another one of Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s evil plans. Musical madness abounds in an escapade so awesome that even Candace can’t help but join the hilarious hijinks. It’s the ultimate end to summer vacation, so seize the day ‘cause Phineas and Ferb are gonna do it all!

WE'RE GOING TO SEE PHINEAS AND FERB LIVE!!!

If you live in the Fort Wayne area, you can see it very soon too!  Tickets start as low as $15.50!  The shows are at 4pm and 7pm on Friday, October 26.  Make sure to check it out - and keep your eyes open right here for your chance to win tickets to the show very soon!

Leave a comment on this post to receive an extra entry in the giveaway.  Tell me what you think of Phineas and Ferb!

Thanks

Just a quick thank you to the men of Chimney 1 for their hard work and excellent outcome.

Before: Bricks were crumbling and literally falling off of the chimney.  

After: 2.5 days of work and we don't have to worry about bricks falling.  We *might* even be able to have a small fire in it once in a while next winter.

Free Fun Education Adventure

We love adventure, especially when it is educational... and free.  Mama Crum likes to look for fun educational adventures.  Here is one from a couple weeks ago.

We went downtown for a walk and discovered a manhole.  Discoveries this amazing always lead to a lot of questions and up close exploration.  The boys are very interested in learning what things are and how they work.

 Mr. Crum had fun showing the boys antique fire trucks through the window of the Fire Station Museum.  Now every time we drive by, Monkey yells to me about seeing fire trucks.  We look forward to taking them IN the museum one of these days.

Mr. Crum wanted to explore the Maker Station.  We got a private tour and learned about all the neat machines that the "makers" use to create things.  I wish I had some great shots inside the trailer to share.

The final stop on our adventure was The Grand Wayne Convention Center.  We NEEDED to go there, because.. why not?  Mr. Crum and I had never been inside and wanted to know what it looked like.  The boys loved these giant penguins in the entryway.

Exploring a small portion of downtown is fantastic fun, free family education and adventure!  The best part is that it takes very little planning.

Date Night

Life with my boys is amazing.  We live and breathe adventure.  We play together, eat together, sleep together.  It is great being a family.

Sometimes, however, mom and dad need a break.  Sometimes we need to get away and go on a date.  It is SO hard to get away, even for a few hours.  As we're heading into the new year, I am working on some plans - maybe resolutions - I want to date Mr. Crum.

We don't have much money to pay babysitters or to spend on incredibly amazing dates.  I've decided that over the next year I want to try to date my husband once a week.  I'm not sure yet how that will work out - we will have to be better about seeking child care.  As we work on sharing "alone" time together (it will be a while before we're out without Baby), I plan to share some of our date night adventures.  I enjoy looking at other people's ideas for dates, so why not share ours, right?

I hope that some of our dates will be an inspiration to others, give great ideas for a cheap night out or a fun couples activity.  So here is our first date night post.

This week we went geocaching.  It was cold out and we only looked for one cache.  We didn't find it, but enjoyed a walk in a nice local park that we had never explored.  This giant Christmas tree was just inside the park entrance.

We followed this up by a trip to the thrift store.  I love this store, 2 floors of stuff.  I love looking at all the gadgets and appliances and books... lots of books.  We don't go often because you can't take a shopping cart upstairs and that is where the breakable things are.. and we have a 1 year old and a 3 year old... 

Loverboy (aka Mr. Crum) and I explored the shop, found some things that were on our mental want lists (still not a used Scrabble game).  

Loverboy and I debated about where to go for dinner.  We wanted to go somewhere that we can't take the kids.  Eventually we settled on Flat Top Grill.  WOW!  It's a little more expensive than I had planned for the night, but it was AMAZING.  We hope to go back there again.  One of the best things - it fits into our new dietary lifestyle!

After dinner we checked in with Grandma - who was babysitting.  We were running late and she was tired.  She confessed that she tried to take a nap on Monkey's bed while the boys were playing.  Unfortunately for her, Monkey told her she had to wake up because mommy said she had to play with him.

Great date!

Wordless Wednesday: Best Summer Purchase

Wordless Wednesday: Fire Station Tour