Crazy things we tell kids (silly stuff).

The other day, I happened upon this comment thread about the crazy things that our mothers told us, and that we tell our children. I was cracking up reading it, and it made me think of some of the crazy things my mom used to tell me too (let's just say wild imaginations run in my family). Now some of these are just plain silly, some of them are borderline genius, and a few of them are almost mean, but they all amused me. 

image source

Since reading through the entire comment thread is slightly time consuming (I think I giggled at least an hour of time away), I decided to condense it into a list. Most of these are adapted from the Reddit thread, and a few are sprinkled in from my childhood (see if you can guess which ones).

A birthday card for the kiddos (printable).

I love to give handmade or semi-handmade cards when I have the time, and I try to encourage the children I care for to do the same thing. A few weeks ago, the boys' cousin turned four, and I had them color these cards for him. They had a blast making their cards their own, and the birthday boy thought they were pretty cool too.

Click on the picture to see it full size. Then save it to your desktop, and print it so that the image fills one sheet of card stock (makes 2 cards).

I used a dotted font for the words, so that the boys could practice tracing the letters. You can add the birthday girl's or boy's name to the front using your computer, or by hand after printing. Give your child age appropriate supplies that they will have fun decorating with. We used markers and stickers (the 3 year old opted for mostly markers, and did a nice job tracing the letters and writing his name inside; the 2 year old colored a little, then went crazy with the stickers).

I hope you enjoy these as much as we did :) I link up to these parties.

Paper American flag (kids' craft).

This is a simple little Fourth of July craft that I did with the three and a half year old that I watch. He had a blast making it, and has been showing it off to everyone. I love that he had so much fun while working on his cutting, coordination, and listening skills too (not to mention practice with colors, shapes, and counting!).

These directions are based on how I did it with him, but this is easy to adjust to other ages/levels of development. I had him cut out the shapes himself (using children's safety scissors of course), but you could do the cutting for younger kids. For older kids, you can give the more autonomy when putting everything together.

Congratulations, it's a girl (treasury Tuesday)!

Congratulations, it's a girl!

Numbers, colors, and shapes coloring sheet (printable).

Most of my days are spent nannying for two sweet boys (3 1/2 years old, and almost 2 years old). A few weeks ago, I brought some fun Easter coloring sheets for them. There was one sheet that the older boy absolutely loved; it was eight eggs, and each one had a color written above it. He had so much fun coloring in those eggs that I ended up making about ten copies for him (and he was still sad when they were all gone). 

We have been doing a lot of work on shapes and counting recently, so I decided to make a new coloring sheet for him that followed the same format, but used shapes and numbers. These were a big hit with the boys I watch, so I wanted to share them with you too!

Click on the picture for a larger version, then save to your computer (drag and drop, or left click)

I put a lot of work into this, so I hope that you will get good use out of it to. However, please only use this personal and/or teaching purposes (no commercial use). If you enjoy this sheet, I'd love to hear from you in the comments. Thank you.

I link up to these parties.