Kid Friendly Archives - Page 30 of 33

Teaching Kids About Grandparents-Family Tree File Folder Game & Family Photo Coloring Pages

September 28, 2009 By Michelle Barneck 8 Comments

Recently, my son came home from nursery with this.

Hilarious!! I totally laughed when he handed it to me. They are learning about eternal families this year. Seeing this on the fridge everyday made me realize that I wanted to teach my little one about his family and that though he has no siblings (YET. We are planning on having more. I don’t need anyone else asking when the next one is coming. How do you answer that question anyway?! Ugh.) he is part of a family that loves him. I wanted him to know that though our family is small he has a big family too.

I decided to start with Grandparents and Great Grandparents (seemed perfect since I came up with this on Grandparents day). I wanted to keep it simple at first because he has a TON of aunts, uncles and cousins. Don’t worry, we love you too!

I love the idea of a family tree and helping him to know that his Papas and Grandmas are Mommy and Daddy’s Moms and Dads. I made him a little family tree file folder game by altering the basic family tree found on Kid’s Turn Central.

I made two different sheets (printed on card stock and laminated using clear contact paper), one that listed everyone by their relation (mom, grandpa, etc) and one that listed them by name. This way he could start with the relation one and eventually grow in to learning all the names. I printed out 2 in x 2 in pics (they fit perfect on a 4×6 photo paper) of all of us to attach above the labels (forgot my sons pic, so he pointed to where he goes). Currently, we are using double sided sticky tape, but you could use Velcro.

Click thumbnails to download 8 x 10 file folder game.

Left is blank to personalize with names. Right is labeled with relations.

We had recently celebrated Great Grandma’s 85th birthday party, so this was a great chance to teach him about Great Grandmas. Unfortunately, this is the only pic we got of them together. Lighting pretty bad and the “scenery” leaves something to be desired.

Great Grandma went in to the hospital for some surgery so we decided to send her a get well card. I wanted something personalized in it, so I sucked the color from the photo, cropped, and softened it so it actually looked pretty cute. Then, I turned it in to a Great Grandma coloring page and let him color it. This was a great time to teach him who Great Grandma is.

We decided to send Grandma and Grandpa a little something for Grandparents day (a little late) and did some finger painting and sent them a card.

As one last little learning activity, I got these Todd Parr books from the library. They were so cute and he loved them! They are a hilarious and refreshing way to look at roles. “Some mommies drive minivans, Some mommies drive motorcycles.”

Images from: http://www.toddparr.com/books/

All in all, we had a fun week learning about parents, grandparents and great grandparents!

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General Conference Activities for Kids-Temple Sewing Card and First Presidency Coloring Page

September 24, 2009 By Michelle Barneck 15 Comments

LDS General Conference can always be a tough time for kids. It can be difficult to keep them quiet and reverent during sessions for two days. We can all use some ideas and activities to keep the little ones interested and engaged. I created a couple of General Conference Activities for kids.

First off, I made a temple sewing card by adding dots to a Salt Lake temple image from Mormon Share. I printed it on a piece of 4×6 photo paper so it would have some strength. Then, laminated it using clear contact paper. Then, I punched holes where the dots were.

I took a piece of 3/8 inch ribbon and rolled one end and taped it so it would be like the end of a shoelace. Then, I tied it to the bottom corner.

Then, I gave it the ultimate test with the little guy. He loved it!

Click picture above to print a 4×6 sewing card

I also wanted a President Monson coloring page. Many of the ones I had seen did not look much like him, or did not have him smiling. Many of the pictures are so serious and I wanted my little boy to see his prophet happy and full of love. I found this picture of the First Presidency from the press conference when President Thomas S. Monson was called and immediately fell in love it. I threw it in to Photoshop and played with it until it looked like something to color.

Click thumbnail above to print 8.5×11 page

Here are a whole bunch of other great General Conference Activities for Kids:

LDS.org Friend Activities and Conference Packet

Deseret Book activity packet

Sugardoodle’s Packet for 7-12 year olds

Conference Bingo

Conference Reverence Tents

General Conference Coloring Book

Conference Chase Game

I hope you have a wonderful conference next weekend!! I know I am looking forward to it!

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Laminating Using Clear Contact Paper-Chore Chart & Color Matching

September 23, 2009 By Michelle Barneck 9 Comments

Did you know you can use clear contact paper to laminate at home? I had some things I wanted to reinforce to protect them from little hands. Basically, so they would last more than five minutes. I wanted to be able to laminate any time I wanted without running out to the copy shop. This works great and is easier than I thought.

I saw these cute color matching cards from Homeschool Creations and loved the nice clear photos. I printed them on card stock and then measured out and cut the clear contact paper. I left an excess of about half an inch on each edge so that I would not have to be too careful. Then, I carefully peeled off the backing, put a sheet on each side, and rubbed out any bubbles. Last, I trimmed the edges and cut them up.

I also found this chore chart template over at Controlling My Chaos. Though my little one is a bit young for chores, he loves to help out and I wanted another way to reinforce good behavior. I “laminated” it and now I can add and erase check marks each week. He gets so excited every time he gets a check mark. He signs “more” and says “more checks.” Then, I tell him what he get the checks for and tell him another “chore” he can do to get more checks.

I love being able to laminate at a moments notice and it is so much cheaper! When I called the UPS store they said laminating was 99 cents a page. I bought my roll of clear contact paper at Wal-mart for just under $6 and have already laminated 15 pages. It is about half gone. Score!

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Build Your Own Cardboard Castle

September 14, 2009 By Michelle Barneck 9 Comments

The other day we went to visit daddy at work we came home with this computer box, courtesy of his co-worker Rex. My little guy had so much fun playing with it at the office that I knew it could be great fun.

I took one look at those gray pieces of packaging foam and immediately thought castle. They were perfect for little doors. I pulled out my dollar store duct tape and went to work!

At this point we had a pretty cool little fort, but every castle needs a tower so I grabbed one of our diaper boxes from Costco. I sliced off the top four inches or so and put it on top. Then, I grabbed a box cutter and sliced a hole to match. I secured it on with duct tape on the inside and outside.

The tower needed a little flair so I went around and made rectangle cut outs every few inches. I decided to tape the back flap to the side two, but leave the front one free so he could spy through the hole or push it down completely. I had some concerns about potential cardboard cuts (those suckers are nasty!) so I duct taped around all of the exposed edges.

Then, I decided the duct tape looked cool, so I taped the whole tower. This took longer than you would think. You could also spray paint it. I liked the look at this point, but was worried about the structural integrity of the foam doors, especially in the middle where my son grabbed them to shut them.

I cut a little piece of cardboard (about 1.5″ x 15 “) and taped it inside of the doors by where they close to reinforce where they would constantly be handled. By this time, I had emptied about a roll and a half of tape and just had to find a use for the emptied rolls. Enter door handles. These have since been ripped off, but they looked cool for couple days they lasted.

What a great little place for my little prince! We love our cardboard castle! Tonight we were using the handle holes as mail slots and he would stick cards (we got in a kids meal) through them then go inside to get his “mail.”

Total cost: $2 for duct tape
Boxes on hand
Box cutter on hand

Linking up with Trash to Treasure Tues on Reinvented and

on Naps on the Porch.