Last Minute Printable Valentines

Love printable Valentine's Day cards by Bunny Cakes.

Don’t give up if you haven’t had a chance to get a card for your Valentine! Here are some gorgeous printable valentines from Bunny Cake. Her lovely designs make your home-made valentine classy and professional. Plus, you can do it all from your computer! Click here for the PDf file and instructions.

Adorable cards you can print for free.

Photos by Bunny Cakes.

Teaching Your Preschooler the Value of Money with a Chore Chart

There is a parenting debate about whether you should teach your children that they should do chores simply because they are a member of the household or if they should get compensation or paid for doing chores. If you go one way, your child might think that they are entitled to receiving a certain amount of spending money regardless of their contributions to the house. If you go the other way, your child thinks that they should be paid for everything they do and don’t learn that they have obligations and duties as a member of a household.

After considering both sides of this issue, I think that allowances should be contingent on work performed for these reasons:

• Children should learn that you need to earn money. That it comes with hard work and dedication. That it takes effort to work, earn, and save enough money to purchase what you want. Yes, they should do things as a member of the family, but it is also useful to show them that they can earn some rewards for their efforts.
• Children learn how to manage the money they earn.

To test my theory (although I won’t be able to judge for sure if this works until my children are adults with savings accounts), I’ve decided to implement a chore chart for my four-year-old son, Jonas, to use. My middle child is quite three years old; so, this really hasn’t made any sense to him, but Jonas is VERY excited by this idea.

We printed out a chore chart from Simplemom.net, cut out the chores, and pasted them on. Then, Jonas happily performed a variety of the chores in exchange for a check mark in the box (which he was allowed to make as well). Each check mark could be exchanged for a nickel or 5 minutes of playing a video game or computer game (redeemable only only on certain days and in specific quantities - e.g. 30 minutes).

The chore chart is working lovely so far. Jonas is excited to do his chores - even asks to do them! He happily marks his sheet and waits anxiously for the weekend to redeem them. His first week he traded half for time to play his favorite video game and half for coins he counted into his piggy bank. This week he traded his points in for money to purchase a small toy.

Try it with your child and let me know how it works for you! If you want a chart you can just print out and skip the cutting and pasting, try FlipFlop and Applesauce’s chore chart.

Make Paper Hearts

Make paper hearts for a lovely display.

Here’s another great inexpensive idea for Valentine’s Day. Using pieces of paper that you might already have in your craft stash, you can easily make these paper hearts to decorate your space. Sweet and inexpensive. You only need pretty paper, scissors, and tape or glue. Go to Flip Flops and Applesauce for the complete instructions.

To display, punch a hole in the corner and string several along on a pretty ribbon or some string or yarn. Hang in front of your window, on your bulletin board, or on a cubicle wall for some love no matter where you are!

Photo by Flip Flops and Applesauce.

Easy Valentine’s Day Treat

Easy to make Valentine's Day recipe for all ages

Looking for an easy Valentine’s Day craft or project? This recipe from Make and Takes is a winner in my book. It includes less than five ingredients, doesn’t involve much cooking, and is a project that my preschool kids can do with me. All you’ll need is pretzels, chocolate to melt (white chocolate and milk chocolate), wax paper, toothpicks, and sprinkles. Use food coloring in the white chocolate to get that lovely pink or try mixing it with some blue, yellow, or green for some fun spring colors.

Simple ingredients you probably already have in your pantry.

Although most of these will probably get eaten by the kids as soon as they are done, you can save some to pack away in some little bags or little boxes to give away as an inexpensive teacher’s gift or a gift to any friend! Click here for the full recipe and how-to-do-it instructions.

Wrap it up for the perfect little V-Day gift for a teacher, friend, office mate, or neighbor.

Healthy, Organic Fruits and Vegetables Delivered to Your Door

Enjoy fresh produce and more delivered to your door by Spud.com.

Life happens and it is often difficult to find time to go to the supermarket regularly to stock up on fresh fruits and vegetables. I tend to buy a lot when I’m at the store, but it can be a couple of weeks before I get the chance to go back and the fresh produce I’ve bought often goes bad before my family can eat it all. If you live in the Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, or Los Angeles area, you can enjoy fresh organic produce delivered right to your door! Formerly known in the Seattle area as Pioneer Organics, Spud.com now offers home delivery of local, organic fresh produce. If you are eco-conscious at all, this is a double bonus of getting organic produce from local farmers - a great way to support these local businesses.

In addition to the fresh, organic produce, Spud.com also delivers a complete selection of natural foods, including milk, bread, pasta and ready-made meals which is ideal for busy families. At SPUD, you can order two ways: The Standing Order or by Personal List. The Standing Order is both a time- and money-saver and allows you to schedule product delivery weekly, every 2 weeks or once every 4 weeks depending on your schedule and budget. Shopping by Personal List lets you customize each order by product and delivery date.

I have my milk delivered straight to my door by Smith Brothers Farm every week, and it is a total lifesaver. With three kids under four-years-old, I was constantly running to the store at the last minute to purchase milk. These “quick” runs to the store took a toll on our schedule, budget, and sanity. The weekly milk delivery alone saves me time and money, and I know the milk is local and the cattle aren’t fed growth hormones. Getting my produce delivered bi-weekly might just tip the scales in my favor and make sure that I always have something fresh and green to serve on the table! Even if it’s next to Mac and Cheese!

Entertaining Your Kids with Paper Crafts

With the economy in a slump, I’ve got my eye on the budget very closely. All those trips to Target are getting nipped in the bud, but my preschool age sons are not interested in saving for a rainy day. How does one stay-at-home mom keep the kids busy without paying out a fortune for crafts, games, and toys?

Enter the world of paper craft. When I was a little kid, I had a paper doll book. These days, they have intricate paper origami and paper craft for everything imaginable. The other day, my four-year-old, Jonas, wanted to buy a Millenium Falcon he saw at the store that cost around $150. I promptly said, “No, maybe we can make one at home.” I kind of thought I would just print out a picture of it for him, but then my ever-helpful husband found a papercraft to create a suprisingly realistic version of the space craft.

Image by SF Movie Paper Craft

Of course, this is NOT a craft for young children and is really designed for a Star Wars loving adult with plenty of time to construct. But I did put one together for Jonas over a couple of evenings and he thought it was COOL! And it only cost me a few sheets of cardstock, printer ink, and some elbow grease. Download your own Millenium Falcon papercraft here. You can make a much simpler origami version by watching this video.

Again, my helpful husband also directed me to a few much simpler paper craft characters. Not quite the impact of the paper Millenium Falcon, but much easier to make with a couple of preschoolers tugging at you. Cubeecraft.com boasts quite an array of characters ranging from Spiderman, Super Mario, Darth Vader, and even Barack Obama. Try it.