Quarantine Weekend Theme- Under the Sea

Posted on June 1, 2020 by sara

After a week off I realised how much I am enjoying these weekends! The weekend with no theme was so boring. I was so glad when it was decided we were back on!

This theme felt dependant on decorating- or was it just me? But my coffers are running low after so much crafting, so we had to order more craft paper, ink for the printer, streamers and some balloons. Hopefully these items will last us beyond just this weekend though!

I roped my husband into helping me decorate on Friday night, using streamers in front of our diffused white curtains. I had lanterns in my supply closet so we made jellyfish. And the bubbles were a mix of clear and white balloons on twine.

These were ready when the kids woke up the morning and they were mesmerised- as well as our new kitty! We also added some green streamers on the wall for seaweed, with some gold bubbles and free handed star fish and sea horse.

The kids went with dad to the fish market in the morning and had a blast– no pictures of that, sadly. When they got home they had a quick snack of seaweed– grapes on a stick.

And then we jumped right into the first craft of sea urchins. I saw this craft on Pinterest, which was supposed to be a flower. I thought it looked some kind of sea creature! We used foam balls I had around the house – which, if I did this again, I’d invest in some better/bigger foam balls. But we tried it anyway, sticking the balls with q-tips cut in half, then dyed them with colored water.

While lunch was prepared, we moved on to Chomping Sharks. I thought these were so cute. It took a bit to find the templates, but I finally found these, which worked well. They print out tiny, but it worked well for our clothes pins. I printed and cut them out, and the kids colored them. I helped them glue the sharks on the wooden pin. (The fish wasn’t glued on yet when I took this picture, but promise it looked even better.)

They did a bit of coloring before watching about 30 minutes of sea animal related videos (this and this), and then had oysters, clams and shrimp for lunch. My daughter was so happy!

We had a quick nap then it was time for snack. The kids got to make a sea scene on a graham cracker with a bit of blue icing, ground up graham crackers for sand, goldfish crackers and a couple of tiny round sprinkles for bubbles.

Then it was time to make an octopus! I love making paper chains, and we did get staplers in order to do this as easily as possible. I cut the strips in advance and the kids each took 4 legs. They couldn’t quite work the staplers, but I thought it would fit better for a toddler’s patience.

Papa was then in charge of the salt water experiment. It took a bit to get it going, but I think the kids enjoyed seeing if grapes floated in regular water, salt water, baking soda or sugar.

Soon it was time to dance like sea animals, where we ended with baby shark (of course!).

We watched Finding Nemo then played a quick fishing game before having fish tacos for dinner. Yum! Then it was bedtime– thank goodness!

The next day started with the cutest breakfast that their dad made them from frozen waffles.

Then the kids made jello from scratch in preparation for their afternoon snack. They dyed it and flavored it blue, naturally.

Craft time! We used celery to make scales on these fish. The colorful fish made it to our sea wall.

After a quick snack of green apple turtles with grape heads…

…it was time for lots of sea foam bubbles in the blow up pool. Always good for at least an hour of fun.

The kids dried off and we watched a bit about hunchback whales while we waited for the sushi to come.

Once we all had a good nap, it was time for the jello! Papa made a shark fin out of an apple covered in chocolate.

After the kids scarfed down their jello, we make turtles out of egg cartons. I thought the kids would want to paint it– but only Rush did. East used markers. I printed out the fins, then we added a pom pom head and I made little eyes.

The last of the activities was the one I was most excited. The kids dressed up (a mermaid and a shark), then we headed into a dark room for a rotating light up under the sea images.

Then we curled up to watch The Little Mermaid before our pizza dinner.

This may have been one of my favorite weekends yet. Maybe it was the anticipation, maybe it was the decoration but it really worked for me. What about you?

Quarantine Weekend Theme- Superheros

Posted on May 17, 2020 by sara

When the kids were picking themes my son came up with superheros, and my daughter readily agreed. But when it came to planning it I realised I knew very little about them. So my husband took over– and I was happy to have a weekend off. I’m not sure he enjoyed it as much as I do, but it was really fun and super creative.

After some outdoor time on Saturday, the kids, Rush, 3, and East, 5, were ready for snacktime. We started with watermelon cut like Wonder Woman’s logo. We did check my daughter’s shirt for the placement of the star!

We then did a superhero matching game that I think my husband made from scratch with images from google. (Here’s a printable one but not the one we used). Once each match was made, we learned about their backstory and each superhero’s ‘favorite food.’ Magically, those foods all showed up in our Superfood salad for lunch! (good touch, Papa, good touch.)

He kept it action packed, with a superhero puzzle perfect for toddlers. Rush loved it.

Then the kids dressed up as their favorite superheros (thankfully our costumes from Halloween last year), and we did a mini-photo shoot in front of a “green screen.” Sadly, I threw away Ti Fiti last weekend- as it was amazing we got to use it even twice- but would have been perfect for this use. So we used a blue-green duvet. My husband took a few minutes to edit a little video that the kids loved!

Here’s the video, if you want to take a look!

Then it was time for the Superfood Salad. Yummy and healthy- and the kids mostly ate it. The kids were better at remembering the Superhero’s favorites than Papa!

After a short nap (mostly for Mama), the kids had a quick Spiderman snack of strawberries.

it was time for spiderweb toss. Papa put masking tape in the doorway in a spider pattern, and the kids used tape balls wrapped in saranwrap. We tried the kids standing on the floor, on stools, and later throwing balloons.

Next was the laser maze. I saw this here and thought it was amazing. We got some 3M hooks and used red string in our entryway (hence the mess!). The kids went through it a couple of times (although I may have liked it more than they did!) .

After all of that activity, we did a couple of superhero dances we found on YouTube before watching The Incredibles (while the adults had a cocktail class).

The next morning we started early with green foam painting on the balcony, then spraying off and played in water. Always good for more than an hour of play!

Once they dried off, the kids made cookies to decorate later (gluten free for Mama). Then they created their own superheros out of pipe cleaners, paper straws and beads. I will say my husband ordered the beads for the joints and the head, so it wasn’t entirely made with things found around the house, but close.

Another naptime (mostly for Mama and Papa) and another cute snack when the kids were up. Guacamole and chips in a Hulk face and we were good to go. Usually Rush doesn’t like guac, but even he tried some.

Then it was time for Superhero bingo! Papa let me help him so I found an online printable bingo that looked cute. We already had some chips made from an alphabet bingo we did in English class (home based learning for the win!), so we were ready to go.

We were ready to decorate the cookies after that! I found some circle superhero logos for us to use as inspiration. While the adults got a bit serious about it, East made a couple of logos for her ‘Super Intelligent Girl’ that she invented that morning.

Afterwards we were going to do a dance video, but we were tired, so we moved up the schedule to watch The Incredibles 2 before eating pizza, like any normal Sunday. And we got the cookies for dessert!

It was fun and Mama’s not entirely exhausted (although Papa might be!). We also had a vote on our last two (we hope!) weekend themes… so a few more of these to go! I hope you will stick with me!

Quarantine Weekend Theme- Birthday

Posted on May 12, 2020 by sara

My daughter asked for this theme– 100% so she could have cake. I thought it was a great idea! Since I mentioned this idea I’ve heard so many families hosting half and quarter birthdays, which is also awesome.

I decided to revisit the kids’ birthday parties, East’s 5 and Rush’s 3, along with decorating the condo, making and decorating a cake. I went through our party closet and planned the weekend.

We started with Saturday snack, empanadas with dinosaur napkins and party hats from East’s Dinosaurs in the Supermarket party. We chose empanadas because they look like the backs of dinos!

Then it was time to make the cake! I recently stopped eating gluten, so my husband made me a gluten-free yellow cake, chocolate icing, with the help of the kids, of course!

Then I let the kids help me decorate our place. I picked out a few past party decorations, which added to the rainbow balloon structure that was still inflated from East’s party in March (!) and we blew up a few extra balloons for the floor.

Te Fiti from the Moana party, alone with the balloons from her most recent party.

We took a little break with a Sesame Street episode on birthdays, had lunch, then made pinatas! We had some really cute ones at East’s Taco ‘Bout It party that my Mother-in-law made, and I happened to have some small pinata frames on hand. The kids decorated them with a mix of paper and markers and had a good time.

After nap we had a snack with kitty sandwiches with kitty napkins, from East’s Black and White Kitty party when she was 2. We thankfully still had the cat shaped cutter!

Then we made the craft from that party, which was a kitty mask. I still had a lot of black cardstock on hand (I assume from this party?!) so we cut out the faces with the silhouette and I free handed the rest. We taped the spoons to the back.

After this they got to decorate the cake! This may have been the best part of the day for them. After icing and sprinkles, I pulled out some candles I had on hand, as well at some decorations I collected in Japan years ago and never used.

Then we moved on to the next craft, which were ribbon wands from East’s most recent party, the Unicorn Rainbow party. I let the kids pick extra ribbon and we tried hot glue to adhere it this time. It worked better– and I have the burned fingers to show for it! The best part of this craft was because it was so recent, all of the supplies were together. It took literally no work to pull it together.

To burn off some of the sugar, we moved on to a dance party! For Rush’s Woodland Animal party we had a dance teacher lead a dance class, but this time we just had youtube. Still, we donned the animal ears and jumped around.

While dinner came together, we read Dragons Love Tacos 1 and 2- relics from the taco party— then had tacos for dinner! They were delicious! Then we lit the candles, sang happy birthday and cut the cake.

The next morning we started early with the fun! We did a couple of hula dances (youtube again!), while wearing our leis, like at East’s Moana party when she was 3.

Then it was snack time! The kids had fruit salad in dinosaur cups, reminiscent of the Dinosaurs in the Supermarket party.

Afterwards was water play- another highlight of the weekend! At Rush’s first birthday party (Hot Air Balloons) we had a ball pit for the little ones. We re-created it with water balloons in a kids pool on the balcony. We probably could have used more water balloons to complete the effect, but the kids had fun.

After the kids were dried and dressed, we cuddled on the couch to watch another birthday related Sesame Street, ate lunch (with a bit more cake to follow) and took a nap.

When they woke up, the kids got a snack of “safety cones” and “boulders” from Rush’s ‘Can You Dig it Party?’ complete with the plates, napkins and cups.

Once they had their fill, we moved on to two crafts- both from their first birthdays. These turned out to be the biggest hits, as they didn’t really remember them! We started with maracas from East’s Taco ‘Bout It Party – fairly simple with plastic eggs, beans, disposable spoons and duct tape.

And then we did thumbprint art with ink pads and a thin point sharpie, from Rush’s Hot Air Balloon Party. Since then someone gave me a book with a ton of thumbprint doodles so we had fun trying them out.

After all of this we were supposed to have sensory digger play (from the Can You Dig It? Party) but I didn’t have it in me to make a mess. So we pulled out some glow sticks and had another dance party. The kids had never played with glow sticks before (they are supposed to be in bed before it gets dark) so it was a really fun to break them, and dance in a dark room!

Following dancing our hearts out, we watched Alice in Wonderland and ate pizza, our usual movie + dinner Sundays. The weekend was a lot of fun and did get us talking about which parties were our favorites. The kids loved all of them (awwww) but the adults were pretty clear that Moana and the Woodland Animals were a cut above the rest- even if they all had something special and fun. Let’s just hope the kids remember it this way!

Quarantine Weekend Theme- Frozen

Posted on May 5, 2020 by sara

And the fun continues! We had a long weekend with Labour Day on May 1st, so the “cold” was extended. Since we are locked inside, we had to make the most of it- for mama and the kids.

We actually started the theme on Thursday afternoon during baking time by making marshmallows. They needed an activity and we needed marshmallows! We more or less used this recipe.

On Friday we started the day with some outdoor time (dodging those who want to report kids for playing), so for snack time we had some frozen fruit- grapes, bananas and watermelon. The grapes worked the best, but the kids loved bananas.

Then the kids helped to make chocolate chip cookies. Ok, so this one was a bit of a stretch. In the first Frozen they talk about smelling chocolate, so there is that. But also, I read about this gluten-free chocolate chip cookie recipe and I was craving it all week. So it seemed like the perfect time to try it! Also, please note our themed clothing. It’s as good as we can get in hot Singapore.

While the cookies were baking, we had a Frozen dance party, some Frozen coloring, then watched one of the Frozen spin-offs.

After nap, we had Frozen dress up and Frozen yoga. Cosmic yoga is the best.

In the afternoon, I pre-cut the marshmallows for the kids to make Olaf. We used 2 circles for the body, and I tried to free-hand the head (it didn’t work out great). My husband used the left over graham cracker from the camping weekend to make Olaf’s hands and hair. We used chocolate chips for the buttons and candy corn for the nose, and used a paper straw to hold Olaf together.

We then cozied up to watch the Frozen movie before dinner and went to bed.

Saturday started with some outdoor time, a snack of fruit juice (it was supposed to be frozen fruit juice, but that didn’t happen) before we started on our toilet paper roll Olafs. My kids did kinda complain about all the Olafs, but come on- he’s the cutest! I printed out the Olaf pieces and cut them out ahead of time. I cut a piece of white paper in half and used a glue stick to add the paper to the roll. We tried to add puffs to the buttons but they didn’t really stick.

We then watched a short video on Norwegian winter sports, which was kinda fun. We did note the fun cup/bowls they used for their drinks, and saw them again when watching Frozen 2 the next day! After lunch and nap, we were at it again, making ice cream! We have an ice cream maker that has barely been used, so we made a strawberry and cream vegan ice cream.

Next was charades, like they play in Frozen 2. Since my kids are young and can’t read, I found some charades cards and printed them. My 3 year old didn’t really get it, but my daughter loved it. We kept the cards and will play again!

Our next activity was to build a castle out of sugar cubes. I made some flags with toothpicks, thinking we could wet the toothpicks and insert them, but that didn’t really work. The kids were both amused and annoyed with the sugar cubes falling over.

Before dinner we watched the short 8 minute Frozen Fever, and about the same length video on ice skating. Then dinner and bed (and the adults had a trivia night, totally unrelated to Frozen!). My husband, always the sport, also made cinnamon rolls for breakfast. Grated, they were American style and not Swedish, but they were tasty.

After a bit we got started on the morning activity of frozen painting! The night before I mixed some finger paint with water and froze them in cubes. I taped some paper on the table and put the cubes out for the kids to paint. It was a bit cold so they used their fingers mostly. (Daddy got involved, can you tell?)

Then it was water time– we set up the pool on the balcony and added “snow” bubbles. The kids happily played for more than an hour.

We watched Olaf’s adventure again while we waited for our sushi delivery (hey, it’s salmon!), and after lunch and nap, we finished up our Frozen day. Rush had hot chocolate (on ice) with our homemade marshmallows.

Afterwards we made snowflakes out of popsicle sticks. Mama hot glued colored sticks together, and added a pipe cleaner for hanging. Then the kids had fun decorating with colored glue.

Lastly, we had a Frozen sing-a-long, before watching Frozen 2 and our usual Sunday night pizza dinner.

Overall, the Frozen weekend was a lot of fun. It was long, and I was tired Sunday night (maybe still?) but it was worth it for the memories. I hope the kids agree.

Quarantine Weekend Theme- Singapore

Posted on May 3, 2020 by sara

Our themed weekends are keeping us busy, both planning wise and enacting, so we are keeping them up. I hope you find them entertaining! We decided on a Singapore theme to enjoy in some local delights, just as Singapore announced stricter lock down measures. It made procuring treats more difficult, but we still had fun with it.

We started with fruit drinks on Saturday, which was one of the first things we did when we arrived in Singapore. I remember heading to the hawker center and ordering big cups of juice for each of us. We made them at home this time, with watermelon and strawberry.

Shortly after we started making the dumplings. My kids love dumplings, so making them is a fun treat. They started with the dough, then helped to roll it out and put the filling in the little pockets.

Singapore is more than 75% Chinese, and we ended up with quite a feast, with all kinds of dumplings, a scallion pancake, veggies, and salad for mommy. The kids ate a ton and were hardly hungry for the rest of the day.

After a good nap, and a failed delivery of Singaporean snacks, we started on our first craft of making Peranakan tiles. Peranakan is the mixing of the Chinese settlers with the local Malays in what is now Singapore, and they created beautiful tiles that can be seen throughout old shop houses. I wanted to create the tile designs out of paper, but really struggled to find anyone who had done this. We ended up cutting out shapes with the silhouette and letting the kids glue them to a piece of cardstock.

After this my husband make some local mochi, called muah chee which is a little softer than Japanese mochi. Meanwhile the kids and I worked on a centrepiece for the table with red tissue paper flowers.

For dinner we did a mix of order in and making at home for the local favorite, Nasi Goreng. It’s a Malay, Indonesian, and Singapore dish that is simply delicious. And we had the muah chee, sesame and peanut for dessert.

For breakfast we had a typical Singaporean breakfast of kaya toast and egg. Usually the egg is soft boiled, but we opted for hard boiled.

Then we opened up our tiny balcony for some water play. One of our favorite things about Singapore is the plethora of fun water areas for kids around the city. Most of them are free and they offer a great way for the kids to cool off in this hot city. So the kids played in our water table, while enjoying Singapore views.

After drying off, we shared some boba tea and peanut butter pancakes (min jiang kueh). One of the things that closed just that Friday was boba tea shops, so we did make our own boba. But in the end we were able to find a shop that was able to deliver, so we had some commercial and some homemade boba.

After water play, we did another craft. We made chili crabs and merlions, both national symbols of Singapore! Both print outs are from here. I added a few more flourishes to make it fun.

Just before lunch we watched a short video on Singapore wildlife, which may have been one of the best parts of the weekend. I liked learning about the otters and birds and lizards. For lunch we had delicious Indian food. Singapore is about 7% Indian and the food here is delicious. We are so spoiled.

And per our usual Sunday afternoon activity, we watch a movie. This week it was Jungle Book. It was a good weekend, filled with yummy food. I think we would have made any Singaporean proud!