Nose Whistles

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Although nose flutes have respectable traditions throughout the world, the plastic nose whistles sold as novelty items just gotta make you smile.  I don’t know why these came to mind yesterday as I was telling the kids a bedtime story, but the nose whistle became a central part of the story, and I promised the kids I would show them a video of one today.  And I was truly surprise by what I found.  But then again, not.  The Internet can be awesome like that.  Anyway, hard to watch these without smiling.

“God Only Nose” video  (I mean seriously?!  The title alone.  I told my husband if we weren’t already happily married, I’d marry this guy based solely on this video.)

Mozart’s “Magic Nose Flute”

“Bear Necessities”

“Africa”

 

 

 

 

Which led me on a tangent to all sorts of cool instruments.  YouTube can sometimes get a bit depressing, but, Wow!  There are such talented people out there posting.

Check out this guy performing “You’re a Mean One Mr. Grinch” and “Evenin’ “ with this rockin’ trumpet funnel kazoo, which I first saw here

Fabric Gift Wrap

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I am ALL about fabric gift wrap!  And having just been through the holiday gift opening, I’m going to highlight some of my favorite things about using fabric, instead of paper:

–It’s SO easy to wrap with fabric bags!
–No need to shop for wrapping paper every year.
–No need to store bulky, awkward wrapping paper rolls and tape.
–SO much better for the environment!  (especially when using upcycled cloth)
–WAY less mess!  (Can’t emphasize this enough.)
–SO easy and compact to store
–Looks quaint, creative, and homey

For me, using fabric gift wrap has been a gradual process, and I think that’s important to remember.  It’s awesome if you can make/purchase a whole stash of fabric gift wrap/bags all at once and dive in, but that wasn’t the case for me.  It started with small fabric gift bags people had used to gift me presents.  Then, I sewed a few of them one year.  And a few the next.  This year, I finally had the time to round out our stash quite a bit, which is probably why I’m on a fabric gift wrap mission right now.  It was so amazing to not deal with paper or tissue paper.  Not only for the mess factor, but for my environmentalist-self as well.  My heart sinks whenever I see piles of wrapping paper.

I also think this would be an awesome fundraiser for a school.  What a fun project to teach kids basic sewing (these bags can be very simple), to teach them and their families about reducing and reusing, and to help them get started on that journey.

I highly recommend giving fabric wrap a try, even if it’s only a little bit at a time.  Keep your eyes out for fabric bags throughout the year, and collect them with your gift wrapping supplies.  If you do sew, even if you’re a beginner, sewing fabric gift bags is EASY.  As with any project, you can make things more complicated if you’d like, but the basic idea is an easy one.  Collect fabric bits, old sheets, even old tee-shirts to use for sewing a simple bag.  My favorite fabric gift bag to make is a drawstring bag, but I don’t always find the time to make these.  Making fold-over bags for gift wrap is super easy, but sometimes I just sew a simple bag shape and tie a ribbon around the top.  Some people will even just use a piece fabric cloth to wrap with and use fancy folding methods.  These are beautiful to see, but the process is something I don’t have the patience to master right now.

Whichever method you use, I highly, highly recommend the switch!

**St. Nick comes to pick up some of our fabric bags at the beginning of December to take to Santa for that year’s gifts.**

ALL our holiday wrap in one small, little stack!

Other alternatives to wrapping paper:
Magazine Gift Wrap
Food Box Gift Bags
Upcycled Paper Stockings

Mysteries for Kids

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As I mentioned in this post, our daughter has been all about mysteries lately.  As a kid I used to love reading mystery books.  I read Agatha Christie novels when I was probably far younger than I’d want my kids to do so.  I enjoyed any and all mysteries.  But in recent years, I just can’t do the murder mysteries.  At all.  Perhaps it’s being older and having heard real-life tragic stories.  I just can’t bear to read or watch a story about anything scary or gruesome.  But that doesn’t mean I have to write off mysteries completely.  I love that my daughter has helped me re-connect with this genre.  I’ve been searching for detective activities and kid-friendly mysteries, and here’s my collection so far:

–This is a great collection of  Observation Ideas.  I thought our 8-year old would be really into the activity of observing a scene and noting the changes, but it was actually our 3-year old who took this activity and ran with it.


–I am pretty particular about what our kids are allowed to watch, but The Inbestigators on Netflix has my Stamp of Approval.  Four cute/sweet kids solving mysteries around their town and school (Well, mostly just one of them solving) and culprits who show remorse.  Interesting cases and the whole family can enjoy.


—The Mysterious Benedict Society  by Trenton Lee Stewart
Our daughter first read this two summers ago, and we’ve re-read this together too many times to count.  It’s been a favorite of mine for many years, so I was super excited to see how much she loves it.  (There are at least four other books in the series!)


—Mysteries According to Humphrey by Betty Birney
(Oddly, of all the other mystery references we’ve seen, this was the one that triggered our daughter’s fascination with mysteries.  Gotta love Humphrey.)  I haven’t read this one, but the kids seem to love it.


—Stories to Solve – Folktales from Around the World
These are some of my FAVORITE kinds of puzzles/mysteries/brainteasers.  They’re short and clever and timeless.  (I do censor some of these or tweak them, depending on the story.). We also checked out Still More Stories to Solve from our library, so I’m assuming there are at least three of these.


–The Mystery of King Karfu by Doug Cushman
Detective Seymour Sleuth and his assistant, Muggs, must make their way to Egypt to solve the case of the missing Stone Chicken!
This light-hearted mystery has lots of interesting and funny details in the illustrations and story.  I love that it involves the reader in looking at clues and decoding puzzles to help crack the case.  (Check your library or local used bookstore first, but here’s a YouTube reading someone did)


—Sophie Mouse:The Great Big Paw Print by Poppy Green
Our kids love the Sophie Mouse books, and I do too!  In this one, Sophie and her friends work together to find out the cause of some curious mysteries around Pine Needle Grove.

(CHECK BACK–STILL ADDING FROM OUR CURRENT STACK OF MYSTERY BOOKS)

You may also be interested in:
Spy Day

Easter Bread

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I made this bread decades ago, back when I found it in my Family Fun magazine as a teenager. (Yes, I was that kind of teen.)   Anyway, I came across a photo of it recently and had to make it this year.  What a fun bread!  First of all, you get to braid it, so my daughter was very excited by this part.  It’s also a sweet bread.  AND it has eggs buried/tucked into it.  How awesome is that!  To top it off, we added our hippie, natural sprinkles on top.  Very yummy treat and a great tradition for Easter day.

I used the old recipe from the 1990s Family Fun magazine, but there are many, many similar ones online.

April Fools

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I used to seriously dread April Fools’ Day, especially when I was a teacher.  I really don’t like when people just tell fibs on this day and call it an April Fools’ joke. I also really dislike pranks that are mean or a huge mess or environmentally-wasteful.  I do, however, appreciate punny/silly jokes like these:

–Google lets you put a 3D animal into a scene on your phone or for pictures.  The kids thoughts these were great fun last year.

–I cut up a bunch of “E”s from brown paper and told the kids I was bringing out a tray of “Brown E”s.  (Be sure to have the real thing after the joke. =)

–This year, the kids loved giving their Dada a mysterious packet labeled “bagel seeds” that instructed him to leave them in a tray by a window sill.  “No watering or soil necessary!” they wrote.  “Bagels will grow in 2 hours!”  The seeds were Cascadian Os cereal, and when Dada left the room, we quickly switched these out with hidden bagels I had purchased ahead of time.

(This one could also work with “doughnut seeds.”)

–I also love the good ol’ dessert dirt in a pot.  I make the cookie part only from these homemade Oreos, with a lot less bother on presentation, of course.  Then we blend them into crumbs and mix with homemade vanilla pudding.  Yum!  Gummy worms are fun too, but we couldn’t find any this year.

Instead, our daughter decided to include an instruction tag that said we could tell if the soil was still “good” by tasting it.

 

And here are some April Fools’ jokes I haven’t tried, but sounded cute:

–Switching your kids into one another’s beds, if they’re heavy sleepers.

–Writing “April Fools!” on the toilet paper that they will unwind.

–Stick googly eyes on fruit or lunchbox foods.

–Switch out morning cereal in box with another kind or with popcorn or Legos, etc.

 

Even our 3-year old got into making up his own pranks this year.  He insisted on hanging some long strands of yarn on the wall for Dada to see.  Then he instructed Dad to leave the room while he cut the strings to be very short.  Sneaky little guy.  ha

Anyway, I’m glad that now as a parent I’ve found an appreciation for this first day of April.  The kids get so excited to play these good-natured pranks.  Instead of seeing it as I used to, a day of feeling gullible or hearing about mean pranks, I see it as a day to be goofy and have fun.  That kind of foolishness for a day sounds pretty good to me.