PLAY – Page 3 – the MAD creative

BUTTERFLY SNACKS

Post author:Ashley
Post published:November 13, 2015
Post category:FOOD KIDS PLAY
Post comments:1 Comment

Truth: Mya’s napping and I should totally be making food for her birthday party tomorrow or cleaning the house… or sleeping. But I’d rather blog about the silly butterfly snacks we made for her preschool class. Priorities, am-i-right?! Yesterday was Mya’s 3rd Birthday(!) and she had school for a couple hours in the morning. We wanted to bring treats, and her teacher requested something besides sugary cupcakes or cookies to make her job easier. (Hey, I get it!) So we opted for some of Mya’s favorite foods: grapes and cheese (and popcorn on the side.) And since Mya loves herself some butterflies, here’s what went down…

(more…)

PLANNING a BLUE SPARKLY BIRTHDAY PARTY

Post author:Ashley
Post published:October 20, 2015
Post category:DESIGN KIDS LOVE PLAY
Post comments:1 Comment

Mya turns 3 in less than a month and she definitely has more opinions in the party planning than the past two birthdays. Whenever I drop her off at preschool, she usually has a request, such as “Please get me chocolate milk and applesauce at the store.” But recently, the requests have been centered around her blue sparkly birthday party theme: “I think I need a blue sparkly bow for my party” or “I want all my friends to dance with me” or “We’re going to paint at my party… but don’t worry, we won’t make a mess” or “Everyone will wear blue!” So yeah. She definitely has inputed some ideas and I love how she’s so into it. I’m also pumped as to the ease of planning a one color themed party!

(more…)

PONY BEAD SUN CATCHERS

Post author:Ashley
Post published:September 27, 2015
Post category:KIDS PLAY PROJECTS
Post comments:4 Comments

With little effort, these turned out pretty cool. I won’t lie, though: They sat on our counter for a good month before I finally sanded them down and drilled a hole in each. But hey, they’re done now and oh so colorful. They’re similar to the perler bead bowls that we did earlier this year, except they’re semi-transparent which makes for some great sun catchers!

(more…)

MYA’S ROOM

Post author:Ashley
Post published:April 20, 2015
Post category:DESIGN HOME KIDS PLAY
Post comments:2 Comments

Welcome to Mya’s room. As she is growing up way too fast and her room will also be ever-changing, it’s fun to document her little space. It’s difficult for me to pinpoint a specific “theme” for the room, except that it’s filled with color and feel-good things. Many items are from my childhood and we were able to save a lot of money on furniture. Her crib is from Ikea and the white cabinet/ shelving unit was given to us. Every picture, blanket, and stuffed animal is meaningful to us and probably won’t be to you; but we hope you enjoy the tour nonetheless!

(more…)

GLOW JAR

Post author:Ashley
Post published:February 23, 2015
Post category:KIDS PLAY
Post comments:1 Comment

This is by far the easiest little activity you will ever do in your life. Mya loves a good glow stick dance party, so we added a few more ingredients to make a glow jar.

(more…)

HEART DAY HIGHLIGHTS

Post author:Ashley
Post published:February 15, 2015
Post category:KIDS LOVE PLAY
Post comments:1 Comment

Everyone familiar with the movie “Tangled” (ie Rapunzel)? Ok, good. Well, when Mya woke up to her “heart attack” on Valentines’ Day, she claimed the “mean lady” came into her room and put the hearts there. Because in “Tangled”, the “mean lady” steals baby Rupunzel from her MamaDada when everyone is sleeping. So yeah, I don’t think the toothfairy’s going to go over very well.

The original plan was to have a bunch of “blue lizards”– currently some of Mya’s imaginary friends, along with a lion that has stinky armpits. But as it turned out, cutting irregular shapes out of thick poster board isn’t a walk in the park! So we cut out some hearts, slapped some painters’ tape to the back and underwent super stealth mode to place them in her room Friday night. (more…)

SALAD SPINNER PAINTINGS

Post author:Ashley
Post published:February 5, 2015
Post category:KIDS PLAY
Post comments:0 Comments

Am I the only one that wants it to snow a boatload? I just want to get out and play in some snow! But I digress… “Salad spinner paintings” are exactly what you think. We put paint in a salad spinner and let it do its magic. Yup, we’re getting pretty ~~desperate~~ creative over here. Some of it turned into finger painting, but still fun!

(more…)

CRAYON HEART VALENTINES

Post author:Ashley
Post published:January 7, 2015
Post category:KIDS LEARN PLAY PROJECTS
Post comments:0 Comments

Recently, Mya hasn’t wanted to leave the house. “Stay home” is her most common demand. The cold weather makes it pretty easy to stay in and play, but we’ve been “forced” to do more small projects to prevent cabin fever. One of those projects was making crayon hearts. It might be a bit too early to think about Heart Day, but we made some Valentines’ anyway. Plus, they don’t have to be for any special occasion– just for everyday play.

(more…)

KEEPSAKE ORNAMENT DRAWINGS

Post author:Ashley
Post published:December 7, 2014
Post category:KIDS LEARN PLAY
Post comments:0 Comments

Another easy craft project comin’ atcha– a small, yet super sweet Christmas ornament:

(more…)

MYA’S 2nd BIRTHDAY

Post author:Ashley
Post published:November 19, 2014
Post category:KIDS LOVE PLAY
Post comments:0 Comments

For Mya’s flower-themed 2nd Birthday party, it was a day full of love and light (and a little bit of snow!) We hope you enjoy a look into Mya’s fun day! It all started with the invites:

(more…)

ROAD TRIPPIN’ : SCHAAKE’S PUMPKIN PATCH

Post author:Derek
Post published:October 20, 2014
Post category:KIDS PLAY
Post comments:2 Comments

We’ve had Halloween fever ever since acquiring Mya’s costume (check out her sneak preview), so we’d been planning a family adventure to the pumpkin patch. With weekends quickly filling up with activities, we decided an impromptu Monday evening road trip was in order. We had heard about a few good area spots, but the ones we knew of were either closed during the week or too far for a weeknight trip. Luckily, we came across Schaake’s Pumpkin Patch, a splendid family farm outside of Lawrence, KS.

(more…)

COLORFUL THINGS KIT

Post author:Ashley
Post published:October 11, 2014
Post category:KIDS LEARN PLAY
Post comments:0 Comments

I’ll just admit it… Mya’s not too good with her colors. Everything was “boo” and now it’s “yeh-woh.” So in the effort to not feel like I’m failing as a parent, we made a color kit. (We also made one for her friend Paiy, which you’ll see in some of the pictures below.) It was super easy and inexpensive (under $10) to make.

(more…)