Play Dough and Printing...

Things have been a little hectic in our household the last few weeks. School was coming to a close, Anna was home with Dad during the day and home with me at night, we have been getting prepared for our Italy trip along with preparing to leave Anna for 10 days straight. It takes a lot of preparation to send your kid to two different locations with all the necessary things for day to day living. Thanks to Granny, Grandpa, T-ma and J-paw for agreeing to keep Anna! Along with all the business in my family, my good friend Libby had her third child, Jack, who was a little early and has been in the NICU for about a week, so we have been preparing meals and visiting her in the hospital. All in all, we have been a little busy, with very little time to post...so those of you who have been waiting...if there are any of you who have, ( I hate to be presumptuous)...my apologies.

The last few days have slowed down a little, and I have been trying to get a concept of having a two ( almost ) year old at home for the summer. Needless to say, I have decided we need some things to do. : ) A few days ago, I found some print pads that I bought when she was a baby to makes prints of her hands and feet. I was very excited and thought...craft time! She had a great time, but this was a bad idea. This ink is not the kind that washes off. After scrubbing relentlessly in the bathtub, she still had pink hands. See pictures for proof.
I needed some other things that were not quite so messy or permanent. So yesterday, I mentioned play dough to Anna, and she freaked out. She was super excited! Apparently they play with play dough at school. SO, I was going to go buy it, and thought, NO, I am going to try something new and make it. We looked online and got a recipe and ran to the grocery store to get some cream of tarter and finger paint ( that is for another project and post ) and came home to tackle making play dough. So, I guess because my experience with home made play dough is the stuff you get at VBS that is not the cooked kind ( probably because hot stoves and Pre-K don't mix ). You know, the grainy and dried and cracked kind. So, when I followed this SUPER easy recipe where you cook it on the stove and it smelled, looked and felt exactly like the kind you buy, I WAS ECSTATIC! I felt like super mom. It was a nice moment. : ) Anyway, here is a video of Anna playing with the play dough. It is a little long, but there are moments you must notice. One: the new phrase, All Gone...which sounds like dalldonn. LOVE IT! Second, resiting the colors. Her little voice is too cute. Third, watching her actually create something. There is a small moment towards the middle of the video that she takes two pieces of red play dough and puts them on top of another piece of larger red play dough and it looks like some kind of animal. She then makes it hop across the table. I loved getting her imagination on film. My apologies for the dark look of it all...it didn't look that dark when we were filming it.

We will be walking the streets of Rome one week from now. We will definitely share stories and pics when we return. Have a great week!