Fun Factory

This is our first time at Fun Factory. I usually set a limit on the amount of tokens/tickets/card to buy when we go to arcades, usually I start at $20 then maybe just go a little higher from there, usually not more than $30. It's enough to entertain her before we go ahead and go home or do other things.

 

It's still entertaining for her even if she's not actually operating the arcades.

 

 

Treating ourselves with Cinnabon sweets.

 

 

 

While I was shopping, RC got bored and ran to this corner and decided she wanted to dance.

 She's usually good  whenever we go out that I don't bring the stroller now at the mall. I also set a time for her playing like the arcade and then she has to help mommy buy some things.

Free / Cheap Activities for Kids

Most of our activities cost about a dollar of less. I get a lot of toys or materials second hand and for some that are new, they are usually cheap like washable paints, paper, puzzles etc.  A lot of things we use are are already things that we have even when RC was not around.

To practice social skills, we also go to free activities for kids and go to the parks around the neighborhood. I love free, yay!

sponge stamping

trying to paint her and mommy's nails (more like painting fingers)

scooping and pouring colored water

practicing our sense of touch while walking around the neighborhood

borrowing a tricycle at the park

stamping and making binoculars with toilet paper rolls

cute drawings

cardboard house

 

Get to B-Dubs this Football Season

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of Buffalo Wild Wings for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

The NFL season will be starting within the next week or so,and anyone who enjoys sports has been anticipating the start of the NFL season.  The preseason is  mostly a test of the others who may not make the final cut of team players.  So, while your significant other is engrossed n NFL football every week, there is a way that you can enjoy the day with them.  You can take the entire family to Buffalo Wild Wings.  So, not only can your family enjoy a tasty meal, but your significant other can watch live football while you’re eating.  Your kids will be happy with the menu items and Mom doesn’t have to cook, so everyone will enjoy the great meal.  So, we can all agree that we should Protect the football. Get to B-Dubs.

How else would anyone enjoy football season? Either you can stay at home and end leftover pizza or stale wings, or you can all go to Buffalo Wild Wings and enjoy time away from home and still allow someone addicted to football to enjoy being away from their computer on game day.  Another option would be to send your football crazy husband to Buffalo Wild Wings, while you stay at home and enjoy a day without football. I am guilty of being not “into” football because it was a sport I did not grow up with. I think most Filipinos like basketball games better.  It all balances out and everyone is happy.  Not only is your husband at the restaurant enjoying chicken and football, but you can be at home enjoying a quiet night with the kids.   Football season is anticipated by some, but loathed by others.  Just try to make it enjoyable for everyone by visiting your local Buffalo Wild Wings restaurant. Protect the football. Get to B-Dubs!

First Homemade Pizza

We made our first home made pizza a few days ago. It is easier than I thought but there were a lot of waiting for the dough to sit and expand.

My helper is more concerned with eating the mozarella cheese then putting the toppings on.

Before putting in the oven

After, it was good!

 

We did not follow a toppings recipe, those are not pepperoni but sliced bratwurst. I guess mixture of meaty and Hawaiian. I used to not eat olives but I eat them  now. We'll be making pizza from scratch again one of these days.

Clothes Line

I got this idea here.  I used a yarn and connected them to chairs. She loves this one and she asked to do it twice the first day and then again the next day. I initially cut shirt-shaped fabrics but she wanted more so I just cut squares. I don't think she is getting it that this is how we can dry clothes because we just use the dryer.

This is how our living room/playroom/craft room really looks like most of the time (even worse). I appreciate that I'm actually NOT the type who likes everything clean and organized all the time. If I am, I will have to pick up every 10 minutes. Hooray to be being messy!
 

Marble Painting

There are many sites who did this activity with their kids, not sure which one is original. I saw this on Pinterest.

I used washable tempura paint. It entertained RC for awhile and we did this activity twice. Today I was trying to show her an "ice melting" activity but she wasn't too attentive. It's either she loves it or she's not into it (yet).

more painting-- She seems to like writing letters using paint. I am trying to encourage her to paint things.

She can do body paints on herself and mommy too.

I am thankful for our little kitchen with old linoleum, we blow bubbles here and a lot of wet and messy things. It's what we have that is close to an outdoor space.
 

Waipio Lookout

We went here at Waipio Lookout after we went to Lapakahi State Park. The view is great. It reminds me of Pali Lookout but it's not as windy and this one is more of the ocean than land kind of view.

RC might not remember these places we have been when she gets older but I'm really hoping there will be more to come and who knows instead of interstate or interisland we might be able to go internationally too someday. Sometimes I think about going to the Philippines for months so RC will learn the language. She's been there once but she was just 18 months old then.

Indoor Activities for Kids

I found this at my list of blog posts as draft (pictures only). These pictures were taken at least over a month ago, I think a couple of them were from three months ago.


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Because little girls don't get tired of being a princess



Uncooked spaghetti noodle and Cheerios

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Coloring eggs using vinegar, water, food coloring, stickers and glitter glue. At that time, we were reading a book about Easter and RC asked me about coloring eggs so we did.

the three happy eggs

I did not want to throw the colored water away so I thought about coloring this old shirt. We took this fun to the bathroom to save our living room from being so wet... then we sprayed away.

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Playdough is an all time indoor activity at our living room. I bought this play dough tools from Amazon, I got the idea once again from the preschool class RC is attending. It just started again and soon the once a week free class might be twice a week so we might get busier.

We slowed down a lot on stamping lately, it used to be an everyday activity.

This is one activity that we did with stamping. I gave these goodie bags at the last day of preschool class months ago. I was the only one who made them for the kids. The Dora bags were left over from RC's last birthday. I gave them for girls and the sandwich bags turned into goodie bags for boys.

I thought about doing goodie bags again for first day of the preschool but I changed my mind. I don't want to overdo it and I feel that maybe I should ask the volunteer teacher first. The class is only 1.5 hours and it's filled with activities so I did not want to interrupt anything.

Finger painting became scoop and splat painting. RC doesn't like to touch the finger paint. She likes it with water color (maybe because they are not thick).


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Anyway, just to  keep up with blog journaling, yesterday we went outdoor by the pool area and blow bubbles. I saw the sprinklers and I thought that RC would love it since she likes bath time but I was wrong. I made her try it but she just stood there and wasn't enjoying so I took her inside, changed clothes, we had lunch. Then we went to the park with my friend and her daughter then to their apartment. Late in the afternoon, we went to Long's, ate at McDonald's for dinner and went to the park for a short while.

Today in the morning we met 5 other kids with their mommies/grandmommy then we went to the nearby park that is different from the one we always go to. I fed some birds. There were a lot of kids! Luckily, they are around RC's age so I was not worried too much about her being hurt. Both of us are getting a lot of sun and it's so hooot nowadays. The afternoon was mostly free play here at home and watched Veggie Tales. We're not really religious but it's RC favorite cartoons at the moment. They have cute songs.

POWOW Messenger for Android

This is a Sponsored post written by me on behalf of POWOW Messenger for SocialSpark. All opinions are 100% mine.

I used to send a lot of text messages but I slowed down a lot about 5 years ago. You may notice a lot of people still love to text and I understand why. It’s good to be connected. They say that the average teenager sends around over 3,000 text messages per month.  I’m not sure if that is a fact but that works out to around 100+ per day.  One of the reasons that so many texts are sent is because it can be difficult to send and receive messages to many people at the same time, so they send the same message repeatedly to different people.

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If you are into texting, there is a new app called POWOW Messenger for Android phones that can make text messaging much easier especially for group texting.  It can make text messaging much faster, but can appear on your home screen and show your last 20 messages.  You can also blacklist text messages so you don't receive those pesky messages that clutter up your day.  Muting notifications is no problem, and POWOW supports emoticons and Contact Pics.  You can even delete an entire string of messages with one click.  You can try POWOW Messenger for Android and see if it's right for you.  It makes text messaging much easier and more manageable.

 

I need to go back to texting and get connected again. I also need to use more apps on my phone including this one about texting. It would be fun to reconnect and learn more about technology.

Lapakahi State Park II