Flower Headbands

I had several design options for the girls but all gravitated toward this one...

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/284078688965234307/

We kept it simple, just a few different colors and patterns of ribbon and a few different colored headbands.

Simple...easy...done!

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Mother / Daughter Pajama Party

PAJAMA PARTY!!! You know any time you get a bunch of girls together in their pajamas, there is fun times to be had.

We began with pizza and pajama ballets. I handed out ballets to each person and had votes for both moms and girls. There were categories like "best animal print" "most fuzzy" "best themed" etc.

Once pizza and ballets were finished we had three games.

First:

Tin Foil Dresses

Each girl got a roll of tin foil and had to make a dress for their mom. There were some pretty wild designs.

Second:

Bedtime Relay

We divided into two teams. I set up two laundry baskets that each had a towel, a bathrobe, and a pair of slippers. One person from each team would run to the basket and put on all of the items and run back to their team then take everything off and hand it to the next person who then had to run with those items and drop them back into the laundry basket before putting them on themselves. The first team to have all of their members run wins.

Third:

Marshmallow Catch

Each girl would toss marshmallows to their mom who had to catch them with a bowl. Whomever has the most marshmallows in their bowl after 30 seconds wins.

Finally, each of the girls gave their moms the necklaces they made for them. I also handed out awards to everyone based on the voting earlier.

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Mother's Day Gifts

I have some really creative girls. Giving them free reign over their project can be both scary and exciting at the same time. We decided to make necklaces for their moms to give them at our Mother/Daughter activity. I had a variety of beads and a few examples of what they could do and asked them to keep in mind that these were for their mom and not themselves but basically make what you want. We had some pretty amazing creations come out of it.

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Easter Scrap Wreaths

Decorating for any holiday can be fun. Personal touches are even better. Since it was coming up on Easter, I wanted to do something both easy and pretty. Easter scrap wreaths seemed the perfect idea. The instructions can be found on pinterest here:

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/518758450802893792/

I cut all the fabric ahead of time so all that had to be done was tie the fabric strips to the wreath hoops. The one that I did was like the instructions and it took me about 2.5 hours to do. After learning how long it would take to make, I decided to have my girls do much smaller ones. None of them finished while we were together but they took them home and finished them on their own.

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Gardening (again)

There were a few activities that I did with the older girls when were split into two groups. We have since recombined into one group and the older girls have either graduated into Young Women's or have moved away. This gives me an opportunity to revisit some activities and do a bit better the second time around.

In my home, early spring means preparing the garden. We weed and lay down compost and once it gets warm enough, we start planting. Learning how to garden is a very important part of both food storage and self reliance. It is important to begin learning these skills at an early age. Even if you live somewhere that does not have a yard, potted plants can produce quite a bit of produce while only taking up a small space.

I made a gardening book for my girls to take home and use for a reference. If printed front to back, the pages should be in the right order. The link for the gardening book and cover are below.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6-SGz_Y1u-jY0FsbHM2TUwyTUk/view?usp=sharing
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6-SGz_Y1u-jcGZ4U3p4RTFpWmc/view?usp=sharing

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Star Gazing

Constellations have always fascinated me. I love to look up at the stars and see all the shapes and admire the beauty Heavenly Father created in the sky. I have a pretty good telescope that I really hoped to use with the girls but light contamination pretty much ruined that for us, so we did what we could with what we were given.

I found several kid friendly websites that showed pictures of some of the more well known constellations. We looked at pictures and talked about where they could be found in the sky and during what time of year. We then played a matching game to see how well they remembered them.

The girls had a blast and were excited to go outside and search. They bundled up in their coats and I gave them cups of cocoa and out we went to search the heavens.

I gave each of the girls cards with the constellations for them to reference and they made a bit of a competition of who could find what first.

I think we will have to do this again, but meet somewhere  there is far less light so we can use the telescope.

Link for the flash cards can be found here:
http://liebacklookup.com/for-a-limited-time-constellation-cards-free-printable/

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Valentines for the Single Senior Sisters

Like our mini pumpkin activity back in October, we wanted to something else special for the senior widows. Since any time I bring out colorful paper, scissors, markers, stickers, glue sticks, and glitter paint, the girls go crazy, I thought I would put that crazy to good use. I pretty much laid all the stuff out on a table and let them go to town. By the end of the night we had about twenty valentines for me to hand out. They were a big hit with the single senior sisters.

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