Printable Children's Spring Stories: Excerpt from "A Little Dutch Maid of New York"/Google Books

A Little Dutch Maid of New York by Eleanor Lee, free and in public domain. To print, right click on the image of the pages and "save as'.

Two downloadable children's books about Dutch families:

Story of Little Jan the Dutch Boy

Windmills and Wooden Shoes

Saving Money at the Thrift Stores

This is a good time to check out the thrift stores; people are cleaning out their closets. We brought a load of outgrown clothes and toys to a local thrift yesterday, and decided to do some shopping as well. I was able to find some light jackets, girl's winter pajamas(for next year), new-with-tags tops(Target and The Children's Place, long sleeved for next year) for my daughter, and a few summer T-shirts and Khaki shorts for my teenage son. I spent about $45.00 for 27 items(20% off with frequent donate card).

Sometimes I find next to nothing at the thrift stores, and other times it seems I've hit the mother load. To be successful, I have to check frequently. In the end, I save quite a bit of money on clothing and household goods. This goes a long way toward creating a savings cushion and extra money for vacations.

Heralds of Spring and the Season of Lent

From my garden. These Lenten purple hyacinths come back year after year, and are so fragrant. I've made some lovely cologne spray with these simply by soaking the blossoms in some alcohol.

Easy DIY Clothing Iron-ons

I've got these ideas on the top of my wish list(time, energy, motivation) for crafts to try in 2011:

Iron on decals from plastic shopping bags- brillant!(image pictured is from tutorial)

How to Print a Design Onto a Shirt Using Sandpaper

Crayon T-Shirts

I think these Iron-ons would be a super solution to cover children's clothing stains, or just jazz up a plain cotton t-shirt.

Grades K-12 Free Printable Short Classic Literature Excerpts with Worksheets and Audio(Human-read MP3)

Click on banner, grades K-12 available. My son has been working through the chapter excerpts from Frank Baum's The Wizard of Oz(seventh grade). This is a little break from our regular curriculum, and these free literature arts printables are just perfect for a change of pace.

I've added the banner to my sidebar.

Printable Short Story and Paper Dolls: Little Journeys to Faraway Lands - Norway

From Primary Plans, February 1909. Click here to print story, pages 16-17. Right click on image of the book pages and and "save as". Read-a-loud for the very young, readable by older children.

Norwegian paper dolls to color here.

How to Remove a Stripped Screw with a Rubberband

We had this problem drilling into thick pieces of wood. I can't wait to try this bit of advice on a table that I messed up with some stripped screws.

See here for tutorial.

DIY Aviary from an Old Storage Furniture Piece

See here for instructions.

(Image from link)

Make Your Own Rustic Floor Lamp

I've been thinking about making one of these beam floor lamps for the family room. Light kits are relatively inexpensive, and a post is easy to come by at a big box store, or maybe at a thrift store. We do have some reclaimed wood stores in a nearby city; however, their prices are more than I'd like to pay for rustic. See post here(image from link).

Family

My sister and her family came to visit this week. We had a great time touring the area with them.




Pictured: The Casement Museum at Fort Monroe and Jamestown.

Primary Drawing Lessons, Learning Angles: Triangles and Rectangles

Primary Plans 1908, drawing lessons: triangles and rectangles, pages 8-10. To print or save, right click on the image of pages at link, and "save as".

Our Pet Snails

MyPetSnail.com, a cute site for young children who want to learn more about keeping garden snails as pets.

It was a warm day today, so we ventured out to pick tiny snails from underneath some rocks in the garden for our vivarium. I found this nice glass bowl(our vivarium) at the thrift for a quarter. I ended up cutting out the plastic in the top(pictured), kept the elastic, and attached some cheese cloth. After a few hours, these little snails were making stinky smells. I added some charcoal to the bottom to absorb odors. I lined the bottom with moss from the backyard, and added a pot shard for them to hide under.

To see snails, click to enlarge picture. Two were pretty active in the early evening, exploring the tank, much to the delight of my daughter. I have a feeling we may lose these little guys in the house! Tomorrow I show her a shallow rectangular plastic container which will be their assigned playground when out of their home.

Eighty-one Free Classical Piano Music Downloads

Beautifully played - 81 free selections via iTunes or MP3 and WMA(and sheet music). I listened to Debussy's Moonlight and Listz, Hymn of the Awakening while raking leaves today...off to download more.

Free Children's Audio Story and Paper Dolls: Cinderella

Professionally narrated from England with read-a-long at website here. To download right click on the download link at site and "save as".

Click on image to enlarge and save/print(source here).

Another vintage Cinderella paper doll set here.

How to Sharpen Your Own Garden Pruners

It's that time again - time to prune the shrubs, bushes, evergreens, and trees. An easy tutorial on sharpening your pruners here.

Free Children's Audio Story and Paper Dolls: Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

This free 30 minute MP3 from Candlelight Stories Audio for Kids is professionally narrated and sung with an original musical score and sound effects, a very nice freebie. You can listen to it as streaming audio and/or download it(right click on MP3 link and "save as"). I had to use a download manager(free) because of my slow connection.

Printable vintage Snow White paper doll
set(source here- larger images) and another here.









Click on images to enlarge.

Free Audio Podcasts: Journeys Into American History Podcast(Dramatized) - Old Time Radio

Journeys Into American History Podcast via KidsLearnOutLoud.com.

These have really good sound quality. You can listen online to streaming audio or download(right click on links at the site and "save link as").