This weeks theme for You Capture was perfect, I knew exactly when I would get the photos: when we headed to the beach. Of course the rain came, but we quickly saved our plans by deciding to go to the aquarium!

I was browsing through my old drafts when I ran across this post I never published. This was written a long time ago, I’m guessing in 2009 or 2010. I almost just deleted it, but then I opened it and smiled at the memories. It also inspired me to talk to you about how going through unfinished drafts is a great way to get inspiration when you have Writer’s Block.

The Old Post

I love to listen to my little boy talk. I love to dwell on his silly yet serious words. Here are some snippets of some of the things I have heard him say just recently.

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Mr. Z: Orange Monkey, there a orange monkey.
I look at him as he lay on the changing table wearing his orange shirt.
Me: An orange monkey?  I think I see this orange monkey! I think you are the orange monkey. (I start to tickle him.)
Mr Z:  giggle

***

As I set Zarek down to play Zane starts yelling, “Zarek need bottle! Zarek need bottle!” In hopes that Zarek may not be allowed to play with “Zane’s” toys.

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I love to listen to him sing with his music in his car seat as we drive down the road.

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Zane was climbing all over the chair in our living room. He was saying, “We need our mouse-ka-tools, We need our mouse-ka-tools, Ohh, Tootles!!” (If you are not an avid toddler TV watcher then you may not know this is from the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse aka Zane’s Favorite Show.)

***

At the doctor’s office we were looking at the fish, which Zane loves to do. Zane points to a big fish, “Daddy Fish”. He points to a smaller fish, “Mommy Fish”. He has been doing this for a month now with everything, but then he pointed to another smaller fish, “Andrea Fish”. Andrea is my best friends who Zane adores. LOL

Any car we pass that isn’t our car he goes, “Andrea’s car”. It can be any color, any size and it’s still, “Andrea’s car.”

The Challenge

If you are staring at your computer and you don’t know what to write about go into your old drafts. Don’t just look at the titles, open up the whole post and read them. You may not find a post that is just ready to hit publish on, but you may find a post that you can add to or edit and post. You may even look at an old post and get a completely new idea from it.

The idea is that reading your old writing may bring back a previous passion for blogging you had forgotten about.

How many old drafts do you have that you have never published? Have you ever published a post from years ago before?

Last week I shared 5 Basic Android Apps you must have. This week we will be talking about 5 great preschool apps that you will want to add to your phone or tablet for your kids.

Zane, my 4 year old, has sleeping problems and for a while he was waking up at 3am. We tried everything we could do to try and get him back to sleep, but it just wasn’t working. To the point of exhaustion we gave up and would take him downstairs and snuggle with him as he watched cartoons. But when we got our first tablet, I had a great idea. Instead of taking him downstairs I would let him play games on my Galaxy Tablet while snuggling in bed.

Kid Mode

If you are going to add one kids game to your phone or tablet Kids Mode is the one to add! You enter your child’s date of birth and the app will pull games and videos from all over the web that are age appropriate for your child. You will get games and videos from Disney, Nickelodeon, PBS, YouTube and more. The only thing you have to remember is you do have to have a internet connection for this game to work

Toddler Lock

This was one of the first apps I ever put on my phone. This is aimed more at younger children, but even Zane likes to play with it sometimes. This app locks your buttons so your children cannot accidentally get into something you don’t want them to. Toddler Lock then lets them draw in colorful lines and shapes and as they draw your phone or tablet will make pretty bell tones. This is great for even the littlest of children you trust with your phone.

Zebra Paint

This is one of the first painting app I added to my phone and it has been one of my sons favorites. I’ve tried other coloring apps, but really this has been the best. I thought that changing the colors would be complicated for Zane, but he proved me wrong. With this paint program you just pick your picture, your color and then each section fills with color as you touch it. Zane has a habit of enjoying coloring the whole page one color.

Kids Connect the Dots

This is a great app to help your child work on there numbers and counting. I like this companies other apps, though the lite versions are more obvious on their limitations. On the alphabet one you only get up to letter H. I’m really considering buying the full version of these.

5 Pumpkins

This isn’t just one app but a series of apps that are just great! They may not be as flashy as Kids Connect the Dots but Five Pumpkins apps are full from A to Z. These were the first educational apps I had on my phone and I love that they grow with the children. They have very basic beginner skills like colors and shapes but they also do letters and numbers and then they have sight words and days of the week and months!

Grow Free

I didn’t want to just give you educational apps for our kids, it’s good to offer them some fun sometimes too. We actually have the full version of Grow, but we got it free on the Amazon App Store. Zane has a fishing game he likes too, but I asked him which he liked best and he said he likes grow the best. You basically move your fish around the fishbowl eating fish that are smaller than you and avoid bigger fish. As you eat fish you grow and once you are big enough you can start eating the bigger fish.

Monkey Preschool Lunchbox ($1.99)

This is a pay only app, again we got it free from the Amazon App Store, but I really like it. It’s a mixture of different kids on matching, color, number games. Every time you get the answer right the monkey will jump and eek at you. I think one reason I like this app is that it also works on listening skills. You have to listen to what you need to do at each level. This is something I’m really working on with Zane.

Conclusion

I hope you find these apps useful and enjoy teaching your children through a great tool as your phone or tablet. Let me know how your children enjoy these apps too! Next week I will be sharing some more apps so if you want to stay connected you can subscribe to PepperScraps in your reader or you can get it straight to your email subscribe to PepperScraps by email!

What are some of the apps you have tried with your kids? Do you have a favorite app? I would love to have some more for Zane!

I remember making these no bake cookies with my mom when I was little. Of course we just made them we didn’t associate them with Dinosaurs. I loved how Stacie renamed these cookies and gave each ingredient a creative dino twist. You can check out her recipe here: Dinosaur Snacks: Yummy and Icky Treat.

Ingredients: Sugar (crushed bones), Butter (fat), Oatmeal (Dead Grass), Peanut Butter (Dead Bugs), Cocoa (Dirt), & Milk w/Green Food Color (Swamp Water)

The boys took turns adding ingredients

I quickly boiled the sugar, butter, cocoa, and milk

The boys spooned out the cookies (though halfway I had to take over)

Zane practiced his letters while we waited for them to cool

They loved these cookies! My husband super duper loved them! I was surprised to find each cookie only 128 calories and way worth it!

Do you have a creative recipe that you do with your kids? Have you seen a cute food recipe you want to do with you kids?

At the end of last year I was doing one of my favorite little series, A Craft A Day. But life got busy, as it usually does around Christmas, and the series had to be put aside. But I’m bringing it back!

A Craft a Day gives you five activities that you can enjoy with your kids, one for each day of the week. Some weeks may have a theme and some may not but either way we are going to have some fun together. Most of these activities work well for preschoolers, but you may be able to adapt them for your toddler.

I will post them on Saturdays so you can use the weekend to get any supplies that you may need.

ABCs

I’m working on a letter based curriculum with Zane, so each week will be based on a letter of the alphabet.

Week one will be all about the letter A. We will be doing lots of Apple activities. Week two will be the letter B and we will be doing butterflies and bug activities! And we will go all the way through the alphabet.

Subject of the Day

Zane and I will also be focusing on a subject each day.

• Monday: Kitchen Day
• Tuesday: Bible Day
• Wednesday: Science Day
• Thursday: Art Day
• Friday: Extra Credit

You don’t have to worry about subjects but I figure when you see the activities you may see a pattern.

Are you Supermom?

Now I’m not supermom and I don’t expect you to be either. We don’t always get to each activity, sometimes life is just too busy.

Hopefully you may try one or two of these activities with me and my kids! You don’t have to do every single one. You don’t have to be doing preschool with your child.

I just hope to give you a resource for some great fun with your kids!

Be Featured

If you do any of these crafts and happen to take a picture or write a blog post about it please make sure and share your link in the comments. Also don’t forget to link the original crafter! I may feature you and your blog  on the following weeks post!

• Watching everyone wait, on Mother’s day, as the mommy duck led her ducklings across the road
• A day of shopping and love from my men
• A pair of pants that fit and I like
• Finding a new place I can eat on my diet
• enjoying the quiet in the house while Granny has the boys
• Being at an amazing Bible Study and enjoying being with other ladies!
• I am a child of God!
• a red throated bird who sat outside my door in the rain long enough for me to catch a picture of him
• Finding something healthy one of my boys will eat.
• Saving the boys from a snail and getting a good laugh.
• Sunshine
• Watching the boys pretending to be fishing in the back yard.
• Little tiny wildflowers in my untamed flower gardens
• Little boys being monkeys
• A clean fridge
• Doctors and Nurses willing to work in such a hard field as a children’s oncology floor
• He is the great physician
• The ability to pour out our hearts to Him and know that we don’t need to know all the answers because He does
• Healing

What are some of the gifts you received this week?

You may have read my post last week and you may not have. I want to share with you this weekend some of the gifts I have received from our gracious and amazing God. There have been so many that this list is incomplete, but I want to share with you some of the things I have given thanks for.

• Little boy pretending that his sweatshirt is “High Shining Armor” running around with a fake helmet on.
• Looking back at a video from March 2nd and seeing the weight that I have lost!
• The bushes in front just about to bloom and share that amazing aroma that they give off when they open.



• The sunshine coming to warm up the afternoon and free the boys from the house.
• A chance to trust a little boy to take photos and enjoy the cute things he chose to capture (with his finger in each photo)
• Random playdates with the neighbor
• Little brother repeating what big brother says and does no matter what.
• An evening drive to get ice cream
• Watching the sunshine creep down our fence waiting for it to touch our yard and let the boys free
• Watching littlest slide down the stairs on his tummy to “run” to get his treat
• Licking the beater
• A MIL who gives hubby and I a date night
• Listening to big brother tell little brother all about the things he’s imagining them doing.
• Big brother teaching little brother a new word, “Owl”
• A sweet call from my husband giving me an early mother’s day present.

What are some of the gifts you received today?

I was reading a dear friends blog. Kari’s blog is in my “must read” folder on my reader, that is overflowing with too much too read, so that I don’t miss a post.

For this I’m so thankful for. For the other day she was writing about a book she was reading, One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp.

For some reason I was thinking it was a devotional. Some reason I felt like I needed a devotional even though bible study was starting in only a week or so. But the way my friend described the book pulled me in and I quickly added it to my kindle wishlist and as soon as TJ came home I asked if I could buy it.

I was surprised to find that it was more of an autobiography, but her prose pulled me in quickly. When I figured out the meaning behind the title I wanted to know more. I wanted to know how she did it. I wanted to count my own gifts. I wanted her experience of seeing the world in a new light.

Then I started to count my gifts and my heart lightened and my world brightened.

Driving home from a job that is hard on my soul my eyes opened up. I looked out beyond the highway and saw the scattering of dark clouds that threatened rain and I thanked God for them. I thanked Him for the beauty of the sun rays that seeped through the cracks between those clouds. I found myself being filled with His love and His beauty and my heart was no longer heavy from the day.

I want to share my list with you, though I’m not sure how I will do this yet. If I will do as Kari is doing and post my list every weekend. I thought this would be a wonderful meme, but meme’s are so hard to build. I have also thought that creating blessings in images would be beautiful and even have started counting some of my blessings on my pinterest.com.

I stopped, I don’t know why, too busy to take a pause that is so important. But I’m starting over, I’ve been slowly adding it in and today I will share with you my gifts.

• Waking in the middle of the night to rock my baby who had a bad dream
• The feeling of his weight draped on me
• Hearing him suck his thumb as he snuggles back into his blankets, he only needed a few minutes of love
• Watching the light start seeping through the blinds as the morning dawned
• A new day
• Listening to the shower as my husband gets ready for his day
• Being awake enough to say good bye to him
• A little more sleep
• Little boys who climb into my bed to snuggle
• Listening to battle hymns being song by my little boy
• Finding forgotten grapes in the bottom of the fridge
• Little toddler “ank ooos”
• Peanut Butter Sandwiches
• Crossing things off my to do list
• Listening to a toddler try singing with no words
• A wonderful husband that lets me sneak out of the house for a little while to go thrift shopping after bedtime

God fills our lives with amazing little gifts that we forget to stop and thank him for, but I am going to take the time to pause and enjoy these moments, to  count each one.

This summer we may be doing a book club at my church, maybe I will try and do a book club here also. Maybe I will do a dare to see who can count to a thousand with me. I’m not sure but I know that this book was an amazing life changer for me, so I hope you will read it!

What are some of the gifts you received today?

One of the points of this project is to not portray yourself as perfect. Life isn’t perfect and one of your goals when taking photos should be showing your life. And when you share an imperfect moment in your life with your photos you suddenly become more real to your audience.

Today has been a day of fun and frustrations.

Laying in bed this morning I realized that I was supposed to take some files over to the church for printing and then looked outside to see the rain and realize my husband has the car.

I started working on making some table number card holders for an event I’m helping with at the church to realize I was out of salt and cream of tarter halfway through the project.

So I decided we will make this fun! I bundled the boys in their new rain gear and we went to the church, went to the store, and went and had a pizza date!

I got home fought with the card holder project till I was completely exasperated at making a mess and with nothing to show for it. Have to love when I project doesn’t turn out how you want.

I then sat down to relax realized that Lynda had sent me the linky for Project 52 and I hadn’t found a good time to take a shot. Sigh.

Then I knew what I would do. I pulled out the camera and showed off my imperfections. Showing off my messy kitchen with the sad results of a bad end to a project. Sharing myself with makeup rinsed off with rain, hair that needs a haircut. And lastly giving you a smirk to show you I’m not always in the perfect mood.

Join Project 52: Self Portraits

Lynda (from Daily Window) and I are putting up a new linky every Monday and inviting you to participate in this project with us. I hope you will join us!

This month we are taking a break from themes, so just pull out your camera and start snapping your photo!!

You have a full week to link up with us. There are only two rules:

1. You should share a recently taken self-portrait
2. The link should be the absolute URL of your photo or entry, not a link to your homepage. Links to Flickr pages are fine!

If you want to use the Project 52 badge feel free and grab it and use it on your post. You don’t have to do every week with us you can post just once even and you don’t have to follow the weekly theme either. We just hope that you will join us for some fun.