Thankful

The month of November is thankfulness month in our family.  I can't remember when I started this tradition--maybe the first year Matt and I were married?  We began by writing down one thing we were each thankful for every night at dinner for the whole month of November, and then on Thanksgiving day, we read through all that we were thankful for and it made Thanksgiving day so much more meaningful.  Each year I did something different in terms of how we collected/displayed these things.  The first year I think I did something like feathers cut from construction paper stuck into a pinecone to look like a turkey (I think we may have done this at some point as a kid?  mom?).  Eventually it morphed into a scrapbook page because I wanted to be able to keep a record of what God had done and what we were thankful for from year to year.  Now that we are here, I have no idea where those pages are or even if we've done this activity in the last few years, but by golly, this year we are starting back up and I've already got the pages designed and the squares for each day cut out!  We have so much to be thankful for I wanted to make sure we got a jump on it and started from the very first day of November! 

Sorry this pic is sideways, but you get the idea. . .

So, since it's thankfulness month, I thought I would post about a few things this month that I am thankful for.  Today, I am thankful for blogs.  Not just any blogs, but blogs that specifically give me ideas for activities to do with Maya.  Being a mommy of two kids under two, living in the middle of a big city with few free options for kids' activities, I have to be creative.  While I tend to be a pretty creative person, I still feel like such an amatuer when it comes to how to incorporate a curious, messy, uncoordianted toddler into my crafty dreams.  But with extremely limited time (and energy, really) I'm just not going to do a craft project if I can't in some way include Maya and make it something that she can learn from and have fun being included in. In my quest to learn how to craft with kids, several blogs have been really helpful and I'll link them here, in case you're in need of the same kind of resources!

http://www.craftjr.com/

http://www.icanteachmychild.com/

http://playathomemom3.blogspot.com/

http://www.breezyacresblog.com/

What blogs do you guys find inspiring when it comes to crafting with and teaching your kids? Please let me know in the comments!