Holidays

13 Easy Halloween Crafts and Decorating Ideas

Here are 13 easy Halloween crafts for kids and adults to make. From Paper plate ghosts to Spooky Eyes, your house will be the best dressed when kids come Trick Or Treating. Creepy, colorful, or comic, these Halloween decorating and party crafts will be a big hit.

Make an Easy Ghost Garland with just a few household supplies

Super Easy Paper plate ghosts from Clean & Sensible.

Cute Bats from Parents.com: These cute little guys can be made with old socks!

Friendly Ghosts from Parents Magazine: A row of goblins welcomes trick-or-treaters to your door.

Q-Tip Skeleton from Busy Bee Kids Crafts: This Q-Tip Skeleton is an easy and inexpensive Halloween kids craft. This would be a great activity for preschoolers to add some spooky to the holiday!

Egg Carton Bats and Leaf Ghosts from Happy Clippings: Make cute bats out of an egg carton and adorable ghosts from leaves. Both projects are easy and kid friendly.

Hang-O-Lanterns: Bend a handle out of thick wire or a clothes hanger and use it to hang small jack-o-lanterns along an outdoor path.

Mummy Candy Holders: Make a spooky candy dish with plastic water bottles, gauze, and googly eyes.

Spirit Milk Jugs from Spoonful with full instructions on Eighteen25: Stationed on a walkway or porch, these homemade lanterns will extend a ghostly greeting and good-bye to all your holiday visitors.

Mummy Treat Containers from Skip to My Lou

Scary Spider Mini Pumpkins from Parents.com: Mini pumpkins are the perfect size for making scary spiders.

Spooky Eyes from Parents.com: A black marker, fluorescent-green foam circles, and some double-stick tape turn trees into mysterious lawn creatures.

Looking for Halloween Treats and Snack Ideas?

Click to view all of these Halloween treats here!

Do you need Halloween Music for your party?

Click to create your Free Halloween Playlist here!

10 Easy Back to School Lunchbox Ideas

School will be starting again soon and Moms and Dads will be packing lunchboxes everyday. Instead of giving your kids a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and a bag of chips, why not try at least one creative lunch per week. I know that making lunches for your kids day after day, week after week, for a year gets monotonous and is time consuming, believe me, I did it for years when our kids were growing up, but think of the look on your child’s face when they open up their lunchbox and see one of these fun lunches waiting for them. Pick one day a week and tell your child this is the special lunch day they can look forward to each week.

Here are 10 easy back to school lunchbox ideas that don’t take long to prepare but will keep your kids happy during lunch and make them the envy of their classmates.

Some of these lunchbox ideas use Bento Boxes, which make packing food easier than a traditional lunchbox or Tupperware container. Other ideas require a variety of cookie cutters to create the desired shape.

Of course, a lot of these ideas should be modified based on what your kids like to eat. Use this printable list of food ideas to keep on your frig in case you run out of ideas and are in a hurry.

Back to School Lunchbox Ideas — Bee Mine Lunchbox Idea from Red Tricycle

Heart-Shaped Food, Lunchbox Ideas — Heart-shaped strawberries, cut in half and sculpted with a cookie cutter, apple cut in half and a heart design added with the cookie cutter and strawberry or raspberry jam sandwiches cut into heart shapes from Redbook Magazine

Lunch Box Ideas — Use a cookie cutter to make this star sandwich, and the elephant cutout in the wax wrapper of Babybel cheese. Add chunk cheese with bread or toast. Include berries, tomatoes and grapes make for bite-size, healthy sweets. From Redbook Magazine and Wendolonia.com

Bento Box Lunchbox Ideas — Chicken Salad Sandwich, crust removed, cut in sections, Mandarin Orange and Kiwi slices, Grape Tomatoes in combination with Cheddar Cheese Cubes from Sandra’s Easy Cooking

School Lunchbox Ideas — Almond Butter, Whole Grain Crackers, Apple, Low-Sugar Granola Bar, Bite Sized Veggies, Grapes from Running with Tongs

Do you have any lunchbox ideas to share?

Sesame Street Bert and Ernie Halloween Printable Masks

Check out these cute Ernie and Bert-o’-masks from Sesame Street you can print out and let your grandkids color for Halloween. Visit Parenting.com for more Sesame Street Halloween games and mazes, and more spooky-fun coloring activities to get your kids or grandkids excited for Halloween.

You can make funny jack-o’-lantern masks that look like Ernie and Bert. Color the pictures on this page and the next. With a grown-up, glue each face to cardboard or stiff paper. Cut out the eyes. Then cut out each mask. To make a handle, glue or tape a paper-towel tube or clean drinking straw to the back.

Ernie and Bert Printable Halloween Masks

Print, color and then glue each face to cardboard or stiff paper. Cut out the eyes. Then cut out each mask. To make a handle, glue or tape a paper-towel tube or clean drinking straw to the back.

Click here to print the Ernie Mask	Click here to print the Burt mask

Looking for Halloween Craft Ideas?

Click to view all of these Halloween projects now!

Quick and Easy Peanut Butter Apple Wraps

Wouldn’t it be great to have our kids learn to make their own lunches? Here’s a recipe that lets them have fun in the kitchen (with your help) while learning how to make a lunch that’s good for them: Peanut Butter-Apple Wraps. Cooking with your kids is a great way to spend time together while learning valuable life skills. These apple wraps are also a great after school snack

Photo courtesy of Cooking with My Kids.com

Peanut Butter-Apple Wraps

Ingredients:

4 whole wheat flour tortillas (8 inch)
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
6 tablespoons granola cereal
1 large red-skinned apple
Honey, optional

Instructions:

Spread each tortilla to 1/2-inch of edge with 2 tablespoons peanut butter.
Sprinkle 1-1/2 tablespoons granola over lower two thirds of peanut butter.
Cut apple into quarters; remove core and chop into small pieces.
Sprinkle apple evenly over granola.
Start rolling each tortilla on apple end.
Fold over 1 edge and continue rolling up. Leaving one end open. Or, fold over both edges and continue rolling up burrito style.

Recipe courtesy of Ready Set Eat

Dr. Seuss Birthday Freebies and Goodies

Dr. Seuss’ birthday is on March 2. Dr Seuss, or Theodor Seuss Geisel, s the beloved author who is widely known for his children’s books. Dr Seuss’ birthday corresponds with Read Across America Day

What better way to celebrate Dr. Seuss’s birthday than reading to a child? On the evening of March 2nd (Dr. Seuss’s birthday), Random House and the National Education Association urge you to participate in the second annual Read Across America and read to a child.

Dr. Seuss epitomizes a love of children and learning. Also, his use of rhyme makes his books an effective tool for teaching young children the basic skills they need to be successful. When we celebrate Dr. Seuss and reading, we send a clear message to America’s children that reading is fun and important.

Dr Seuss Freebies and Crafts

Are you planning a Dr. Seuss themed party?

Parties ideas from Celebrate Every Day with Me

Recipe from Taste of Home

Grinch Punch Recipe

Prep: 20 min. + chilling
Yield: 16 Servings

Ingredients

1/3 cup sugar
6 tablespoons plus 1-1/2 teaspoons water
1/3 cup evaporated milk
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
12 drops neon green food coloring
1 bottle (2 liters) lemon-lime soda, chilled
2 pints vanilla ice cream

Directions

1. In a large saucepan, combine sugar and water. Cook and stir over medium heat until sugar is dissolved; remove from the heat. Stir in milk and extract. Transfer to a bowl; cool to room temperature. Cover and refrigerate until chilled.

2. Just before serving, transfer milk mixture to a punch bowl. Stir in the food coloring and soda. Top with scoops of ice cream.

Dr. Seuss & His Friends Book Club

Create a personal library of children’s books

Great Deal for only $5.95! Includes:

The Cat in the Hat, Mr. Brown Can Moo, Ten Apples On Top, Go Dog Go! & The Tooth Book
Free colorful Cat in the Hat Backpack to carry all your books in
Free shipping
Free Dr. Seuss & His Friends Audiobook read by Jason Alexander, David Hyde Pierce or Kelsey Grammer.

Get 5 Books for just $5.95 Plus FREE shipping! Sign up today and get a FREE Dr. Seuss backpack* plus 2 Bonus Book Opportunities!

Dr Seuss Apps Sale

The award-winning The Cat in the Hat digital book app discounted to 99 cents

The Cat in the Hat camera app available as a free download

More than 40 Dr. Seuss apps on sale ranging in price from 99 cents to $8.99 including classic books, short stories, book collections, cameras and games.

The sale runs from March 1st through March 7th on the App Store, Google Play, Amazon Appstore, Barnes and Noble NOOK Store and Windows Store.

Colorful Dr Seuss Jelly Snacks

Cute snacks that do not require any skill or talent required from Simple Girl at Home