3 Winks Design

Summer Skills Practice even in The Outdoors!

6/8/2021

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Because the pandemic created such a strange learning environment for children everywhere, it is more important than ever to practice their skills at home to build them up to where they ought to be within their grade level. For years before the pandemic, I used to get so frustrated because our family wanted to go on fun vacations and enjoy family time together during the summer, yet I also wanted to keep my kids thinking and learning and not going backwards in their academic skills. Practicing those skills is even more important now that kids have had such a strange school year and also if you have students who struggle with conventional learning in even normal conditions.

Combining Learning with fun

This summer, I have 3 of my grandsons with me, as well as my 3 year old granddaughter. I am the Summer School Teacher for the month that they are here. We do school every morning for 2 hours. And while learning and getting caught up is our main focus, their grandpa and I want to do some fun things with them as well. We are trying to color in more experiences found on our Adventures With Grandparents Chart. We have planned a trip up to a favorite creek, perhaps a camping trip and we want to spend some other days up in cooler temperatures than we have in Phoenix. (It is going to hit 107 degrees this week!)

It is still possible to keep learning and basic skills fresh in their minds even when you are having a fun family time. As a matter of fact, when you combine learning with fun, those are lessons that will definitely stick in a child's mind better than any other. I wrote about one such example last year when I had a grandson and granddaughter with me for summer school.

Of course, a lot of practice can happen orally and visually as you experience the fun moments of Summer. But, I have also created some ways to have my grandkids do some hands on writing and sort of scavenger hunt type activities that help them practice the areas that they need the most help in. I am going to share with you the worksheets that I made for my grandkids to use, and you can print and use them as well. Mainly though, I want you to see that you can take some of the things that YOUR kids need to practice and tailor the activities to their needs. Here is the first example:

My grandson has trouble with initial sounds in speech. He usually substitutes the "f" sound. My granddaughter, as age 3, has trouble pronouncing "s" blends. This page focuses on the "st" blend and the "f" sound. Plus, all of the children can read, follow directions and make observations. Of course, a lot of conversation needs to go along with these activities. Grownups need to be active participants to encourage the learning!

I create my worksheets on Google Draw and save them in the Drive. I can easily reopen them and add different tasks in each box. This one is for us to take to a favorite creek and do when we are taking a lunch break from swimming in the creek. If you want to download this page, click on the button.

Outdoor Thinking Skills

Here is another example of a simple math page for younger children:

My grandson needs practice on position, such as over, under, beneath, beside and so forth. This page addresses some of those skills.

Measurement and Position Outdoors

One of my grandsons is 13 years old. He is autistic and has a language processing disorder. He loves Science and reading non-fiction. So, I needed to provide him with something more on his grade level. He reads very well but needs practice with comprehension and connections when he reads.
Since we will be going up to Wet Beaver Creek, I did a little research and found out about more of the "science" of the area and put together a packet of information that he can read and look at as we go up there. Click on the pictures for the pdf of the photos. Click on the button for the written information. If you live in AZ and plan to go to Wet Beaver Creek, you can use this with your kids.

What Do You Know About ...

The informational page also covers the concept of "Leave No Trace." That is something that I will let my grandson help teach to his younger brothers as well. When he gets a chance to teach, information stays with him better and "Leave No Trace" is something we should all understand.

It didn't really take a ton of effort to put these things together for my grandchildren. There are always websites that cover the attractions that you may be going to where you can get the info that you need. To tell the truth, it was all a bit of an education for me as well! In the long run, the effort will definitely be worth it.

So, get out there and have fun and keep learning as well!

If you liked this article, you may enjoy these as well:

Baby University Books

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Funfetti blueberry PANCAKES

6/6/2021

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This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for purchases made through those links at no additional cost to you. All views expressed are my own. Thank you for your support!

How is your summer going so far? We have a houseful of people in ours right now because besides my husband, myself and our youngest son living here, Lindsey, her husband and my 3 year old granddaughter are staying with us until their new house closes and they can move into it. Then, to top things off, My husband and I picked up 3 grandsons from Wyoming to come and visit with us for the month of June! We are loving it, chaos and all!

3 of our handsome grandsons!

One great way to feed a crowd breakfast is with pancakes. Around here we love our pancakes and we have shared a variety of them over the years. From Root Beer Pancakes, to Cinnamon Roll Pancakes to Chunky Apple Pancakes with Red Hot Syrup, we've got quite the variety. Check them all outhere.
The other morning I asked my grandsons what they wanted for breakfast and in unison they chimed out "Pancakes!" Then one of them added, "Chocolate Pancakes!" So I asked, "How about chocolate chip?" They thought that was acceptable, but, when I reached into my stash of chips, the first ones that I pulled out were Funfetti! We had blueberries in the fridge and I thought to myself, "Funfetti Blueberry Pancakes sound delicious!" I tossed the idea to my grandkids and they were on board, so that morning Funfetti Blueberry Pancakes were born!

I sprinkled on the Funfetti chips liberally then added the blueberries.

I am going to give you my old reliable recipe for these pancakes, but you can use any basic pancake recipe and then just add the chips and blueberries. Here are some tips to remember.

Make sure your griddle is hot to begin cooking the pancakes.
Sprinkle on the chips and blueberries liberally.
Watch for numerous bubbles to appear on the batter to know when to flip. My rule of thumb is about 10 popped bubbles.
Do expect some scorching of the sugar from the chips when you flip the pancakes over. I mopped the griddle with an oily, crumpled paper towel after each batch of pancakes to clean off the scorch marks and to add oil to help the pancakes not to stick.

Use butter and syrup as usual. I garnished with more chips and blueberries on top. The chips melt on top of the hot pancakes for a delicious treat.

Funfetti Blueberry Pancakes

My grandchildren declared them a hit! I hope you guys will love them, too!

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Donut Father's Day Cards

6/2/2021

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This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for purchases made through those links at no additional cost to you. All views expressed are my own. Thank you for your support!

It's June and that means Father's Day is coming up! We're excited to celebrate with the men in our life. That's why we decided to create these fun Father's Day cards that you can give out. They're all donut themed so they'd be perfect to deliver with a donut on Sunday morning.

Donut Pun Cards

When I first started making the cards I was at a loss of what to do but then I saw a picture of a donut and the puns just started coming to me and I decided to make 6 cards in a pack to sell on Etsy. I like the pack of cards because it's enough to give one to all the father's in my life. Plus I can buy a dozen donuts and give each guy 2 donuts!

Just press the button below to go to our listing on Etsy to get them for yourself!

Donut Father's Day Cards

The cards are postcard style and print 2 to a page. There are crop marks and bleed so cutting them out will be easy. I recommend printing on white card stock. I printed mine at home but you could also take them to a print shop and have them professionally printed and cut.

I'm so excited to share these with y'all and hope you enjoy the puns as much as I do! I love dad jokes and I think you'll like them too on these cards.

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Ice Cream Bombs (the Cool opposite of Hot Cocoa Bombs)!

5/24/2021

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This post contains affiliate links. I will be compensated for purchases made through those links at no additional cost to you. All views expressed are my own. Thank you for your support!

My SIL had a great idea the other day, and as soon as he mentioned it, I had to run with it! He told me that since it is too hot for Hot Cocoa Bombs now, I should do the opposite and have Ice Cream Bombs! I thought, "What a great idea! Little nuggets of ice cream, just the perfect size for children or dieters or to eat as many as you want of the various flavors!

In the next few minutes, I was off to the store to get the ingredients that I knew I would need:

Any flavors of ice cream that you want. We used strawberry, mint chocolate chip, salted caramel, cherry vanilla and vegan chocolate cookies and cream.
Chocolate chips, I used milk chocolate and semi-sweet, but you can use whatever you like. Just remember that the darker the chocolate, the more difficult it is to get the shells to work.
Fruit or candies for a surprise in the middle if you would like. We used cherries, strawberries, Rollos, mini Junior Mints and mini Oreos.
sprinkles (of course)
straws or stirring sticks or popsicle sticks or sucker sticks. I love how cute the little straws are that I got at Dollar Tree. I just cut them in half.

You will also need your molds that you use for Hot Cocoa Bombs. You can find them here.

Making Ice Cream Bombs Part I:

Just like the process of making Hot Cocoa Bombs, you will need to make the shells and harden them in the freezer. They will take about half an hour to harden. If you haven't made Hot Cocoa Bombs, go to this post to find out how to do it. You can also purchase our instruction booklet here. For Ice Cream Bombs, I would try to make the shells thinner than you might for Hot Cocoa Bombs because when they are frozen, you want to be able to bite through the chocolate. It may take some practice to get them just right. Thick enough not to break when you remove them from the molds, yet thin enough to bite through.
While the shells are hardening, get your fruit and/or candy surprises ready and in the last 5 minutes before getting out your shells, soften your ice cream slightly. Not too much, but so you can scoop it out fairly easily and form it to the mold.
When the shells are hard, pop them out of the molds. Fix any holes and put them back into the molds.
Now, fill your molds halfway full with ice cream, add your surprise center and then fill the rest of the way with ice cream. Of course, you can make them without surprise centers, I just like surprises.
Put in your stick, then put them in the freezer to harden for an hour or so. (You may have to maneuver your stick around your surprise center.)

That is my granddaughter's little hand helping me put in the surprise centers. That is just a slice of strawberry.

Making Ice Cream Bombs Part II:

After the ice cream is well hardened, cover it with chocolate all around the straw or stick that you used. Let that harden again.
When they are all frozen solid, pop them out of the molds and apply sprinkles. I found that the best way to apply the sprinkles was to hold the ice cream pop over the flame of the stove for about 2 seconds and then to dip them into the sprinkles.
To serve them, I put ice in the bottom of a bowl and then set a plate over the ice. The Ice Cream Bombs looked so fun stacked on that plate and they stayed contained in the bowl!

I also tried these palm tree and some flamingo stir sticks from Dollar Tree. They are cute but more difficult to fit in my freezer. You may have better luck.

This was my first attempt to get the sprinkles to stick using a sugar water. It was pretty hit and miss. Doing the slight melt over the stove worked much better.

Eating Ice Cream Bombs:

When you go to eat these tasty little nuggets, I've found that the best trick is to use the base around the stick as it is intended, a base to keep the ice cream in place. When you bite through the chocolate at the top and begin to eat it and the inner ice cream, it can all sit on the base without falling all over the place. Then, you have the nice chocolaty base to finish it all off. So, be sure to stick that chocolate base to the stick very well!
My favorite chocolate was the milk chocolate, but my SIL says he prefers the semi-sweet. What do you think?

I have a refrigerator on my back patio where I keep drinks and snacks. My grandchildren like to get out popsicles and eat them during the summer. Last summer I found a sticky puddle in the refrigerator to clean up because my little grandson had put the rest of his popsicle in the fridge thinking it would keep it cold for later! Ha Ha! Hopefully this summer these cute little Ice Cream Bombs will get all of the way eaten with no leftover mess! (Chocolate and not mess? Ha!) I hope that you will give them a try, too!