A is for Apple

It's apple time and a great kids activity is get out in the fresh air and pick some apples - either from your own garden or go to a 'pick your own' orchard. Some parks and Statley Homes have 'apple days' this time of year with loads of different activities for the kids and often they combine a food fair with it for the adults. It's usually a fun day out for the whole family......have a look and see whats going on in your area.......

When you get home with your apples - apart from eating them - there are lots of fun things you can do with them - here are a few of our favourites - click on the pictures to take you to the link.....

Make some toffee apple wedges 

Create some artwork with some apple stamping

Get all wet with some good old fashioned apple bobbing

What ever you decide to do get out into the fresh autumnal air and enjoy collecting some apples.

Kids Kebab

 

Kids like nothing more than helping with the dinner and one of the easiest things to do with them is to let them thread meat, fruit & veg on to skewers for the barbecue or under the grill.

Its a funny thing but if you allow the children to choose what they want on 'their' skewer they will eat it all up when cooked! But if you put the exact same ingredients, without them being involved, they will become fussy and refuse to touch it - Murphy's law or something!

Loads of different ingredients can be available for cooking this way from cubes of meat & cocktail sausages; to meat balls & bacon rolls; pineapple & grapes; halloumi cheese; all types of vegetables including mini tomatoes;corn-on-the-cob rings; colourful peppers; black pudding; prawns and I've even tried mango wrapped in bacon.

This is so easy to do all you need are some kebab sticks (or even coctail sticks for mini kebabs) and raid your fridge & freezer for a variety of ingredients (you only need small amounts) to prep and place in bowls for the kids to assemble themselves. When they have finished you can just brush with oil & grill or barbecue.

Serve with simple dips of tomato sauce, mayonnaise or  just a fruit yogurt if they are sweet kebabs.

Have fun enjoy yourselves and let your imagination run riot!

Blackberring......

Arm yourself and the children with baskets and containers and head into the wilderness or the local park and pick some blackberries - the hedgerows are really heavy with them this year!

Make sure you avoid hedgerows next to busy roads or areas that might be within reach of dogs.

When you get home try turning your findings into something spectacular 

Try these recipes I found on netmums all are child-friendly 

Build a Bug a Home

 - Shoebox or any small cardboard box

A selection of bug friendly materials, here are a few suggestions of what to use and what kind of animals you might get moving in:

............Straw and hay make great bug hibernation sites
............Twig bundles - bigger insects love these
.............Dead wood brings in beetles, woodlice, and ladybirds
.............Dry leaves mimic the forest floor and will bring in all kinds of bugs
.............Loose bark chips will attract beetles, centipedes, spiders, woodlice – all the animals that                            break down wood
.............Old garden canes or a piece of wood with some holes drilled in it make a great home for                            solitary bees
.............An old terracotta flower pot turned upside down makes a great spot for a bumble bee nest –                      try adding some nice soft moss to entice them in!

The most important thing is to use natural materials that bugs love, so get creative and don’t limit yourself to these suggestions – you could add pine cones, old slates or bricks, anything you fancy (some people even put their old woolly jumpers in their bug houses). 

As a bonus, most of us already have some great bug house material just lying around in our gardens, so you can do a bit of recycling too.

Here are some of the bug houses I found on line....... 

or how about this one????

The above idea came from 'the bug club' website - click on the bug below for the link

Beach Games 3

Remove shoes get on the beach and The Chase Is On:

 The first player runs with a beach rake in hand… and leaves a wiggly trail. 

Give them a good start, it is hard work!!! 

Then let the players try and catch the leader… leave a gap between runners – not too far to dishearten and not too short that they can catch the player in front of them…

Beach Games 2

Fill the Bucket Race

Splits everyone into two teams (adults can join in too! Just be sure there are an even number of adults on both sides and the little kids and bigger kids are split up evenly on each team to make it fair). Have each team form a line by the shore.

Set up a buckets about 10 feet from the water’s edge. The object of the game is for each team to carry the water in their bare hands, or a small cup, to the bucket. 

Once a player fills the bucket then the next player in line can grab a handful of water and race to the bucket and so on until the bucket is filled. The first team to fill the bucket wins!

Beach Games 1

 We call this game - Spades - and it's by far our favourite beach game…

Really it is just an alternative version of musical chairs. 

Place a row of spades in the sand – one less than the number of players - and draw a start line in the sand some way away.

Race from the start line to the spades and grab one… one player is knocked out. Line the spades up again and remove one. Race again… until you have just one spade and the winner is the last to grab a spade

Beach Party

If your planning to have a garden or beach party this summer this is a brilliant idea that I stumbled across the other day.

Instead of party bags make up some personalised beach buckets and either filling them with treats or with a packed lunch.

Amazon has loads of great stickers for you to theme your buckets from pirates to mermaids.......

Wellie Wonders

Do you have wellies that don't fit still sitting in your boot rack?

We did until this summer when I saw this idea on pintrest!

We all went off to the garden centre and the girls choose plants to suit their old wellies and we got planting - so far they seem very successful and we may expand to veggies in larger ones next year!

Here's the link to little trekkers blog who came up with the idea.

Let's go fly (make) a kite

Thanks to my Mum informing my nieces that I once made a kite - the project for the next visit will now be........
 
   .......you guested it

              .......... kite making!

Now, considering that I haven't made a kite since I was about 15 (which was a long time ago!)

            not say how long - I might frighten myself if I work that out......

So I decided to do a bit of research because, I'm sure kite making has come on a long way from the two bamboo canes and black bin bag I used last time!

Well I came across this site and the kites are really excellent. There are a variety of shapes & sizes and also ones to suit all age ranges.

I'm going to forward a few of the designs to the girls for them to choose what they want to make and then we can be all ready to start when they come to visit...

I'll let you know how we get on .......

and if we manage to fly them........

and photo's of all the great stunts we can do........

(yah ...right!)

anyway here's the link to 'how to build kites' site

Lemon & Banana Ices

Wow it's really hot here at the moment and an quick ice would help to cool us all down.

This recipe for lemon & banana ice is really easy and requires only a couple of ingredients that I always have in the house - and you probably do to!

to make 8 ice lollies you will need

3 large bananas
Juice of a lemon
1 tablespoon icing sugar (optional)

Lolly mould & sticks
(loads of different moulds on Amazon & you can usually get some at the supermarket this time of year)

Blend the bananas with the lemon juice, check for sweetness if needed add the icing sugar & blend again.

Pour into moulds and freeze - will take a good 4 hours to freeze or leave over night.

This recipe is so easy and children just love to help make it.

We coated our with white chocolate to make an extra crunch.

Simple crab lines

As I have mentioned before, in this house, we like all things to do with the sea and the girls really love to do some fishing.

One of their favourite summer evening activity is to take some home made lines down to our local quay and fish for shore crabs. 

The lines are really easy to make. All you need is a length of string about 4 meters for each line, some card, and the small net bags the washing powder tablets come in. you will also need some rashers of bacon diced up.

 (don't forget your line will need to reach the river or sea bed so don't choose anywhere too deep & make sure your line is long enough - if your river is more than 3 or 4 meters deep you may need to pop a pebble or weight of some kind in the bag to help take the line to the bottom)

All you do is take your bag, fill with bacon and attach the line. Cut the card into a small, hand size, rectangle and use it to roll the string on. Place in their buckets for safe transport and head to your nearest saltwater quay.

We have a few games whilst were crabbing - the obvious one being who can catch to most. Others we play are a few crab races where they choose their 'champion crab' and pop them on a start line about a meter from the water we then watch as they make their sideways run towards the sea - the first one is the winner - obviously!

And the last game - which is my husbands favourite and also any boys in our group! - is to place a pound coin in the bottom of a bucket, pour some crabs in the bucket as well and each take it in turn to grab the money - the kids get to keep the coins to add to their pocket money! 

All these games teach them to respect the animals and the water. It also shows them not be fearful of the crabs and we show them how to handle them properly so as not to hurt them - we all get to have a good look at them as well. 

And at the end of the day though, just a cheap fishing net can also provide hours of fun!!

Have a great weekend 

 Liz xx

Cork Boats

Another simple craft idea & a good use for all those left over wine corks stashed around the house.

follow this link below for the full SP

We have made them on a rainy day & had races in the tub; made them outdoors on a sunny day & had races in the stream and taken them to the beach for rock pool fun. Everyone can make a different colour sail & decorates them as well.

Cork Boats