Dress-up Box for my Girls

I wanted a slightly bigger container for the girls to put their dress-up clothes into.  So I found a box laying around the house and mod podge some pictures into it, filled it up with their dress-up, hats, necklaces, bracelets, and dresses.  Here are some pictures before I filled it.

~Laura

Hello From Peter the Christmas Pickle

Hello! My name is Peter the Christmas Pickle.  I would like to invite you to sign up as a follower of Munkin Punkin.  The next 3 persons to sign-up as a follower of Munkin Punkin shall receive one of my 3 cousins Paul, Percy or Patrick.

Wishing you all a Very Merry Christmas!  

By the way you can also sign up for email alerts when a new post is made, by typing in your email address in the space at the top of Munkin Punkin's Blog.

~Laura

Name Painting

A friend of mine recently asked me if I would/could paint her daughters name while incorporating some of the characters from a cartoon called 64 Zoo Lane.  I didn't give a strong affirmative answer to her request because I wasn't sure if I felt like I would be able to do it and I wasn't sure if I would have the time.  She doesn't  know that I have started to sketch out her daughters name and characters on a piece of canvas yet, but she will find out now-hehe!  I hope that she likes what she sees thus far. 

~Laura

I just finished painting the letters!  

Progress Photo #2

Progress photo #3

Different lighting has made the background look yellowed because it's still as white as the previous photo?  I just have to say the chameleon is my fav only because I have this crazy interest in chameleons!

Photo #4 

All Done!  

(I think?!  What do you think?)

I hope that my friend and her little one likes it!

~ Laura

The Girls Thrift Store Kids Table Refinished

Late in the summer of this year I stopped at a local Salvation Army and found a small kids table and chair.  I had been wanting a small kids table for awhile and thought this one would do for now until I found something better.  The table top was fine but the plastic on the chair seat was torn when I purchased them.
This week I made a visit to a favorite store of mine JoAnn Fabrics and found some beautiful cranberry colored vinyl on sale and immediately thought about the girls table.  The original design is a little too busy for my already busy house so I thinkI like the solid color helps.  With the help of my hubby I found a piece of paneling that I had him cut to the size of the table top.  The paneling helped to give the table top a firmer surface and a little extra to put the staples into.
What do you think?

~Laura

BEFORE

AFTER

Horton/Dr. Seuss Dress

Ok I've had Horton the elephant on the brain lately.  Mostly due to a plan to see Seussical this month.  My mom gave me some fabric that she has had lying around and one that was a blue gaberdine that made me think of Horton the elephant.
I've also been on a dress making kick for my oldest who is a little Fancy Nancy (minus the red curly hair and speaking in French).  She loves wearing dresses as of late.  So much so that she gives me a hard time about wearing pants.

When I saw the blue fabric my thought was "Horton the elephant" and next was " I should make my oldest a dress to wear when we go to see Seussical.
But I'd like some help.
I have a couple of questions that I would like my friends to chime in on.

1.  Should I add a same material ruffle to the bottom of the dress OR just hem it up?
2.  The pink circle is representative of the clover that Horton carried around the Whoville speck.  Does it look good where I have taped it?  The black ribbon will be replaced with green ribbon that has been gathered and then sewn into place.

Looking forward to what you'll think!
~Laura

The Finished Dress...drum roll please.

I like how the dress turned out and just in time for my daughter to wear it to the Seussical!!!  It definitely looks a lot better in person.  

~Laura

Countdown 1...2...3...4.................24 to Our Savior's Birth Wreath

The idea for this project came from the December Family Fun Magazine.  The Family Fun magazine is such a great idea magazine. Ours is slightly altered by the tulle wrapped around the wreath and the glitter on the sides of the circles.  The girls helped do a lot of the painting of the wreath and the individual circles and adding the glitter.  I did the tulle and the hot gluing.  I'm liking it and if it holds up maybe we'll do this again next year!

Busy & Crazy Lately!

I feel bad that I have not posted for quite some time now.  Things have been a little busy and crazy lately.  My husband and girls have been enduring a cold and I've been busy preparing for my youngest daughter's birthday party.  I have a feeling though that things are not going to calm down a whole lot until the beginning of the year.  After we celebrate our daughter's birthday I'll share what we did and how it went.

This is a hint as to the theme of the birthday party!

I recently joined a NYS homeschooling group LEAH and have attended two meetings.  So glad that I did!  I think that the group will be encouraging and helpful as I decide what/how I will homeschool my girls.  You can check them out here at www.leah.org


One activity that I recently did with my girls was to clean off and examine some stones and fossils with toothbrushes, squirt and spray bottles.  This was a great activity that kept them busy for a good length of time.

~Laura

"C" week an off week so far.

"Look mommy a circle and a heart"

This week has been a little off.  On Monday we attended our first Toddler Story Time at our local library.  Of which I believe the girls enjoyed.  Tuesday we made up for a topic that I was planning for "B" week and read Jack and the Beanstalk.  We also played with soap bubbles outside and made ping pong ball tubes.  It has also been off too because mommy has been trying to catch up on laundry and cleaning the house, that I somehow got pretty behind on.

Ping Pong Ball Tubes

Filling the tubes

Don't Forget: Keep checking in on my Metamorphosis! post to follow our Painted Lady Butterfly progression. 
http://growpumpkingrow.blogspot.com/2011/09/metamorphosis-what-amazing-process.html

We're going bananas!

We're Going Bananas!

We read the above 3 books and really enjoyed the illustrations in Hippo goes Bananas and found the story of The Boy Who Loves Bananas to be funny.  After reading the 3 books we later made banana bread that we enjoyed during lunch, yummy!


Continue to check back on the post on the Painted Lady caterpillars.  I will be adding pictures regularly.

Metamorphosis! What an Amazing process!

Decided to dedicate one whole post to the progression of our Painted Lady Caterpillars.  Our Larva arrived on Thursday September 15th.

September 19th I decide that I want to give the caterpillars a little more freedom.

This little guy whom I shall call Hiccup was the first to crawl out of the cup.
He is the smallest by far out of the group!

This guy on the edge of the cup is the 2nd one to venture out of the cup.
He and Hiccup are still the only 2 that have ventured out, so far!

I thought that our 2nd guy was possibly thinking about
going to the next stage here!

#2 here has been lovin' the mallow or Hollyhock seedling that I placed in the butterfly enclosure.  I don't think that there's going to be anything left for the remaining 4 still in the cup, should they decide to venture out as well.  I wanted a more natural environment for them to be able to roam about in and to pupate in versus the paper towel at the top of the cup they came in.  I stole these mallow plant seedlings from my mothers garden.  Painted Lady butterflies, Females that is lay their eggs on mallow plants and they are said to do so 5-7 days after they have emerged from their chrysalis.

They're geting bigger.  It won't be too much longer till we have pupas!

September 22-23. 2011

This is the first one to hang upside down.  A pupa is soon to come!

2 out the 6 are preparing to go into pupa stage!

The first caterpillar to hang himself upside down has been hanging that way since late last night and this morning he still hasn't molted his skin yet!  Wonder how long the upside down hanging will last before molting will begin?

This is what I found this afternoon on 9-23-11.  I was a little disappointed,
because I had been hoping to be able to catch him molting for the last time.

This is the skin molted from the first caterpillar
that moved into the pupa stage

Okay it's Saturday night and I'm staying up much later than I should AGAIN! Only to find out that our directionally impaired caterpillar who had attached himself to the BOTTOM of the butterfly enclosure to have fallen off the net and was wriggling out of his skin WHILE at the BOTTOM!!! I'm freaking out internally-"what do I do now! I can't leave him at the bottom!" So thank you internet -googled and found out that I could place him on a soft tissue at the bottom OR attempt to tie a piece of thread to his bottom and hang him back up!!! Now mind you I find this process of Metamorphosis very cool but I get a little creeped out by buggy kinds of things especially touching buggy types of things. But said to myself "He's not supposed to being on his side. He's supposed to be hanging upside down!" So here goes I did it-I tied a thread to his bottom and hung him in a mallow plant I have sitting on my counter. okay now just need the adrenaline to get out of my system and maybe I can get to sleep now!!!

September 29th: Our last caterpillar is on his way to pupahood.  He or she has been named Hiccupillar.  He was the tiniest caterpillar when when they all arrived and he is the only one that has done the largest portion of his eating at fresh mallow plant leaves.  So glad that he/she has made it this far.  I honestly did not think that he/she was going to survive because he was so small and often seemed more interested in adventuring than eating.

It won't be too long now!  Can you see the tinge of orange under the chrysalis?

October 1st our first butterfly has emerged from its chrysalis.  Affectionately named #2

You can see this guy using his proboscis to drink the juice from the orange.

The middle Chrysalis you can start to see the wing color.  The larger looking chrysalis on the right is Hiccupillar.

Painted ladies have a beautiful pattern on the underside of their wings.  The eye spots have a beautiful tinge of blue.

A Sad Story

On the evening of October 3rd Directionally Impaired Piller started wiggling.  Me: "Yea, I'm going to get witness him emerge from the chrysalis as a butterfly.  Not exactly, he was wiggling like crazy and then he stopped then started again, but he just wasn't popping out.  I kept peeking in on him wondering when he was going to come out and wondering why it seemed to be taking so long.  Then I noticed that there was a slight tear on the back of the chrysalis not usually the side that the butterfly exits so I started to panic inside, AGAIN!  So, I decided to pull out the bamboo stick that I had attached him to in order to  get a better look at what was happening.  Sure enough there was a tear on the backside.  Something inside prompted me to assist in his escape.  You can see what he looked like after assisting him in his escape below.  He was a mess!  His antennae didn't extend outward and looked mangled.  In the end he was not able to extend his wings fully.  Now I was worried that maybe I shouldn't have helped him, but from another web sight I had read it's very likely that if I hadn't assisted he probably would have eventually died inside the chrysalis.  Now he gets a few days in the fresh air before he dies because of his disabilities.  I was worried that he would be already dead by now because he hadn't zipped up his proboscis and that is something that a butterfly must also do very soon after escaping the chrysalis.  (Important so that they can drink nectar) But check out what he is able to do further down this post.

The Release
We released the four butterflies that were able to fly Today October 4th, 2011

Directionally Impaired Pillar is Drinking!!!

Directionally Impaired Pillar drinking orange juice drops off my hand after dripping some on his proboscis which appears to have helped him to connect the two separated pieces of his proboscis!!!