Outdoor Movie Theater

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We have been talking about having a family date night so we decided to do it at home and all outside!
The kids and I put up then tent all by ourselves...that's pretty impressive! Then we got our swing mattress, blankets and pillows and set up our outside bed. After that we dug out the Christmas lights and strung them up around the yard. Of course we couldn't forget the candy and popcorn that Ashtyn put in the little red wagon! And last ... the projector, got it all set up and ready for movie time!

The night started off by our grill out --> yummy stakes and potatoes and of course the kids had to have hot dogs! We ate by our campfire and roasted some s'mores.
Finally it got dark enough to plug in our lights and snuggle up to watch our movie! To my surprise I only saw 1 bat which stayed away and the bugs were scare the entire time! YAHOO!
Once the movie was over we crawled into the tent for a comfy night of sleep.

It is so awesome making memories with our family that will last forever :)

Marble Run

I attended a child care conference in Sioux Falls this past weekend and got SO MANY aweseome ideas of things to do and make with the kiddos! So of course as soon as I got home I had to try one of the awesome ideas from Jeff Johnson... the MARBLE RUN!

It can be done indoors or outdoors, we chose to do it outdoors (only because thats the only place you will ever find our kiddos)!

It is so inexpensive, SO EASY and so much fun!

My only advice is to let the kids help you build it, or give them tape and let them build and and invent the way they want to make the run themselves (they will amaze you with what they come up with)!

WHAT YOU NEED:

*Pool Noodles (buy @ the dollar tree)

*Tape (Duct Tape works the best but can use packaging tape as well)

*Knife

*Marbles (I bought ours at Hobby Lobby in a bag of 25 for $1.99)

HOW TO MAKE IT:

*Cut the Pool noodle in half the long way (you can also cut the noodle the short way to make tunnels, ect.)

*Use tape and tape the cut pool noodles together --> then tape the noodles to the steps or whenever you want to make your marble run

*Then let the kiddos play!!

Pool Noodle, Marbles and the top of the noodle cut off!

Make little tunnels by cutting off the top of the noodle

Cut the noodle in half

Tape the ends together

Tape down the noodles!

Let them play, figure it out and invent what to do with it!

And let them fix it!!! They will Be SOOO Excited when they figure out how to make it work on their own!

The exitment of figuring out how to fix it! :)

ENJOY!! :)