Family Night: Pizza, Pudding, and Pinterest-Inspired Painting

A few months ago our family implemented Thursday "family night" at our house.  We finally realized that church, work, school, gymnastics, birthday parties, etc all have set times and dates to get put in the calendar.  Because of that family time is ALWAYS 2nd priority to our outside commitments.  The only way to put our family in its proper place in our schedules and priorities was to make an "appointment" in all our calendars for a set time each week.  For us that turned out to be Thursday, so now, with a very few exceptions, Thursday we are all required to be at home for family night.  We usually try to have something fun planned, but sometimes its nice to just all be in the same place at the same time with no where to be, ya know?

Last night we started off the night with the kids helping Dave make homemade pizzas and a instant pudding topped with graham cracker crumbs (yum!).  Isaac asked if we could do a painting project for family night, so I went to my trusty Pinterest "Kids Activities" board and found two fun ideas.  We already had a few small painting canvases.  This was a 2-pack of 11x14s from Hobby Lobby.

For Isaac I used painters taped to tape off a modern geometric pattern and helped him choose or mix colors to match his room.  He painted each square a different color and then we peeled off the tape.  So simple, but the look of pride on face was priceless.  (What is it with me and alliteration in this post??)  Here's a link to the blog I got the idea from.

This project is fun for grown-ups, too.  My hubby did one in black paint that looked like an abstract, framed cross.  It was pretty cool.  I get the sense our living room wall will soon be the family art gallery.

For Zoe I taped off her name, like in this idea I saw on Pinterest.  I gave her 2 cups of similar colored washable acrylic paint, because they were going to end up mixed together anyway with a two-year-old painting.  We used light pink and light purple.  She painted the whole canvas and then painted in again... and again.  She probably spend 30 minutes applying pink and purple pain in layers.  When we peeled off the tape, her eyes lit up when she recognized her name.  Very cool!  Made mommy smile.  = )

We painted outside, so clean up just meant putting our masterpieces somewhere out of reach to dry; throwing tape, paper plates, and plastic cups in a big trash bag; and bringing the paint and easels back inside.

Shockingly Easy Summer Project That Will Impress Your Kids, Fellow Moms, Random Strangers, and Maybe Even Your MIL

I was feeling brave yesterday I guess. Or maybe being couped up in the house with sick kids for two weeks just made me desperate for some excitement in my life. Either way, when my mom called and told me there was a cool idea in Lowes Creative Ideas Magazine for a kids bike wash made out of PVC pipe, I thought... I'm so doing that.



I googled to find a couple more ideas and ended up using this one from Family Fun Magazine I used it because it was super cool, but also because it had a materials list and an easy-to-read diagram for cutting the PVC and piecing it together. I ended up spending about $65 total including accessories and a new tool to cut the PVC. The PVC pipe itself was probably only $30-35. It took me less than 3 hours and that was including getting my neighbor to help me figure out how to use my new tool and chasing the kids around the backyard in between PVC cutting and assembling.



The kids really seem to like it... Especially my 5- and 1-year-old boys. Let me know if you've ever done a PVC water park and what the kids thought. I'd love to hear your feedback!