Rained Out

Our objective for the day was a fun morning with cloud dough and a fun evening at the baseball game. The second part of our day, we realized early on, would have to be changed. It had been pouring all night and storms were in the forecast for the next 24 hours. There would be no baseball this evening, but no worries!

We took to the internet to find something to celebrate today. Upon finding that it's National Chili Dog Day, we decided if we had to change our evening activity plans, we'd also change up dinner. I had beef stew in the crock pot, but that could be saved for tomorrow. Instead, chili dogs! That also meant we'd have to make a grocery store run.

First, though, we wanted to have a little bit of fun. A little prep-work on my part last night left us with something various bloggers on Pinterest call "Cloud Dough." It's a simple mix of 1 part baby oil with 8 parts flour. You can add food coloring if you wish, for colored dough, but we opted out this time. I wasn't comfortable letting Caleb play with this mixture this time (baby oil is not safe for consumption, and I know he'd have found it tempting!) so we scheduled this play-time for during his morning nap.  After covering the table in paper, the kids went to town -- building, smashing, and squishing the morning away!

Kaitlyn's favorite part was making big walls with towers in between, then flattening them down in one fell swoop!

Elias seemed to just love the texture of it; he squished the cloud dough between his fingers and buried his hands in it.

They played for a while, then had a nap, then we went on the grocery store run. The kids helped me prepare dinner. Elias was in charge of carefully picking the stems from the grapes that went alongside their chili dogs. Kaitlyn used a plastic knife to help me cut the banana and cheese stick into sharing-sized pieces. Caleb mostly stayed out of the way, which naturally is always a wonderful help in the kitchen.

Are these not the cutest plates? They were only $3 at Target!

After dinner, a great first-time experience: we made s'mores with these large square marshmallows I found on clearance at Target last week. It was a horrific mess for Elias, who ended up wearing more than he ate, but it was an utter delight for them both. The clean-up was more than worth it!

Before the worst of it ...

After a quick bath, we read the usual favorites: Elias went with I Love You, Stinkyface by Lisa McCourt and Kaitlyn chose Wild Sea Creatures: Sharks, Whales, and Dolphins! by Martin Kratt and Chris Kratt.

Now, all that's left is for me to catch up on Big Brother, then hit the sack myself. (Do you watch it?? Were you happy with who went home? Did America's Players accept the challenge??)

What's up for tomorrow?? Maybe we'll celebrate Rounds Resounding Day by learning a few new tunes, or perhaps make a raspberry cream pie to celebrate Raspberry Cream Pie Day? And I'm positive the kids will want to hit up the park, or the zoo, or ... ? I can't wait to find out what pans out!

Until then!