Emily's Artwork For Dad

 One of the things on Craig's Christmas list this year is an art project from Emily. I wanted it to be something pretty cool that he could easily display on his desk at work. I saw a few examples of this style of art on pinterest and so I thought Emily would have a lot of fun with this.

DIY Reward Chart

 

In addition to finding a need for a chore chart for Emily, I also that she was ready for a reward chart. I wasn't quite sure how I wanted to go about doing this...so off to Pinterest I went. I found an amazing post from, "Life Sprinkled With Glitter" on a great reward system that I followed with just a couple of adjustments to match our chore chart. The post goes into great detail on how this works, but I'll just give you a brief summary. Basically, Emily starts each day with all of her "coins" (on our chart they are princesses) no matter how many "coins" were lost the day before, you start fresh each and every day. When Emily displays poor choices/behavior she has to give me a princess. I let her choose which princess she wants to give me (at the age of three she already has her favorites that are always the last to go...one word...Cinderella). When she makes good choices she can earn a "coin" back. The goal is to have ALL of her princesses by the end of the day. If she has all of them, then she earns a sticker. If she doesn't have all seven princesses then she doesn't get a sticker. Once she earns 10 stickers then we can go to the store and she can pick out a $10 toy. NOW, if she is really having an off day and happens to lose all of her coins before the end of the day then she can not earn her coins back. She will have to wait until the next day to get her princesses back. 

DIY Chore Chart

Now that I am staying home full time, the need for these charts quickly presented itself. I'll begin with the chore chart. Honestly, this chart is more for me than it is for Emily. There are so many things that Emily can now do on her own but I kept doing them for her out of habit. I'm simply going through the house grabbing things as I go and constantly picking up...which is doing Emily a disservice. For example, Emily is absolutely capable of taking her dirty dishes to the sink all by herself. She is able to pick up all of her toys when she is done playing with them. She can get dressed and (for the most part) she can brush her teeth all by herself. These are all things that I was doing for her because I just get in that mindset of "do...do...do", I want to clean up, put things away, get her dressed and ready, etc.

DIY Reindeer Ornaments

This is an oldie...but a goodie!! I made these ornaments with my mom when I was super young, and I had a blast making these with Emily this year.