International Puzzle Day

Today is International Puzzle Day!

I am spending the day painting the front and inside of my new Flipzles Dinosaur puzzle!  Here is a sneak peak of the puzzle piece artwork in progress. I am super excited about this puzzle and can't wait to show you more.

In 1760 John Spilsbury mounted a map on a sheet of wood and used a saw to cut around each country.  This mapmaker created the first puzzle to use as a teaching tool.

Puzzles have become a standard toy in classrooms and homes throughout the world.
They are great for so many reasons --

Here are just a few of them -

Problem solving & Critical Thinking

Fine Motor Skills and Hand-eye coordination

Focus and Concentration

Memory & Observation skills

Social Skills and Cooperation (when working as a family or with classmates to solve a puzzle)

Flipzles add a few more to the list --

Creative play 

Imagination 

Storytelling

Children can use the pieces to make up their own stories and scenarios.  They can make up and write their own stories and use the pieces them out, or they can come up with other creative ways to play with the pieces.  My nephew likes to line them up like dominos.

There is no denying that puzzles are food for the brain.  So sit down with your child today and solve a few puzzles!

I am having a 20% off sale on the website now through Feb. 2nd. 

Use this code at check out

INTLPUZL

Go to http://www.flipzles.com to purchase

Personalized Valentines

I love School Valentine's exchanges, but I think Valentine's candy is the grossest -- too many cherry medicine flavored lollipops and conversation hearts... YUCK!  

My kids always want to give Valentine cards with some sort of treat on them though, because those are also their favorite to receive.  Over the years, we have started looking for ideas of fun, unique things to add to the cards that don't involve candy.

Last year my 5th grade daughter's whoopee cushion valentine's were a huge hit.

This year I looked through the Oriental Trading catalogue with my kids and let them pick something (with guidance of course).

My 3rd grader chose cute butterfly masks for the girls in her class and slap bracelets for the boys.  My 1st grader chose mustaches for her his class.

We did a little photo shoot and then I added messages in photoshop.
We will print these pictures 4x6 and then attach the masks, mustaches and bracelets along with writing the names of the classmates on the back of the photo.

The mustache ones aren't as creative as you can find them all over on pinterest, but my son wore his mustache for the entire day after the photo shoot, so at least I think the kid's in his class will love to get their own to wear.

  

His front tooth fell out the day before - so we had to showcase it somehow.

My youngest son, really wanted in on the action so I let him have a mustache to wear.  He kept calling it his "Mus-beard." He also found a hat in our dress up closet and started following me around asking me to take a picture of "cowboy Dantley." He was twitching his lip and acting tough.  It was too cute so I decided to make a Valentine for him as well.  He isn't in school yet, so maybe it will just be a fun one to send to his grandparents.

5 Years of Neighbor Gifts at Christmastime

Every year at Christmas I like to make a little something for my neighbors and family friends.
But, this is a busy time of year for Flipzles, so I like to do something that is not too time intensive.

As much as I would like to hand-dip chocolates or make caramels and other delicious candy like my grandma, mom, and sisters do -- it is more up my alley to try to come up with an original but easy idea.

I like to try and do something people might copy and put on their Pinterest boards -- knowing that I didn't find it on Pinterest myself.

Here are a few things that my family has done in the past ---

2012- Geyser Gifts

Tag reads "We think you GEYSER awesome and we hope you have a blast this Christmas!"

We taped instructions to the back of the bottle.

In 2011 we bought cases of gum and altoids at Costco and put them in brown paper bags with this note on them -- "We MINT to bake something scrumptious or make some decadent candies... but by GUM we just didn't get around to it.   Merry Christmas all the same! Love, the Lewis Family"

In 2010 we made large candy bar wraps, and topped them off with gloves for hats.  These make great teacher gifts too!  (I didn't come up with this idea completely on my own, I saw something like it at a craft show and decided to go home and make my own printable version)

It is also fun to cut paper to the correct size and let the kids draw their own design to give as gifts.

In 2009 I came up with another way to use gloves as a gift wrap...

Gretchen the glove filled reindeer - the tag is somewhat corny, but cute nonetheless

Last year while my husband and I were on a ski trip in Idaho, we bought some chocolate covered cinnamon bears to try.  We both loved them, and then and there I decided that would be my next neighbor Christmas gift.  At first I intended to buy cinnamon bears and dip them myself, but once again, that ended up not working out.  So instead I ordered an entire case (27 pounds of chocolate covered cinnamon goodness) from sweetcandy.com.  It made 50 neighbor gifts!

Now the problem was deciding how to wrap them. 

Ribbon & tag on top

 Simple

Bow on top, tag around paper cup

 In a bag so the chocolate bears can be seen

I couldn't decide, so I did some of each.  Now I just hope my neighbors like these little blasts of cinnamon and chocolate as much as I do.