Buzz and Alien Pumpkins

We were very Toy Story themed this year for Halloween so I painted our pumpkins to go along with that. We like to paint our pumpkins down here since the weather is so hot if we cut them they tend to melt and mold very quickly. So the alien was pretty easy, I used lots of neon green. For both these pumpkins I used the little bottles of acrylic paint, makes for an inexpensive craft. The aliens' antenna was a pipe cleaner covered with green felt and some thread.

Buzz took several hours to do but he turned out pretty darn awesome. The black is a sparkly black which gave it a great outer space look to it.

And here is my tiny little buzz lightyear. Costume, themed bucket and matching pumpkins. We had another great Halloween. 

Deployment Box #8 - Happy Birthday

This is our last box for this deployment! My husband will of course be gone again for his this year so I put together a birthday box. It won't be the same as a party with cake and presents home with us, but hopefully some extra fun goodies will brighten his day. I had my son help do hand prints for a heart, and I did a happy birthday banner across the top. The tissue paper is green with sparkles, I was going to do wrapping paper but I found we were all out so I had to work with what we had in the wrapping bin. 

Included in this box was:

• Birthday cake M&Ms (Not pictured, and I've never tired them so hopefully they are yummy)
• Lays chips (I liked that these were a in plastic "pringles-like" container which hopefully will help them survive the journey)
• Capn' crunch snack mix (.99 store treasure, ha)
• Cashews
• Banana chips
• Jolly rancher green apple drink mix
• Gatorade energy chews
• Dried pineapple and papaya
• Redvines
• Protein powder (not pictured)
• Razors (not pictured)

Deployment Box #7 - Vitamin Me!

I thought I'd have some fun with this box. No neat designs, just lettering, but its a fun one that hopefully will get a smile out of my husband. Only one more box after this since it will take longer for boxes to get to him and he is almost home!

Included in this box:

• Dried fruit (again I know, but if you are eating MRE's any fruit is better than none)
• Oatmeal
• Peanut butter
• Tuna pouches
• Protein bars
• Razors
• Pistachios
• Funions (not pictured)
• Life Cereal (no pictured)

Deployment Box #6 - Goodnight and Goodmorning

Another fun deployment box. Since my husband is on the other side of the world we definitely have to deal with time differences and one of us being asleep while the other is awake. This one is just filled with normal goodies that he likes. 

Includes:

• Dried fruit
• Crunch munch
• Cookies
• Butterfinger bites
• Oatmeal
• Tuna (canned and salad kits)
• Razors

Deployment Box #5 - Viking

Viking Theme!

This box wasn't super detailed, but I'm sure my husband would say it was his favorite theme so far. He loves Norse mythology and so I did a Viking themed box. Also since I couldn't think of many treats (or any) that were Viking themed, the goodies I added were just a good selection of what I had on hand.

In this box I filled it with:

• Crunch 'n munch
• Redvines
• Jolly rancher flavored drink packets
• Cup of noodles
• Tuna salad kits
• Campbells soup pouch
• Yakisoba noodles

Deployment Box #4 - 4th of July

It is almost independence day so I put together this red, white, and blue themed box. Using my Silhouette I cut out lots of fireworks and stars. I also filled the box all red, white, and blue colored goodies. 

Included in this box is:

• Tuna salad kits and canned tuna
• Cookies
• Peanut butter
• Rice cups
• Flavored water drops
• Corn nuts
• Poptarts
• Oatmeal cups

All these items are not necessarily that red,white and blue, but their packaging worked. Hopefully he enjoys it as much as the others. 

Summer Fun #3 - Water beads

This was a fun and super simple activity to do. I ordered a bag of these little balls called Jelly Beadz. This is what came:

I added 3 teaspoons of them to a big container filled with about 4 quarts of water. They start out a little smaller than the size of a peppercorn, I know it doesn't seem like a lot, but they soak up the water and get big.

After about an hour they were already getting pretty big and looked like this. I'd compare them to the size of plump peas at this point. 

And after a full night of soaking in water...They are about the size of marble and they are super fun, bouncy and a great sensory play activity.