Thanksgiving Winner!

Thank you to everyone that participated in the Thanksgiving recipe swap! It was fun seeing everyones favorites and reading about how they turned out. I plugged in the comments to the www.random.org number generator this morning and the winner is....

Comment #2 submitted by Jessica Wanless

Nana's Mashed Potatoes

10 pounds of potatoes will make a large cake pan and some extra. I always make them the day before - it makes it a lot easier. You bake them @ 350 degrees with alumium foil on top of them for the first 45 minutes and then take it off for the remaining 15 minutes so the top can brown. They will bake about an hour if they have been refrigerated from the day before.

l0# of potatoes
peeled - cut up and cooked
smash them
add: l c. sour cream (l6 oz)
l 8 oz cream cheese
1/2 stick butter
whip them with a blender and add
milk needed for consistency
also add: 2 tsp onion salt
salt and pepper to taste
put them in a cake pan that has been sprayed
with Pam or coated with butter and dot the top
with the rest of the stick of butter.
350 degree
45 min with alumium foil
l5 min without to brown

Thank you Jessica and congratulations! Email me at jcochran@lexca.org to claim your prize.

I will be back tomorow with a fun new post about education activities for you and your preschooler to do at home. Have a happy Wednesday!



Thanksgiving Recipe Swap

With the Thanksgivng holiday coming up in a few days, I thought it would be fun to swap some of our favorite recipes! Do you have a tried and true recipe that you make every year for your family? Leave a comment with the exact recipe so we call all see. Be sure to come back later in the week and let everyone know how it turned out.

 Next week, we will pick a random comment to win a $10 gift card to your favorite grocery store! The gift card would be a great way to get started on your Christmas grocery list. 

Iphone Apps

Technology has become an integral part of our world today. Some 3 year olds know how to work an iphone better than their parents! Today I wanted to share some of the top iphone apps for preschool aged. Most of these are inexpensive and you can even find a lot that are free.. These apps are a great way for your little one to have fun while also engaging in an educational exercise.

1) 123 Color Talking Coloring Book

Age: 4+

Price: $1.99



2) Elmo's Monster Maker

Age: 2-8

Price: $3.99

3) Duck Duck Moose

Age: 2-6

Price: $.99

4) Dr. Suess Books'

Age: 2-8

Price: $3.99

5) Jungle Time

Age: 4-8

Price: $.99

6) Fish School

Age: 2-5

Price: $1.99

7) JellyDoodle

Age: 3+

Price: $.99

8) Preschool Connect the Dots

Age: 4-8

Price: $1.99

9) Count with Sesame Series

Age: 3-8

Price: $2.99

10) Twinkle Twinkle Little Star

Age: 3-5

Price: $.99

Do you have a favorite preschool app? Share it with us in the comments section!

Also, with Thanksgiving being next week, it would be fun to do a recipe exchange. Be looking for a post with instructions on Monday!

Compassion Bloggers Trip

The whole idea of blogging may be new to a lot of you, but if you search the internet you will find that it is a very popular outlet for lots of moms! Compassion international reached out to several popular bloggers and invited them to travel to Ecuador to do mission work this week. All of the bloggers are updating nightly about their expereinces. They just left Monday and already have amazing stories to tell. I thought it would be fun to link up with these bloggers so you can read about their trip, but also so you can get a feel for the community that blogging can build. I encourage you to read through the comments on the postings and see how fun it is.

Kelly's Korner

Kelly's blog is one that I read just about every day. She is a stay at home mom of 2 sweet girls, Harper and Hollis. I encourage you to not only read the Ecuador postings, but to also read through her other posts. She really feels that God has lead her to blog as her ministry. Isn't technology amazing?



Baby Bangs

If you have been in the Christian women's community for any length of time you are probably very familiar with Beth Moore. Amanda Jones is Beth's daughter and is also a very popular mommy blogger. Amanda has 2 children, Jackson and Annabeth. Check out her blog to read about Equador, and also to read about the new Church she and her husband just started.

Big Mama

Melanie blogs about her family and daughter Caroline. She also has her fist Equador post up!

 

A Holy Experience

Ann Voskamp is a blogging mamma of 6 and a best selling author. 

BooMama

Sophie, better known as "BooMama" blogs about her family with such fun, witty humor! You will love reading her blog!

Be sure to check back with these ladies all week to read about their adventures! It will be fun to see how the Lord uses blogging (even South of the Equator) :)

Feeling Crafty

With such a rainy Thursday, I thought it would be fun to post a few fun craft ideas to do at home with your little ones! These all came from Pinterest and if you click the link under the picture, it will link you back to the original source. On that same note, are you all on Pinterest yet? It is so fun! Send an email to jcochran@lexca.org if you would like to be sent an invitation. If you are already on it, leave a comment here with your username so we can all follow eachother!

I have listed my top 3 current favorites! Do you have any fun craft ideas for rainy or snow days? Leave us a comment and share!

1) Thanksgiving Mantle- I really love this one! It is perfect for the current season. You cut leaf shapes out of construction paper and have your child write one thing they are thankful for on each leaf (or, if they are too little to write, you just ask them and write it for them.) You can put up the leaves with ribbon or string. It turns out to be a cute and fun fall craft with a great message.

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2) Homeade Crayons- If you are like me, you have several broken crayons sitting around the house. Most usually get sent to the trash around our house. This is a fun way to recyle them! Place the broken crayons into a muffin/candy mold and bake them at 230 for 15 minutes. You are left with a cute craft that is also practical. These would also make great gifts!

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3) Paper Towel Roll Art- this is another great idea to recycle things you already have at home. Let your little one paint using a used paper towel roll! They will love it and you dont have to worry about finding paint brushes around the house. Just squirt a few colors on a paper plate and let them go!

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Again, be sure to leave a comment with your favorite at home craft ideas!



Job Opportunity

LCA is looking for a part time extended care worker for preschool

 at the East campus. The hours are M-F 3:00-5:30. This would be

 a great position if you have a little one at the East campus and

 are looking for a part time job. If you are interested, visit www.lexingtonchristian.org and find application

 documents under the “about us” section.

Have a happy Thursday!

From the Lunchbox

From the Lunchbox- Tips for packing a healthy and yummy lunch for your little one!

It can be so hard to find good, healthy food that your little ones will actually want to eat in their lunchbox. We have listed below some tips that you will hopefully find helpful for packing healthy lunches!

•Involve your child in the planning.- Sit down with your children once a week and plan out their lunches. Odd’s are, if you involve them in the decision making, they will be more likely to eat what they find in their lunchbox.

•Shop for foods that will last all week and prioritize to use the freshest ones first (blueberries and baby carrots should last but raspberries might need to be used right away).

•Stock up on healthy non-perishables.- There are a few staples that are great to keep in the pantry for when fruits and veggies may be starting to turn: almonds, raisins, rice cakes, wheat crackers, canned pumpkin (sprinkle cinnamon, include a spoon!), and granola.

•Make ahead what you can so you can streamline the packing process (savory muffins, hard-boiled eggs, half-sandwich for tomorrow)

 

Do you have a lunchbox tip? Please leave us a comment and share!

Congratulations!

We used the www.random.org number generator to choose the winner of the giftcard.

Congratulations to Carrie! Please email jcochran@lexca.org to claim your prize! We will be doing more givaways in the future, so be sure to keep checking back!

The first official blog post will be up tomorrow. The topic is "from the lunchbox" and we will be discussing healthy and easy lunch ideas for your little ones. Have a happy Tuesday :)

Welcome & A Giveaway!

Welcome to the new moms of LCA preschoolers blog! After months of preparation, we are excited that launch day is finally here. Our prayer is that this blog will be a source of encouragement, ideas and fellowship for you.

While some of you may be very familiar with blogging, we know this may be an entirely new concept for others of you. Take a few minutes to click through the different pages and familiarize yourself with the different tabs and ways to connect.

You will notice that there are 4 tabs at the top of the page:

     1) About Us- this tab is for newcomers to the blog or LCA. It gives a brief description of the schools history. It is a great starting point for someone who is completely new to LCA to learn a little bit about the school and its history.
    
     2) Prayer Requests- this is probably our favorite tab. The main goal of this blog is to foster a healthy community among mothers. One of the ways we can do this is to pray for one another. If you go to the Prayer requests tab, you will see an email address that you can send your requests to. These requests can remain anonymous, or can have your name included. It will be exciting to get updates on these and see how the Lord answers our prayers.

     3) Resources- this tab will have links to resources mentioned or used in blog posts as well as resources used by moms on the blog. If you have a great website that you use a lot, please feel free to email it to us and we will add it to the resources tab.  We want to have an exhaustive listing of the best resources for preschool moms available on the web.

     4) Connect- When you click over to this tab you will notice 2 things. The first is that there is a handy button called "email us". When you click on the button, a form opens up for you to fill out and it sends the message directly to us. The second thing you will see are direct links to our facebook pages. Facebook is another great way to connect and get in touch with other LCA families. Click on the link and be sure to "like" the page.

Starting next week, we will start having our weekly blog postings. Some of these will be weekly, while others of them will only show up from time to time. Here is a list of postings we have planned.

-Biblical Integration into the home

-Craft Ideas for Snow Days

-From the Lunchbox- tips for healthy lunches

-Suggested reading lists for your little ones

-Thankful Thursdays

-Local Activity Spotlight Days

-Guest bloggers from our school and the community.

-Mommy blogger link ups
-Recipes

This list is just the start. Always feel free to email us if you have a topic that you would like to see on the blog!

To celebrate the launch of the blog, we want to have a little giveaway! Leave us a comment on this post letting us know what "tab" is your favorite AND what blog topic interests you the most. Comments will be closed Monday, October 10th and we will randomly draw a winner. The winner will receive a $20 gift card to your favorite restaurant.

*Please note- all comments will have to be approved before they are posted, so it may take a few hours before they show up in the comments section.*

This post will stay up for the next week, giving everyone a chance to explore the blog and enter the comments contest. Feel free to use the connect tab to email us any feedback you have. Have a happy weekend!