The Family Night Snow Version

I stole the idea of a themed family night from my friend Beth. Her blog is private or I'd point you in her direction. But just take my word for it when I say she is creative and such a great mom and wife! I saw some of the things she did last summer and really felt that this would be a great thing for our family. Things can get so busy and most of our nights at home are a rush to feed, love, bathe, love, read, rock , love and bed, and then sleep. I try and want to do better at making our quality time special and memorable for the boys. Some of this comes with a pure motive, a desire to create a magical childhood. And then of course is the working mother guilt that I struggle with. Every day. And my need to overcompensate for the boys. Regardless of the motive we all had an awesome family date! I highly recommend taking the time, setting it aside to focus on creating fun with the kiddos. It is a tradition that I hope we continue!

For our first family night I picked snow, because we won't have any. And that is something the boys were studying at school. We started the afternoon/night with a story about a cold snap and all the fun you can have in snow.
Then we painted snowmen with "snow paint". This activity was very well received  Miller in particular LOVED it. I was so glad because last summer he was not really ready for craft based activities and now it looks like he is.

Mommy's snowman

Daddy's snowflake

Noah's snowman

Miller's snow scene 

 {In case you are wondering "snow paint" is made with equal parts shaving cream and Elmer's glue. It dries cute and puffy.}

After this we went around the block in our sleigh (or wagon) and played outside for a while.

Then we came in and a white dinner....

Penne pasta with chicken and homemade cream sauce. We did add some green salad. Gotta have the veggies.

After dinner we took the snow to the bath and made a little winter wonderland in the tub. This might have been the boys favorite thing!

After we were all clean we made marshmallow snowmen for dessert.

We ended our night with a movie we found on Netflix about snow. None of us liked it. I won't recommend it. I should have rented Happy Feet. But all in all it was a great night of focused attention on our most precious gifts. And hopefully built a memory for them. Next month I'm thinking hearts or love or something Valentinesy.