Free Printable 2013 Personal Calendars

Do you keep a personal or family calendar? If you're like me, you have several going at once. Here is a tool to personalize, customize and design your calendars. Make coloring page calendars with animal, Bible, holiday, fantasy and cartoon character calendars. The calendar creator tool is free to use and customize. Make personalized free printable calendars for everyone this holiday season. Print 2013 calendars in color for older family members and make color your own calendars for children. You might also print all the calendars in black and white and ask children to color images and give colored calendars as gifts. This makes a great Advent service project or countdown to Christmas activity. Read more

Free Printable Chanukah Crafts for Kids (and busy Jewish Moms!)

Hanukkah or Chanukah, the Jewish Festival of Lights, begins at sundown Dec. 8, 2012. On the Hebrew calendar Hanukkah always falls on the 25th of Kislev on the Hebrew calendar. For busy Jewish parents, trying to juggle work, kids and Hanukkah preparation, life can get busy around the holiday. Here are free printable crafts and activities to keep kids productively (operative word) occupied! Assign children tasks of making decorations and cards. This keeps them happy and out of mischief (for awhile anyway!) read on

How I Set Work-at-Home Boundaries

I've been a WAHM (work-at-home-mom) since 2005. There are advantages to working at home. I see more of my family, I'm readily available. I don't have to go out to work every day. Oddly, those advantages are closely related to the disadvantages. Work-at-home perks caused many problems before I learned to set boundaries. Here's how. How I Set Work-at-Home Boundaries with Myself and Family

Free Printable Halloween Word Games, Word Search, Word Scrambles, Puzzles

Little ones look forward to Halloween, but so do big kids. And sometimes it's hard to keep anxious kids, young or old, productively occupied while waiting. Got some big kids that need activities to keep them busy till trick-or-treat? Maybe you're a teacher or home school parent that needs activities to keep kids on task? Here are free printable Halloween and trick or treat word puzzles, games and word searches. Games are educational too! Use these free printable word games, word searches and puzzles for classroom lesson plans.   Free Printable Halloween Word Games, Word Search, Word Scrambles and Puzzles 

Montessori mom: At-home preschool dramatic play learning center

 As a special needs and former Montessori teacher, my classrooms have always been organized on the learning center principle. Learning centers are rotational play areas were children perform tasks related to specific content areas: math, reading, science, art, practical life, dramatic play. When I had children, I imported the learning center philosophy into my home. The play room was set up like a modified preschool classroom. Got toddler or preschool age kids? I highly recommend setting up learning centers. If you're homeschooling, learning centers are a must. Here's how this Montessori mom designed an at-home dramatic play area. Montessori mom: At-home preschool dramatic play learning center 

Helping middle school kids transition to high school

Transitioning from middle school to high school is a lot like starting kindergarten--there are similar woes and worries. Will I make friends? Will my old friends meet new people and ditch me? Do I look okay? Will I get lost? Where's my locker and how the heck do I get it open? Here are parenting tips to help middle school kids transition to high school. Helping high school kids with back-to-school jitters

Parents' back-to-school concerns: Should kids ride the bus or walk to school?

Nervous about kids going back to school? A big cause of back-to-school anxiety for parents is transportation. Should kids walk to school? Are school buses safe? I drive to school; how do I juggle schedules? Here are parenting tips on coordinating school transportation. WAHMs and work at home parents, here are tips to help you decide. Parents' back-to-school concerns: Should kids ride the bus or walk to school?