last minute turkey treats

Thanksgiving is literally just around the corner. In almost exactly 24 hours we'll be having my husband's side of the family over and hosting our first Thanksgiving at our house! I'm very excited because I love to host (it gives me an excuse to do some fun, creative things) and I think it will be fun to watch the cousins play together, and enjoy some time with family. On Saturday, we'll also be hosting dinner and family time with my sister and brother and their families. My parents are in Alaska, so we'll definitely be missing them (hi mom and dad!) for Thanksgiving, but they'll be "home" soon!

I thought I would try to squeeze in one last fun project before the big feast tomorrow. This idea had been in the back of my head for awhile ever since I saw it on Make and Takes (You have to go check this blog out! Marie has so many great ideas and many of them are meant to be creative with your kids.) Have I mentioned yet that I'm pretty good at borrowing ideas? I borrowed some ideas for a few of my October projects, too.

It wasn't until Monday that I got the necessary supplies to create these little turkeys and then finally this morning we went to work creating some turkey treats. This was one of the traditions I wanted to add to our Thanksgiving this year (along with the other two that I shared about here). I tried to keep things simple this year (no, really I did) since I am heavily involved in my local MOPS group and also working on building my photo card business. However, I still wanted to make the most of this holiday and celebrate being thankful, and of course adding a little bit of fun into it, too!

So, here's the fun...
**For a better explanation than what I'm about to give you, go here where Marie from Make and Takes shared her turkey treat idea. You'll have to scroll down about halfway to find it.

Make a batch of rice krispie treats using Cocoa Krispies. After they cool for a few minutes, grease up your hands with cooking spray and form into balls. Gather together candies (we used Mike & Ikes, candy corn, mini M & M's, and Fruit Loops) and you'll need some toothpicks. Oh, and don't forget to take lots of pictures of your little ones enjoying building their creation. (As you will see, I did plenty of that!)

Enough with the pictures...let's get to work, mom!

Using candy corn, make the turkey's beak. (I used the end of a spoon to make a hole so Mikayla could put the "beaks" in.)

Now find some eyes (mini M & M's). This was a good lesson in matching colors since she had to find two of the same kind. See, I'm even using my teaching skills!

For the feathers, poke 5-6 toothpicks into the rice krispy. I had Mikayla use Fruit Loops to make the feathers. Also a good lesson in sorting colors. I also used candy corn as feathers, but found that they didn't stay in quite as good as with the Fruit Loops on the toothpicks.


And this is what Austin did with his Fruit Loops...


Death by toothpicks. Yikes! I was busy doing something and came back to this. I'm thinking Mikayla wanted to give her turkey acupuncture or something.


Voila! Turkey treats! Cute huh?


I decided to wrap these little turkeys up and give them to our guests tomorrow for a take home treat.


Just remember you don't always have to come up with your own ideas to be called creative. You can still be creative by borrowing something you see. It's just a matter of doing it. I think that's one of the reasons why I have loved blogging so much. I am keeping myself accountable for making the most out of daily life while I stay home with my kids...both in creativity and productivity.

OK, enough fun for now. Time to get back to dusting and figuring out how to cook this darn turkey for tomorrow! Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Enjoy this time with your family and friends...