My first summer camp was in 3rd grade. My last summer camp was the year I married. Camp is one of my best and favorite memories. And it’s a big deal in my family–my mom is a camp director for Camp Rocks, while my dad, brother, sister-in-law and cousin all volunteer at it. Lydia is chomping at hte bits to be old enough to attend.

This year, while the family was at camp, Lydia and I decided to make a special camp necklace to deliver to our camping family on the last day. We made S’mores Necklaces! Aren’t they the cutest thing you’ve ever seen?! It’s as easy as it looks–just string them together and wear! But I’ll show you some of the things we learned along the way…

Supplies: dark brown craft foam, light brown craft foam, paper clips, string for necklace, scissors and Foam Marshmallows

1. Cut out 2 identical squares of the light brown foam. These are your graham crackers! Cut out a smaller square from the dark brown foam. This is the chocolate!

2. Flatten out a paper clip leaving the smaller end intact. (I tried using a quilting needle and just stringing them all together. I couldn’t get it–maybe my string was too fat or my needle too skinny. Paperclips are more my style anyway!)

3. Stack your chocolate on top of one graham cracker. Then poke your paperclip through the bottom! If you do this out of order, your chocolate will be underneath or above the marshmallow and you won’t be able to see it.

4. (Yikes! Sorry about that crazy focus job!) Now, fold down the paperclip to be flush with the craft foam. It makes a nice little clamp that keeps everything from slipping off!

5. Then slide on your marshmallow (through the equator, not the north/south poles!) and your final piece of graham cracker!

6. Now twist that paper clip into a little circle and add a string!

We delivered them to my family this morning and everyone loved them! My mom said a bunch of kids asked her, “Where’d you get that S’mores necklace?!” I wanted to add a little tag to it that said, “You’re loved S’MORE than you know!” Or something like that. Maybe next time!

Have you been to summer camp? Do your kids go? What’s your favorite part—besides the s’mores, of course?

While you’re thinking about camp–here’s some of our favorite summer camp posts!

linked to childmade.com

The kids and I found a turtle in our backyard on Friday. They were so excited that it turned our whole day into a turtle day. We watched the turtle, looked at him with a magnifying glass, looked up stuff about turtles on the internet, printed off turtle worksheets and finally decided to make a turtle craft–a cute turtle necklace! {I found this on another website which I cannot find again but if I do, I’ll link back to them!}

All you need is some yarn, beads, craft foam cut into the shape of a turtle (the template was on the website & I can’t find it!), hole punch, glue gun, scissors, paint & some plastic bottle tops.

We painted our bottle tops brown and made yellow spots. Well, Lydia did one giant spot. It was a box turtle & really, she looked just like the ones the kids painted! By the way, did I tell you they named her Daisy?

While the bottle tops are drying, cut out a little turtle shape and punch a hole in his front feet (paws? hands?).

Then string a piece of yarn through the holes and add a few beads. Asa loves stringing beads so this was a fun one for him!

When your beads are on, grab your hot glue gun and attach the new bottle cap turtle shell. (You can see Asa’s spots on that one!)

And that’s it! Tie it up and throw it around your neck–turtle necklace! Isn’t it cute?

As we beaded and painted I read all of Psalm 7. It’s a rough one about how David is about to be torn apart by his enemies like a lion tears apart his prey. But verse 10 is the one I wanted them to hear:

The Most High God is like a shield that keeps me safe.

“The Most High” is something our family talks about a lot. My dad’s favorite passage is Psalm 91. It’s kept us leaning on God through cancer, chemo, surgery and Hepatitis C treatments. And Lydia and I just had a big conversation in the car about dwelling in the shelter of the Most High. So, this verse is a perfect add on to Psalm 91′s focus of The Most High.

And the shield? Well, it reminded us of our little turtle shells! A shield protects just like a turtle shell! I had the kids repeat the verse several times and I really wanted to make a giant paper mache shield to write the verse on—but alas, we didn’t have any newspaper. Oh, well. Some other time!

But the point remains–the turtle reminds us of God’s protection in our life. The Most High our very own shield!

I am so inspired by all the Meaningful Easter posts you guys are linking up! I thought I knew everything I wanted to do with the kids this week to celebrate Jesus’ Resurrection but now I have even more ideas–and I hope I can incorporate them into our celebration this week!

Yesterday was a crazy day and we didn’t get to do the Palm Sunday stuff I wanted to do. But it wasn’t a big deal because at church they had real palm branches and did a parade through the hall. Asa thought he was at Disney World he was so excited. They talked about it all day!

Regardless, I decided to do some Palm Sunday stuff this morning. First we made some palm branches from our PALMS! We traced our hands on paper then cut them out, glued them to a craft stick and had a dance party downstairs!

We actually have TWO favorite Palm Sunday songs. Who knew, right? Well, they aren’t Palm Sunday exactly but they do say, “Hosanna!” which is what the people were shouting to Jesus when he rode into town on the donkey.

The first song is called, “Shout Hosanna” from The Donut Man. Lydia loves this one because it begins with “Jumping up and down, shout Hosanna!”

Our other favorite song is called “Hosanna Rock” from Yancy. This was the first songs Asa ever sang when he was little and he pronounced it, “Ho-nanna, Ho-ho-ho-nanna!” Now he can sing all the words (correctly) and do all the motions, including when they “play the drums and rock the guitar!” I love this one because it talks about how you can praise the Lord in different ways–clapping, instruments, raising your hands, etc.

I loved seeing the kids run around the room singing and dancing to the Lord. There’s nothing that makes me more exciting than hearing words of praise and adoration come from my children’s lips. That’s why good music is so important to me. And to help you with a little Word-filled music, Yancy is giving away THREE of her Little Praise Party: Springtime EP’s which includes “Hosanna Rock”! These CDs are basically out of print (they were an Easter gift for her church last year) so this is an exclusive for you!

Enter to win one of three Little Praise Party: Springtime EP by Yancy (do one or all, leave a separate comment for each):

• Leave a comment. How are you celebrating Easter? Or what’s your favorite Easter candy? Or whatever!
• Tweet it! I’m celebrating Easter with @yancynotnancy and @impressyourkids–win a Springtime CD! http://bit.ly/hosannaCD
• Share on Facebook. It’s easy – just click the “Like” button at the bottom of this post! You can even add a status update with it!

Contest ends Sunday, April 22.

Can’t wait to listen to find out if you won? You can download Springtime for only FIVE BUCKS at KidzMatter.com!

linked to Ultimate Guide for Celebrating Holy Week