Lapbooking: Now is your opportunity to SAVE BIG with Hands Of A Child

     Hello everyone! I wanted to share with you one of my very favorite methods of teaching my children.... through lapbooks! Lapbooking is a fun way to cover any subject from a literature unit on a book (like Charlotte's Web, etc.), math (like Multiplication Pizza Party), social studies/history (anything from Ancient Egypt to learning about geography of a state or even country) or even grammar (we are doing one on a grammar detective)! Our 1st lapbook was actually on Guinea Pigs. The kids wanted to get a guinea pig and I decided to have them learn all they could about them before bringing one home! I also wanted to mention some of my observations in regards to lapbooking. I found that the kids are always VERY proud of their final product and they gladly “show” it to everyone! When they “show” it around, they are restating everything they learned throughout the process. Ever since the very first time that I witnessed them doing this, I KNEW this was an excellent hands-on approach to teaching just about anything!

     Before I start rambling, I want to share with you one of my favorite sites for lapbooking, Hands of a Child. www.HandsOfAChild.com . They are having a HUGE SALE for Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Cyber Monday. The following is the information regarding their huge sale! If you aren't sure if they are for you or not, this is a great time to try one out for less money! They have a sample for each Lapbook that you can look at and pictures of completed Lapbooks so that you can see an example of the finished project. Many times there are several different little mini-books used within a folder or binder, somewhat similar to notebooking; but, in my opinion so much better! If you have any questions on lapbooking, feel free to email or call me OR even contact Hands of a Child as they have wonderful customer service! If you wonder how much I love Hands of a Child, I thought I'd let you know that I'm a Lifetime Super Member! The information on the sale is as follows:

Our 5th Annual Black Friday Sale is Almost Here!

Are YOU Ready?!?!

As always we will be offering a HUGE Black Friday Discount on Hands of a Child Products*

This year we will also be doing an additional discount on all products we offer during Cyber Monday*

and NEW This Year
Small Business Saturday



Support In the Hands of a Child
on
Small Business Saturday

Saturday, November 26th is the 2nd annual Small Business Saturday. Small Business Saturday is a day that is dedicated to supporting small businesses. Please take time out of the busiest shopping weekend of the year to support small businesses!

When you shop SMALL businesses, your money makes a HUGE impact!

Like many businesses in the United States, In the Hands of a Child is a small company. We began In the Hands of a Child in 2002 when Kimm and Niki, two homeschooling moms, found themselves constantly searching for the right graphics and information for their children to complete hands-on activities and unit studies. The two quietly "set up shop" on the web and became the first company to sell ready to assemble lapbook kits.

Three years later, Katie, a stay at home mom of three, joined In the Hands of a Child as an author/researcher and partner in the growing business. Nine years later, we are still small, but thriving. The three of us share equal responsibilities, each bringing unique qualities and talents to our small business, with one goal in mind- to provide quality unit study, lapbooking, and notebooking materials to all educators. Together, we have published over 400 packs and continue to release new ones on a regular basis!

Please join us in celebrating our success and endurance as a small business. On Saturday, November 26th we are offering 1-year Super Memberships for $50.00 (retail $75.00). Purchase a Super Membership on Small Business Saturday and not only do you save $25.00, but you make a HUGE impact on our business. Most importantly, a Super Membership at In the Hands of a Child will put laughter and learning into the hands of YOUR child all year long!

But WAIT are you already a Super Member?

Super Members can start saving TODAY, no need to wait until Black Friday to begin saving BIG!

Use the coupon code SuperThanks to get 45% off all Hands of a Child Products*

Use the coupon code SuperFun to save 30% on all non Hands of a Child Products**

Use the coupon code SuperMember to save $25 on your 1 year Super Member renewal 

* Excludes Custom Designed Project Packs, already discounted products and Super Memberships
** Quantities are limited, backorders will not be excepted

www.HandsofaChild.com
sales@HandsofaChild.com This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
1-866-HANDS-01
 

A family in Vegas with Kids

     We knew Las Vegas was known for gambling, drinking, and other unspeakable sins; none-the-less, we were determined to find some good – some family fun! So, our friends had just been there and we had never been, so we asked them what they did when they were there. They said that you just go and walk around and that there was a lot to find and do for free.  For those that don’t know the hotels are connected and you walk through them and see the different sites to see. Each hotel has its own theme and many have something to see or do for free (thanks Erin!). I thought it was a bit weird that you walk through hotels that you are not checked in at, do not plan to check in at, nor even play in the casinos!  Once we arrived in Vegas, parked in the parking garage, I completely understood! The adventure was on!




Kids in front of Nevada sign!
Frank and kids in front of Planet Hollywood


     We decided the first day that we went into town that we would just check the place out and go from there. Wow! We only brought our camera phone with us as we didn’t want to be the only crazy tourists flashing our camera everywhere… little did we know EVERYONE carried their cameras and acted the crazy tourists that we were!  There were so many side shows ~ meaning people do almost anything for money/tips while you are walking around! The kids enjoyed the below gentleman so we had their pic taken with him! We walked and we walked, and we walked! If you decide to take the bus, it drives around the “Las Vegas Strip” and it costs $5 for two hours or $7 for 24 hours. That’s not a bad price at all; but, me being cheap and figuring the exercise could only help us all, I thought no, we’ll pass on the $28. It was fun walking around and exploring; but, wow, we only walked around (including sitting and breaks in between) for about four hours and I was limping by that time!
     Through doing research of our destination, I found a website that offered quite a few attractions, museums, and other things to do for a relatively reasonable price. I found a similar site when I was in Houston called the City Pass (www.citypass.com). The one for Las Vegas is called the Las Vegas Power Pass (www.visiticket.com/LasVegas). If you’d like to get it for just one day, you can see as many places as you can or would like to for $80 for an adult or $50 for a child. The more days you add on, the cheaper it is considered per day. For an example, we did it for two days so it was $99 for adults and $66 for kids. So, if you do it for one day for an adult it averages $80 or 2 days for an average of $49 a day. If you do it for 5 days, it runs $35 a day.  Before getting it, we decided what we’d like to see in Vegas and how much it would cost us if we didn’t get the pass. Just to see the Beatles concert ($50), Siegfried and Roy’s Dolphin Habitat ($20) and Madame Tussauds Wax Museum ($20), it would have been $90! On top of those destinations, we also had at least another 25+ things to see and do for “free” with the pass. Wow, did we find a lot of educational, yet fun things to do in “Sin City.” Not only did we find educational things but we also found other areas of interest like arcades! I’m not a big video game player or enthusiast by any means; however, with the pass we each were able to play for up to 4 hours in the arcade for FREE (a value of about $30 each). We even had pizza, soda, and some ride coupons!
Kristi volunteered to go on stage to help the magician! Boy were we proud of her and was she nervous!
She still doesn't know how she made that table rise!
Ta ~ Da!

We were rocking and dancing in our seats (just as a family) and Kristi was dancing so much in her seat that they came up and asked if Kristi would join the Beatles on stage as their biggest fan! People all over Vegas kept coming up to us congratulating Kristi for doing so well up on stage with them! Quite an experience! She was able to take home a little tambourine with all their autographs on it!

With our pass we were able to go to the top of the Stratsophere! It was awesome! Daddy even rode the rides at the top! Yikes, we were afraid he may fall off the top! LOL! (At least the kids were!)    :-)
Siegfried & Roy’s Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat

We absolutely LOVED the dolphins!

The pass also included going to the top of the Eiffel Tower!

Scenes from the top of the Eiffel Tower!


More scenes from on top of the Eiffel Tower.

The kids driving their first small go-carts!
 
 More fun on the go-carts!

Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum with the Pirate's of the Carribean!  
Madame Tussaud’s Wax Museum with President Obama! 
Leaving our rv park. Notice the cactus plants! There were so many animals that played around
those plants that we could stay busy watching the ground squirels, birds, and even quail!
     I thought I would write this blog post because my general misconception (along with probably many other people’s misconceptions) is that Las Vegas is not a family friendly place for children.  I hope you have fun looking through all the fun things that we enjoyed sharing with each other!