The boys had some crazy early waking hours this morning so besides a few meltdowns we managed to have lots of fun appreciating the Earth!

We started our day at a local library story time for toddlers… celebrating Earth Day too… they focused on the wind and the clouds.

The kids did a neat little craft using shaving cream mixed with Elmer’s Glue to create a puffy, cloud-like paint.

We returned a stack of books and picked out a few more – a book on recycling and “The Lorax” by Dr. Seuss.

After the process of putting kiddos back in car seats – we drove around the corner to get out again – stopping off at a local cupcakery to share a cupcake! MeMa had gifted us with a free monthly cupcake gift certificate and I wanted to make sure I didn’t forget to bring Jeffrey for the month of April. It was a yummy Cookies n’ Cream one!

He does have a little hat hair here…

Once home we had some lunch… yes, yes, I know… we probably should have eaten the cupcake after. Some days you’ve got to switch things up a bit though!

I read Jeffrey his new library book, “Recycle Every Day.” It was the perfect book for his age and as we were reading it I even got an idea from it!

First we went out and I showed Jeffrey how we recycle here at home…

He even helped recycle a box… (as I’m sure you can tell – we went on a Costco shopping trip yesterday – they had lots of good deals!)

Then, as the book suggested, we grabbed a baked beans can to decorate for a pen holder, or in Jeff’s case a marker holder.

For his age I’m pretty impressed with his drawings…

He drew Daddy, Mommy, Auntie Na, MeMa, Uppa, Boo, Caillou and his sister Rosie (sorry to those relatives who were replaced by Caillou!).

Once he was finished drawing, we trimmed it up and taped it around his recycled can, for a new and improved marker holder!

This isn’t the best lighting… but I had to show you he was smug about his creation!

Phew… this is a long post!

Along with Earth Day it was National Jelly Bean Day! We still have Gourmet Jelly Beans from Christmas so I figured it was a perfect time for some practice garbage sorting.

I wrapped 3 little cups with paper and labeled them – Paper, plastic and glass (he can’t read so the labeling was probably unnecessary now that I think of it!).

I gave him a variety of jelly beans – blues and purples to represent paper; reds, pinks and oranges to represent plastic; and greens and yellows for glass!

Then I had him sort them into the right recycle bins. He thought that was pretty fun!

We spent the afternoon outside enjoying the “Earth” – then made a quick run to a different library to pick up some books on hold (we may have a slight library addiction!).

Following a quick dinner of One Pan Chicken Pasta Lemon Alfredo – we ended our evening watching “The Lorax” (the old version) – all about saving the environment… we tried reading the book but it was a little long.

Oh! And our bedtime story was “The Giving Tree!”

I say that was a successful day indeed! And sorry for the lack of Jack pictures! He really was with us!