With several special holidays coming up, now is the chance to order your gift before it is too late. Easter is a great opportunity to capture photos with the kids, all dressed up in their “Sunday Best”. Why not take that opportunity and turn it into something imaginatively creative with a custom made board book to share with your little ones for years to come?

Believe it or not, Father’s Day is our busiest holiday here at Hullabaloo Stories. Women seem to plan out their gift giving much more than men do. If they are anything like me, they wait until the last minute and it’s is either breakfast in bed or hand delivered flowers for the Mrs. on Mother’s Day.

Perhaps, now is the perfect opportunity to begin dropping hints or sharing ideas about a custom made story to share with your children, made with the loving hands of a professional educator at Hullabaloo Stories. This way there won’t be a chance of waiting until the last minute to make your day and an extra special memory to cherish beyond Mother’s Day.

Check out some of our previous Father’s Day themed books, here.

We hope the upcoming holidays are filled with laughter, fun, love and memories. Happy “Spring” holidays.

Source: http://bit.ly/U8gNzb

It’s difficult to find the right thing to say following a tragedy. On Friday, December 14, 2012, the nation was jarred to find the repugnant actions of one person cause chaos and pain for not only a community, but a nation. The mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School, in which 20 children and six adults were gunned down has left a rift in our hearts as parents. Innocent children were taken from their parents. Teachers and administrators sacrificed their lives to protect the children before themselves.

The mood of the nation is saddened and sullen. We are grieving. We believe that so many blogs during the National Blogging Day of Remembrance, said it best:

“We know that no words, no gifts, no acts of service will ever take away the pain, but we, as bloggers and parents collectively, want those affected by this to know how close to our hearts they are:

We love you. We pray for you. We’re so brokenhearted for your loss.

To honor the memory of lives cut short, we choose to step away from our blogs and computers today to celebrate the gift of life and those we love most: our children, families, good friends, and community. We’re holding our kids a little closer, reaching out to neighbors and giving thanks for the moments we have together.”

Source: http://bit.ly/Wk6yX5

We couldn’t have said it better ourselves. No parent should ever have to bury their child. Gun violence, acts of terrorism, foreign and domestic, and the treatment of mental health problems are all worthy of a serious discussion in our homes, places of worship, communities, and government. However, today is a day that we choose to honor and mourn those who were lost on December 14, 2012.

We must make the choice not to live in fear or anger. Instead, we must embrace every moment as a gift. Hug your children. Hug your husband, wife or partner and your loved ones. Tell them that you love them. Cherish and seize each moment as the gift it is.

The following is a list (as released by police) of the victims in Friday’s shooting spree on the campus of Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Our hearts go out to these fallen, their families and loved ones today. We know that we couldn’t get through something like this on our own and our minds and prayers go out in support of those lost and their families.

In remembrance:

• Charlotte Bacon, 2/22/06, female
• Daniel Barden, 9/25/05, male
• Rachel Davino, 7/17/83, female
• Olivia Engel, 7/18/06, female
• Josephine Gay, 12/11/05, female
• Ana M. Marquez-Greene, 04/04/06, female
• Dylan Hockley, 3/8/06, male
• Dawn Hochsprung, 06/28/65, female
• Madeleine F. Hsu, 7/10/06, female
• Catherine V. Hubbard, 6/08/06, female
• Chase Kowalski, 10/31/05, male
• Jesse Lewis, 6/30/06, male
• James Mattioli , 3/22/06, male
• Grace McDonnell, 12/04/05, female
• Anne Marie Murphy, 07/25/60, female
• Emilie Parker, 5/12/06, female
• Jack Pinto, 5/06/06, male
• Noah Pozner, 11/20/06, male
• Caroline Previdi, 9/07/06, female
• Jessica Rekos, 5/10/06, female
• Avielle Richman, 10/17/06, female
• Lauren Rousseau, 6/1982, female (full date of birth not specified)
• Mary Sherlach, 2/11/56, female
• Victoria Soto, 11/04/85, female
• Benjamin Wheeler, 9/12/06, male
• Allison N. Wyatt, 7/03/06, female
• Source: Huffington Post

If you want to join in donating to the families of Sandy Hook Elementary, donation links are listed at ChoosetoThrive.blogspot.com.

You can still place an order for gift cards through December 14th to ensure delivery before Christmas.

If you want to place an order after these dates, you can do so, but we cannot commit to make sure that you receive your gift before the Christmas holiday.

We hope the holiday season may bestow joy, happiness and peace with you, your family, friends, and loved ones. If you have any questions, please feel free to visit our Contact page and send us a quick note.

Happy Holidays from Hullabaloo Stories

2012 Copyright Christine Hull,
Windy Pinwheel

Last month, we posted a downloadable set of free Halloween printables. We’ve decided to share the printables from Windy Pinwheel each month as a cross post to spread the word about each of these printables. This month, we are sticking to the Thanksgiving theme. Thanksgiving is a very special time for us all to reflect about what we’re thankful for in this world. We are thankful for our family, our children, being free from want and you, the reader of this blog. Without you we wouldn’t be who we are today, creating and sharing custom stories for you to share with your children.

What are you thankful for this Thanksgiving holiday? Please feel free to share. We would love to hear your thoughts.

P.S. Every month we will post a new set of lunch box notes. So check back at Windy Pinwheel often.

Download your free Thanksgiving themed printables at Windy Pinwheel

2012 Copyright Christine Hull,
Windy Pinwheel

My husband, a couple of friends and I recently stared a new venture for parents in the local area of Reno, Nevada at Windy Pinwheel. Most of what we post is pertinent to the local audience, but occasionally, we post things that might also be relevant to my audience here at Hullabaloo Stories. We couldn’t be more thankful for both our patrons and our fans of this site. Without you, we wouldn’t be who we are today. That being said, we have a special offering for you via our Windy Pinwheel site – Free Halloween themed love note printables for you to share with your kids.

Being a full time working parent sending my children off to school can be tough some days. There are days when I miss them so much, sending a little “love note” in their lunch boxes is a small way I can remind them half way through their day how much I love them. I like to picture them sitting at their cute preschool tables unpacking their lunches and finding a fun new “love note”.

This month, in honor of Halloween on the other blog that I write for, I wanted to share some SPOOK-tacular love notes for you to print and share with your children.

The Valentine’s Day notes were such a huge success, here at Hullabaoo Stories this year, that we thought we could make some in the spirit of Halloween. My husband is certainly a sucker for all things surrounding the Halloween holiday and enjoys it, I think, as much as our kids do. We hope you like these free printable Halloween lunch box love notes as much as we do. It brings the biggest smile to our faces as parents knowing that we made our kids’ day.

If you download the set, be sure to report back and let us know if they are a hit with your kids in your household.

P.S. Every month we will post a new set of lunch box notes. So check back at Windy Pinwheel often.

While typically Mother’s Day is all about giving something to your mom, I also like to celebrate the two beautiful little lives who made me a mommy.

I cannot wait for them to see these books, I feel like its just a little piece of the love story I share with my children.

To celebrate all the mommy’s out there that inspire me every day, Hullabaloo Stories is partnering with the amazing Ana from Bluebird Kisses to give away one of these little treasures to one lucky mommy. Check out the give away here. Make sure you like Bluebird Kisses Facebook fan page and comment on the post about our give away to enter. You get an extra entry for commenting here…so let’s hear it…what do you love most about your little one?

In addition, to celebrate Mother’s Day, we are offering free shipping in our Etsy Store (we do have gift certificates!) use the code AMOTHERSLOVE until April 30th.*

Happy Mother’s Day to to all the amazing mommies out there.

*Orders submitted and processed (meaning we receive all your photos) by April 30th will be shipped in time for Mother’s Day.

First for even more ideas check out the collection I have started on my St. Patrick’s Day Pinterest Board

Next, I made these printables so long ago that I nearly forgot to post them. So check out all the separate files here in our 4Shared Folder.

The last thing I want to share is our project, I got this idea from this Pin and then somewhat made it my own. Instead of using old book pages, I used Irish proverbs, which the pages I used are in the printables folder. Then, I added a couple of blank green pages, printed some small shamrocks, and topped each page off with a little doily from Martha Stewart’s Craft line. Similar to these Martha Stewart Crafts Tags Die-Cut Lace). They turned out really cute. Then, I simply added them onto a ribbon to hang. They should last our family several years.
The other craft we made was something really fun for my daughter. I pre-printed a shamrock on some card stock and then put the glue all over the page, then let her place all the little flowers all over the page. She did a great job and it was a nice evening project that didn’t get us too messy.

Here is the dried flowers we got at our local craft “project” store

So there it is….our projects for a lucky day! Happy St. Patrick’s Day and may the luck of the Irish be with you today!!!

Ainsleigh chose Tyra…congratulations Tyra, you will be receiving a copy of Oh, the Places You’ll Go!

Now for our second winner, chosen by Nolan…congratulations Kathi, you will also be receiving a copy of Oh, the Places You’ll Go!

Thank you everyone for sharing our blog this past week and celebrating Read Across America and Dr. Seuss’ birthday with us.

Click here to get your copy of
Oh the Places You’ll Go
on Amazon.com

We had such a fun day today. This morning, I took my daughter to a friend’s Kindergarten class to deliver a set of laminated Dr. Seuss bookmarks for each of her students to celebrate Read Across America week. We stayed for about an hour and read two books (There’s a Wocket in My Pocket! and Fox in Socks). We also worked on two rhyming worksheets and visited with all the kids in the class.

Our daughter was so excited about getting to go to "big kids" school she didn’t want to leave when it came time to go. The bookmarks thrilled the students and they had such a fun day. I think the poster all my teachers had in their rooms must be true “All I really need to know, I learned in Kindergarten”, because Kindergarten is so cool.

When we got home, we read a few more books with our son so he could share in the awesomeness that is Dr. Seuss.

» Click here «
Download these bookmarks in celebration of Read Across America Week

Check back on Friday for a fun post after we deliver these bookmarks to one lucky local elementary school with a lot of ideas about how to encourage a love for reading in your children.

Source: 30 Dr. Seuss Quotes to Live By