Painted Wooden Spoons

 

So it's that time of year again. Time for craft and teachers presents. These are some spoons Miss 4 and Mr 6 painted up for teacher gifts. They had such fun doing it, and are very much looking forward to giving them to their teachers. Mr 6 is usually not a painter, but this is a project he really enjoyed.

Simple Rubber Band Gun and Ammo Pouch

I made these simple wooden rubber band guns with Mr 6 today. It was declared to be "epic" so many times I thought I'd share. I made a second one when Miss 4 came home, and the whole process (including "helping" took about 10 minutes)

Ingredients:
26mm diameter dowel stick. 7cm long*
1cm square stick. 18.5cm long*
1 wooden peg
2 nails
*note: all the measurements are approximate, done by eye, and measured later. We used scraps we had handy.

You also need:
wood glue
sandpaper
hand saw
hot melt glue

1. Sand all edges
2. Saw a small groove horizontally across the end of the square stick (for the rubber band to sit in)
3. Wood glue and nail the other end of the square stick to the round dowel.
4. Hot glue gun the peg to the top of the square stick
5. Test it out and paint it.

For the target, we made holes in the side of a cubby house box, and I taped plastic bags to the back of the holes to catch the rubber bands. It made it easier to see which hole the rubber band had gone through, and easier to get it back.

I also made an "ammo pouch", which consisted of a simple rectangle of fabric sewn into a tiny bag (sew sides and a triangle across the bottom corners). I sewed a pipe cleaner in the top hem, which gives it a stiff feel, so the pouch can be pinched shut or kept open.

Good quiet fun that's not going to actually injure someone when the rubber band hits (unlike the wooden sword which was Mr 5's first suggestion for a wood work project). And all done before the kids lost interest. Definitely a great thing to make on a quiet or rainy day.

Kaleidescope Tutorial

Cheap, easy and quick; making your own kaleidoscope is a great activity to do with the kids. It took us about 20 minutes to gather the materials together and make 2 kaleidoscopes and the kids were very impressed with them.

Peg Board Fairy Garden

I recently saw this lovely post at Made by Joel to use a peg board and twigs to make a play scene. The idea was still fresh in my head when we happened to be visiting relatives, and I noticed a couple of large peg boards beside some twigs collected by the fireplace.

Super simple landscape painting

This is Miss 4's painting using the super simple tutorial from Creative Learning (found through here)

We did it together, but I actually liked hers better than mine.

There are just 3 simple steps:
1. Sponge on watered down blue (the tutorial said water colours but we used watery poster paints)
2. Use a playdough cutting wheel to paint on green stripes
3. Use a cotton tip to paint coloured flower dots on.

A lovely way to experiment with different ways of applying paint, and cute results.

Painting Easter Eggs

I blew about a dozen eggs for us to paint for easter this year. But when I took a look at them this weekend it turned out that I hadn't washed them thoroughly enough and they weren't too pretty. So I printed out an egg shape template instead, and the whole family spent about 2 hours painting them. Once they were dry we cut them out and hung them on a line across the corner of the room. Such a simple craft, but an excellent one anyway.

The Science of Air

I saw this experiment here and it's one of the best science experiments I've done with the kids (and beautifully described too). Mr 5 in particular kept on telling me how cool it was.

The gist of the instructions is to take an old plastic bottle and put a hole in the side, put a straw in the hole pointing upwards and seal the hole with blue-tac. Have a chat with the kids about gas/air and what's inside the bottle. Fill the bottle with water (until it's at risk of coming out the straw). Blow up the balloon and talk about what's inside the balloon, and then put the balloon onto the bottle and watch the water squirt out.

Not only did the kids seem to get the talk about air, they loved everything about the experiment. They filled the bottle up again and again and again. Then Miss 3 asked to put a second straw in, so we did that and talked about water pressure. And of course plenty of flower petals and leaves were added (because they were there, and to see what would happen - which wasn't a great deal).

A perfect bit of summer science.

Christmas Tree Craft

I needed something for the kids to do last week, and so we made our own paper Christmas tree which the kids decorated with stickers. They had such fun, I thought I'd draw one up that I could use for playgroup craft. I thought I'd share the printable tree for anyone else looking for a super easy Christmas craft. Just print it off and find some cheap little Christmas stickers. Alternatively draw your own on a large sheet of paper.

Free printables:

Coloured outline tree 

Full colour tree

Black and white tree

Toilet Roll Art

Rainbow fun with a white toilet roll.

Thaumatrope

Making a Thaumatrope is a fun little activity perfect for a rainy day or holiday. All you need is some paper, sticks (I used kitchen skewers) and a bit of imagination. 

The classic picture is a bird and a cage. Draw the bird on one piece of paper, a bird cage on another and stick them together around a stick. When you spin the stick, the two pictures seem to merge together and the bird appears to be in the cage.

I tried a few more, a face and some face paint, and a tree and it's leaves. Miss 3 concentrated on her passions: butterflies and rainbows.

Rose Headband

We had an artificial rose lying around, and I thought I'd make Miss 3 a new headband. Quick and simple. I made a tube of white satin to fit around some elastic (about 1.5 times as long as the elastic.) I turned it right side out and threaded the elastic into the tube. I sewed the elastic together and then tucked the ends of the satin in and sewed it together.

I sewed a small circle of white felt onto the satin (through the elastic). The felt bonds nicely with hot melt glue. I then cut the bottom of the rose off so it was flat, and glued it in place. A few of the layers of the rose seemed to be a little loose, and so I added some hot melt glue where ever it looked like it was needed.

Pretty, comfy and practical.

Scissors, Paper, Holepunch.

I thought I'd share this one, not because it's a work of art. Far from it, just because it's some inspiration for a bit of happy crafting.

The idea is to cut paper into strips, punch holes in the strips, and then glue them to another piece of paper. I'm pretty sure I first saw something like this on Mr Maker. We used patterned scissors/pinking shears. And seriously, with scissors, hole punching and glue, how can you go wrong!

As you can see Miss 3 thought the thing needed to be finished off with a pile of sequins. Later she also added some alfoil, just for extra sparkle. She was obviously very pleased with her work as it was the first thing she showed to Mr Crafty when he came home.

2 Dresses and a Nappy

I am just discovering how easy it is to sew clothes (as long as you're not too fussy if the end result is not exactly what you had in mind). This week I set out to sew Miss 3 a singlet top out of some cute panda material. I wanted to use a simple pattern so I had a quick look at the tutorials from Prudent Baby, and Random Nicole and then set to work. I was a bit too generous in my sizes and made a dress instead of a top, but neither Miss 3 or I were too worried about that. 

The great thing about this dress was that the largest triangles that were cut off, made a scrap of the perfect size to make a new matching dress for her baby doll. I used the same pattern, just seriously scaled down.

However once baby had a new dress on it was obvious she also needed a nappy, so I used a piece of lovely soft material to make her a modern cloth nappy. 

Weather Collage for a Story Box

This time our inspiration came from Inner Child Fun. Miss 3 took one look at their lovely spring branch picture and said "I'd like to do that, can we do that, please?"

So we started with a sunset picture.

And a green leaves picture. With pink mountains.

From there she got more creative, with a rainy sheep picture and a couple of snowy pictures.

Next we stuck them all on a story box, one picture on each side of the box. The idea is that you turn the box around while you tell the story. We used toys to act out the characters in the story.

Paperclip Chains

You can't get an activity much simpler than this. Paperclip chains (or necklaces or bracelets or houses) can be a pleasant way for the children to occupy themselves on a rainy day.

Making a Wind Vane

We found this activity in a beautiful book "Feel the Wind" by Arthur Dorros. An excellent book for explaining what wind is to young children. 

We made this first wind vane together, and then the kids made a second one by themselves.

You need a pencil with an eraser, some cardboard, a pin and a straw.

Put them together, making sure you put the pin through the balance point of the arrow.

Take it outside and put it in the ground.

Using a compass, put rocks around to mark north, south, east and west.

Cars, Roads and Construction Site Cake

This was such an easy birthday cake, because I could just make it around the bulgy shape of the cake as it came out of the oven. The tiny teddy cars were made out of little slices of iced cake, with a teddy biscuit pushed in. The wheel were M&M's and the headlights were made from piped icing. The traffic lights were made out of jubes on tooth picks (I cut dinosaur jubes into squares). The grass beside the road had green died coconut sprinkled on for extra effect. There were 6 little party guests, all very happy with their teddy in a car.

Simple Plane or Car Games

Here's a list of games I've collected (with our upcoming long-haul flight in mind), which are suitable for preschoolers in a plane or car or even in a tent on a rainy day. They should need nothing more than your body, or pens and paper (and the occasional piece of sticky tape).

Travel Games for Kids:

1. Odds and evens (pick odd or even, then stick out 1 or 2 fingers like scissors paper rock, count your fingers and your friends fingers to see if the total is odd or even).

2. Find 3 things starting with the letter…

3. I spy.

4. Thumb wrestling.

5. Stretch and wriggle. Find all the body parts you can wiggle.

6. Randomly select two body parts and try and touch those two body parts together. (Maybe make a spinning wheel with lots of body part names, or write lots of body parts down and close you eyes and pick, or get two people to choose one part each).

7. Try and guess who I am.

8. Write the alphabet, fill in an animal starting with each letter.

9. Write the alphabet, fill in a food starting with each letter.

10. Write the alphabet and find something you can see starting with each letter.

11. Draw a picture of things you might expect to see at your destination.

12. Draw a picture of a zoo.

13. Draw an outline of one or two people and then fill them in.

14. Draw an outline of a scene and then fill the picture in: a beach, the sea, a campsite, a garden, space etc.

15. Paper bag mystery. Put something in the spew bag and you have to try and guess what it is.

16. Guess the letter. One person closes their eyes, and the other draws a letter on their palm or back or foot. Could also be done with numbers or shapes.

17. Guess how many seats. Count them.

18. Hangman.

19. Naughts and crosses.

20. Close the square.

21. Make finger puppets.

22. Make a finger puppet movie.

23. Make paper clothes for a doll.

24. Make a puzzle (with square pieces).

25. Travel memory. Look at a plate of objects for 1 minute, then take the objects away and try and draw as many of them as you can.

26. Mr squiggle. Draw a few squiggles on a page and the other person has to turn it into a picture.

27. Make a scavenger hunt from a magazine.

28. Find something of every colour of the rainbow.

29. Find something in the shape of a circle, square, triangle, oval, rectangle, trapezoid, arch.

30. Tell a fairy tale from your head: 3 bears, Gingerbread man, 3 billy goats gruff,etc.

31. Tell a book from your head: any bedtime story you've told enough times to roughly remember by heart.

32. Make paper houses.

33. Make a mobile phone or robot out of empty fruit juice or dried fruit boxes. 

Mom's Mini Van and this site have heaps more travel game ideas.


Do you have any other good travel games?

Suncatchers

Once again I was inspired by one of my favourite blogs, MiniEco. This time we made sun catchers. The kids had a great time, although didn't always get the concept of gluing things on the back-side of the black paper, and Miss 3 struggled with the idea of covering the holes, preferring instead to glue paper around them. But we all had fun doing it. The kids also loved it when I cut out their names, and filled them with different colours. We used a combination of tissue paper and cellophane, because that's what we had in house.