Spray Bottle Fun

I don't know what it's like in your house, but in mine I'm a sought after playmate. The children would absolutely love me to stop everything I'm doing and just play and be with them - all day! I'm willing to bet that you are always in demand too :). 

That being said, I am always keen on activities that amuse them and keep them busy for a little while. Quick and easy things - things that don't require much thought, or unpacking,  and things that are super easy to clean up. One of my go-to ideas that fulfill these criteria are spray bottles. Toddlers and preschoolers LOVE them. The best part is that it exercises those little fingers and is great for the strengthening of the fine finger muscles.

Little One is happy to simply walk around the garden spraying whatever he can, but I have found some nice variations of this simple idea on the web. One nice activity is to paint with a spray bottle. You can use this homemade paint recipe and water it down a bit. Then find a spot where it can get a bit messy, stick some bigger sheets of paper to the wall and allow the children to spray a painting.

I have also read that you can add food colouring to some water and spray paint snow. Now that sound like so much fun. Pity it doesn't snow here. :(

I have let Little One spray a big window and then "clean" it for me - a nice activity for a rainy day. I have also added a spray bottle to bath time and allowed him to spray the walls. I recently found this wonderful idea - bubble bath spray painting - I know both my boys would love this. I will however, have to find paint here locally that doesn't stain. (Know of any?) I wouldn't want multi-coloured children - although now having said that, it could be fun ;). Another idea for bath time is to allow the children to play with some shaving cream and then ask them to spray it away.

 (mmm, how high can it go?)

Have any more spray bottle ideas? If you do, please share them in the comments.

Till next time, have fun!

PS. Sharing at

Show and Tell @ ABC and 123

The easiest yummiest Sponge Cake

Do you have special dietary requirements in your family? We do and to complicate things somewhat, my boys are sensitive to different things. Trying to accomodate both of them is near impossible, so sometimes it means baking two different versions. Oh, I just need to add - the Kitchen and me - we have a rather strained relationship. So, I try to get in and out as quickly as possible :). 

One of the all time favourites in our home is this particular sponge cake. I have baked it many many times and everyone who has tasted it has loved it. (Either that, or I have seriously polite friends).

The best part for me - it's quick and easy.

Original Recipe:

175 grams self-raising flour

175 grams castor sugar

175 grams margarine 

3 eggs

5ml vanilla essence

To make this gluten and casein free, I substitute the flour with Orgran self-raising flour, and the margarine with Blossom Lite (dairy free) margarine.

Oven set to 180°C

Cream the sugar and the marge.

Beat in one egg at a time till smooth.

Add vanilla essence

Add the flour, folding it in with a spoon.

I use a small round non-stick cake pan and spray it with Spray And Cook (contains Soy lecithin)

Cooking time depends on your oven, but approximately 25 minutes to half an hour.

To ice:

Icing sugar

Add boiling water until you have correct consistency

If you want to, you can add a drop of almond essence to make a marzipan flavoured icing

Sprinkles (optional)

Or you could ice with cocoa icing - icing sugar with some cocoa added.

Recently I decided to start baking the cake without the margarine (to make it soya free too) and substituted the margarine with 175 ml of canola oil. It's a bit drier, but  it still works. 

PS. Recipes as you know are often passed along hand to hand, so I unfortunately don't know the original source of this one.

Enjoy!

PS. For my American readers, icing sugar is called confectioners or powdered sugar in the US (I think) :).  

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Runny Paint Possibilities

Oh the fun you can have with runny paint...

or... put the paint at the top edge of the paper and watch it go...

  or...

  or add a marble and a tray....

Little brother wants to see too...

or what about painting with a magnet stick and a metal ball... (I had to go outside for these - the lighting in the kitchen was deteriorating quickly)

Big One looks rather serious in these pics, but he was concentrating on the task at hand and definitely enjoying the process. 

 

We used acrylic paint for these activities and when it was a little thick, we added some water.

Have fun!

PS. Sharing at 
Show and Tell @ ABC and 123

Make an Airport (and some aeroplanes)

I've had this idea for the longest time to make Little One an Airport. (I actually saw an amazing wooden toy one, but the price left me gasping for breath!) So with a little bit of imaginative thinking, some recycled containers and some craft paper...I got building.

Most importantly, I wanted an Air Traffic Control Tower. To make, I used a Lipton tea box...cut off the hinged lid and turned it upside-down.  I then glued a polystyrene rectangular dish (also upside-down) to the top of the upside-down tea box - you got that right?  And then I balanced a clear plastic container on top of the polystyrene container (also upside-down). I specifically didn't glue this part, so that Little One can remove the container and play with the men inside. I'm sure this picture will help make sense of my tutorial :).

The lego blocks that you can see inside the tower are the fancy computors and equipment that are used to bring aeroplanes home safely.

To make a hangar or two, I also cut off the hinged lid of a tea box and put it on it's side this time. Our smart passenger jet is parked inside one in this picture.

A nice tallish box makes for an Airport terminal...

The landing strip is a big piece of white cardboard and some coloured strips for the runway. I used the same road map for my Seussville Town.

The craft stick aeroplanes (can you spot them?) were also very easy to make. I painted the wings and added some star stickers.

I showed the boys some You Tube videos of Air Traffic Control Towers in action, as well as aeroplanes taking off and landing. It gave them a nice idea of what an Airport is like. Little One has never actually been to the Airport - that's still on our to do list .

All that's left to do is...PLAY!

 

Sharing this at:

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Show and Tell @ ABC and 123 

Making cards using children's art

When Mother's Day comes along, I'm always racking my brain for a great gift for the Grannies in our lives. I like making something for them - or letting the children make something. So I was grateful when a friend of mine reminded me of this lovely idea. 

 

I don't know about you, but I love having some blank cards (bought or made, although I prefer home made) in my writing box. They are nice to have for birthdays, thank you's or any other reason - actually who needs a reason - I love giving and receiving a card! It's great to have something pretty to grab and use when you need it. I knew that both the Grannies would love this... 

So here's how to make some:

• If you can, buy some pre-cut cards and envelopes - much easier than cutting and folding your own.  
• Scan your child's art work into your computor OR 
• If you don't have a scanner or the art work is too big for your scanner, photograph the art and download it. 
• Use a photo editing program to touch it up or crop it if necessary - I use Picasa - it's free and easy to use. 
• Cut it out and glue it on. 
• A nice touch is to write the Artist's name at the back of the card and their age when they created it.   

 

Some beautiful, personal cards for Granny, or any special lady in your life.  

Now I definitely need to make some for myself :). If I do, I'll share them too. 

Happy crafting! 

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Bottle Top Art, Pinterest Boards, and a Winner!

Getting tired of all these bottle top posts :)? I hope not, because I just can't help myself. When I see bottle tops...I see possibilities!

Here in South Africa we have many schools with very limited resources and every time I pick up a bottle top, I see all the potential that this little throw away plastic top has :). So to better collect and organise ideas, I have created Bottle Top Teaching and Bottle Top Fun Pinterest Boards. The first board will focus on using bottle tops to teach and the second board will be anything creative one can get up to with a bottle top. I hope you will drop me a line if you have been doing some bottle top activities. I will be right over to check it out :).

So this sweet bit of art (see above) was really easy to make.
All you need is :

bottle tops

two chubby little hands (yes, chubby ones required)

gloopy glue (you know...gloopy white runny glue)

pretty paper sprinkle/confetti

I wish I had a picture of those two chubby hands squee-eezing the glue into the bottle tops, but we did this fun activity at night and the photos came out rather yucky. I can assure you though, that Little One loved this. After all the squeezing, came the sprinkling of the paper confetti. When he was done, I arranged the tops nicely onto a page and stuck them down to make some super easy wall art. Easy and fun!

One last thing before I go...
I have a winner for the makedo giveaway. 

Congratulations Lizanne from Clay Jar People! 

I'll be in touch shortly to get your postal details.

Thanks also to all of you who took part and left such kind comments. I'll definitely be having some more giveaways, so stay tuned.

Till next time, be good...

Georgia :)

makedo {A Giveaway}

I was so excited when I recently discovered a new product, called makedo. I immediately went and checked out the website and after seeing all the wonderful possibilities, I couldn't resist getting it for the boys. 

What is it? Essentially, as they so aptly put it, it is "a set of connectors for creating things from the stuff around you". 

I particularly like that they offer both free-play kits, as well as find-and-make kits. In the free-play kit, you have a set of connectors and using the recycled objects you have at your disposal, as well as your imagination, you can make anything you want to. The find-and-make kit is a project-based kit, in which you make a specific thing, for example, flowers. These kits tell you which recycled objects you need for the project and it gives you the required connectors and instructions - cool hey?

In the Easter holidays we had some friends over and I gave the kids some recycled items as well as our free-play kit. Here's what they came up with...can you spot the tiny toilet roll character?

According to the website, this product is suitable for ages 5 and over. I think this depends on the child's fine motor dexterity and finger strength. The children who made these items in the picture were aged 10 and 12.

I really knew I had made a smart purchase when shortly after getting our kit, Big One had to go dressed up to school for "Crazy Day". He created a mask from a box and using the connectors, he attached items to the box to make it interesting. I was so thrilled, because it was far easier and quicker than using glue - no drying time required!

And now for the best part, Annelize, our local agent for this super product, has very kindly given me a 33 piece free-play kit to give away to you! 

How do you enter? It's really easy. 

• For one entry, leave a comment and tell me what one of your favourite posts has been here at Love and Lollipops.
• For a second entry, tell a friend about this competition. 
• And, for a third entry, "like" my Love and Lollipops Facebook page. 
• You need to leave separate comments for each entry and please make sure that I have your contact (email) info.
• The competition closes on Sunday the 13th of May and is open world wide.

:)

Can't wait and want to buy some in the mean time? If you are local, you can contact Annelize via her Facebook page or send her an email at preta(at)mweb(dot)co(dot)za

Annelize will also be exhibiting at the next My Favourite Things market, being held in Paarl on the 12th of May. 

Good Luck! 

Blog Hop

There's this fun blog hop hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things, Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi and this week I'm so lucky, I'm being spotlighted. So if you're visiting from the hop, WELCOME! I hope you will grab a cup of tea and enjoy the playfulness and creativity I (try to) share here.

I thought I would share some quick links to some fun posts here at Love and Lollipops: 

Recycled Robot Craft 

The Little Yellow Bus Teacher Gift 

A Mommy-made Doctor's Kit 

No-Sew Sock Kitty 

Our Batman Lego Party 

Thanks again for hopping by :). Happy reading!

Seussville {Bottle Top and Pom Pom Town}

Big Brother went off to camp for a few days this morning, so I thought it would be nice to have a few distractions for little brother. Truthfully, Little One will probably be fine - it's Mommy (that would be me) that might not be.

Anyhow, this project started off a few days ago with me encouraging the boys to make some "buildings" from bottle tops. Big One wasn't in the mood, but Little One loved the idea of using the gloopy glue again and he made some nice creations. I, of course, got completely carried away and created a whole town of buildings :). Right at the end, I decided to added some pom poms for a kind of "Dr Seuss effect".

Little One's creations...

The little buildings needed a place to go, so I took a large piece of cardboard and glued some colourful cardboard roads on to it and added the street markings with a correction pen. "Seussville" awaited Little One when he got home today. He really liked it and played and played...makes a Mommy's heart glad...and not having Big One around, just a little bit easier.

Until next time, happy playing!

PS. Sharing this at
Too Cute Tuesday @ Funky Polkadot Giraffe

For the Kids Friday @ Sun Scholars 

Kids Co-op
Show and Tell @ ABC and 123 

Earth Day Craft

I am an honest gal! And honestly, I had never heard of Earth Day until I started blogging. This year when I noticed all the Earth Day crafts, I decided to put on one of my favourite caps...the research one...and find out a little more about it. So here's what I found out:

Earth Day is a day on which events are held worldwide to increase awareness and appreciation of the earth's natural environment. Many communities around the world celebrate Earth Week, an entire week of activities focused on environmental issues. Earth Day is now coordinated globally by the Earth Day Network, and is celebrated in more than 175 countries every year. The origin of this day is credited to Gaylord Nelson, a former U.S. Senator, who after witnessing the devastation of the 1969 oil spill in Santa Barbara, California, called for an environmental  teach-in  on 22 April 1970. In 2009, the United Nations designated April 22 International Mother Earth Day and it is planned for this date in all years through till 2015.(Reference: Wikipedia)

If you have been reading for awhile, you will know that I like, no make that love bottle tops, and have shared quite a few bottle top crafts here at Love and Lollipops. So to celebrate Earth Day and in the spirit of recycling and looking after our beautiful planet, here's another bottle top craft for you :).

Till next time...happy recycling!

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Show and Tell @ ABC and 123
^{Too Cute Tuesday @ Funky Polkadot Giraffe}