Christmas Cards 2014

 

 

I love the idea that we make our own cards. The boys aren't always as keen as I am. :)

This year we went for something more arty looking. 

Long time ago, we made our own Eric Carle style paper. To see what I mean, you can read this post. There was still lots left over over in the craft cupboard and it came in very handy for the idea I had.

    So to make these, we used our own handmade paper. We cut out the background scene and the trees. We then used a punch (Little One loved doing this) to make the decorations and the snow. We had a small production line going on the dining room table, with each of us doing a different "job". 

I love how they turned out. 

Till next time, enjoy this wonderful season. 

S is for The Very Busy Spider

When I planned these "S" activities, I completely forgot about this post in my archives. Do go have a look if you want some more spider ideas. :)

Do you know the book The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle? It's a great book with lovely illustrations.  In the hard cover version, the spider web is raised, so it's fun to feel how it gets bigger and bigger in the story. It's a very simple story line, so it's an ideal book for a young child. 

I've seen so many lollipop spiders on the internet and this inspired our very busy spider lollipop . For the head you need one green pipe cleaner. For the legs cut two orange pipe cleaners in half. Simply wrap the pipe cleaners around the lollipop stick to make the spider.  The eyes and mouth were cut out from felt and glued on.

Our very busy spider also got her own real life web. Little one punched some holes in a paper plate and was then supposed to thread the string through the holes to make the web. I was told, however,  quite emphatically, that he doesn't like threading, so I did end up doing it myself. If you can get your little one to do the threading, it's really a great fine motor activity. 

We also found some Very Busy Spider activities at Making Learning Fun.

I thought it would be fun to build a "S'" with little spiders. The "S" we used was printed from Confessions of a Homeschooler. If you go to this link and look for a-z lowercase worksheets, you will find all the letters of the alphabet ready to print. Thank you Heather!

Our last bit of spider fun was a small spider building station (Idea via Fantastic Fun and Learning). To make the play dough, I used my favourite recipe - no stove required! Here it is:

1 cup flour
2 Tbs cream of tarter
1 Tbs vegetable oil
1/2 cup of granulated salt

Add some essence for a nice aroma (orange, almond, peppermint)

Mix all the ingredients in a bowl and then add a cup of boiling water. Stir until combined and turn it out onto a floured board and knead until smooth. Colour can be added to the boiling water or at the kneading stage. Just a tip - wear gloves when kneading - the food colouring does stain your skin and it isn't very easy to clean off. Store your dough in an airtight container. 

To make black play dough, I combined blue, green and red food colouring. I kept adding and mixing it until I was happy with the colour. 

Here are some more fun Spider crafts on the blog:

Bottle Top Crafts

Spider Party

Till next time, have fun.

PS. Linking to The Weekly Kids Co-Op, For the Kids Fridays @ Sun Scholars and Kids Activities Blog.

Bibliotherapy {Heart Stories}

Have you ever read a book and really connected with it? It touched your heart (and your head) ? It may have been cathartic and allowed you to release some pent-up emotions or perhaps it made you feel less alone, knowing you shared similar feelings and circumstances to the characters. It may have empowered or inspired you, encouraging some resourceful problem-solving. For all of these reasons, a book can really speak to you and may even help you to solve a problem. Perhaps you have done this for your children too. You have intentionally chosen a meaningful story to help them cope with a difficult situation or to encourage them to speak about a circumstance in their lives. In essence, you have been doing a little bit of Bibliotherapy.

Bibliotherapy is using books to help someone address emotional, social or behavioural difficulties. In therapy, a counsellor would take a client through a certain process. As parents, we often just follow our instincts. Although simply reading a story will in all likelihood not solve a problem, it can be good starting point and may open up a valuable discussion with your child. I will often ask my older son what he thinks the moral or message of a story is and I am always surprised by his insights and perspective.

Recently we read "The Tiny Seed" by Eric Carle. It is a beautiful story of a tiny seed that travels through the four seasons and over diverse terrain to eventually land in the soil, ready to germinate into a flower. Although it was the tiniest of all the little seeds, during their travels, many of the bigger seeds were lost along the way due to the elements or for other reasons. This tiny seed however, beats the odds and becomes the most beautiful, extraordinary flower. People come from far and wide to see it, as it grows to tower above the houses!

I think the message in this book is so inspirational. To me it says that no matter the circumstances in our lives, sometimes the extraordinary can happen. If  we have faith, God may in fact surprise us and not only answer our prayers, but exceed all our expectations. For me this is a beautiful , uplifting story of hope! "Heart Stories" is a name I coined for these kinds of  stories...stories that touch, teach, inspire and heal.

The art work in this book is also lovely and we were inspired to do some "Eric Carle art". Eric Carle uses painted tissue paper to create his beautiful and distinctive art work, so I thought to paint ordinary typing paper with a small roller and try to achieve a similar tissue paper effect. I think the paper came out really nicely. Big One then copied a picture (our favourite) from the book. (I helped with the butterflies.)

I think the end result is just lovely (see the top photo). Now I have a wonderful reminder of this book's beautiful message. I definitely need to frame this one.

For more ideas (including class room activities ) linked to this book and other Eric Carle titles, you can visit his website.

I would love to hear about any "Heart Stories" you may have read to your children.

PS. I have linked this to Kids Get Crafty @ Red Ted Art's Blog.

Adam's Art Spot : Glove Puppets

Adam's Art Spot is Big One's space to share his wonderful art and craft ideas. This idea was inspired by Eric Carle's book, "Little Cloud" and by some wonderful Beleduc puppets that he saw at a toy exhibition we attended. 

After reading the book, Big One suggested that we make a cloud puppet using a hand glove and some cotton wool. So I purchased blue gloves (I was very pleased to find blue ones) and cotton balls. He then stuck the balls onto the glove using craft glue and allowed it to dry. As you can see, it made a very sweet cloud puppet, which he modeled so nicely. I then decided to make a little one for little brother, using a blue baby sock. Unfortunately he would not oblige by modeling his.

This idea has inspired some more hand puppets in our house, which I'll share with you in an up-and-coming post.

PS. I have linked this to StArt @ A Mommy's Adventures.