Crayon Canvas Art

Finally did it!

As seen on every blog everywhere...

Glowing Christmas tree

Materials:
Hole punch
Black paper
Tissue paper

Glitter Snowman

I think I've made these for the past 393629 years with every kid I know

Materials:
Paper plates
Contact paper
Glitter
Scrap paper/ fabric
Tape

Back! With Christmas Crafts!!

Testing the blogger app and here's a random christmas tree craft!

Classics- Rock Painting

Rock painting is fun and easy and a classic Montessori based activity. My niece and I went searching for rocks. Didn't find many big ones but that's ok! We still had fun painting the small ones. (I painted a lot myself!) "Indy" didn't have much interest in it at first, much to my surprise. (I fear he is much less interested in a lot of stuff I present. Maybe it should be more challenging? Also, since Big Brother is home all the time now he wants to hang with the Big Boys and not me. :( Oh, well. I keep on trying anyways. ) Eventually he painted a few when I told him we should paint some gold to use as treasure in the Moon Sand etc. We used some sparkly paint like the gold and they came out really cool looking. My niece LOVED painting the rocks and made sure she had plenty to take home.

Weekly Unplugged Project- Petal

I have a secret plan to try to use up ALL the craft sticks in the house. Of course we will never really run out but it's nice to have a goal. :) There just seems like there is a neverending supply. Here is one such project using craft sticks. And incorporating the Weekly Unplugged Theme of Petals.

This was a collaborative project. He colored the "stems" (craft sticks!) green one day and then lost interest. So my niece cut and glued on the petals with me the next day. Then after they dried...

I had them play this game with the flowers they had made. They started off with one flower and had to run down the yard and stick it in the ground by the other flowers then run back grab another flower and do the same thing. They each had 3 flowers to stick in the ground. It was easier because the ground was still damp from all the rain. Next time I would have them run down to a pot with dirt in it and stick the flowers in. Would have been much easier! You live you learn.

Weekly Unplugged Project- Magic

For this weeks Unplugged Project I pulled the only two "magic tricks" I know out of my hat. :) I have remembered these since I was a kid. We did the "I bet I can walk through this piece of paper" trick and the "Bet I can put pins/needles/thumbtacks into this balloon without popping it" trick. You love my terminology I know.

Cut along the lines and then cut only the middle apart and walk through!



Scotch tape was the secret in this magic trick.

Muffin Tin Monday - Theme: Children's Literature

Our Muffin Tin was based on the book Growing Vegetable Soup (Books for Young Readers). We used craft sticks to labels our vegetables like they did in the book for their garden.

Inside the book:

Last Minute Mothers Day Present

I had a lot of ideas running around in my head for his present to make his mom for Mothers Day. I decided to use up the Plaster of Paris that has been sitting in their closet for 4 years. So, we made Plaster of Paris collage heart. We used glitter, scrabble tiles, glass rocks etc. He helped make one for me too. :)

Weekly Unplugged Project- Powder

Does flour and baking soda count as powder? I sure hope so. So today for the Weekly Unplugged Project we used his favorite product FLOUR and made stress balls. We made some with flour and some with baking soda. We didn't have any cornstarch. :) Or a real funnel and my homemade one was a total FAIL. While we had balloons out to tried to make bean bags like Flip Flops and Applesauce. So not as cute as hers! Plus my computer died in the middle of reading the directions fully.

Pretty boring.

I admit it. I have been slacking lately on the exciting project front. Between neighborhood garage sales and weird "working" hours and birthdays we have been basically just hanging out. The most exciting things lately have been 50 cent sand art (garage sale find!), giant Cars puzzle (birthday present!) and discussing Titanic! Oh! I also bought him a canvas bag he could decorate so he could hold some of our many library books. Yes, he drew the Titanic and an Iceberg on it.

He turned 5 years old a week or so ago. 5! I have been watching him since he was a little over 6 months old or so. It's crazy. He starts kindergarten next school year. :(

Next week I am going to start some hardcore project making and exciting activity having because once summer comes and Big Brother is home all the time it will be harder to get him to concentrate on me. :)

Random Pictures:

Fingerprint Sunflowers

I got this idea from Preschool Daze. Unfortunately, I can not free hand draw anything! Like a sunflower. So I printed out a template he traced around it and then took brown paint and dipped his finger in and made the sunflower seeds in the middle. So cute!

Weekly Unplugged Project- Science

Both of the "experiments" we did today today for The Weekly Unplugged Project came from this book: Simple Science Experiments With Everyday Materials

For the first one we took 1 tsp of baking soda and 1oz of water and dissolved it in the bottom of an empty water bottle. Then he poured in the 2 oz of vinegar and I QUICKLY slipped the balloon over the top of the bottle. And...tada the balloon inflated. (because of carbon dioxide you create)

The next project was called Magic Colors. This took some time. He painted the front of two circles blue and the back of one yellow and the back of the other red. (I held them when he painted the backs.) Then we hung them up to dry and then we waited and waited and waited...When they were mostly dry I poked holes (two on each side) and threaded some string through them. Then you are supposed to twirl it a around and then release it and your eyes are supposed to see the color purple for the red/blue one and green for the yellow/blue one. At first it didn't work because our circles were too big. So we cut down the circles and tada! It worked! Make sure to look right at the circle.

Muffin Tin Monday-Theme: MTM Goes Awol

Boring I know, but we ate our MT in bed today!



Puffcorn, Bananas, Cheese
Ketchup, Veggie Dogs, Corn

It was an unoffical yellow day as well. :)

Weekly Unplugged Project- Transportation

This weeks Unplugged Project Theme was easy. Transportation. Someone has been OBSESSED with The Titanic lately and this was a perfect opportunity to do a project I had been planning anyways. We made a book featuring The Titanic with the story and pictures by the little guy. He knows way more about the Titanic than the book says. :) All he draws is the Titanic so he's had a lot of practice. He really liked making his own book and said today was the best day of his life. Haha.

Muffin Tin Tuesday- No Theme

I got a bit more creative today with our Muffin Tin. Yes, I need a life. Anyways, I made bologna flowers with black olives in the middle. (olives are a favorite around here) The cheese in the lower corner is supposed to be a sun ;). Strawberries and a leftover Easter Bunny cookie finish it off.

The Last Of The Easter Projects

I just realized we didn't get around to making the hand print bunnies! :(

We blew out eggs a couple days ago and then washed them. The next day we decorated them with markers. One suffered a terrible accident as you can see. He really liked making the holes in the ends of the eggs.

Then we played a Egg Match Memory game. I took two of some random items and put them into different eggs and mixed them up. Then we found the matches. Those little egg holder are from the Thrift Store (99 cents for 3) and they were originally from Pier One! :)

Carrot Collage

This turned out so cute! And it as beyond easy! The inspiration for this project came from No Time For Flashcards!

At first I picked out a small piece of cardboard to use, then he said "I want a HUGE carrot!" So, we cut some poster board in half and used that.

I had him cut up pieces of Green and Orange construction paper and Green and Orange Tissue Paper into baskets. He loves using scissors! Kids could also tear up the pieces with their hands. Then he applied glue ALL OVER the a carrot shape I drew on the paper. I helped a bit because it was a HUGE CARROT and I added more glue as needed. We let dry and then I cut it out. So cute!

Foil Easter Eggs

This was another project I have seen on numerous blogs.

I cut egg shapes out of cardboard (empty cereal box) and covered them in foil.
I had him paint the whole egg and then use a Q-Tip to draw designs or whatever he wanted in the wet paint! Easy! Then we strung them together and hung them next to the Easter Egg Collage in the window.

Easter Egg Collage

I've seen this done on a bunch of different blogs so we decided to try it yesterday! It worked out great. I took a piece of contact paper, cut out a egg shape and taped it down (face up) on the work space. I set out different materials. Pom Poms, Feathers, Tissue paper, Sequins, Felt, Etc. I told him to stick on whatever he felt like sticking on and that's it. I then sandwiched all the stuff in with another square of contact paper, then trimmed around it. We hung it up in the window when we were done.