Tag Archives: preschool

Jul4

Egg Carton Daffodils – School Holidays Craft

Posted on July 4, 2014 by thestick81

School holidays! Woot! First cab off the rank, these simple little daffodils made from egg cartons.

All you need is an egg carton, paint, pipe cleaners or skewers, glue. I used split pins to attach the centres to the petals, but you could just glue them too. One carton makes 5 flowers.

Cut the centres first, as shown above. Then cut out 5 of the cups to make neat little flowers. Daffodils technically have more than 4 petals, but I just worked with 4 as the egg cups have a squarish shape and it was easier to cut that way.

Paint the middle sections inside and out. We used orange, but you could use any colour you like. Then paint the outers a lighter colour.

Once dry, I poked some holes through the centre of each piece and using pliers inserted a gold split pin (my fingers wouldn’t fit in there, so had to use pliers).

For the stems, pipe cleaners would have been easier, but I decided to use some skewers wrapped in green raffia. It gave them a more natural texture. I secured the raffia at each end with some sticky tape.

Then it was simply a case of attaching the stems to the flowers. I used hot glue for this.

Apr13

Easter Biscuits – Kids in the Kitchen.

Posted on April 13, 2014 by thestick81

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Much to my children’s disappointment, I am not much of a sweet tooth. So I struggle to be inspired to make sweet treats. But I figured we should do some ‘cooking’ for Easter, and this seemed simple enough for my likings. 🙂

They kids had lots of fun making mess with the icing and creating patterns on the Arrowroot biscuits. I just bought ready made icing – because yes, I am that lazy. 🙂 Mini M&Ms and snakes for the stripes.

Apr6

Kids Craft, Easter Egg Sun Catcher / Stained Glass

Posted on April 6, 2014 by thestick81

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Kids Craft, Easter Egg Sun Catcher / Stained Glass

Inspiration for this project came from Alpha Moms blog. I thought I’d adjust it into an Easter themed project, given it is already that time of year.

All you need is some of the whitish milk or juice cartons. We actually used a cordial bottle for the grass. The stickers on the milk bottle where quite hard to remove and left a sticky residue. I managed to remove this with some mineral turpentine.

Once you have your clean pieces of plastic, draw or as we did, trace your shapes using a black permanent marker (Sharpie etc). Then let the kids colour as desired. Once coloured, cut away the extra plastic and you’re done! They turned out even better than expected.

We attached ours to the windows using double sided tape rather than suction cups.

Mar3

Make Your Own Bottle Top Stamps

Posted on March 3, 2014 by thestick81

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Here’s a super quick and easy activity to put together to keep your toddlers and preschoolers entertained. All you need is some bottle caps and foam stickers (available from most $2 shops and craft stores). If you don’t have a stamp pad, you can spread out a thin layer of paint on a plate or add a few drops of water to a water colour tray like we have.

Preview

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Mar2

Cardboard Roll Easter Chicks – Kids Easter Craft.

Posted on March 2, 2014 by thestick81

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Cardboard Roll Easter Chicks – Kids Easter Craft.

I’d like to say I came up with this all on my own, but that would be a lie. Ms5 and I made some owls inspired by this post from Kerrys Craft Blog. It was from this concept that I came up with these easter Chicks. I thought the fact you can hold eggs or treats in them was ideal for an easter craft project.

All you need is some coloured paper, cardboard rolls, tape and glue. You can make them just as cute without the feathers, goggly eyes and pipe cleaners, but if you have some of those handy, you could use them like we did too. The main difference between these and the owls is that the top and bottom folds are in opposite directions to each other, so the head comes to a peak in the middle rather than making two ears like the owls have. The rest of the instructions can be found by running your curser over or clicking on the photos below.

This is how you fold the ends in, but first, cover your roll with coloured paper.

If you are adding legs, secure them in before folding the bottom in, with tape or hot glue.

Attach the head feather to the inside of the top of the roll before folding it in.

Ms5 cutting out the paper circles using a 1″ punch.

Starting at the bottom, run some glue or double sided tape along and attach your first row of paper circles.

Work your way up in layers with the paper feathers then attach eyes and a beak. We made this beak from pipe cleaner, but paper looks good too.

Cut down some feathers to make little wings.

Attach the feather wings with hot glue or double sided tape

We also attached a tail to the back.

Cut a small sec on of pipe cleaner then twist it around let to make a foot shape.

Fill with eggs or just use as decorations.

Easter Chicks. Paper craft.

Feb28

Bugs and Bees and Butterflies! So Sweet!

Posted on February 28, 2014 by thestick81

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Bugs and Bees and Butterflies! So Sweet!

Check out these cute bugs the girls at All Tizzied Up put together on the weekend. Made from pipe cleaners, pom poms, wooden pegs, goggly eyes and tulle. So simple and so cute!

They have kindly taken step by step photos so you can be inspired too, to create your own colouring creepy crawlies.

Feb27

Soup Mix Scale Creatures, Sensory Craft

Posted on February 27, 2014 by thestick81

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I actually stole this idea from Mr3s current favourite show, Mister Maker. We used soup mix, but you could use lots of different things, dry lentils, rice, couscous, anything that is going to give you a unique texture and that is fun to run through your hands.

I just printed out some basic shapes from the internet. Keep them simple as you’re going to cover up any detail anyway. Smear the area with some craft glue and attach an goggly eye. Then let the kids sprinkle the mix over the rest of the glue area to completely cover it. Gently shake off any excess into the bin. These took about 24 hours to dry. Once fully dry, cut out. We created a simple background with some coloured paper and put them in $2 Ikea frames.

Feb3

Kids Valentine Craft, Love Heart Entrance – Bubble Painting.

Posted on February 3, 2014 by thestick81

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Kids Valentine Craft, Love Heart Entrance – Bubble Painting.

We have done a bubble painting project before for Easter, it is so easy and the results are always cool, so we have tried it again this time just using pink. We also used some pink paper as well as the white, where as last time we just used white paper.

Valentine Door Hanging,

Again I cheated and printed out some heart shapes, rather than drawing them all just so all the sizes were consistent. You could obviously trace around a cookie cutter too, but hey, did I mention I am lazy? I didn’t really measure out the ingredients for the bubble paint, it really was a squeeze of dishwashing liquid, splash of food colouring and a splash of tap water. Then let the kids blow bubbles in the mixture until the bubbles come up over the top of the bowl. Get them to quickly place the paper gently over the bubbles and the patterns will transfer to the paper. Instead of cutting each shape out first this time, we did the painting then cut them out after they were dry. Then it was just a case of attaching them to some gift ribbon with tape. I stuck them to the wall with blue tac.

Ms5 and Mr9 blowing bubbles in the solution

Bubble patterns, left to dry.

Cut out and attach to some string with tape.

Bubble painting

Valentine Craft

Hearts on a string.

If you wanted to make these hang in a door way, it would be a good idea to paint both sides of the paper, so they can spin and still look pretty on both sides.

Jan25

Valentine Craft, Love Heart Door Hanger Part 2

Posted on January 25, 2014 by thestick81

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Valentine Craft, Love Heart Door Hanger Part 2

This is another variation of our earlier Valentine Door Hanger , the main difference is rather than hanging the hearts from strings, we hot glued them to a flat ribbon. The finer details can be found in the previous post or by hovering over the images below.

Method and recipe for making the hearts can be found on the previous blog entry.

kneading the dough.

Bake for 2 – 3 hours at 120C

roll out to 7mm thickness and cut shapes.

Mr3 painting

Ms5 painting the hearts

Create a loop that will sit flat against the door.

Jan13

Tin Can Garden Men! School Holiday Project

Posted on January 13, 2014 by thestick81

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Tin Can Garden Men! School Holiday Project

I must say I am quite jealous of all the projects the girls at All Tizzie Up are doing this holidays. I have been so swamped with work and other obligations I just haven’t had the time or energy to get any of the things I wanted to done. But that will change! In the meantime, I am very happy they are helping keep my blog active! Here is some cute little tin can men they made using recycled cans, wire, paint, beads and some bells.

Watch the slide show or click on the images for step by step instructions to make your own recycled can garden critters.

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Dec19

DIY Christmas Bell Mobile

Posted on December 19, 2013 by thestick81

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If you like working with fabric like my friends at All Tizzied Up , here’s a simple Christmas craft decoration you can put together with the kids that will last for years to come.

Once you have gathered the fabric you want to use, all you need is some styrofoam bells, ribbon, hot glue and sharp scissors and you’re ready to get crafty. The smaller kids can get working on the covering the loop while an adult does the hot glue bits. The rest of the steps are covered in the photos below.

Christmas themed fabric in your desired colours

Cut into squares

Pinch in the middle and dab with hot glue

attach to your bell

Work your way up the bell from the bottom

One complete bell

Trace out some felt to cover the bottoms

Cut and glue on.

Bells ready to go

Cut strips of the same fabric to cover the ring

Tie in pattern

Finished ring

Cut different lengths to hang bells

Attach to bells with glue and hang from ring

Cut lengths to hang ring

Attach to ring

Secure all strings together.

There you have it!

Dec18

3 Easy Mini Christmas Tree Decorations

Posted on December 18, 2013 by thestick81

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My crafty mum friend at All Tizzied Up has been very busy putting together some Christmas Craft projects with the family. Thought we’d share for inspiration.

They created 3 different trees from styrofoam cone shapes using buttons, ribbon, felt, and every crafters favourite tool – a hot glue gun!

The felt tree was created by layering leaf shape felt pieces working from the bottom up, then decorating with plastic jewels.

This one is simply a case of measuring out same lengths or ribbon, fixing with hot glue, then twisting, gluing again. Glue 2 of these together to create a flower type shape and attach to the cone. Again, finishing with some jewels to look like ornaments.

The button one is covered in aluminium foil, before attaching buttons all over with hot glue.

So if you are wondering what to do this weekend before Christmas, maybe get out the craft supplies and get crafty with the kids. Would make a great addition and talking point for your Christmas table on Wednesday!

Dec11

Easy Kids Craft – Hanging Christmas Decoration

Posted on December 11, 2013 by thestick81

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These are really simple to make and kids of all ages can help. Mr8 actually showed me how to make one, then we extended on the concept to create this hanging ornament.

It is really just 2 card board stars slotted into each other at right angles to create a ‘3D star’ as he calls them. But we made 4 different sized and hung them form some cotton. We covered each star with some paper from a themed wrapping pack, so they were not all exactly the same, but similar enough to ‘match’. The whole project took about 20 minutes for 3 of us and looks pretty cool! Further instructions available if you open or scroll over each picture.

Draw the star shapes on some card. We used cookie cutters to make it easier.

If using plain card, glue on some wrapping paper

Cut out and glue paper to the other side

Covering second side then cut out again.

Cut one star to the middle from one side, then the other star from the opposite side to the middle again.

Slot together and you have 3D stars

Hand on some string

3D Star Ornament.

Dec5

Paper Plate Angel Garland – Christmas Craft

Posted on December 5, 2013 by thestick81

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Paper Plate Angel Garland – Christmas Craft

These are very easy to make and can be as fancy or as simple as you like.

I usually avoid glitter when doing craft. Sure it’s pretty, but after we use it, that stuff turns up all over the place for the next month. ‘The herpies of the craft world’ a friend of mine called it, I think she was right. But today I caved, because an angel needs her sparkle! Honestly, there was no template, just trial and error until I got the shape I was after. You can see the steps in the photos below. Double sided plates for the body would have made pretty dresses, but I couldn’t find any of those, so we stuck with white. Of course you could get the kids to colour them or even use a different colour glitter on the body too. But I was all glittered out after the wings alone!

Cut your plate something like this, that’s right, no pattern, trial and error was all I went by

Secure with tape or staples.

Apply a generous amount of hot glue to the bauble

Place on top of the body. Tie a ribbon around the neck once glue has dried to cover any mess.

Run some glue (we just used a glue stick) along the edges and sprinkle with glitter

Once the wings are dry, attach to the body.

Hang from a string

Christmas Angels

Paper plate craft.

Nov13

Autumn Tree, Family Craft Activity

Posted on November 13, 2013 by thestick81

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This week I am excited to feature a project from a local crafty mumma from All Tizzied Up . She and her gorgeous girls have brought nature and some textiles together to create a colourful fall themed wall hanging.

They have gathered up some bark and leaves and painted the leaves while still fresh using acrylic craft paint. The paint has slowed down the drying out process and kept them supple so they don’t crack through the next few steps. The rest if fairly self explanatory, or run your mouse over each picture for more details.

Some lovely leaves and bark

MissM paints the leaves

Blue leaves

MissM starts gluing on the bark to the trunk

First layer of bark complete

Coat with a thick later of PVA glue

Dust over PVA layer with saw dust or dirt for texture

Start gluing on the leaves

Alternating colours for effect.

The leaves

Coat with another thick layer of PVA as a sealant.

Allow to dry.

Colourful Tree!

Once all the collage was together, mum then filled in the surrounds of the tree with blue paint and there you have it.

Sep22

Halloween Toddler Craft, DIY Treat Boxes

Posted on September 22, 2013 by thestick81

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Halloween Toddler Craft, DIY Treat Boxes

I know many Australians still have not accepted Halloween, ‘it’s a silly American tradition’, even though it is not American, but anyway, they really should, because it is heaps of harmless fun and the kids love it. Our new neighbourhood really gets into it, I think I enjoy it more than Christmas!

But of course, it’s not just about the dressing up and lollies, halloween craft is lots of fun too. Maybe it’s because I am new to it, but it seems so much more fun than Easter and Christmas craft. Today I just did a simple project with the little kids as the older 2 were not home. I had another idea in my head, but have decided to keep that for later in the school holidays. I am hoping to get quite a few Halloween themed projects in over the next 2 weeks while the kids are off.

I cut out some Halloween shapes in the potatoes while Ms4 gathered the paint and plastic plates. The boxes were just from the grocery store, but they are available at many places, $2 shops etc. We had to allow each side to dry before doing the other side, as you need to apply pressure for best results, rather than trying to stamp the assembled boxes. Once both sides were dry we applied another coat of glitter paint, and some embellishments, again, one side at a time. The weather was nice today so the whole project only took a couple of hours even while waiting for things to dry.

Cut in your shape with a sharp knife, around 5mm deep.

then cut in from the sides until you hit the cut out,

Paint, boxes (or what ever you want really) potatoes.

Ms4 stamping away.

Ms4 adds some glitter paint.

Allow first side to dry.

Everything is better with googly eyes!

Add extra detail with a marker if desired.

I am pretty happy with the results. Would have liked some different coloured boxes for variety, and was disappointed we are out of black paint for the bats, but over all, not bad for an afternoons work.

Aug20

Ten Tin Bowling! Recycled Cans – Toddler Activity.

Posted on August 20, 2013 by thestick81

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Ten Tin Bowling! Recycled Cans – Toddler Activity.

The hardest part of this project was collecting the cans! To make stacking easier, make sure all 10 cans are the same height. Obviously you don’t need to cover the cans with paper, but I think it made it a bit more fun. I just cut some scrap booking paper to size, fixed with tape, and they’re done.

Coloured paper cut to size

Secure with tape

Pretty cans.

Ready to bowl

Miss 4 setting up.

Mr2 having a go

Ms4 having a bowl.

Ten Tin Bowling

Recycled can

toddler activity

Gross motor skills

Easy toddler activity.

This activity develops hand eye coordination, cognitive and gross motor skills. Once you’ve had enough, the cans can just go into the recycling! The kids loved the noise they make as they smashed to the ground. Older kids could keep score and make a more competitive game out of it.

Jun9

Owl Family Craft Project

Posted on June 9, 2013 by thestick81

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To be honest, craft is the last thing I was in the mood for this weekend. After some tragic news on Saturday morning, the tone of what was planned to be a fun 3 day weekend, soon turned into a very sombre one indeed. All I really wanted to do was hug my pillow and cry. But my children don’t really understand grief, so after 24 hours of my moping around, they were climbing the walls. I was inspired by this project from an activity I saw at school a few weeks ago, of individual owls as they related to the letter O (letter of the week). I thought a little owl family with the kids prints would look very cute.

The concept is quite simple like most of my projects, and as you can see in the photos below, so I wont go into too much detail. I let the kids choose from my scrapbooking paper a pattern they liked, but you could just as easily use plain colours. The background is just 2 school scrap books centre pages sticky taped together, then washed with blue water colour as demonstrated by Mr 8. Once dry, I ironed the paper to make it flat again. I drew the owl body and Mr 8 and I cut them out. The eyes were traced from a circular cookie cutter and cut out. The black dots made with a hole punch. I just drew one foot, then used it as a stencil for the rest of the feet, so they are all similar.

The kids then chose their wing colour. I placed the body on the background and had the children do their hand prints one at a time, starting in the middle. This way I didn’t have to worry too much about working out the spacing. Once they were all done, I sketched in a branch and Mr 8 painted it in. Then it was just a case of glueing eyes, pupils, beaks and feet. We added some leaves cut out from green paper to the branch and there you have it. A little owl family hand print keepsake.

Mr 8 painting the sky.

The sky backdrop.

Use one foot as a stencil for the rest of the feet.

Choosing the paper.

Glue owl body.

Paint hands.

Mr 8 placing the first print.

Mr 2’s hand prints

Mr 8 painting the branch

Glueing on the feet

Cutting out the leaves

Adding the leaves.

Girly owl.

Baby owl and big brother owl

Girl and Boy owl.

Owl hand print family.

Owl family wall hanging.

Close up.

From a distance.

Materials:

Paper, Scissors, hole punch, water colour, coloured card and paper, glue stick, craft paint.

If you have got this far, thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed the post and it inspires you to do something just as fun and rewarding with your young family. But if I can just ask one small thing of you, next time the opportunity arises, please donate to childhood cancer research in your country. Currently only 5% of research funds go towards childhood cancer research, so please pinpoint your donations to this very important cause. This beast needs to be stopped.

Mar13

Home Made Chalk with an Easter Twist.

Posted on March 13, 2013 by thestick81

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I have been going to try out this home made chalk method for a while. When I picked up some new silicone moulds from Aldi last week, I figured it was the perfect opportunity to try them both out!

Ingredients and utensils.

Ideally disposable plastic cups would be the best thing to mix the plaster in, but I didn’t have any, so we just used some plastic cups we are not very attached to (IE, not Tupperware, lol). You can buy plaster of paris from any large hardware or craft shop for around $10 for a 3kg (which is heeeaaaaps, 1kg is more than enough for this project). Silicone or rubber ice cube trays, food colouring and something to stir with. Again, paddle pop sticks would have been better, but these skewers will do the trick.

: Mix the water and the colour, then add the plaster powder

: Stir thoroughly, don’t let the mix get too thick so you can still pour it into moulds.

: Ms 4 mixing in the plaster

Mix the food colouring in the water first, then add the plaster. Stir rapidly until its fully mixed, then poor into the moulds. The plaster will set in roughly half an hour, some water may rise to the top, you can just dab this away with some paper towel or tip the moulds after this time for it to run away. Then allow to fully cure in the moulds over night. We also experimented with some glitter in the chalk, for something a bit different. It actually worked quite well, although its really hard to capture the results with the camera.

Pour into the moulds

Moulds ready to set.

One of the glitter chalks.

Then simply turn out of the moulds and get drawing!

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Mar10

Decorated Eggs, Easter Egg Dying and Decorating.

Posted on March 10, 2013 by thestick81

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Decorated Eggs, Easter Egg Dying and Decorating.

While we did the Tie Dying, I also started experimenting with a few other methods of colouring eggs using a home made dye using ingredients that almost everyone has already in their kitchen. These were some of the results;

These are obviously pretty straight forward. Dyed in a food colouring/vinegar/warm water mixture. Then a scrap booking embelishment stuck on. Would have preferred embellishments without the clear plastic behind them, but the craft shop didn’t have any like that and you can’t really tell from a distance anyway.

I love how these turned out. Just use leaves from the garden, lay over the eggs then cover with a stocking or pantyhose. I actually used some stocking I had on hand and didn’t even need to ruin them in the process. Dip dye for a few minutes and you’re done.

Crepe paper results

We actually discovered this dying method accidentally. After we had finished the Tie Dying from a previous post, we placed the eggs on this pre shredded crepe paper. Some of the eggs still had a bit of water in them from the boiling process, so when that ran out and wet the paper, the colour transferred onto the eggs! So I took it a step further, wet a hand full and covered them in it. The results are pretty cool I think!

The dying solution we used was 3 parts hot tap water to one part vinegar, with as much food colouring as you wanted, we only used about a teaspoon per large cup.

Some of the other patterns we created can be seen below.