Craft Day Tuesdays - Necklace plus Art

 Does inspiration ever come to you at the weirdest times? It does me.  I went to Hobby Lobby on Saturday.  I was a woman on a mission.  I knew exactly what I needed.  I had a short window of time...then BAM!  Inspiration struck.  I saw these tiny wooden discs and I thought, "I know our next project!"

 We painted the discs pale blue.  It took very little paint to do 4, so a whole bottle of paint would probably paint 50+.  Then, we went off to play while they dried.

 Later, we drew the "scenery" with Sharpie markers.  Just fun things like sunshine, grass, rainbow, etc.  Easy, right?

We picked which button would go with each scene (Dress It Buttons - aren't they cute?).  I hot glued on the buttons.  I burn my fingers ev.ery.time.  Then, I hot glued the ribbon on the back for the necklace.

They turned out sooo cute.  I might make theses with my nieces and nephew, too.  They were a hit!

8 wooden discs - $1.99
Blue paint - $1.00
Ribbon - $1.00
We already had the Sharpies and the buttons

Are you inspired to make some adorable necklaces?  I think I want to wear the unicorn one!  :)

Have a fun and playful day!
Mel

Reggio to Rainbow

I have always loved the Reggio approach to education.  I incorporated a lot of its aspects into my classroom once upon a time.  The above photo was on Pinterest and comes from atelierpourenfants.blogspot.fr  I was so inspired by it.

I went in search of clay and decided to go to my local dollar store, because it's inexpensive and didn't know how well the project would go over. They only had rainbow clay and that's okay. 1) G loves rainbows and 2) it was cheap. I didn't want to invest a lot of money in clay if G was interested.

But G WAS interested - intrigued even.  She loved molding the clay aka tree bases and adding different twigs to make the trees - big and small, straight up or "very branchy".

Roo, who is 20 months, also LOVED making the trees.  She spent about 30 minutes making her trees.  She likes to do everything that big sister does, but also this is her kind of project.  She likes to figure things out.

The above was my Rainbow Forest.

This above photo is G and Roo's Rainbow Forest.  G has plays to expand her Rainbow Forest.  "We need to make it big enough for all the animals of the world." She said.  I had to go pick up 4 more packs of Rainbow clay.  In between breakfast and preschool this morning, we were making more trees for the Rainbow Forest.  I smile, because I think in true Reggio fashion, we have a project lead by the child's interest and it is a project that it being added to and growing with the child's thoughts and imagination.

Have a fun and playful day
Mel

Once Upon A Time in a Rainbow Forest

"Once upon a time, there was a Rainbow Forest.  It was a cozy play, where lots of animals live.  I wish I could live there too.  It's sooo cozy..."

"...lot's of animals live in the Rainbow Forest and make it their home.  There's deers and hedgehogs and skunks and a whooole lotta birds..."

"...sometimes a baby dragon is in the Rainbow Forest and needs someone to take care of him.  He is a tiny baby dragon..."

"...the fairies take care of baby dragons and alllll the animals.  They are good at taking care of animals.  If I was lost there, they would take care of me.  No bad people are in the Rainbow Forest.  If bad people did come, the fairies would hide everyone..."

"...foxes are in the Rainbow Forest too.  They are onry sometimes and play tricks on the other animals.  Look, there are owls, too!"

"...we can take care of hedgehogs and deers just like the fairies, but first we have to catch them.  Where is there a forest here?  I do want to find a Rainbow Forest big enough for me to stay in.  I think they eat and drink and sleep and play alllll day in the Rainbow Forest.  It's a happy place and cozy, too..."

"...lots of birds live in the trees but one lives on the ground.  The red bird is flying.  I can fly too.  Watch me..." (running about with arms flapping)

"...the fairies take care of alllll the animals then they go to sleep.  The End." - G, age 4

I do love the imagination of this child.

Have a fun and playful day!
Mel

Craft Day Tuesdays - St. Patrick's Day

Here's some St. Patrick's Day Craft inspiration from Pinterest!  Happy crafting.  We have freezing rain here in Ohio - great day to stay in and craft the morning away!
Have a fun and playful day
Mel

St. Patrick's Day Inspiration by melanieshanks featuring traditional home decor

Math Games Monday - Roll the Dice Games

Games are fun...and easy to make.

You need very few supplies - paper, glue, cutouts or stickers, 2 penguin game pieces, and a die.  My penguins are from Safari Ltd. Penguins Toob.

Simply map out a twisty path with your snowflakes and glue them on.  If you are using stickers, place them on.  Kids can help make the gameboard.

Roll the die and move that many spaces. Easy, peasy.  You can make these easy game for little money and for any theme you want.  You could coordinate your game to your child's favorite book or movie.

 OR if you have 2 players...you can use the penguins to take turns (patience is a good thing!) to see who reaches the end first.

 So that there's no hard feelings, I always say, "Kate is the first winner. Ethan is the second winner." I learned that from a veteran preschool teacher of 20 years.

 I used Safari Ltd. Penguins from a Toob, but you could use any animal as game pieces.  If it's snow-themed, you could use any polar animals or Anna, Elsa, or Olaf figures like these at the Disney Store as game pieces.

 The possibilities are endless.

Games are great for teaching taking turns, patience, counting, one-to-one correspondence, and family bonding time.

Have a Fun & Playful day!
Mel

Craft Day Tuesday - Small Shadowboxes

 Do you remember making dioramas as a kid?  I used to love getting an assignment where I could make a diorama instead of writing a book report...more fun and creative.  Well, on this cold and snowy day, I decided that we would do a mini version of a diorama.  Instead of a shoebox, we are using 3x3 jewelry boxes (found at Michael's for $.99 each but 1 box makes 2).

 Just a few supplies are needed: scrap paper, cotton, felt, stickers, glue, scissors.  I found these adorable fox and polar friends sticks by Sticko at Walmart.  Greta was so into this project.  She could do most every step.

 We lined the bottom of each box with a scrap of paper that I had.  Then, we just added tree cutouts, the stickers, felt or cotton, and a few plastic flowers that I had laying around.

 They turned out sooo cute.  You could hang on a wall, but we decided to tape ours to the frig.

 It's a beautiful little display of art, don't you think?