Family Picture holding Letters - Great gift

This is the best gift ever!

Okay so it's a little selfish to call this the best gift ever when I'm the one that gave it, but it is awesome. I found the idea on Pinterest from this blog.

We have a very large blended family and I thought this would be perfect for my Mom and Step-Dad. It's something everyone can do no matter how far away you live. My brother and his family live in Germany (military) so we don't get to see them often.

Here is our project.



It's 12X24. Mpix.com will print 12x24, but I ran out of time.  I printed it at Sams as a 20x24 and cut off the excess.  I needed something to fill in the top two squares, so we added the Japanese symbols to match their house decor. I printed some smaller ones too. I need to print more because everyone wants their own. I even kept one 5x7 for myself.

They both love it!! Now if we could just get everyone together in person.

Family Hand Turkey Table Runner Craft - Revisited

I'm so excited to pull out our table runner from last year!  The kids have grown SO much already.

When we went to SeaWorld over the summer they had a Handimal Art for sale.  They have the family put their hand print on a canvas and they make animals out of them.  It's really cute and I really wanted to do one.  I still want to do ducks for our bathroom.  I've seen places that make art out of children's hand/foot prints for their room.  I love it! 

I decided to make a hand Turkey table runner for Thanksgiving.  I am not very crafty or artistic, so I was a little worried on how it would turn out. 

 Materials:
Table runner - I was hoping Walmart would have a plain cheap one (I didn't have time to go other places to look).  I found this one for $13.
Fabric Paint (Brown, Red, Yellow, White, Black, Orange)
Paint Brushes
Fabric markers
Paper plate (or something to make a palette for mixing colors
Leaf
Hands of each member of the family

I marked the center with one of Sissy's hair clips.

I mixed brown and white to make a lighter brown for the turkeys and mostly because I knew I needed a lot of brown.  I needed to stretch it further.  I painted on our hands and had each person put their hand print on the table runner.

I was going to paint the fingers different colors, but I realized with Sissy's that it was drying to fast and not coming out even, so I just went with all brown with the rest of us.

 I painted in the spaces and added the colors to our fingers.  I added the extras to the turkeys.  I was carefully using a paint brush for all of the details and when I was finished I remembered the the fabric paint has a thin pen like applicator.  Duh!  It would have been easier to just use them.  See...I'm not that crafty.

I painted the leaf we had found and tried to put the print on the table runner.  I had taken the kids on a leaf hunt earlier in the day, but we don't have any cool fall leaves in our neighborhood.  Thankfully, I had one leaf that I found at the park with the kids the other day.  The impression didn't work too well, so I went to buy fabric markers.  I traced the leaf and painted in the rest with brown and red on one side and orange and red on the other.

I finished painting in everything.  I used the fabric paints to add the leaf details and added our names and it's done! :)  Well almost.  I need to finish the leaf on the left and possibly outline our hands with the fabric marker to clean it up a little.

What do you think??

Educational crafts - painting with fruits

My kids recently started "school." Sissy is in preschool and Bubby is at the same place in a 1-2 year old class. I love when they bring home their artwork and crafts. I decided to to share them with you. :)

Bubby painted with strawberries while learning about the color red.


This week he painted with lemons and yellow paint to learn about yellow.

He also painted with blueberries and whipped cream. I forgot get a picture, but it wasn't the prettiest painting with the now sticky cream. He was learning blue that week...his favorite color.

Sissy painted with Apples while learning about the letter A.

Rainbow Craft for St. Patrick's Day

We decided to continue with the Saint Patrick's theme this week and made rainbows.  I love that it was easy enough for my one year old to do...I know, I know he's almost two, but I have exactly 2 months to keep calling him one.

Step one: Tear up paper.  Bubby LOVED this.  He enjoys tearing things up.  I let Sissy use scissors to start with because my friend, the art teacher, always tells me how kids just don't know how to use scissors.  Turns out Sissy does okay with scissors (for a 4 yr old at least), but she did not know how to tear paper.  She kept trying to pull at it instead of tearing it.  The fact that she was having trouble with this was an eye opener for me.

I love the look on Bubby's face in this pic!! lol

I put the glue on paper plates for them.  With Sissy, I gave her a whole plate to use.  She had to look for the glue and help make the rainbow shape.  She did want to make it go all the way around a couple times.  For Bubby, though, I cut the plate into a rainbow shape.  I figured it would help show exactly what it is.

We went a little crazy tearing paper.  We have extra for another project someday.

When they were done with the gluing all the pieces on they each picked a pot and got to stick on some gold.  We had some leftover metallic stickers from a mosaic project that were perfect.

This was their favorite part.  They didn't want to stop!

 

 We are ready for St. Patrick's day!  Actually, I have one more project to work on before then, but it's an edible/cooking project.  It will have to wait, so that it's nice and fresh.  It does involve rainbow colors. :)

St. Patrick's Day Garland

My daughter made a cute heart garland to hand up for Valentine's Day.  She was missing all the Christmas decorations, so she went with the next holiday.  She's really big on Holidays right now.  She made the pink and purple hearts with pipe cleaners.

Valentine's is over, so I decided to let her update it to St. Patrick's Day.  She had fun coloring all the little Shamrocks and stringing them.  It's great for developing motor skills as children thread them onto the string.

 It's something simple and easy to do.  She is proud of it though because it is hanging up for everyone to see.

Hand Turkey Family Table Runner

When we went to SeaWorld over the summer they had a Handimal Art for sale.  They have the family put their hand print on a canvas and they make animals out of them.  It's really cute and I really wanted to do one.  I still want to do ducks for our bathroom.  I've seen places that make art out of children's hand/foot prints for their room.  I love it! 

I decided to make a hand Turkey table runner for Thanksgiving.  I am not very crafty or artistic, so I was a little worried on how it would turn out. 

 Materials:
Table runner - I was hoping Walmart would have a plain cheap one (I didn't have time to go other places to look).  I found this one for $13.
Fabric Paint (Brown, Red, Yellow, White, Black, Orange)
Paint Brushes
Fabric markers
Paper plate (or something to make a palette for mixing colors
Leaf
Hands of each member of the family

I marked the center with one of Sissy's hair clips.

I mixed brown and white to make a lighter brown for the turkeys and mostly because I knew I needed a lot of brown.  I needed to stretch it further.  I painted on our hands and had each person put their hand print on the table runner.

I was going to paint the fingers different colors, but I realized with Sissy's that it was drying to fast and not coming out even, so I just went with all brown with the rest of us.

 I painted in the spaces and added the colors to our fingers.  I added the extras to the turkeys.  I was carefully using a paint brush for all of the details and when I was finished I remembered the the fabric paint has a thin pen like applicator.  Duh!  It would have been easier to just use them.  See...I'm not that crafty.

I painted the leaf we had found and tried to put the print on the table runner.  I had taken the kids on a leaf hunt earlier in the day, but we don't have any cool fall leaves in our neighborhood.  Thankfully, I had one leaf that I found at the park with the kids the other day.  The impression didn't work too well, so I went to buy fabric markers.  I traced the leaf and painted in the rest with brown and red on one side and orange and read on the other.

I finished painting in everything.  I used the fabric paints to add the leaf details and added our names and it's done! :)  Well almost.  I need to finish the leaf on the left and possibly outline our hands with the fabric marker to clean it up a little.

What do you think??

Thanksgiving Craft

Here's a cute craft Sissy did with Grandma.  It's paper plate with cut out leaves covering it.  I love the little plate pouch in front.  She is putting things she is thankful for in it.  So for Sissy is thankful for our house and for cupcakes. :)

Apple Worm Craft

Sissy made this cute craft with Grandma yesterday.  They were working on the letter "W."  I love it!

Snowflake Costume

Here are the pictures that show the solution to our snowflake costume dilemma.  If you saw my earlier post, I was looking for ideas on snowflake costumes that are cheap and easy to make.  My garbage bag idea was too trashy (pun intended), so my Art teacher friend came up with an awesome idea.  Ironically, she found my blog while searching for snowflake costume ideas before she came up with her own.

I walked into her classroom the other day to see 6 tables that looked just like this...

I picked her brain a little to see what she did and took a few cell phone pictures.

 Materials:

• Fabric paint Blue, White, and Glitter
• Spray bottle (she actually used an old bottle that originally had cleaner in it)
• Blue Felt
• Cardboard Snowflake decorations for template
• Glue and snowflake foam pieces (extras)
• Paint brush
• Thick blue yarn

1. She bought the blue felt and cut them into circles.  I probably would have had problems with even the first step.  My circles may resemble Mr. Potato heads. :P
2. She took the blue fabric paint and diluted and put it into a spray bottle. 
3. Using the templates she placed them on the blue felt and spayed the diluted blue fabric paint over them.  It looks awesome like it was air brushed on. 
4. She used a mixture of the white fabric paint and glitter paint to paint in where the template was to accent the snowflake patterns.
5. She also glued on a couple felt snowflakes.  They look great with or without these.
6. She is going to punch a hole in it to attach thick blue yarn so the children can wear these like a necklace.

I'm so excited!  They've been singing their 3 songs since October.  I only see them once a week, so we had to start early...especially with Thanksgiving week off.

The kids will wear a white polo shirt which is part of our school uniform, so most of them should have one.  If they don't they will wear a blue polo shirt.  I've asked them to wear light khaki pants or white.

This was the 1st design where she used a sponge to apply the fabric paint.

Here's the 2nd design, but we don't have the string/rope on it to wear it like a necklace for the concert.  I taped this one on for the picture. :P

Snowflake Costume Solved

My Art teacher friend came up with an awesome inexpensive idea for our snowflake costumes!  I'll post about it soon and put up some pictures.  She is so awesome and creative.  People think I'm creative because I'm a musician, but I definitely am not.  I can take someone's idea and add to it or create from it, but I'm horrible at coming up with my own, creative, idea/design. 

Snowflake Costume??

I'm getting ready for our school's annual Holiday Concert and I'm planning on having Kindergarten students be snowflakes.  I've already got the 3 songs picked out and the students have been working on it.  I found this snowflake costume on Oriental Trading and bought one.

I estimate that about 30-40 Kindergarten students will show, so for $12 a piece it's not possible to have them all wear one of these.  I will have one KG speaker, so only he/she will wear it.  I remember seeing some really cute penguin costumes made with black trash bags and thought we could do snowflakes with white trash bags.  I mentioned it to my art teacher friend and she looked at me with a face of disgust.  She obviously did not like my idea.  I'm pretty sure she thinks it's too trashy (pun intended!).  :) 

So...back to the drawing board for some cheap snowflake costumes!  I don't think this one will work either.

These are SO cute.  Now if I can just get someone to make me 30-40 in 2-3 weeks!  I don't think I can make a trash bag look that cute.

This Mom makes some AWESOME stuff.  Check it out here!

Any ideas?  Update here is our solution.