Tag: crafts

family

Christmas Cards

Andi

It’s a beautiful day! Christmas is coming up fast and I decided this year I wasn’t going to ship gifts and everything had to fit into a regular envelope with a regular stamp.

Sidebar: shipping is expensive!! I spent more on shipping gifts than I spent on the gifts themselves. I could not believe how much the cost of shipping was. End Sidebar.

So, to make things still a little special and unique, I decided to make hand crafted Christmas cards. Luckily, I have a friend that does paper crafting and we set a date to bring all of our supplies together and spend the day making cards.

We crammed the table space we had full of stamps and dyes, scissors and glue. Time went by so quickly as we got sucked into our crafting.

We did accomplish our goal. They are not anywhere close to perfect, but they are still pretty cute. More importantly, we, both mothers, got some time together to enjoy each others company.

family

Pumpkin Painting

Andi

One of the most common Halloween activities many families like to do together is Pumpkin Carving. They go to the pumpkin patch, pick out the biggest ones they can find, take them home and carve Jack-o-lanterns. It really is a fun event, and the pumpkin patches love it too because most of them charge by weight or size. But when your kids are too small to properly carve a pumpkin, and you don’t like squash guts anyway, what are you to do? We do Pumpkin Painting instead.

Each year, we make a trip to the pumpkin patch. I look for one that has lots of activities included in the price of admission, and specific sections for younger kids. A petting zoo is always a big bonus, and if it has a bounce place, it’s a definite win. We spend most of the day there, and towards the end, we go out to pick a pumpkin. But the pumpkin we pick, probably won’t be the one we paint. This one is for my child to proudly parade around and show everyone. I’ll buy painting pumpkins later from the grocery store where they are much cheaper. The day at the pumpkin patch is definitely a seasonal experience for us. The focal point is to have a fun day. It also signals that its fall, and time for pumpkin season.

After we get home, probably the next day, we get out our paints and our painting pumpkin. If you live further south where it stays warm through the fall, you could keep your kid in just a diaper (or underwear if potty trained) and then give them a bath afterward to wash any paint off. I’d also only do this if you have a fenced in yard nobody can peep into. If you do not, you just don’t want your child outside in their underpants, or it’s already cold and snowing before Halloween where you live, my best suggestion is an apron. Paint is still destined to end up on your kids clothing though, so be 100% sure you got washable paint. Put them in worn out clothes you’re not worried about piant getting on.

I take my kids outside to paint, so the mess is not on my flooring. We had a few younger kids join us this year including my younger child, so I got some baby sized pumpkins for them. I aso let my kids use real paintbrushes instead of those flimsy plastic ones kids paint comes with.

This activity probably won’t last long. The older kids may be more intent on their painting, but even so, a pumpkin is only so big. As they get older it may become a longer activity when they start expressing creativity more. Right now it lasts 20-30 minutes at most, much less for younger children.

I still threw my kids clothes right into the washer afterwards and gave them baths because of course they still managed to get everything messy.

As you can see, kids are messy painters. They like to mix colors and experiment. But they are learning to be creative, as well as some hand eye coordination and dexterity. They are also usually very proud of their work, and feel accomplished.

If you want to do a family activity, but on a tight budget, this is also a good alternative. Like I said, the pumpkins we paint we get from the grocery store, off brand childrens paint, and a brush. Your cost will depend on how many pumpkins you need and how large. Those mini pumpkins came 6 in a bag for $3, making this craft less than $10. If you do want a pumpkin patch experience, look for one with a front gate admission. These usually include lots of things in the price. Patchs that are free admission will probably charge for each activity and spending a dollar here, 3 dollars there, accumulates cost very quickly. You get more for your money when the patch has a admission cost, and many have some kind of deal for purchasing tickets online.

So if you are looking for an alternative to pumping carving, look no further! Pumpkin painting is where its at!

family

TP Tube Bat

Andi

What can you possibly do with a toilet paper tube? Quite a bit it turns out. For Halloween, TP Tube crafts include monsters, witches, and bats.

My son made a toilet paper tube bat. This craft could easily be adjusted for a wide range of ages. For younger ages, you could find stick on eyes and mouth, and use crayons. For older kids you could let them cut out their own mouth and wings and glue them on. For my son I cut out the mouth and wings, but I let him glue them on and used paint.

Materials you will need include a TP tube, construction paper, googly eyes, and paint (or crayons) and glue.

So I cut the construction paper and let my child paint it, however he wanted. After he was finished, I glued it to the TP tube and we let it dry. We went on to a different activity and came back to it about 2 hours later. From there on, it was mostly his doing. He glued on the eyes and mouth himself. They needed to be that way so it was smiling when it was hanging upside down. 🤷🏼‍♀️

It was really a rather simple and quick craft. But with the attention spans kids have, it was a perfect length. I enjoyed watching him happily glue on the pieces in the odd way he thought they needed to be. Good idea, great craft 👍🏼.

Art, family

Halloween Wreath Craft

Andi

I set out to make a Halloween wreath and decided to make it with only materials from the Dollar Tree. Now, knock it if you want, but I have my reasons for going there. First, when I started decorating I lived in a less than desirable part of town in a state that has some awful weather. So if my outside decorations were destroyed by weather or stolen, I didn’t want to have spent a lot of money on them. So I’d go to Dollar Tree and I’ve found they have decent looking stuff. Secondly, I see all the time bloggers who make “budget friendly” crafts and “decorations you can do on a budget!” But then end up spending $50 on wreath materials. I’m not sure what budget they’re on, but a $50 wreath isn’t in mine. So if I can make a wreath with only Dollar Tree materials and make it look good, it is possible to decorate on a budget. Take heart, you can do it!Starting pieces. I got a metal wreath ring, three rolls of tool, a string of garland, a little witch hat, a BOO, and two packages of small figures. Totaled to $9, and if you add tax round that up to $10. I did also use a hot glue gun and string that I already had and didn’t calculate into the price. Neither are terribly expensive if you need to buy them. If you do, add another $8-$10 dollars.First, I wrapped the orange tool around the metal ring flatly, and then with the second roll, I wrapped the orange but twisted it. Then added the purple tool on top of the orange. I decided to keep it only two colors to avoid making the wreath too busy and confusing to the eye. Simple is sometimes best, especially when it comes to base colors. I secured the tool directly to the metal ring and added a little hot glue for extra strength because tool likes to come apart.Next I added the ghost Garland. This added a third color to the mix and some spooky as well. I also secured this directly to the metal ring. Pretty simple step, just wrap the garland around the wreath.For the BOO I tied it onto the wreath with string to hold it on. Then I used the hot glue gun to position it where I wanted. I knew simply glue wouldn’t be strong enough to last, which is why I chose to tie it on with string for added strength.After I had the BOO where I wanted it, I arranged the small figures around it for added flair. I had a package of plastic bugs and skeletons and a package of glittery bats. I didnt use all the bugs, mostly just the spiders, so my kids got the extras to play with. I tried to positon them in places with contrasting colors so they would be easy to see. Hot glue is what I used to keep them in place. Careful with this part as not to burn your fingers on the hot glue that eeks through the loose weave of the tool.Lastly, I added the little witch hat in the middle of the wreath. I debated putting it on top or figuring a way to tie it on the front, but ultimately chose to put it in the middle. This was the most difficult part of the entire craft. I tied both sides down with string. I made little peeky holes down to the metal ring and secured the hat directly to it. Once it was tied down, I used a little hot glue to position it exactly how it needed to sit and keep it there.Final product on the door. In total, this took me about an hour to make and cost me just under $10. I like how it turned out, and I’m pretty pleased with my craftiness. I’m thinking next time though, I’m going to use black tool on the base and orange or purple garland. Just to make it more stable and simply pleasing to the eye. Final consensus is you can make a good looking wreath entirely of Dollar Tree materials. Have a fashionable door and not spend a fortune. I’d say the experiment was a success.

Art, family

Paper Plate Pumpkin

Andi

It’s almost 🎶Autumn🎶, it’s cooling down and its almost Autumn! 🎶 Auutummmn🎶

I love the fall. My favorite seasons are spring and autumn. They are both that perfect in between temperature that’s not too hot and not too cold. Spring is bright with colorful flowers and Fall is bright with colorful leaves. And sweaters are always appropriate for both seasons. So when it comes to cute seasonal crafts, Fall and Spring get a few more than Summer or Winter. So when September hit, I excitedly pulled out all the fall crafts.

I saw this paper plate pumpkin and thought it looked cute and simple, but the original had a pipe cleaner stem and I didn’t have any pipe cleaners on hand. So I thought I’ll just cut the top and make that the stem. I’m not sure where I thought I was going with it, which is abundantly clear with this first one my younger child did. I don’t have an explanation for that.

But by the time my older child was ready, I had a better idea of what I was doing, which is good because he cares about his crafts a great deal more. I helped him make the face, but if you wanted, you could cut the face out of black paper and have the child glue it on instead of drawing it.

This is, I think, adorable and easy. It took a little paint, paintbrushes, and a paper plate. I let my small one try to paint with this craft. A good craft to get the little ones involved and start jogging their creative juices.

A thumbs up 👍🏼 craft.