Collages for the Senses, A Craft for Children



Alexander loves to glue things. I can cut out shapes -- all sorts of different shapes and he can glue for hours. His first "project" was the abstract piece above. I really like it! Rebecca created an actual scene with various shapes... it conjures up an image that Eric Carle and Henri Matisse might have collaborated on.



I asked Rebecca and Alexander to create a "Fruit Bowl" for me. In Alexander's fruit bowl are: 2 bananas, a grapefruit, a lemon, an apple and a pear.



In Rebecca's Fruit Bowl are: 2 apples, some blueberries, a lime, a lemon, a banana and an orange.

The Fruit Bowls reminded me of

Lois Ehlert's Eating the Alphabet


and so that is what we did... we sampled, bananas, strawberries and apples and lemons. We talked about texture and taste.
You could even bring this a step further by incorporating a little bit of cooking!
Click on the fruit below to get some fun cooking ideas!


A study of Caterpillars and Flutterbies...



Everyone loves Eric Carle's A Very Hungry Caterpillar. It certainly is a favorite around here! I learned after visiting Eric Carle's Blog that this year marks the 40th Anniversary of A Very Hungry Caterpillar. I had no idea the book had been around such a long time! But certainly classics never go out of style. If you live in the New England area you should make a point to stop by The Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Springfield, Massachusetts. It's a treasure for children of all ages, from 1 - 99!

Alexander's class has been studying the caterpillar and the butterfly. Of course they read all books on the subject but they also got to grow their own caterpillar and watch as it formed a chrysalis and turn into a butterfly. It was as miraculous as childbirth, really! We kept our butterflies -- we had two, one did not make it -- for a couple of days and then we set them free. Did you know that butterflies live just two weeks? All that work for such a very short life? It seems so unfair!

His class also went to see the Butterfly Exhibit at the Bronx Zoo. If you ever have the chance to see such an exhibit by all means go -- no, fly on over! They are wondrous, beautiful creatures!

Lastly, to finish his butterfly study Alexander made a wonderful craft that illustrates the life of a butterfly.

This project really could not be any more simple!

Have the kids go outside and gather a healthy-sized stick.

You'll also need (for each stick):
1 small pearl bead
1 wooden clothes pin
4 small pom poms
2 pipe cleaners
1 coffee filter
assorted water colors
Glue gun or other strong glue

The kids will decorate their butterflies by painting, with watercolor, onto white coffee filters. Let dry several hours. Gather the center of the butterfly and tie a pipe cleaner around it and then round the ends to form little antenae.

You'll use another pipe cleaner to form the chrysalis. Wrap the pipe cleaner in a swirl. See above.

The caterpillar itself was created by gluing small pompoms onto wooden clothes pins. The clothes pin pinches on to the stick. Everything else is attached with a glue gun. This should be done by an adult. And just below the caterpillar you will see a single pearl bead, to represent the egg.


Pictured below is Rebecca's butterfly. Christopher's flew away as soon as we set it free while Rebecca's decided to hang out a little while.


If you would like to try this at home, following are two sites to help you in your Butterfly Study! This really is a great project for all ages, and watching the daily changes in the caterpillar, to the chrysalis to the butterfly as she first spreads her wings is truly an amazing thing!
Click below for more info:

Happy Birthday Buggie!

It all started with this, a roll of self-adhesive Hallmark wrapping paper.

I just love using this paper as it is just ever so lightly tacky and the paper stays in the right spot and presents generally look professionally wrapped. It's also great for kids to use. Alexander wrapped this present with me and decided he wanted to do something with the scraps left over. He got some scissors and started sticking the wrapping paper to a blank sheet of paper.

And what resulted was another Birthday present!




Aren't they nice? He was so proud of his work!

Alexander loves to play with stickers and loves to make collages. (For another great collage idea, "Matisse Meets Lilly Pulitzer" click here!)


Happy Birthday Buggie! We hope you'll like this and all your other presents!!!
XOXOXO

A work in progress...


A few months ago we lost a great local store called Blue Tulip. It carried everything from greeting cards, to fine soaps and lotions to handbags, dishes, glasses, stationery and party items. It was a great place to stop off to get a hostess gift, a party gift or a teacher gift as there was really something in it for everyone. When they closed they had a slew of Going Out of Business Sales. I got a few items, not many. One items I picked up was a lovely white leather Guest Book. My grandmother always had one and whenever she entertained her guests would sign the book and jot down a little lovely or two. As a child I loved to read them, decipher hand writings and signatures, stopping every now and then to ooh and ahh over a celebrity, politician or even royalty. Our guests are not as exciting but still I love the idea of having something to remember each event. The Guest Book has yet to be opened. I keep forgetting!

Another thing I picked up at the sale was an unattractive, plain cork board. It was a great size and they wanted just a few dollars for it, so I snatched it up with great dreams of doing something nice to it for Rebecca's room. I had always wanted some place to pin up things or tape things, but I was not allowed. My room was practically museum-perfect with no toys out save for an antique doll and my Snoopy on my bed. I was so envious of my friends who had their posters of Shaun Cassidy and Parker Stevenson, Scott Baio, Christopher Atkins which led the way to posters of Andrew McCarthy, Tom Cruise and Rob Lowe. Pages of Tiger Beat and Seventeen ripped out and taped onto walls. I wanted a room like that and I couldn't have one. I wanted a place to put photos of my best friends, and other collectibles like ticket stubs and the like. Now while Rebecca won't be able to tape stuff up on her walls either. No Jonas Brothers no Zac Ephron on her pretty walls. I do think a memory board would be a lovely thing for her to have.

Originally I wanted to line the cork with pretty wall paper then quickly talked myself out of that idea thinking that the paper would get destroyed too quickly. So I chose this dusty rose color to paint to cover the cork and a little bit of white, a thin green and white grosgrain ribbon that I will use across the board and a wide grosgrain ribbon in orange, pink, green and white that will cover the unattractive metal frame. I was so excited to finish up the board this evening but I couldn't locate any of my glue gun sticks. So bummed. So I will keep you posted.

The project was super easy to do. Anyone can do it!

You'll need:

One inexpensive cork board
Some paint (any color)
Wide paint brush, either bristle or foam
Ribbon -- any color and width that you like that will coordinate with the paint
Glue gun to glue ribbon around the perimeter of the frame and across the center
Thumb tacks

Place newspaper over your work surface
Apply paint over cork -- will need at least two coats as the cork absorbs a lot of the paint
Make sure brush strokes are smooth, or do as I did and create patterns with the brush
I also squeezed the paint out of the bottle in random patterns to create a 3D effect
When all had set and dried I painted circles in white over the pink -- you can create any pattern you wish. You could even use a stencil for a more polished look.
Apply ribbon with a glue gun and when dry it is ready to hang!

The kids celebrated Earth Day today at school. It was a magnificent day for it as the temperatures climbed into the 70s. The children spent most of the day outside composting and planting and making birdfeeders. They've given me some great ideas for crafting/recycling that I will post throughout the next week in honor of Earth Day!

Our Decorating Egg-stravaganza!

We've been busy this morning. First the kids all made watercolor resist pictures. They drew pictures with white crayon on white paper and then applied water colors to the paper to create some wonderful pictures. Then we colored our eggs. I bought 3 dozen eggs... I figured that would keep us busy enough! We had a great time and I love the way our eggs turned out! See below to learn how to achieve some of the unique results! Ok... now I am off to bake because the kids want to decorate cookies. I'm glad they are busy and having fun and being creative but all this fun is tiring me out!



This egg was created by first dipping drawing an image on the egg in white crayon then placing the egg in yellow food coloring, then placing it for a much longer time in the blue food coloring.



After we had dyed most of the eggs we added a little bit of cooking oil to some of the colors. We took a white egg and dipped it in blue and purple. I love the speckled look the cooking oil gave the egg.



This white egg was also dipped in to the blue that had the cooking oil in it.




As was this. But first we took an egg let it soak in pink food coloring and then soaked it in the blue coloring with the vegetable oil.



This egg was an accident! I took a pink egg and placed it in orange. I had just added an extra color tablet to the yellow and it hadn't quite mixed in. Looks like a sunset!


We took a pink egg and dipped in purple for various lengths.




A light blue egg dipped in purple on one side and green on the other. We found that adding extra food coloring and extra vinegar made the colors super vibrant. And if you make a mistake everything can be washed off with soap and water!




Here we cut our shapes from thin masking tape and applied it to the egg as decals. The egg was then dyed green and the tape was removed for a batik-y effect.




One white egg dipped in yellow on one side, then blue, then green. On the other side dipped in pink and purple.



A white egg dipped in blue and green.



Here a white egg was dipped in yellow then taped with thin masking tape, then soaked in pink then purple food coloring. The tape was removed to give the egg this very cool effect.




What happens when you dye brown eggs pink then yellow? This lovely red! We'll definitely dye more brown eggs next year. We only dyed two this year. They happened to be sitting in the fridge.



White tape was cut into shapes and then applied to the egg. The egg sat in pink food coloring and the tape was removed.



April Showers bring Spring Flower Bookmarks!

It's warm outside. Warm enough that we can go play wearing just a light jacket or sweater. In our backyard we noticed the daffodils starting to blossom. Spring is in the air! And so when Alexander asked to do a craft, we chose one to bookmark this fabulous weather! (Pun very much intended!) These adorable things are so easy to make and are a perfect gift for a parent, grandparent, teacher or sibling. Rebecca made them all the time when she was little. I am sure she will love the one Alexander made for her today!

To make your Spring Flower Bookmark you will need:
Some craft glue
Some Grosgrain ribbon
Foam flower pieces (available at any craft store)
Craft or fabric glue and scissors


Line the table with paper or an old towel
Cut off a desired amount of ribbon. At the top of the ribbon place a dab of glue, place large foam flower on the glue, press well. Repeat steps for smaller flower and circle. Set aside to dry for an hour or so.
To use as a bookmark place in book backside toward you, fold the ribbon over. (You can glue another flower on the other side so that there is not back or front to your flower.)



Bring the Springtime In!





It's hard to keep my oldest boy away from the television set. After playing outdoors for a good bit he came in, bored. So we brought out our craft stuff and decided to make a spring time picture, similar to what I have done with the children in the past. I sent the boys outside to look for sticks -- not too big or too small. I cut a piece of foam-filled poster board in half. Got the glue out, the paints, the bubble wrap and the tissue paper.

When the boys came back in we mixed some paint to form what would become the background of our picture. The boys then painted their bubble wrap, turned the painted bubble wrap over and applied it to the poster board. We repeated the steps a couple more times. When the poster board looked the way the boys wanted it to, they placed their sticks on their boards, then glued them on (using a good, strong craft glue). Then we cut tissue paper into squares that the boys crinkled up and glued (with Elmer's glue) onto the sticks to represent little buds.

If you do not have sticks, you can have your kids paint them on to a piece of painted poster board or colored construction paper. I have used yellow and pink tissue papers in the past and I love how real those colors look. I had just the green and the blue yesterday, but I love how the boys pictures turned out!

To do this you'll need:

Poster board, cut in half -- or colored construction paper
paints, any colors
paint brushes
bubble wrap
Glue, strong craft glue as well as Elmer's
Tissue paper, white or colored, cut into squares and crinkled

Matisse Meets Lily Pulitzer


I really have no idea what's gotten into me, and honestly if I didn't know better I would wonder... wonder if maybe my sudden urge to clean and declutter, my sudden insatiable hunger and expanding midsection might indicate the arrival of... but I am 200% certain that the symptoms are just a coincidence! (Thank God... I have two hands which is nowhere near enough to handle my three kids!)

Alexander and I were in the kitchen this morning. He's dying to learn how to read. Before he learns how to read he needs to recognize his letters, upper and lower cases. So we were working on some alphabet activities that I had printed out from Starfall and after about 20 minutes of tracing and coloring As and apples he had had enough. He wanted to do some crafts, with glue. Anything as long as it is with glue. So I thought it would be fun to do a collage. In the spirit and the vein of Matisse. I asked him what colors he wanted as I pulled out the craft papers. "Pink. And pink and white. And green." So I pulled out the colors he requested and he selected the dark pink sheet as his background. Together we went to town tearing bits of paper. As I searched high and low for the glue (I found one empty bottle) making an insane mess as I did, I came across the Mod Podge which is my most favorite crafting glue ever. It works like glue but it adds a shine to the finished product. I found a plastic paint plate and a paint brush and Alexander immediately went to work "painting" the glue on to the paper and sticking the pieces of paper over the paint and painting over the glued-on paper. Alexander was having so much fun I decided to join him and created my own "Matisse." I love the end result. In fact, I am going to frame them and hang them in Rebecca's room.

Alexander's:
Mine:
Whose do you like better?! ;)


When we were done Alexander wanted to paint. So I took out the watercolors and while he painted I cleaned out my art basket -- a huge wicker basket that sits under my desk. I tossed old markers, broken crayons, dried up glue, broken brushes, unfinished masterpieces long ago abandoned by my artistes. I removed all the Play Doh and Play Doh accessories and put them in the office, in an empty cabinet. I tossed out dried out and empty paint containers, unfinished craft products, beads and broken googly eyes. I organized my pens and markers and papers and paintbrushes and all my crafting tools.

Matisse certainly worked in many mediums and had a broad range of styles and phases. But the simplest of all seemed perfect for my 3 year old. I will try more complicated things with the older two, or I may not. There is something beautiful with his simplicity.



It was a productive day indeed... I wonder what tomorrow will bring? Meantime if you want unleash your inner Matisse here are a couple of great kid-friendly sites to visit:

Meet Matisse

Matisse for Kids

In school Alexander is learning about Frida Kahlo and on Wednesday we are going (his preschool class and the 7th grade Spanish class) to have lunch at a Mexican restaurant and talk more about Frida. I will report back about that on Wednesday.

I'm going to sign off and clean out the armoire now!

(For more of my crafty ideas check out the crafts under the Labels section and visit my abandoned site http://entertainingmom.wordpress.com/craftymom/)

Talk Dirty, Baby!

There is a most wonderful place for children of all ages in Stratford, Connecticut. If you happen to be on the I-95 corridor and passing through New England you must stop here. This was my third field experience to The Garbage Museum, part of the PreK-3 curriculum at my children's school. Our clever teacher loops this trip in with a lengthy lesson on the importance on recycling and precedes the study of Andy Warhol who made art from recycled items. (Think Campbell's soup cans!) Our school does what it can to help make the world a little "Greener" using fluorescent lights, buying organic, locally grown produce, meat and dairy and teaching all it's students the importance of recycling.

The Garbage Museum is a great, hands-on way to learn the importance of recycling. Adjacent to the building is a recycling center. Part of the museum is comprised of a large, windowed corridor over the actual recycling center. Twenty towns utilize this recycling center. Plastics, glass, paper, and tin are brought to this location. Oh what fun it is to watch the recyclables being sorted accordingly. The items that are unable to be recycled are sent off to the local waste station where the trash is turned into energy.

The children watched eagerly as the plastics went down a large shute on one side of the glass hallway, to rise up on a long conveyor belt on the other side where it was brought to workers who sorted, by hand, the items to be recycled. After the workers sort though everything, the plastics then get crushed by a giant machine and packaged up where eventually it will be transported to North Carolina and recycled into carpeting, or sweaters or backyard swing sets! The paper goods will get recycled into other paper goods. As you will see in the slide show, (below) every once in a while, items made their way into recycling bins that had no right to be in those bins!

At the museum the children saw the museum's 2000 pound Trash-O-Saurus, created entirely by recycled items that people had tossed into the garbage. It's quite the creation and fun to look at.

The museum is very interactive. In addition the Trash-O-Saurus the children learned about composting, saw art made from recycled items and learned that the earth will really be a happier place if everyone recycled. Sadly, the museum is in danger of being shut down due to lack of funding. I do hope that someone steps in and helps. For the most part I am not a fan of Obama's stimulus packages. But, if he could find it in his heart to keep small, special places as this alive, much as he is pumping money into the NEA, I would be happy. And so would a lot of little children. Including Alexander and his friends.

There are other similar museums across the country. You should check your local towns to see if such an activity is available to you!




The children learned that everything should be reused, reduced and recycled. Instead of throwing away items that are no longer needed, give them to someone else. Instead of throwing away your water bottle recycle it. Or reuse it. Come up with a creative use for it.

Alexander fell asleep on his way home from the museum. It's unusual for him to nap these days, but he had fun and he was exhausted. When he woke up he demanded that we reuse his orange juice bottle!

Together we made an I Spy Bottle. And he loves it and he is so excited to bring it in to school to show his teacher what we made with his recycled bottle!






You too can do this. It's simple and takes a matter of minutes. I do suggest using a bottle (or jar) with a wider mouth. (Soda or water bottles won't work so well.)

Together we found, and used the following items:

a small car
2 gum balls
1 piece of hard candy
1 crayon
1 glue stick
some odd change
a red plastic lobster
a pink eraser
a key
a few multi-colored nonpareils
a button
a green plastic clip


We placed all the items in the bottle and then we filled the bottle with uncooked rice, leaving enough room so that the rice would move enough so that we could find the items inside the bottle.

This is a great craft project to tie along with a little lesson in recycling!

Floral Arranging 101



My Son clearly spends too much time with his Mama! Yesterday he went out to play for a while and came back, banging on the kitchen door, fists filled with goodies he had collected from the outdoors. He placed the items, sticks, branches, acorns, dead leaves, gingerly on the kitchen table and said he wanted to do something with his stuff. He, initially asked for the glue, but I had no paper large enough, and the thought of more pine needles shedding all over my home so soon after Christmas sent my heart racing. He agreed to do something else with them instead. Then he told me that he wanted to make a centerpiece. So I gave him an inexpensive vase and let him work away. He was quite proud of his end result which now sits on display in our foyer! I love that this was all Alexander's idea! I bet you would have fun doing a similar project with your little ones.

My Funny Valentine (Gifts)!




We love Flubber! After making Play Doh for Alexander's preschool class I thought it would be fun to make something a little "more cool" for the older two... not that Play Doh is uncool by any means, but well, Flubber is cool! And so easy to make. Alexander had a blast helping me this morning. Here, again, is another fun project suitable for all ages!

Recipe for Flubber

In Bowl #1
3/4 Cups of warm water
1 Cup of glue (Elmer's)
Food coloring

In Bowl #2
2 tsp. Borax (you can get it in the grocery store -- cleaning/detergent aisle)
1/2 Cup of warm water

Directions:

Stir together well mixtures in both bowls. When both bowls are well mixed pour mixture #2 into mixture #1. Stir with a rubber spatula, or just reach in with your hands to pull out a glob of Flubber!



Here we have the packaged Valentines....




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