I HEART CRAFTY THINGS

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-03-01T01:00:00.001-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things,

Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Jillify It

Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back. Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Velveeta Cheese Box Choo Choo Train

2012-02-27T21:37:00.000-08:00

We picked up some books about Trains this past week at the library and after reading them we decided to embark on an adventure of making our very own train. My boys' main requirement was that it had to be a freight train so they could carry around some of their favorite toys in it.

I instantly thought of two empty Velveeta Cheese boxes that I had saved knowing someday I would have a use for them. I took the tops of the boxes off and put them together to make the front of the train and then used the cardboard bottoms as the box cars.

The boys picked out what colors they wanted and painted each of the pieces.

They also painted two clothespins black to use as the smoke stack for the train.

Connecting the train cars was the most difficult part of this project. I used black yarn to put them together.

I took my craft knife and cut a small X in the corner of the cars where they would need to be connected.

I then used a pencil to push the end of the yarn through the holes and tied a knot on the inside of the box so they would stay connected.

For the front of the train, after getting the yarn into the holes, I added some hot glue to hold them in place since I couldn't get inside the box to tie a knot.

For the smoke stack, glue the two clothespins together, then cut a small hole in the top of the front car where you want the smoke stack, and put the clothespins down inside. We glued a cotton ball in the clothespins for the smoke and Luke used a black marker to add some color to it to look like smoke.

Lastly we cut out some black circles for the wheels and Luke glued them around the train.

In some of the books we read, the freight cars had things written on them so Andy said he wanted me to write on the cars. They decided one of them should be for dinosaurs and one should be for Star Wars. You can also see I added some yellow detail on the freight cars for the boys too. Totally not needed, but Andy used to be a HUGE Thomas the Train fan and remembered those lines being on his old trains.

After it was all finished the boys had quite the Star Wars set up on he table. The bad guys were on top of the train, Anakin and Luke Skywalker were hiding in the freight car, and Obi-Wan and R2-D2 were in their ship on the sidelines as back up. My boys are so fun!

Our favorite book we read was Shark vs. Train by Chris Barton and Tom Lichtenheld. In this book, Shark and Train egg each other on for one competition after another; burping, bowling, Ping Pong, piano playing, pie eating, diving, and so many more! Who do you think will win? The pictures are great and my kids loved it! This book is on the recommended Preschool/Kindergarten list at our library so it's definitely worth checking out if you haven't read it already.

We also read Trains from the Heinemann first library collection. I picked out this book because I wanted my boys to learn about all the different types of trains throughout the world. I thought it was really educational for them and gave them a good understanding on how different types of trains worked.

Happy Crafting!

I like to link my posts up to THESE great link parties.

Finding Joy in Motherhood...

2012-02-26T18:15:00.002-08:00

This pretty little lady has been getting over having croup this week. Let's just say it's been "one of those weeks". You know the kind where miraculously your body somehow finds a way to live on practically no sleep and still manages to function all day long. The kind where you will not find an ounce of patience left in yourself and the sound of "Mommy? Mommy?" almost drives you completely bonkers. Come on folks, we've all been there right?!

I may have completely lost my mind on Tuesday morning yelling at my husband for a reason I cannot even remember anymore (Wait a minute, it may have been Tuesday and Wednesday hahahaha!). This would definitely be the week that my husband deserves an award for finding a way to co-exist in the same house with me, and even in the same bed, for dealing with my complete lack of sanity as a result of Motherhood.

Can I show you something without you judging me? Andy brought home this assignment he did in class on his 100th day of school. The book was filled with the endings to words like ___ish ___at and he had to complete the word by writing the beginning.

I was really excited as I got scrolling through the book to see the words he had written and then I got to the __it column.... (#39 below)

It wasn't one of my most proud moments as a Mom. I was actually surprised he picked that word because the word I usually blurt out in haste would have started with Damn. Ha!

If I'm being honest with you, during weeks like this I usually find that I have to dig deep to find the joy in Motherhood. All I really wanted to do was snuggle in my bed and watch Cake Boss on Netflix and I could care less how messy the house was. I am really sounding terrible right about now, aren't I? The truth is, despite the **it incident, I can honestly say how much God loves me because he sent me this handsome young man. He was my saving grace this week.

This has been hanging on my fridge since Valentine's Day. Andy made it for me at school. "I love you because you make my dinner and lunch and breakfast."

Earlier this week they were using stamps in one of their centers and he brought this home for me. He even stamped the period with a heart. Awww...

And then on Friday, out of the blue he handed me something extra special.

I learned a big lesson this week. I learned that if you pay close enough attention, you can always find joy in your life through small and simple things. This week, it was the constant reminder that my sweet Andy loved me every day. And all the trials of Motherhood this week seem so small now when I think about it.

Andy's Artwork (He asked me if I could find the hidden message in the sky, hee hee)

This is what matters most folks...This family of mine is my JOY! I am one lucky Momma!

Giveaway: Dear Daughter/Son Keepsake Book

2012-02-26T15:24:00.000-08:00

I have always wanted to create beautiful keepsake scrapbooks for my children but when it comes down to the craftiness of designing the pages, it's just not in my blood. I even have digital scrapbooking software but I've never been able to find my creative niche with it. I have come to realize that I am the type of person that needs it all laid out for me so that I can just insert the finishing touches. That is why Marianne Richmond's Daughter/Son Keepsake Books are perfect!

Not only are the pages in the book laid out for you to simply add pictures and mementos, but the message of love throughout the book is heartfelt and remarkable. Marianne says everything I always wanted to say to my children, but just couldn't find the words myself. The book also includes a removable page in the beginning full of ideas on how to personalize your book. These books are even great for avid scrapbookers since there are endless possibilities on how to personalize them.

I wanted to tell you a little bit about Marianne's amazing story as well. She was diagnosed with a brain tumor (which thankfully was benign), but as she was recovering she spent her time creating hand-painted thank you cards for her well wishers. After a friend started selling some of her cards and they were a hit, Marianne and her husband started their own greeting card company. She now has an array of products and receives a lot of her inspiration from her four children every day.

I am soooo excited about completing my Dear Daughter Keepsake Book for Lila. Since she's so young I know it's going to be a work in progress that I will enjoy completing over the next couple of years.

GIVEAWAY:
The Organized Parent has been gracious in providing me with a Marianne Richmond Dear Son Keepsake Book to give away to one of my readers.

Discount Code:
The Organized Parent is also offering all I Heart Crafty Things readers a 15% discount off select Marianne Richmond products through March 15, 2012. Her collection also includes Grandchildren and Mom's books (which would be a perfect Mother's Day Gift). To use this code, click on the banner in my right sidebar and use discount code 21699 at checkout.

HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment. Only U.S. residents are eligible for this giveaway. (Big apologies to all my International readers!)

Visit The Organized Parent and leave a comment telling me which Marianne Richmond product is your favorite.

For additional entries (Make sure you leave a separate comment for each additional entry):

Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect, Linky Followers, Facebook or Twitter and leave a comment on this post telling me where you follow.
Like The Organized Parent on Facebook.

Good Luck!

Giveaway will close Sunday, March 4, 2012 at 10:00 am MST!

***The Organized Parent provided me with a Marianne Richmond Dear Daughter Keepsake Book free of charge in exchange for reviewing their product, but all opinions are my own.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-02-22T21:32:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot.

Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back.
Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Bald Eagle Day & Craft

2012-02-22T05:00:00.000-08:00

A couple weekends ago it was Bald Eagle Day in Utah. There were five different locations throughout the State that you could go to view Bald Eagles. There were spotting scopes set up on Bald Eagles to get a good look and we arrived just in time to see a captive Eagle on display.

My Brother, Sis-in-Law and my Niece were able to come along with us so it made the trip extra fun!

I didn't have the right zoom to capture good images but my Brother got some great pictures.

The Eagle landing in front (pictured below) was carrying a fish. Super cool!

Bald Eagle Day is a yearly event in Utah held in February, so you should definitely check it out next year if you live in the State. It's completely free and it gives children the opportunity to be out in nature.

I saw this great Bald Eagle craft from Craftprojectideas.com and knew it was just perfect to go along with Bald Eagle Day.

This project is so simple. You will need to purchase a small package of Kids Crafts brand white and brown feathers from Walmart and you'll need a piece of white, brown and yellow foam sheets.

You can find detailed directions on how to make the craft HERE, and to make it even simpler, I made a template for all the Bald Eagle pieces. You can print it off HERE.

We couldn't end our Bald Eagle fun without reading a story, now could we! We picked up Eaglet's World by Evelyn Minshull.

It is a cute story about a Bald Eagle who from the time he is still in the egg, is reluctant to take each new step in his growth, until the day comes when he flies and sees the beautiful world beyond his parents' nest.

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE great link parties.

Paper Plate Walrus

2012-02-18T14:13:00.000-08:00

Luke was sitting next to me while I was on Pinterest the other day (I know, I know, great Mother/Son bonding time, right?!). He saw this Walrus craft as I was browsing and he decided his life would not be complete if we didn't make it. After two days of non-stop bugging me and a trip to the library, we not only made this adorable craft, but we learned a lot about Walruses as well!

Isn't he cute? I traced the Pinterest link back to Danielle's Place of Crafts and Activities. Due to her Copyright Policy I can't give you a complete tutorial but you can find the directions for this craft on her Arctic Animal Page. (You have to scroll down the page a bit till you get to the Walrus craft.)

I did want to give you a couple tips if you decide to do this craft though. Danielle's directions say to glue the paper plates together. If you are inpatient like me and my boys, don't waste your time with school glue. Pop out the glue gun.

Also, we didn't glue in the tusks (plastic spoons) in the muzzle before we painted, as her directions said to. I knew painting would be messy for my preschooler, so we opted to glue on the muzzle and add the tusks after the Walrus was painted and dry. I used the glue gun for the tusks as well. Add glue to the bottom of the spoon and press it inside the muzzle on the lower piece of the folded paper plate.

Then add hot glue to the top of the spoons and close up the muzzle.

If I was going to do this craft with a class, I would probably have the paper plates all assembled, ready to paint to help with time. I think I would also consider using staples to put the paper plates together instead of glue. You wouldn't see the staples anyways once it is all painted.

I was disappointed that I could only find one children's picture book with a Walrus as the subject. Turns out, it was a wordless book too. If you know of any fiction Walrus books, I would love some suggestions for future use.

Where's Waldo by Stephen Savage

Although wordless, it was fun to make up words for each page with my preschooler. It is about a Walrus that escapes from a Zoo and the Zookeeper searches all over town for the Walrus. The Walrus was really good at disguising himself in each scene, which makes this book really fun.

Walruses by Jody Sullivan Rake

This is a perfect non-fiction book about Walruses for preschoolers age 3-4. There is one paragraph on each page with facts and info on Walruses. Just enough information for preschoolers to stay interested and not be too bored.

Walruses by Frank Staub

This was the perfect book for Luke, who just turned 5. I would recommend it for ages 4-7. It has a lot more detailed info and facts about Walruses. I feel like Luke learned a lot from this book and he loved all the photographs of the Walruses. I asked him after we were finished with our craft what he learned about Walruses and he said, "If a Walrus gets too cold he turns white and if he gets hot he turns pink." I liked how this book showed pictures of the Walruses white and pink so he really grasped that concept.

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE great link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-02-16T04:00:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things,
Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Smarty Pants Fun

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot.

Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back. Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Valentine's Activities--How much is a Heart Worth, Broken Heart Alphabet Matchching Game, Heart Art, Making Valentine's

2012-02-14T11:10:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentine's Day!! We've been having fun the last week doing some Valentine-inspired activities. I thought I'd just do one post about them. I picked up Clifford's Valentines at the library and Andy read it to us. After reading about how Clifford made his big Valentine, we decided to make some of our own.

Every year we enjoy making Valentine's for Aunts and Uncles. This year I was inspired by a card I saw on Putti Prapancha. Here is the front of the card. Since we were making so many, we decided to just use a half sheet of paper for each Valentine to conserve paper.

I made a heart template that we laid over the card and we used a pencil eraser to stamp different colors into the heart shape.

When the heart was completely stamped, we took off the template and had a colorful heart on our card.

After making two cards, it was taking FOREVER so we decided to use our extra large pencil to make the stamps. It worked much better for us. The boys wrote an I and U on the side of the heart to complete the front of the card.

The boys took turns writing on the back of the cards. On a couple they wrote things they loved about their Aunt/Uncle. On others they wrote Happy Valentine's Day.

I was especially proud of Luke for how hard he worked writing on the back of the cards. For just turning 5 years old, he is doing really good at his writing.

We were also inspired by a fun idea from I Can Teach My Child using broken hearts to make an alphabet matching game. I made a template of hearts in which each heart contained the capital letter on the left side and lowercase on the right side. After cutting out each heart, I cut a zig-zag line through the middle to make it a puzzle.

We laid all the capital letters out on the table while keeping the lowercase letters in a pile to the left. Luke took the top lowercase letter on the pile and matched it up with the capital letter. I put my template in a PowerPoint document which you can download HERE. I was worried it looked a little distoted so if you want each individual page in PDF format I can email them to you, just leave your email address in a comment below.

We also worked on Math with this What's a Heart Worth worksheet I found at Mrs. Wheeler's First Grade Tidbits. You can stop by her website to download the worksheet and check out more of her fun ideas. I picked up the little hearts in the Target dollar section and labeled each one with numbers 1-9. For my preschooler I filled each heart with a different number of pennies for him to count. For my first grader I filled them with pennies, nickles, dimes and quarters for him to count.

After counting the coins in a heart, they recorded the amount on the worksheet in the corresponding box.

We also read about the history of Valentine's Day by reading Valentine's Day by Kathryn A. Imler. If I'm being completely honest, I don't think my kids really care about why we have Valentine's Day, but I certainly learned a lot. :)

We finished off our Valentine's week by making some abstract Valentine's Art. We used our dollar section Target hearts again as a heart stamp and pressed them all over a sheet of paper in red and pink.

While the paint was still wet, Luke sprinkled red and pink glitter all over the hearts.

After dumping off the excess glitter, we used the leftover red and pink paint and an old toothbrush to splatter some paint all over the paper. It looks so pretty glued onto a red background.

I know it's hard to see how pretty the glitter looks in a picture, but it's vibrant and beautiful!

Hope you have a Happy Valentine's Day!!

Happy Crating!

Jillie Willie Apron Giveaway

2012-02-13T13:42:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed.
Congratulations to Smallgood, Comment #16! You are the winner of the Jillie Willie Apron!

Dear Jillie Willie, YOU ROCK MY WORLD! Seriously people, these aprons are just too cute for words! I laid them out on the couch after opening my package from The Organized Parent and pretty much stood there in awe, basking in their cuteness for nearly 20 minutes.

Jillie Willie equally impresses with the practicality of her aprons. For instance, underneath the top layer of the apron pictured on top, you will find a hidden row of lined pockets perfect for holding your cell phone, keys, or even a small towel or kitchen utensil. The pocket on the front of the apron shown above serves as a perfect spot for so many things from cooking to cleaning. And did I mention how awesome that little towel holder is?? I swear I'm constantly grabbing for a towel when working in the kitchen and having one that handy is so perfect.

Here is a closer look at the beautiful fabrics used on these aprons.

You know those days as a Mother that you find yourself too busy with laundry, cleaning and kids to even fit in a shower, and you end up wearing sweat pants the entire day (sooooo me today!)...Well, tie on this apron while attending to all those dreaded chores and go about your day feeling pretty. Don't be surprised if you knock on my door and I answer wearing this apron, whether it's a sweats day or not! It is simply adorable!

GIVEAWAY
Now for the fun part! One lucky I Heart Crafty Things reader is going to win this adorable Jillie Willie Apron.

DISCOUNT CODE:
The Organized Parent is also offering all I Heart Crafty Things readers a 15% discount on all Jillie Willie products through February 29, 2012. A perfect gift for yourself or for the favorite ladies in your life. To use this discount, click on the banner in my ride sidebar and use discount code 21698 at checkout.
HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment. Only U.S. residents are eligible for this giveaway. (Big apologies to all my International readers!) Leave a separate comment for each entry.

Leave a comment telling me what chore you will enjoy doing in your new apron.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect, Facebook or Twitter and leave a comment on this post telling me where you follow.
Like The Organized Parent on Facebook.

Good Luck!

Giveaway will close Sunday, February 19, 2012 at 10:00 am MST!

***The Organized Parent provided me with a Jillie Willie Apron free of charge in exchange for reviewing their product, but all opinions are my own.

Drawing Penguins

2012-02-10T06:00:00.000-08:00

I had this great week planned out for learning about Penguins...We were going to make a penguin out of a water bottle...Can I say HUGE FAIL! Life is not always perfect around here in the crafting department.

Since I had to find a way to redeem myself, I decided to teach my kids how to draw a penguin. Ok, ok, really, I found this awesome video that taught all of how to draw a penguin. haha! We were also inspired by some penguin painting at My Shae Noel All Things Wonderful in making our penguin scene.

Luke's Artwork

Over the last year I've noticed some difficulties Luke has in being the younger brother. Don't get me wrong, he LOVES his older brother dearly, they are pretty much inseparable, but Luke can't help but compare himself to what he sees Andy doing. It sometimes feels disheartening with the frustrations Luke feels when he can't do it as fast as Andy or if he doesn't know as much as Andy. Now truth be told, Luke is actually farther advanced in some areas than Andy was at his age (Sh! Don't tell Andy), but Luke doesn't understand that, and obviously I'm not going to go around telling my children things like that. hahaha! Anyways, I thought teaching him how to draw his very own penguin was a perfect way to boost his self-confidence. It acted as a reassurance that he could do something as well as Andy could.

Andy's Artwork

We started by following this step-by-step video and drew a penguin diving into the water with pencil. We also drew the rocks, the water, a big cloud in the sky, birds, and an extra penguin standing in line. Andy learned how to draw a penguin in school so he gave a step-by-step on how to draw the standing penguin.

We traced our pencil lines with oil pastels and then finished off our artwork painting the scene with water colors. We opted to make the sky look like the sun was setting with yellow and orange. The red in the water is krill for the penguins to eat.

My Artwork

(I know, I know, I'm such a kid and can't stop myself from participating!)

Some of the books we've been enjoying this week are:

Penguins by Valerie Bodden

This is a great non-fiction read for preschool thru first grade. It wasn't too lengthy and filled with too many details. I felt like it was just enough to keep my boys interested and still contained plenty of facts and material to talk about during and after reading the book.

We threw in some comical reading this week with some Tacky the Penguin books as well.

Tacky in Trouble by Helen Lester

Tacky decides to go windsurfing when the other penguins are napping and ends up on a tropical island, captive to an elephant. A great read on how Tacky manages to get himself out of the hilarious jungle mix-up, and back to his penguin friends.

Tackylocks and the Three Bears by Helen Lester

The Penguins are in charge of entertaining a crowd of energetic young penguins and decide to put on a play. Will the young penguins pay attention through an entire performance? Let's just say our favorite misfit Penguin delivers an winning performance with his own indomitable personality and style.

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-02-08T21:58:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot.
Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back. Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Dot Art--A Lesson on Creativity

2012-02-06T08:00:00.000-08:00

I love, Love, LOVE this book, The Dot by Peter Reynolds. A girl named Vashti is frustrated in Art Class and thinks she doesn't know how to draw or be an artist. Her teacher teaches her a very important lesson when she says "Just make a mark and see where it takes you." Vashti angrily makes a small dot on the paper and signs it. To her surprise, her teacher frames the picture and puts right above her desk. When Vashti sees it the next day, she is determined that she can make a better dot, and then an even better dot, etc. Soon she is displaying her artwork in the the school's art show, which makes quite a splash with everyone. This book is sure to help your children understand that they really are artists.

To go along with this book we got out our watercolors just like Vashti did and started by painting dots. Any kind of dots we wanted, any color, any size....It was so much fun that we found ourselves painting several different pages of different dots.

After our dots were dry, we came back to them and used our creativity to turn them into a work of art. Using oil pastels, we made finishing details on our papers, and then signed our artwork. Here is what I came up with using the dots pictured above.

Luke had fun making animals out of his dots...

And he says this is Saturn with the Sun and Stars in the background...

Andrew connected his dots together to make a Pyramid...

And a sky full of butterflies and balloons...

I had fun making a colorful tree...

And a pond full of fish...

Once their creativity started flowing, they had hundreds of different ideas of things they could create with dots. I thought I would put one of their pictures in a frame in their bedroom to act as a reminder to them that their minds are full of creativity and that they are indeed an Artist.

Happy Crafting!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun Link Parties.

Paper Plate T-Rex

2012-02-04T12:20:00.000-08:00

We went on a play date yesterday to the Dinosaur Museum with a friend I met through blogging. (Hi Evonne!) I met a couple other ladies while there who came along to play as well. It's crazy how blogging can actually bring you "in real life" friendships. :)

Look at my little flirt of a daughter. It was too cute to see these two together.

Some of our favorites at the Museum in the Erosion Play area where the kids can play in the sand and water with little dinosaurs. Lila is finally tall enough to get in on the playing action.

My boys love this Design a Dinosaur station.

You can also design a dinosaur on their big magnet station. This was a big hit for Luke.

I snapped a photo with my phone of Lila playing on this little Protoceratops.

On our way home, my dinosaur enthusiast Luke said he wanted to make a Paper Plate T-Rex. Paper Plate Dinosaurs is one of our favorite crafts, but we've only used the patterns to make a Brontosaurus and Stegosaurus. Since Luke's favorite dinosaur is a T-Rex, he was so insistent that we figure out how to make one. This is what we came up with.

I'm pretty excited about how they turned out! To start, we painted the front of a paper plate with water colors. We have used acryclic paint in the past, but watercolors is much less messy. You could also use bubble wrap to paint the plate to resemble scales, like we did making our Dragons.

(I remembered to take a picture after I started cutting it.)

When the watercolors are dry, draw this pattern on the back of the paper plate and then have your child cut out all the pieces.

Use a hole punch and metal brads to attach the pieces to the dinosaur body. I attached one leg and arm to the front and one to the back to give it more dimension.

After we got all the pieces put together I made a few adjustments. I ended up triming the head to make it more rounded in the back, and I also trimmed down the tail. Just so you can see the difference, here is a before and after photo of me trimming the tail.

Luke is now in heaven with his new creature.

We finished the night off reading one of favorite Dinosaur stories, Oh say can you say Di-no-saur? by Bonnie Worth. It's from the Cat in the Hat series and it's wonderful!

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

My Grandfather's Clock

2012-02-02T13:57:00.000-08:00

This is my Grandfather Clock. It lovingly stands in my living room where I enjoy hearing it's ticks and tocks every second and it's ding dongs every half hour and hour. This clock holds a special place in my heart as it really was my Grandfather's clock.

For some reason I have always been drawn to this clock. I can remember being 14 years old sitting in my Grandparents basement and subconsciously counting the number of ding dongs every time they went off every hour. I've always adored it's dark color and I especially enjoy how it's ding dongs aren't annoying at all. They are actually more of a deep tone and quite handsome (if I say so myself hahaha!). My Grandad purchased it from an old farm wife when he was stationed in Germany many, many years ago, and it traveled back with him to the States and eventually found it's rest in my Grandparents home where it took it's prominent place in their living room for as long as I can remember.

When my Grandma asked me several months ago if there was anything in particular I would love to have of theirs to remember them by my mind instantly moved to the clock. I'm fairly certain my heart squealed outloud with delight when she told me I could have it. Of all the things I could have chosen, this clock was the perfect choice for me.

My Grandad passed away last month...I remember as a teenager there were times I felt like he was always lecturing me. He was always so concerned that I reach my highest potential. One day when I was a Senior in high school he told me that with my grades I needed to be a Doctor or Lawyer. I struggled hearing that from him for several months and then one day I opened my heart to him and said, "Grandad, I know you want me to be a Doctor or Lawyer, and even though I know I could be if I wanted to, that just isn't what I want to do." I thought he was going to be mad at me, but instead he gave me a big hug and said, "You will be wonderful at whatever you choose to do in life Rachel. I just want you to know that you are capable of doing anything you want." In his mind, it wasn't so much being the Doctor of Lawyer that mattered, it was knowing and believing in my potential. It was understanding my worth and reaching for whatever goal it was I wanted for myself.

I never did become a Doctor or a Lawyer (although I do have to say, I practically felt like an attorney with how many divorces I completed being a Paralegal for 7 years LOL). What I did become was a Mother and a Wife. And every time I visited with Grandad he told me what a good job I was doing. He believed in me! And I know he is up in Heaven somewhere still believing in me.

Now every time I hear those tick tocks and ding dongs, I have this special reminder of my Grandfather, and a reminder to myself to believe in me. To believe that I really can accomplish everything I set out to do in life. To believe that I really am doing a good job at being a Mother, even though my family room might look like a hail storm of toys, and I didn't even take a shower today.

Thank you Grandad for believing in me. And thank you for leaving me with the legacy of your clock...I promise it will lovingly stand here, a part of this family forever.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-02-01T23:30:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back. Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Review & Giveaway: Jelly Pals Ice Pack and Sleeper Peeper Eye Mask

2012-01-31T22:37:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed.

Congratulations to Tonii, Comment #1, who is the winner of the Sleeper Peeper Mask!

It seems like at least every other day my boys end up with a bump or bruise on their head or some other place on their body and I often find myself running to the freezer looking for a frozen bag of peas for them to hold on it. Does this sound familiar?? And let's not get started on how much of a fight it is to get them to actually hold the peas on the bump. Let's face it...it ain't pretty!

If you are that parent going through the same exact thing as I described, you have got to get your hands on one of these fun Jelly Pals Ice Packs by Streamline. FINALLY, someone created an amazing product for those bumps and bruises we are ALL familiar with! The Organized Parent sent me this darling pig-style ice pack to try out and I LOVE IT! You simply pop it in the fridge and the next time your child encounters one of those bumps, you reach for it and it soothes perfectly. It is less cold than ice and isn't wet so no more complaining and fighting from the kids. Plus, since it's so cute, your kids will love getting the chance to hold it.

But wait, the best part...put it in sunlight for a couple of hours and it gently glows in the dark. What kid doesn't love glow in the dark objects? Look at all of their cute styles and they are so affordable at only $4.95 each.

GIVEAWAY:
Streamline makes several other fun and useful products as well. The Organized Parent has provided me with a Sleeper Peeper Eye Mask to give away to one I Heart Crafty Things reader.

These masks look so cute! They can help kids to nap when away from familiar home surroundings, or even at home. They would also be fun for your family photo album to take a photo when they’re asleep. They have several other fun and whimsical designs.

The Organized Parent is offering all I Heart Crafty Things readers a 15% discount on all Streamline products through February 15, 2012. This is an amazing discount considering how affordable their products already are. To use this discount, click on the banner in my ride sidebar and use discount code 21649 at checkout.

HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment. Only U.S. residents are eligible for this giveaway (Big apologies to all my International readers!).

Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect, Facebook or Twitter and leave a comment on this post telling me which Sleeper Peeper Mask style is your favorite.
For an extra entry: Like The Organized Parent on Facebook. (Make sure you leave a separate comment for this extra entry.)

Good Luck!

Giveaway will close Monday, February 6, 2012 at 10:00 am MST!

***The Organized Parent provided me with a Jelly Pals Ice Pack free of charge in exchange for reviewing their product, but all opinions are my own.

Paper Plate Groundhog

2012-01-31T10:07:00.000-08:00

In honor of Groundhog Day on Thursday, we made Paper Plate Groundhogs yesterday. Technically I think they could pass for Beavers also, but they all pretty much look the same, right?! :-)

Materials You Will Need:
Paper Plate
Brown Acrylic Paint
2 Large Wiggly Eyes
Black Marker
Ears, Nose and Teeth pieces (pattern found HERE)
Craft Knife (Used by Parent, obviously!)
6 Toothpicks

Directions:
We started by painting the bottom of a paper plate with brown acrylic paint.

When the paper plate was completely dry, we started assembling it together. I free handed the ears, nose and teeth for the groundhog and made a pattern you can print off HERE. The nose will need to be on black card stock paper, ears on brown paper and teeth on white paper.

First, attach the black nose in the center of the paper plate. Then, glue on the wiggly eyes. Our wiggly eyes were graciously given to us by Craftprojectideas.com and they can be purchased at your local Walmart. Next, glue the ears to the back of the paper plate.

I used a black permanent marker to draw the mouth on the paper plates for my boys. Then I used a craft knife to cute a slit in each side of the mouth for the teeth to go in. Put glue at the top of the teeth and slide them through the slits. Press down on the mouth on top of the teeth to make sure they are securely in place.

Here is a picture of the mouth after I had cut the slits with the craft knife.

After the teeth were in place, the boys used the black marker to draw on eyebrows, make a line in the ears, and add hair between the eyebrows.

The final touch is adding 3 toothpicks on each side of the nose for the whiskers. If you have the flat toothpicks they are better, but since all I had was the round pokey ones, I just cut the ends off so they weren't dangerous for the kids.

He sure is a cute little guy! Let's hope he blesses us with an early Spring on Thursday. :-)

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-01-25T20:01:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back.
Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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Chinese New Year Dragons

2012-01-24T09:02:00.000-08:00

I don't know if my house has ever been in such a state of chaos...I thought about tackling it yesterday but after I saw this idea on No Time For Flashcards, I decided it would be more fun to make Chinese New Years Dragons. hahaha :)

We made a much smaller version of the craft and instead of making it a combined family craft, each of my boys completed their own. We used bubble wrap to paint the dragons. Love this technique. It is so fun and fast!

Since I decided to add feet to the dragons, I ended up having to cut them out for the boys after the paint was dry. We cut out different colored triangles to add spikes to the dragons. We also added a googly eye to him and finished him off with crinkled red and orange tissue paper glued to the back of his mouth for the fire. They turned out super cute! If you are interest in making this craft, I saved my dragon pattern and you can find it HERE.

The best part about this craft was that knowing the Chinese New Year was coming up, I picked up some dragon books at our trip to the library last week.

Max's Dragon Shirt by Rosemary Wells

Max's sister takes him to the Mall with $5 to buy a new pair of pants since his are frighteningly overused. Max keeps saying he wants a dragon shirt instead but his sister insists they only have $5 and that's how much new pants costs. His sister takes a detour to try on dresses and while she is out getting a different dress to try on, Max wakes up to find his sister gone. He slips out of the dressing room to find her, following a girl in a yellow dress (that he thought was his sister). He puts on a dragon shirt he finds in the boys section and when the girl in the yellow dress turns around and it isn't his sister, he screams. He ends up sitting with the security guards eating ice cream waiting for his sister and ruins the dragon shirt. Long story short, Max ends up getting a $5 dragon shirt instead of the pants he desperately needed.

Dragon Dancing by Carole Lexa Schaefer

After a group of Preschool students finish reading a book about Dragons, they go into the art room to make decorations for Mei Lin's Birthday. They soon discover that they can use their imagination and put the decorations together to make a big dragon. When their dragon is complete they take in on an adventure outside in the playground. I love the imagination in this book. I recommend it for ages 3-5. I thought my first grader was a little too advanced for the book.

Life-Size Dragons by John Grant

This is a HUGE book talking about different kinds of dragons and offers pages that fold out with life size images of what size dragons would be. My boys have brought this book home several times from the library in the last year. They love this book!

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

"A Bad Case of Stripes" by David Shannon

2012-01-22T18:10:00.000-08:00

Have you read this fun book? It is about a girl who really loves to eat Lima Beans, but since someone told her that was uncool, she decided she needed to stop eating them. One day she woke up in the morning with a bad case of stripes (see the cover of the book). She has not fever or other symptoms other than the stripes so she is sent back to school the next day. Every time someone in her class says some type of pattern her skin changes to it. After specialists visit her and no one knows how to cure her, an old lady shows up with the cure--to eat Lima Beans. The girl soon discovers she shouldn't fret over what others think, she should just be happy being herself.

After reading this story I thought it would be so fun for my boys to pictures themselves having a bad case of stripes. I found a picture of them from this past Summer wearing shorts and faded it using the Sketch option in Picnik. This way the skin became more white and would be easy to color. My boys got out their colored pencils and colored themselves a good case of the stripes. It was so much fun!

Oh, and in case you were wondering, I couldn't resist but get in on the good fun. Here is my completed picture of the boys. :)

Andy's Picture

Luke's picture

I told Luke to make sure to color lightly on the picture but he loves to color dark so there was no stopping him. They are both so pleased with their pictures and they got such a kick out of getting to color each other with the stripes and not only themselves.

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-01-19T06:38:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things,
Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.
Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Posy the Porcelain Pig

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!
Please leave a comment so we know to follow you back! This week we have a special surprise for you!! Kristi is sponsoring a FABULOUS giveaway. She will be giving away a copy of the book Heaven is For Real by Todd Burpo to one lucky blog who links up and follows all 5 co-hosts. I've been wanting to read this book!
So happy blog hopping! We hope you have fun with us!!

Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week. Also, if you are interested in hosting a giveaway for our blog, please email any one of us. We would love to have you!!

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Valentine's Monster Box

2012-01-18T14:00:00.000-08:00

I am so excited to show you my Valentine's Monster Box today. I made some for my boys a couple years ago (which we still use each year) and decided it was time to make one for Lila this year. Here are pictures of my boys Valentine's Monster Boxes.

I started out with an empty shoe box, cut a rectangle hole in the top for the mouth, and then completely covered the outside of it with felt. I used a gluegun to attach the felt to the box.

Her is the underside of my lid. I wrapped my felt underneath the mouth and glued it so you couldn't see any edges of the box peeking through.

To make the fur on the monster you will need to buy a roll of Fun Fur. I got mine at Walmart in the yarn section but I've seen it at Michael's too. They have lots of different colors to choose from. I picked a striped pattern for Lila's box.

I used a glue gun to attach the Fun Fur to the box. I wrapped my Fun Fur over the top of the box, while adding a dab of glue at each end as I wrapped it. After I had made several rows, I lifted up the Fun Fur and put a line of glue down on the felt underneath it to hold it in place more. I usually put a row of glue in the middle and one on each end. Hope that makes sense.

(Yes, that is a Pineapple in my picture next to my juicer. Can't wait to make me some fresh orange and pineapple juice. haha)

When you get to the opening in the mouth, go ahead and keep wrapping the Fun Fur along the left side of the mouth and down the rest of the box, and then go back and do the right side of the mouth. You can see in the picture below what I mean.

After putting Fun Fur over the top of the box, I went around each side of the lid and did the same thing. After you are done adding the Fun Fur, it is time to add all the Monster features.

I started with the eyes. Glue down 2 extra large pom-poms for the eyes with a large googly eye in each. Then add a medium sized pom-pom for the nose.

I have to say that my most favorite feature of this Monster box is definitely the jeweled eyelashes. Aren't they adorable???!! LOL Craftprojectideas has the cutest package of Heart Acrylic Jewels at Walmart and that is what I used. For my boys' boxes I used the same exact jewels, but Luke's had flower jewels instead of hearts. I simply hot glued the jewels along the top of the eyes to make eyelashes.

I also curled two pipecleaners around two fingers and then glued them on the side of the eyes to make fun antennae.

Then I cut out teeth and a tongue out of white and red felt and glued them around the Monster's mouth.

To finish the box I used glitter glue to write "Feed Me" on the front of the box and glued on some more heart jewels. On the boys' boxes I used foam stickers but I didn't have any so I improvised. On Luke's it said "I'm Hungry" instead of "Feed Me".

These boxes have held up sooooo good! This will be our third year using my boys'. We usually have to form the antennae again, but other than that, they are like new. And did I mention how much my kids LOVE them?!! They are so cute!

We are trying to eat healthier around our house so this year I think I'm going to start a week or two before Valentine's Day and feed their Monster's sweet notes telling them how I'm proud of them or what I love about them. If you make these I would love to hear about it.

Happy Crafting!

I like to link my posts up to these fun link parties.

Lyle, Lyle Crocodile

2012-01-17T11:23:00.000-08:00

My boys love crocodiles! I was so excited when Luke picked out Lyle, Lyle Crocodile from the Library so we could make a crocodile craft. We decided to read a couple more stories and spend the week learning about alligators and crocodiles.

Lyle, Lyle Crocodile by Bernard Waber is the second in the Lyle the Crocodile series. It is about a crocodile who lives in the city with a family named the Primms. The family's neighbor Mr. Grumps dislikes Lyle because he scares his cat and he ends up having Lyle thrown in the local zoo. Lyle is surprisingly freed by his old performing partner, Mr. Valenti, and when they got back to the Primms home they find Mr. Grumps' house on fire. Lyle rescues Mr. Grumps, is declared a hero, and is allowed to stay with the Primms.

Alberto the Dancing Alligator by Richard Waring.

Tina receives a big egg from her Uncle and is so excited when it hatches into an Alligator. She names it Alberto and it loves to dance the tango. It soon grows big enough that it has to live in the bathtub, but one day as Tina and Alberto were dancing in the bathroom, they slip on a bar of soap and Lyle slips into the toilet while Tina accidentally flushes him down. This is a rather silly and fun story about how Lyle has to find his way back to the right home by coming up the toilets through the sewer system. Tina eventually guides him back to their home through Alberto's favorite tango music. I must say we rather enjoyed it!

We also enjoyed some non-fiction reading, Alligators and Crocodiles from the Zoobooks series.

This is a great read to understand the differences between alligators and crocodiles. My kids asked to read it almost every day last week. They are huge fans of non-fiction books.

Our crocodile craft was inspired from a craft by Relentlessly Fun, Deceptively Educational. They used a painting technique to make scales on the reptiles with a shower poof and I just had to give it a try.

To make our crocodile I found the perfect pattern HERE which you can print off on card stock paper. The pattern only came with one leg, so you will have to trace another leg onto the paper for the crocodile.

We started out by painting the pattern green with water colors. I was worried some white would show through when we painted the crocodile, that's why we did this step. However, I'm not so sure it was really necessary. You will see why in the next step.

To finish painting the crocodile, take a shower poof and rip a large strip out of it.

Lay the netting over the crocodile pattern and dab paint over it to make a scale texture.

As my kids got to dabbing I started realizing the netting worked better if you lightly dabbed it with paint. I was worried that by my kids using lots of paint, the texture wouldn't show through, but as you can see in the picture below, it did. You can also see how unnecessary the water coloring was.

After the paint is completely dry, cut out all the crocodile pieces.

We attached the tail to the crocodile body with a metal brad. This way the kids can move the tail around.

Next I hot glued two clothespins to the back of the crocodile so he would be able to stand up.

Glue the feet to the front of the clothespins and your crocodile is complete.

My boys just love how these stand up so they are easier to play with. It's fun to make crafts and art to display, but even more fun sometimes is to make crafts that the kids are free to play with as they may.

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-01-11T20:48:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things,
Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next
week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Books, Crafts & Pretty Things

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your
blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and
making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow
the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the
fifth spot. We always follow back!!

Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop
with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure
to come back every week.

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and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs,

share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Ice Fishing for Letters

2012-01-11T14:02:00.000-08:00

Luke had fun ice fishing for letters the other day. This is such a simple project and is so great for reviewing letters, numbers, shapes, pretty much anything.

Here was our set up:

I purchased a roll of white wrapping paper at the dollar store and cut off a sheet to make my ice. I taped it to the floor to secure it. You could easily just tape white paper together to make the ice also. For the water hole, I taped 4 sheets of blue construction paper together and then cut out a circular shape. I used double stick tape to attach it to my ice.

I found some clipart HERE to make my fish. I added a paper clip near the gills so the magnet would attach to the fish. Here are all my letters in the fishing hole.

I set up a bucket on the ice for Luke to place all his fish after he caught them. Any container will do.

To make the fishing pole I used an empty wrapping paper role left over from Christmas. I used a hole punch to make a small hole in the end and then tied a piece of string to it.

At the other end of the string, I hot glued a magnet to a paper clip and then tied it to the string.

Now it's time to go fishing! Each time Luke caught a fish, he had to tell me what letter it was before he could put it in his bucket.

We also did lower case letters as well.

Even though my first grader didn't need a review with his letters, he also wanted a turn. He is currently working on passing off his subtraction facts at school so I thought it would be fun to turn subtraction flash cards into fish so he could practice them. There are so many possibilities with this.

Joyfully Weary recently did a smaller version of this project using a shoe box for the ice and a pencil for the fishing pole. It is FANTASTIC! She even created a printable of the flashcards that you can download. Make sure you stop by and check it out!

Happy Crafting!!

Polar Bear Masks

2012-01-05T16:38:00.000-08:00

We've been learning about Polar Bears this week and to go along with all the books we've read we decided to make Polar Bear masks. They turned out so cute!

These are the books we've been reading.

Polar Bears by Valerie Bodden

A non-fiction children's book with beautiful photographs of Polar Bears. I choose this book because each page only has one paragraph with facts about polar bears. I hate overwhelming my kids with too much information so this book was just perfect. Just to forewarn you, there is a page where a polar bear is eating a seal and there is blood on the ice. My kids are ok with that kind of stuff, but I know some aren't.

Where Do Polar Bears Live? by Sarah L. Thomson

This book has good information about polar bear's and is environmentally friendly discussing how the climate is changing in the Arctic and scientist's don't believe polar bears will be able to live in the wild after 2020. There are pages in the back with ideas of how we can help the environment like by recycling.

Sleepover Larry by Daniel Pinkwater

This one of the books in the Larry series about a Polar Bear named Larry who lives in a hotel with a family. In this story the little girl has a sleepover with friends and Larry decides he wants to have one too. Larry invites his brother and friends from the zoo and they have a fun sleepover. I thought it was a cute, funny story.

The Biggest Thing in the World by Kenneth Steven

A Mother and baby polar bear come out of their den and the baby is mesmerized by all the big things he sees in the world around him. He wants to know what is the biggest thing in the World and no matter what size of thing the baby sees (like the Ocean), the Mother always says there is something bigger. In the end, the Mother's love for the baby bear is the biggest thing in the World. Such a sweet story!

The most difficult part about making our polar bear masks was making the holes in the paper plate for the eyes. I traced a small circle for the eyes and then used a craft knife to cut them out. I've seen those Martha Stewart circle punches that would work perfectly for this but I didn't have one so I improvised.

For the snout we used one of those empty Dole fruit cups. I also used it to make the ears by tracing it onto a piece of white card stock paper, cutting it out and then cutting the circle in half. This makes the two ears.

First we painted the clear fruit cup white for the snout and let it dry completely.

While the snout was drying, we put school glue onto a section of our paper plate, used a paint brush to cover an area with it, and then placed white crumpled tissue paper squares all over the glue. Do this on every section until the paper plate is covered.

We opted to not put tissue paper where the snout was going to go, but I don't think it matters which way you do it.

Next we glued the ears to the back of the paper plate.

Once the snout was dry we drew a bear mouth on the bottom of the cup with a black permanent marker.

Then I used my glue gun to run glue around the inside rim of the cup and glued it down onto the polar bear face. I used my glue gun to glue on the black pom pom nose too.

To finish the mask, simply punch holes onto the sides of the paper plate and tie a knot on each end with a piece of string or yarn.

They turned out so cute!

And my kids gave them a thumbs up!

Another idea instead of using string would be to glue a tongue depressor stick to the bottom and they could just hold the mask up to their face. Or I think they would be cute using large wiggly eyes for the eyes and not making them masks. So many possibilities. :)

Happy Crafting!

I link to link my posts up to THESE fun Link Parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2012-01-04T21:35:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your
blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and
making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow
the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the
fifth spot. We always follow back!!
Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop
with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure
to come back every week.

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We hope you have fun

and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs,

share great ideas, and inspire each other.

2011 Favorites

2011-12-31T01:19:00.000-08:00

Man, this year flew by didn't it? It's been so fun for me to look back on the year and pick out my 5 favorite crafts we've completed.

#5 Sunflower Craft

I saw this beautiful sunflower on Meet the Dubians and we set out to make our own take of it. I love so much how the flower pops out of the page with the petals lifted off the page and the beads glued in the center. We used a fork to paint on the details of the grass.

#4 Parrot Craft

Every time I look at these colorful parrots I can't help but smile. I learned how to make these from Tippy Toe Crafts. I let my boys pick all the colors they wanted to use to make them unique and personalizing them with handprints makes them extra special.

#3 I Took the Moon for a Walk

If you could take the Moon for a walk, where would you go? I love when my children are free to use their imagination. I especially love seeing how my boys depicted their scenes of where they would take the Moon. This was such a fun book to read and I definitely recommend it.

#2 The Giant Jam Sandwich

If I had to pick a favorite story we read this year, it would be "The Giant Jam Sandwich". If you haven't read it, YOU MUST! A city overtaken by wasps must find a way to rid themselves of the pests and decide to make a huge jam sandwich to trap them. We made our own jam sandwiches and the boys chose what creatures they wanted to trap in them.

And then SNAP, the boys had fun trapping all their creatures in the sandwich. This is a craft that needs repeating yearly, it is that fun!

#1 Out of this World Craft

Oh how I LOVE these solar systems we created! They are my most favorite piece of art created all year long. They still hang proudly on my boys' magnet boards and both my boys have told me this was their favorite craft all year. I love the bright colors and the galaxy look created by spraying white paint on the black background. Such a fun craft to go along with a space-themed week.

It's been such a fun year! I hope you enjoy your New Year's Eve!

Happy Crafting!!

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2011-12-28T20:36:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things,

Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Running With A Glue Gun

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!

Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Why Every Blogger Needs a FranklinCovey Planner---Giveaway!

2011-12-28T20:30:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed.

Congratulations to Comment #12, Amanda Joy, who is the winner of the FranklinCovey Planner! (Winner chosen randomly through Random.org)

If I'm being completely honest I have to tell you how disorganized I have felt with my blog lately. Crafting with my kids is one of my most favorite things to do, but getting everything done that I want to in a weeks time and making sure I have all the correct supplies and books to read can sometimes be overwhelming. That's why I was so excited when The Organized Parent sent me a FranklinCovey Wire-bound Weekly Planner.

Instead of feeling disorganized for the upcoming month, I already have all our activities planned out. Here is a look at my January monthly calendar.

At the beginning of each week I have listed the book we will be reading and using during the week. Then throughout the week I have listed specific crafts and activities we are going to do. I also used the empty column to write down the sight words I will be working on with Luke during the week.

Have you ever been to the Library and all the books on your list happen to all be checked out? Isn't that the pits?!! Having my entire month planned out will now make my trips to the Library easier because if the books happen to be checked out I can always switch my weeks around. Also, I can easily attach a post-it note to the month with additional books on my list to look for at the Library. I can't tell you how much easier this made my trip to the Library this past week.

I have also broken down my schedule on the weekly section and I love it because this makes it so I can add even more details to the activities we are going to do for the week and I can write a list for myself of any supplies we will need to complete our projects.

The Classic Simplicity for Mom Style has extra columns on the left-hand side of the weekly pages where you are able to add even more personalization for you and your kids' schedule. The planner also includes forms for your kids' critical information so it's easy to grab at a moment's notice. I LOVE this planner! I can now see why FranklinCovey has been the leader in time management training and planning tools for over 20 years. And even though I am choosing to use it to organize my Blog schedule, it goes without saying that this is PERFECT for every day use.

GIVEAWAY:

The Organized Parent has provided me with a Botanica Wire-bound Weekly Planner to give away to one lucky I Heart Crafty Things reader (pictured below). The Botanica is a new style that is a perfect opportunity to get organized. There’s space for tasks and room for recording notes or appointments, all in a crisp, elegant layout. This planner is valued at $24.95!

Leave a comment on this post.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect.
Like The Organized Parent on Facebook.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things on Facebook.

Good Luck!

Giveaway will close Tuesday, January 3, 2011 at 10:00 am MST!

***The Organized Parent provided me with a FranklinCovey Planner free of charge in exchange for reviewing their product, but all opinions are my own.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2011-12-21T21:00:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!
Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

The Cutest Elf Craft you ever did see....

2011-12-20T09:46:00.000-08:00

I have been so excited to make this elf craft with my kids. Especially after we made our annual trip to Gardner Village for the Elf Scavenger Hunt. They have elf displays throughout the entire Village and after you find all of them you can take your completed paper into the Candy Shop for a free peppermint stick. This year we invited some friends to go with us. Here they are in front of the elf selling Christmas trees.

And again in front of the photo studio with an elf waiting to take their picture.

If you live in Utah, DEFINITELY check it out! You can't beat a FUN and completely FREE activity!

We also enjoyed reading some Elf stories. First up, An Elf for Christmas by Michael Garland.

It's about an Elf who has worked so hard on finishing up making toy airplanes on Christmas Eve that he accidentally falls asleep in one of the planes and gets wrapped up and sent out for Christmas. When he wakes up he is surprised to find that he is now a little boys new toy for Christmas. He ends up using the toy airplane to get home and sends the little boy a replacement. It's a little lengthy so more appropriate for age 4-7, but it's a good read.

We also read Elton the Elf by Lisa Mullen. The story is about an elf named Elton who is lost. He ends up wandering through every holiday until he gets back to Christmas and finds his home. It's super fun for the kids to remember the holidays throughout the year in the correct order.

And then we got to making our fun elves!

To make our elf, we used a white lunch sack as his body. You can buy a package of them for under $2 at Walmart. We painted the front of the lunch sack with a red brick pattern.

I simply cut up a rectangle piece of a large sponge and attached it to a clothespin to paint with. You can see one of my boys pictured above dabbing on his pattern.

This is what it looked like all painted.

While the paint was drying, I printed off my elf pieces pattern on red card stock paper. I made my own pattern for the pieces and you can download it from Google Docs by clicking on the picture below.

Since I didn't want the face to be red, I used it as a template to trace it onto a tan/peachy colored paper and cut it out again. After you cut out your template pieces, you will also need to cut out a couple more pieces: two 1" x 6" white pieces for the arms, two 1" x 11.5" white pieces for the legs (I just used the entire length of a sheet of construction paper), one 1/2" x 6" black piece for the belt, and a 1/2" x 1" yellow piece for the belt buckle. You can see all my pieces pictured below.

Assemble the pieces together by gluing the feet onto the long white pieces, the mittens onto the smaller white pieces, the yellow belt buckle onto the black belt, and the hat onto the head. Make sure you tilt the hat on the head a little so one of the pointed ears is still visible. At this point the boys also drew their elf face on their head and added some hair with markers.

**Tip: I had my boys draw their elf face in pencil first just in case they wanted to make any changes. After they were happy with their face, they traced it with black marker.

Next glue all the pieces on to your elf body. The feet go on the bottom of the sack, the arms on the inside flap of the bag and the belt on the front. You can see in the picture below how I added a bow tie for my belt buckle since I was making a girl. I don't think it's necessary but I thought it was a fun little detail. I also reinforced by arms and legs with a piece of tape just to make them extra sturdy since I know what my boys are capable of. (hahaha!)

Once the pieces were glued on the bag (minus the head) we opened up the bag and stuffed it with a plastic grocery sack to make it nice and plump.

Before gluing the head onto the paper bag, fold down the top edges of the bag forming a triangle and staple it shut. Then just glue your head on the front of the white sack.

We added a couple more details to our elves after the head was glued on. We glued a small ball of cotton to the end of the hat. We also added lines in the hat and outlined them in red glitter glue.

You can also use red glitter glue to add some interest to the feet and mittens...

Or add more cotton to the feet...

I just love these little guys! They are sitting up on a shelf with their legs hanging down and I just feel so giddy when I walk by and see their legs dangling. So much fun I tell ya!! :)

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun link parties.

How Many Scoops? Guesstimation Activity using Marshmallows

2011-12-18T16:18:00.000-08:00

This is another great activity I saw in The Mailbox Magazine for teachers (I'm obsessed) and I couldn't resist doing it with my kids. I took the liberty of making my own worksheet so I could re-use it through the year. You can download a copy by clicking on the picture below if you are interested.

After printing off the worksheet, you will need to gather 4 different sized containers. I tried to come up with wintery things but as you can see, I wasn't so successful. haha! I picked out a Gingerbread Man Mug, a penguin craft Luke made in preschool with a cup attached to the front, and two different sized jars.

You will also need a small scoop and a bag of marshmallows for scooping.

To do the activity, first have your child draw a picture of each of the objects in the first column of the worksheet labeled "Draw". Then have your child hold the scoop up to the different containers and make a guess as to how many scoops it will take to fill up the container. They write the number of scoops they think it will take in the second column labeled "Estimate."

Now scoop the marshmallows into the containers. After each scoop make sure to add a tally mark in the third column so you won't lose track of how many scoops. The tally marks were especially helpful since my boys took turns making scoops into the containers.

After the container is full, count your tally marks and write the total number of scoops in the third column labeled "Actual Number". Then have fun comparing the numbers with your kids.

Here are my boys completed worksheets.

This would be fun to change up every season with different things for scooping. I'm thinking those Robin Egg candies for Spring and some kind of nuts for Fall. Anyways, I love doing activities with my kids that fun and educational.

I like to link my posts up to THESE great link parties.

DIY Christmas Gift Bags

2011-12-16T10:37:00.000-08:00

So I have a couple Christmas presents for people this year that aren't really wrappable due to their size and awkward shape. I saw this fun idea for making your own wrapping paper in the The Usborne Book of Christmas Art Ideas and realized I could use the same technique and make my own Christmas Gift Bags.

Here is how they turned out.

Now granted, I had intended on getting all of my gift wrapping done that day but then added in even more work by making these bags so lets just say gift wrapping is still on the TO DO list...But who cares...I just love my bags!

I'll give you the rundown of how I made them.

I started with plain old white lunch sacks. I happened to have them on hand because I bought them for another craft project, but they are less than $2 at Walmart. I got out the watercolors and for the ornament bag, I used different colors to paint on shapes for the ornaments. I pretty much copied the designs I saw in the book because I liked them so much. You want to thin the paint out a little more than normal for the ornaments because after they are dry, I went back with the same color, only thicker, and made dots or lines on the ornaments. You can see what I mean in the picture below.

After the watercolors were dry I used a journaling pen that writes thick and thin to outline the ornaments. The idea is to not make it look perfect, that's why it's so fun. I love getting to draw out of the lines on purpose. :) I also outlined the lines and circles inside the ornaments and added bows and strings like the ornaments were hanging. Lastly I used gold and red glitter glue to add dots all over the bag and some details inside the ornaments.

For the present bags, I just painted splotches of rectangles all over the bag. Then I drew rectangles around them and added ribbon and bow lines with the journaling marker. I also used a blue and purple marker to add more details to some of the presents.

Lastly, I used silver glitter glue to add dots on the bag and to highlight some of the ribbon on the presents.

When the glitter glue was completely dry, I punched a hole on each side of the bag and used small gift wrapping ribbon to make a little handle for the bag. I attached a gift tag while I was attaching the handle. Put your present in with some matching tissue paper and WAH-LAH....A cute homemade gift bag!

I know these are going to totally end up in the trash as my husband says, but who cares! I had fun making them. Plus they are unique and make a statement. hahaha! I'm a dork! :) Oh, and I totally made my husband tell me TWICE how cute they were before I would give him his dinner that night. LOL!

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE great link parties.

Rudolph Puppets Tutorial

2011-12-15T10:27:00.000-08:00

Thought I'd post this today in case you missed our guest post over at Adventures in Mommy Land the other day.

One of the books we just finished reading was Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer by Robert L. May.

Photo Source: Paperback Swap

Such a perfect story for the season, especially since my boys are so fond of singing the familiar tune that goes along with it. After reading the story we decided it would be fun to make Rudolph puppets.

They are so simple to make and since we added a couple jingle bells to the antlers, my kids have been merrily wandering around the house jingling their puppets all day.

To make a reindeer puppet, start by folding a light brown sheet of cardstock paper in half then open it back up. Use a glue stick to add glue to the top and side of the right half (see picture below).

Then fold your paper back down to glue it shut.

Next use scissors to round the bottom of the paper to give it the shape of a reindeer face.

You can see below how the bottom opens so the child can put their hand in it.

To decorate the reindeer's face you will need 2 large googly eyes, a large red pom-pom, a 3" light brown circle cut in half, 2 strips of 1" x 4" dark brown paper and 4 strips of 1" x 2" dark brown paper.

Have your child make the antlers by gluing 2 of the smaller strips to each larger strip of dark brown paper. Then glue the antlers onto the reindeer along with the half circles which make ears. Then glue on the eyes and nose. I gave my boys a black marker to draw on a mouth.

For added fun, I used my hot glue gun to put a jingle bell on the top of each antler. All you have to do now is get out your camera and take a picture of your kids singing "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" while jingling their cute puppets. :)

Now we're off to watch the famous version of the movie!...

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link up my posts to THESE great link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2011-12-14T20:34:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things, Joy in the Jumble and

Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Stardust - Decor & Style

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!
Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

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We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

"That's When I'm Happy" Craft

2011-12-14T16:30:00.000-08:00

I don't know if I could express to you how much I simply adore this book, That's When I'm Happy by Beth Shoshan. Let's face it, we all have days and moments when we aren't happy. Whether we are having a crummy day or someone hurt our feelings, or we feel like the whole World is against us, it's just inevitable that there are going to be those unhappy times in our lives.

In this book, the little bear describes how on those days when he's feeling sad and unhappy he thinks about all the things in his life that make him happy. He describes those things throughout the book.

Every time I read this book with my kids my heart explodes with joy of all the great things I have in my life. We own this book because I treasure it so much.

I read this story to my children about a month ago and the very next day found myself in The UPS Store mailing a package. There were two ladies working in the store, a Mother and her daughter who had down-syndrome. Her Mother busily helped all the customers and I watched as her daughter walked around the entire store straightening up everything she could find that was out of place. She kept going back to this one particular little pile of papers behind the counter. I could tell it was important to her.

A little bit later (it was busy in the store) she grabbed a piece of paper off of that stack that she kept adjusting and walked up to me. She looked up, handed me a small piece of white paper and said, "Hi. This is for your today." I said "Thank you" and as she walked away I read it.

I found myself holding back tears the rest of my visit in the store. It was as if Elizabeth read my soul that day without even knowing me. She didn't choose to give the note to the lady in front of me or the man standing behind me. She gave it to me...I bet you're wondering why it's all crumpled and worn right? Well, I have kept this little note in the pocket of my purse ever since, and every time I feel unhappy, I pull it out and read it. I feel like this little piece of white paper has changed my life.

So I got thinking about my little boys and how I know there are days when they aren't happy. Sometimes Andy gets picked last to kick the ball at recess, or Luke feels mad and unhappy when Lila destroys his latest block building. I decided I wanted to have my boys create their own "That's When I'm Happy" book so that whenever they are feeling blue they can get out their book and remember all the things that make them happy. We've been working on this project FOREVER but the boys finally got them finished.

Here is Andy's Book:

(Now if you are reading this Grandma, don't be alarmed at the size of your hair. I swear it isn't that big! Plus, Andy draws me like that too. haha!)

That is me in the back pushing the double stroller with Luke and Lila in it (notice the hair). I always insist on going to this park with the sidewalk wrapped all the way around it so I can get in some exercise while the kids are playing. I loved how Andy remembered all the details in his drawing.

The last page in their book is a picture of them being happy.

Here is Luke's book. I had to write in everything he said and it's hard to read so I'm going to add it to the top of the pictures.

When I give Mommy Hugs.

When Daddy builds me a Lego Castle.

When I play with my Dinosaurs.

When we read books.

That's when I'm Happy.

I think I treasure these simple books more than my kids. Being able to see the heartfelt things they chose that makes them happy is very touching to me. Especially since not only me, but Daddy and Grandma were mentioned. Now when I'm feeling down, not only do I have my crumbled piece of paper to look at, but I also look through these simple books that remind me of the things I have in my life that make me happy.

Like when I see my sweet little girl happy as can be on her bouncy zebra wearing her blue necklace...

I am so blessed to have such a beautiful curly-haired little girl...

Or like when Luke is so excited to show me his latest dinosaur drawing (even though they are rated PG-13). I've learned to just admire those fierce teeth he draws because that is just him and that is what he likes...

Like when I look down and see these beautiful blue eyes with his arms wrapped around me saying "I love you Mommy" for absolutely no reason at all...

Or like when I see Andy's eyes light up when he finishes reading a book all by himself without needing any help at all...

Or when I look at his smile and see the most adorable dimples in the whole wide World...

Or when I see my husband being a Daddy...

And when he tells me that I'm beautiful even after 10 years and 40lbs later and still likes to kiss me...

That's when I'm Happy!

Happy Crafting!!

Rudolph Puppets

2011-12-13T09:01:00.000-08:00

Come read about our fun Ruldoph Puppets at Adventures in Mommy Land. I'm guest posting today for her Homemade in December Series.

We are currently having the flu make the rounds at our house (crossing my fingers it will bypass me) so it might be quiet around here the next week. I'm pretty bummed since I had so many more activities I wanted to do before Christmas, but I guess that's life.

Hope you are enjoying your holidays!

Christmas Bingo Game Winners!

2011-12-11T18:15:00.000-08:00

Here are the 3 winners for the Christmas Bingo Game from Big D & Me (chosen using random.org):

Comment #12, Amanda Joy

Comment #3, Unknown (Catherine)

Comment #6, Crayons and Curls

I will be emailing you shortly! Thanks so much for entering the giveaway and supporting I Heart Crafty Things!

Gather Round Dinner Game Review and Giveaway

2011-12-11T17:53:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to Lindsy, Comment #16! You are the winner! I will be emailing you shortly.

This Giveaway is now closed.

I recently received the Gather Round Dinner Game by Familytime Fun from The Organized Parent. We have always been the type of family who eats together at a dining table for dinner every night. It is so important to me to have quality family time every day so we never have the TV on when eating dinner either.

Having a 6yr old, a 4yr old and a 16 month old, you can imagine how little attention span my children have for sitting and eating their entire dinner all while attempting to have quality conversation with them. I'm not gonna lie, there are days when dinnertime seems like such a drag between the crying and complaining, and baby throwing her food off her high chair....Sigh!

Having said that, I was so excited to try out the Gather Round Dinner Game. Let me tell you, it did not disappoint! I love how it is a small, simple circle shape that we could easily pass around the dinner table. All you do is press the button, and complete the activity that lights up. The kids get plenty of entertainment by pressing the button and watching it decide which activity to light up, but the activities are fun too! Here are some examples:

-Everyone name as many purple foods as possible.

-Say the ABCs as fast as you can or say it backwards (I am the champion for saying them backwards in my house hahaha!).

-Name 3 super powers you'd like to have; let your family give you a superhero's name.

-Everyone eat some veggies or food (My kids actually played along...).

-Name what you like most about each person at the table.

It comes with 11 different discs so there are 132 activities in all, so you are sure to never grow old of all the activities. My kids have asked to play this game every night since we received it. It has been a huge hit in our house and has brought some much needed laughter and smiles into our family time. We even let my 16 month old have a turn pressing the button and she LOVES it! My favorite part is there are no game boards or game pieces required--just food and your family.

The Organized Parent has a whole line of family time games: The Original Dinner Games, Gather Round Restaurant Game and Racers Ready.

They all look like so much fun!

GIVEAWAY:

The Organized Parent has provided me with The Original Dinner Games to give away to one lucky I Heart Crafty Things Reader.

This is an award-winning collection of 51 dinner games for your family to play while they eat! If your family is anything like mine, it's time to break out of the old routine and start having more fun and laughter at dinnertime.

Mandatory Entry: Leave a comment telling me which game you think your family would enjoy most.

For extra entries: (Make sure you leave one comment for each entry.)

Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect.
Like The Organized Parent on Facebook.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things on Twitter.
And for kicks and giggles, leave a comment telling me what your favorite dinner is for one extra entry. (I need some new ideas!)

Good Luck!

Coupon Code:
If you want to purchase one of these fantastic family games for yourself or your loved ones, The Organized Parent is offering a 15% discount through December 15th. Click on the banner in my sidebar to be directed to their site and use coupon code 21512 at checkout.

Giveaway will close Thursday, December 15, 2011 at 10:00 am MST!

***The Organized Parent provided me with a Gather Round Dinner Game free of charge in exchange for reviewing their product, but all opinions are my own.

Fingerprint Snowmen

2011-12-11T13:53:00.000-08:00

In case you missed my fingerprint snowmen guest post at Handprint and Footprint Art this week I thought I'd post it here as well.

Since Christmas is fast approaching we just got done reading Snowmen at Christmas by Caralyn Buehner. We thought it would be super fun to make a snowman collage using our fingerprints to go along with the story. I saw this idea in The Usborne Book of Christmas Art Ideas which I happened to get at my local thrift store for 50 cents (score!).

We started by cutting a sheet of card stock paper in half. I thought a whole sheet would be too much for the kids but you be the judge. I used blue so the white snowmen would stand out. Have your children press their thumbprints and fingerprints on the paper to make snowmen.

After the paint is dry, use a fine tip black marker to draw eyes, a mouth and arms on your snowmen. We also used different color fine-tipped markers to draw buttons on the snowmen.

To paint on the carrot nose, I cut a small strip of cardboard and we dipped the end into orange paint and pressed it onto each snowman.

We then used the same painting technique to paint hats on the snowmen. I pressed the cardboard piece down and then slid the bottom of it over to create the triangle shape. That didn't work so good for the kids so they just painted with the little cardboard piece like a paint brush.

We had a lot of different cardboard strips going on for all the colors. I thought I'd show you what it looked like so you could see how you don't really need that much paint at all. We also used some glitter glue to add glitter to the snowmen hats.

After the paint was completely dry, I added some ribbon scarfs on some of the snowmen. To do this I used a craft knife to cut two small slits under the snowman's head. Then I pulled a small piece of gift wrapping ribbon through the holes and tied a knot. We used a variety of different colors.

The boys snowmen scene's turned out soooo cute! Here is Andy's (age 7).

Here's a close-up of some of the snowmen.

Here is Luke's snowmen (age 4) and a close up of some of his snowmen below.

My boys LOVED this craft and I'm not gonna lie, I obviously did too! :) You can create some pretty funny scenes with your snowman. These would make the cutest cards for Christmas if you folded your paper in half instead of cutting it.

Happy Crafting!!

I like to link my posts up to THESE wonderful link parties.

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2011-12-07T21:07:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!
Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

<center><a href="http://iheartcraftythings.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" alt="I Heart Crafty Things" src="http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m13/harveyusn/blog-hop-button-175.gif" /></a></center>

We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Fingerprint Snowmen Collage

2011-12-07T15:36:00.000-08:00

We made the cutest Fingerprint Snowmen Collage the other day!

I am sharing them over at Handprint and Footprint Art today....Hope you'll stop by and read the tutorial. :)

Happy Crafting!!

Christmas (or Hanukkah) Bingo Giveaway--3 Winners

2011-12-06T08:59:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed.

Do you know Jennifer from Big D & Me? Well if you don't then YOU HAVE BEEN MISSING OUT!! I first met her when I saw these fun Super Hero Puppets she created with her children.

No matter what my mood, I know I can always click on over to her blog and leave with a smile, a laugh, or some much needed inspiration. Jennifer graciously agreed to give away 3 of her fantasic Christmas Bingo Games to 3 lucky I Heart Crafty Things Readers today. Yes, you heard me...There will be 3 winners. Fun stuff!

Jennifer provided me with a copy of her Bingo Game for a sneak peek (and because she is so nice!) and I have it all printed out and ready to play with all the kids and cousins at our annual Christmas party. I can't wait! The best part about her Bingo Game is it comes with 3 different size cards from 9 to 25 squares so even the preschoolers can play along!

Here is a little bit more about Jennifer.

I am a SAHM of three and the designated cruise director of our family. On Big D & Me I try and share the humorous side of our daily lives whether its getting up at 5 AM for preschool registration, cleaning up vomit at Red Lobster, or sneaking zucchini into banana bread (huge failure!). I also like to document our crafts (super hero puppets), share party pics, and provide printables (lego bingo, Care Bear bingo, and kitchen prints).

Today I am giving away 3 copies of my Christmas Bingo Games. Or if you prefer, win a copy of my Hanukkah bingo game. Either way, three of you will have a fun game to enjoy with your kids, nieces and nephews, or cousins.

The set includes:

12 typical bingo boards with 25 squares

8 smaller bingo boards with 16 squares

9 preschool bingo boards with 9 squares

and 35 calling cards

You can find a link to my etsy shop on my Big D & Me blog or go directly there by clicking here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/bigdandme?ref=em

HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Simply leave a comment on this post!

For extries entries: (Make sure you leave one comment for each entry.)

Leave a comment telling me what is your favorite Christmas song.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect.
Follow Big D & Me via Google Friend Connect.

Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment.

Good Luck!!

This giveaway will close Saturday, December 10, 2011 at 2:00p.m. (MST). I will notify the winners by email shortly after.

Making Tracks in the Snow with Glitter Play Dough

2011-12-04T17:58:00.000-08:00

After we made our snowglobe craft to go along with Snow Music by Lynne Rae Perkins I wanted to do something else to go along with the story. Since the story depicted the sounds of snow through animal and vehicle tracks, I thought it would be fun for the boys to make tracks in the snow, only we used play dough instead of actual snow.

I saw the most darling idea on Creative Connections for Kids where they made green play dough and mixed in glitter and sequins to make Christmas trees. We started by using the same idea with adding glitter to our homemade play dough to make it look like glittery snow. It's hard to see the glitter in the pictures but it was so beautiful. The kids rolled it all out and used animals and vehicles to make tracks in their snow.

The kids had so much fun doing this. They kept their animals a secret from me and they made me guess which animal made which tracks when they were finished. Then they'd roll it in a ball and roll it back out flat and do it all over again.

I dyed half of the play dough green just like creative connection for kids, and the boys also had a fun time making their own Christmas trees. You can see the glitter better in this picture with the green play dough. It was so pretty!

They added some sequins I had on hand for ornaments.

They were having so much fun that I decided to get out all the other Christmas cookie cutters I had. They thought it was pretty cool using the sequins as eyes for the reindeer, snowmen and gingerbread man.

I definitely think we'll be adding glitter to all of our homemade play dough from now on! It's so much fun!

Happy Crafting!

I often link my posts up to THESE great Link Parties.

Make a Snowman out of your child's sock!

2011-12-02T19:54:00.000-08:00

We had a blast the other night making snowmen out of the kids' socks. Look how cute they turned out!

Of course we had to start out with reading a fun book though. We chose Snowmen at Night by Carolyn Buehner.

Have you ever wondered why in the morning a snowman's grin is a little crooked, or his tree branches have moved? This fun book explores the adventures Snowmen might have at night which causes such a change. Of course we all know they are just melting, but have some fun with this book using your imagination. It is definitely a delightful read!

To make our snowmen, we started with a children's sock. You could obviously use whatever size sock you want depending on what size snowman you want to make.

The boys first added a small scoop of beans into the sock to add some weight to the bottom of the snowman.

Then they created a ball from fiber fill and stuffed it into the bottom of the sock. We then used a white plastic elastic to secure our ball in the sock. If you have little girls at your house I'm sure you know what elastics I'm talking about. I bought a huge multi-colored pack of them at the Dollar Store.

We made two more balls out of fiberfill the same way and secured them with the plastic elastics. You don't have to use a white elastic at the top because it will end up being covered.

Next fold the top of the sock down like this and get out your glue gun.

You have to fold up the sock and glue it down about halfway so it ends up looking like this. I hope that makes sense.

To make our hat, I cut out a rectangle piece of fleece and cut slits down one entire side of it.

Fold the sock top completely back down again and glue the fleece halfway down, all the way around the hat. Make sure you leave enough room at the bottom to fold up the white sock to make the brim of the hat.

It should look like this after gluing on the hat.

I then used another small elastic to form the top of the hat, and then folded up the top of the sock to make the brim of the hat.

Use another scrap of fabric to make a scarf for your snowman. Just cut slits in the ends of the fabric and tie it around the snowman's neck. We made one with the same fleece material, one with a fabric scrap I had, and one with a blue ribbon. I wanted to show you how you can really just use anything you have on hand.

Now comes the fun part of decorating your snowman. We first glued buttons onto the snowman with the glue gun. Then we added some googly eyes. We used pink acrylic paint to make the rosy cheeks and after they were dry, we used orange and black puffy paint to add the carrot nose and mouth. Be creative!

I tried to make mine girly with the purple floral scarf and the eyelashes.

I LOVED Andy's eyebrows! Such a manly snowman! I think my snowman had a crush on Andy's snowman. :)

Luke was so worried about adding the details to his snowman but he did soooo good! I let them practice a little on a paper plate with the puffy paint before putting it on their snowman. I wanted them to get a good handle on how quickly it came out.

Now we have a happy little snowman family keeping our couch company by the Christmas tree.

Just to forewarn you, if you have boys, these snowmen may very well keep them entertained for hours after they discover what a fun weapon they are when flinging them at each other. No worries though, they are super soft and as of yet, I have no injuries to report. Only hours of good fun! :)

Happy Crafting!

I like to link my posts up to THESE fun Link Parties.

Gloveables Giveaway Winner

2011-12-01T17:56:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to Michelle, Comment #6! You are the winner of the cute pink and zebra-striped gloveables! I will be emailing you.

Thanks to everyone who entered! Stay tuned for another FANTASTIC Giveaway from The Oraganized Parent next week! :)

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2011-12-01T06:00:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things, Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is BabyBerry

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

<center><a href="http://happy-go-lucky-harvey.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" alt="Happy Go Lucky" src="http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m13/harveyusn/blog-hop-button-175.gif" /></a></center>

We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Snowman Math

2011-11-29T13:31:00.000-08:00

Luke and I had fun today making a snowman scene while working on mathematics. I saw this idea in the Mailbox Magazine for Teachers. It is a simple, fun activity that any preschooler would love! All you need is a sheet of white paper with the number 1-12 (or 10, whatever you are working on) written along the bottom, flashcards corresponding to the numbers on the bottom of the paper and Bingo Dot Markers (found at the Dollar store).

Luke drew a flashcard out of the stack and practiced sounding out the number word as best he could. I obviously had to help him on most of them since they are phonetically ridiculous. haha! After he figured out the correct number, he found it at the bottom of his page and put that many dots above the number to build his snowman. Do this until you are done with every flashcard.

Then simply add some details to your snowmen with markers.

Now they are one big, happy snowman family!

Happy Crafting!!

I often link my posts up to THESE great Link Parties.

Winner of Ultimate Box of Projects

2011-11-28T21:41:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to The Bishop Family, Comment #14! You are the winner of the Ultimate Box of Projects from Craft Project Ideas. I will be emailing you!

A big thanks to all those who entered and continue to support I Heart Crafty Things. I love you! :)

Making Housework Fun---Gloveables Review and Giveaway

2011-11-28T08:14:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed.

Doing the chores can be such a bore, especially when I have to wear those unattractive, yellow gloves....

Ever since I had my first child nearly 7 years ago I have been battling hand eczema. Those baby wipes are a killer on the hands! It's one of the things in my life that I hate talking about and honestly, can be pretty embarrassing at times. Because I have sensitive hands, wearing gloves while cleaning is a MUST. Whenever I have to slide on those ugly, yellow gloves I can't help buy feel like an old, worn out housewife. hahaha!

But recently The Organized Parent sent me these fancy Gloveables...

No more worn out housewife here folks! Now I slip these beauties on and I'm pretty sure there's a twinkle in my eye while I stand over at the sink washing dishes. I might even happen to belt out an old favorite tune and move my hips while doing the housework now. I can finally put on some gloves and don't have this ugly yellow aura surrounding me. If I haven't mentioned it yet, I LOVE these gloves! And I'm pretty sure every Mother and housewife you know would feel the same way about them. Christmas is coming up you know, hint hint! :)

They have a variety of cute styles to choose from.

The Organized Parent wants you to experience the euphoria of ridding yourself from those ugly yellow gloves too, so they are giving away one pair of Pink Zebra-striped Gloveables to one lucky I Heart Crafty Things Reader. They have a value of $14.95, and I'm telling you, if you want to add more excitement in your life while cleaning your house, these gloves are right up your alley!

HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Make sure you leave one comment for each entry. Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment. Only US residents are eligible for this giveaway!

Leave a comment telling me which style of gloveables is your favorite.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect.
Like The Organized Parent on Facebook.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things on Twitter.
And for kicks and giggles, leave a comment telling me what chore you dread the most for one extra entry.

Good Luck!

Coupon Code:
If you want to purchase a pair of these adorable Gloveables for yourself or for all the beautiful Women in your life, The Organized Parent is offering a 15% discount through November 30th. Click on the banner in my sidebar to be directed to their site and use coupon code 21510 at checkout.

Giveaway will close Thursday, December 1, 2011 at 10:00 am MST!

***The Organized Parent provided me with a pair of Gloveables free of charge in exchange for reviewing their product, but all opinions are my own.

Snow Globe Craft

2011-11-26T15:09:00.000-08:00

I hope everyone in the U.S. had a Happy Thanksgiving! I finally feel recovered from all that food (haha) and I'm excited to be moving on to Winter crafts at our house. We picked up "Snow Music" by Lynne Rae Perkins at the library last week. I knew it would be a perfect story for us since we've recently had our first snowfall.

The illustrations perfectly depict a snowy winter scene. A little boy opens his door to see the snow that had fallen over night and his dog quickly escapes. As the story follows the boy trying to find his dog, it illustrates the sounds of snow through animal tracks, tire tracks, etc. It was pretty fun to have my kids imitate the sounds with me and they were engaged the whole time during the story.

We decided to imitate the book cover by creating our own snow globe scene. To complete the snow scene in our globes we painted it with glitter paint to depict the snow falling down. Here is mine below.

I simply cut out a shape for the globe out of white card stock paper and the boys used pencil to first draw their scene. After coloring it with crayons, we got out the water colors to paint the background of our scenes.

After the water colors were dry, we painted iridescent glitter paint all over the globe. It gave it a shiny texture like glass and the glitter created a beautiful snowy scene. I realize it's hard to see all the glitter in these pictures so they don't do the craft justice, but they really turned out so sparkly and beautiful! I cut a base out of brown paper to add to the bottom of our globe.

This project has really got us excited about the Winter season. We are going to do one more craft with this book so you'll have to stay tuned in the next couple days.

Happy Crafting!

Dont' forget to Enter the Ultimate Box of Projects Giveaway. It ends 11/28 at 10:00a.m. MST

Linking up to THESE Great Linky Parties.

Ultimate Box of Projects Review and Giveaway

2011-11-23T08:00:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed.

Craft Project Ideas recently came out with a new product line called 'Made by Me' Junior. They are craft kits designed for ages 4-6. I'm sure you can all guess how excited I was when I received the Ultimate Box of Projects in the mail to review.

I opened up the box and the first thing I thought was how they certainly got the "Ultimate" part correct in their title! My 4 yr old could hardly contain his excitement upon inspecting the box and there was definitely some inpatient jumping up and down as I opened it up to take a peek inside. :)

Here is a sample of some of the fun projects we have already completed out of the box.

The boys insisted on making these fun clay animals first. They turned out so darling!

Keep in mind they made these completely on their own, without any help. I was glad they didn't need any assistance since I was having so much fun making a creation of my own out of the clay. (What can I say, I don't know how to stay out of the FUN!)

The next day Luke had fun creating the Life on the Farm scene. Below is a picture before he started. He was able to place the stickers wherever he wanted on the background to create his own scene.

Here is his completed scene. He seriously spent an hour making his scene just right and it now hangs proudly on our refrigerator.

Since I have an adorable niece celebrating a birthday this week, Luke also took it upon himself to make her a beautiful necklace out of the foam beads.

I loved that he could practice some fine motor skills while crafting! :) And he has a handmade, beautiful gift for his cousin.

These kits would make wonderful Christmas presents! My 4yr old has asked me every day to get the box out to do another project. The best part is everything easily stores right in the box it came in....I know, isn't that magnificent?! You can purchase these fun kits at any Wal-Mart.

Since Craft Project Ideas wants you to be in on all this fun too, they are giving away one Ultimate Box of Projects to one lucky I Heart Crafty Things reader.

HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Make sure you leave one comment for each entry. Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment. This giveaway is open to U.S. residents only (apologies to my international readers).

Leave a comment telling me what is your favorite kind of pie. (I've totally got Thanksgiving on the brain!)
Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect.
Stop by Craft Project Ideas and check out their 'Made by Me' Junior Products. Then come back and leave a comment of which kit is your favorite.
Like Craft Project Ideas on Facebook or follow on Twitter.

Good Luck!!

This giveaway will close November 28, 2011 at 10:00a.m. (MST). I will notify the winner by email shortly after.

Disclaimer: I was provided with a free Ultimate Box of Projects for the purpose of this review. I was not otherwise paid for the review, and all of the opinions stated here are my own.

There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie

2011-11-20T08:00:00.000-08:00

First of all, I've neglected to mention a Congratulations to Danielle, Comment #46 who won the Robot Backpack Giveaway! :)

If I'm being completely honest with you, I have to tell you that my husband does not fully appreciate my love for this book. Hahahaha! I placed a hold on it at my local library and waited for what seemed like an eternity for it to become available. When I picked it up at the library I sat in the passenger seat (husband was driving) and couldn't help myself but open it up and read it out loud to him, laughing the entire way through it. Let's just say he was less than amused. :) But you know, I just can't help myself!

I saw the most fun idea from The Mailbox to make a scented pumpkin craft and I instantly knew it was PERFECT to go along with this book. It is a rather silly kind of craft but my preschooler has absolutely adored it!

I got out a paper plate and had Luke paint the inside of it pumpkin orange. While the paint was still wet, we sprinkled some gold glitter in it and some pumpkin pie spice all over the plate.

After the paint was dry, we glued square pieces of brown tissue paper around the outside edge of the paper plate to create the crust. You wouldn't even know it was fake because with the pumpkin pie spice sprinkled on, it smells like the real thing!

It's been sitting on the kitchen counter for days now and every time the boys walk by they have to stop to take a big whiff and exclaim how excited they are to eat the real pie on Thanksgiving Day!

Happy Crafting!!

Don't forget to Enter to win some awesome digital scrapbooking software HERE. You can even use it for blog design so you don't want to miss out!

Linking up to THESE Great Parties.

My Memories Review and Giveaway

2011-11-19T09:53:00.000-08:00

This Giveaway is now closed. Congratulations to Comment #5, Jollym, who is the Winner!!

I am very excited to tell you about My Memories and their digital scrapbook software today. Their software allows you to create scrapbook-style pages from your computer. They have tons of free templates to choose from or you can start from scratch to design your own templates.

The favorite thing about this software is how versatile it is in creating a variety of different projects. Not only can you create your own scrapbook, but you can create your own greeting cards, invitations, calendars, blogger background designs and headers, and so much more! The software even has an option to create a slide show with music! You can have your pages printed and bound in a book, print them from your own computer, or save them as a JPG file and use them digitally.

Every year for Christmas I make a calendar as a gift for my siblings and I typically use an online company. My biggest complaint about those companies is how unappealing their background pages are. When I heard about this scrapbook software and it's ability to create your own custom calendars I squealed with delight! I have been working away at it the last couple days and I've completed my own calendar pages. Here is a little sample.

I found the software so simple to use and navigate through. I used their Help section a couple times and found it really useful for any questions I had. Although the software came with tons of free backgrounds and embellishments, I decided to purchase the "It Happened This Year" pack from their website to create my calendar pages. I was so surprised with how much I received with the pack for only $3.59. I have bought scrapbook supplies in the past and know how pricey they are, so imagine how pleased I was to get so much for only a couple dollars. Plus, they had pages of Free packs you can download without having to purchase anything.

Now that I've been introduced to this software my list keeps growing with ideas of how to use it. I KNOW you will feel the same way about it!

THE GIVEAWAY
My Memories has been so gracious to give away one software package to one lucky I Heart Crafty Things Reader. I know, aren't you excited?!!

HERE IS HOW TO WIN: Make sure you leave one comment for each entry. Please make sure your email is on your profile, or include it with your comment.

{Mandatory} Visit My Memories and leave a comment here telling me what your favorite digital paper pack is.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things via Google Friend Connect.
Follow I Heart Crafty Things on Twitter. (I don't post much on there so I promise I won't fill your feed!)
Follow My Memories on Facebook.
And for kicks and giggles, leave a comment telling me what your favorite thing to eat on Thanksgiving is, and I'll give you another entry. :)

Giveaway will end Wednesday, November 23, 2011 at 11:59pm.

My Memories Coupon Code

My Memories is offering my readers a coupon code that will give you $10 off your purchase of My Memories Suite Software as well as a $10 coupon for the My Memories online store. Copy and paste this code to use at checkout: STMMMS73503

Disclaimer: I was provided with a free copy of My Memories Suite for the purpose of this review. I was not otherwise paid for the review, and all of the opinions stated here are my own.

Apple Turkeys

2011-11-19T08:01:00.000-08:00

We have a tradition in our home making these adorable apple turkeys for Thanksgiving. My Mom made them every year with me and my siblings growing up and I've decided to continue that on with my kids.

Aren't they cute?

I'm guest posting over at One Artsy Mama for her {Our} Home for the Holidays Series and I'd love it if you'd stop by and check out how to make these adorable little creatures! :)

I also wanted to mention that Amy from One Artsy Mama is the darling gal who designed my sidebar labels for me. You know, the cute rainbow colored ones with the heart on them! :) I asked her to make them for me but didn't even know quite what I wanted. She seriously had them designed in like 10 minutes and emailed to me. I gasped with delight when I saw them and said, "Oh my gosh, it's like she read my mind!" She's pretty amazing like that! So if you are one of those non-designer bloggers like me, you should definitely consider her for any of your designing needs. :)

Ok, what are you waiting for??? Go click over to read about those darling Turkey Apples!!

Happy Crafting!!

2011-11-17T06:00:00.000-08:00

It's Time to Mingle!

Hosted by Happy Go Lucky, I Heart Crafty Things, Joy in the Jumble and Keeping Up With Kristi.

Each week we will choose one blog at random to spotlight at the next week's blog hop.

This weeks guest host is Making Mama Happy

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!! Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

<center><a href="http://happy-go-lucky-harvey.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" alt="Happy Go Lucky" src="http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m13/harveyusn/blog-hop-button-175.gif" /></a></center>

We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

Thankful Turkey Puppets

2011-11-16T18:42:00.000-08:00

After our Thanksgiving Reenactment we made some Thankful Turkey Puppets so the kids could display some things they were thankful for this year. They were so simple to make and the kids have had a grand ol' time playing with them saying "Gobble, Gobble".

We just used the kids cut-out handprints for the feathers, some googly eyes, a yellow triangle for the beak and I cut out a waddle from a red foam sheet.

Andy is thankful for church, going to first grade, Mommy & Daddy, computer games and Thanksgiving.

Luke is thankful for Thanksgiving dinner, Netflix (haha), the turkey crafts we made, that he can go to preschool and his toys.

I am thankful that God blessed me with children. I feel my greatest strengths and weaknesses have come from having children and I am grateful that they continually give me a desire to to better and to be better.

Happy Crafting!!

Linking up to THESE Great Parties.

DIY Christmas Picture Frames

2011-11-15T07:00:00.000-08:00

I am sooooo excited to be participating in The 13 Crafts of Christmas over at Lines Across My Face today. Look at these fun Christmas Picture Frames we made...

Hope you'll stop by Lines Across My Face today to read all about it!

Happy Crafting!!

Thanksgiving Reenactment and Indian Corn Craft

2011-11-14T12:47:00.000-08:00

We spent some time yesterday afternoon reenacting the Thanksgiving story after reading these fun books.

Thanksgiving Mice by Bethany Roberts

It’s Thanksgiving and four adorable mice are putting on a play for their woodland friends. The play is of course the story of Thanksgiving. This is a GREAT book for Preschooler's to easily understand the story of Thanksgiving. My first grader even enjoyed it.

One Little, Two Little, Three Little Pilgrims by B. G. Hennessy

Ten little Pilgrims and ten little Wampanoag boys and girls are getting ready for the harvest feast. After gathering all the food, everyone gives thanks, and then it's time to eat and celebrate. The simple, rhythmic text is great for sharing the history and fun of Thanksgiving with young children.

After reading our stories my pilgrims set out to sea on their long journey on the Mayflower...(I know you are all loving how I wrote Mayflower on the cardboard, hahaha!)

They got so hungry they even tried catching a small fish with their telescopes.

Finally they spot land far off in the distance...

After reaching land and starting to settle in they meet the cutest little Indians you ever did see...

The Pilgrims made friends with the Indians and the Indians showed the pilgrims how to plant corn and other seeds...

And after the garden had grown and was ready to harvest, they had a huge feast and gave thanks to God for all their blessings! I meant to pop popcorn with the kids to eat but the night got away from us. But we did make this adorable Indian Corn craft.

I cut out a corn cob shape out of yellow card stock paper and we used a pencil eraser to press on the corn kernels all over the cob. We made sure to use fall colored paint. The boys LOVED using the pencil eraser to paint with. Heck, even I did! :)

My cute little pilgrim hard at work on his corn.

I cut out some corn husks from leftover scraps from our paper bag Indian vests. We crumbled them up and then straightened them out to give them some texture and glued them to the back of our corn. Andy was such a perfectionist and made sure his kernels were all close together so it looked "real" (as he said).

Next I lifted up the corn a little at the end, punched a hole in it with a hole punch, strung some raffia through it and made a bow. The raffia could act as a way to hang up the corn, or I just personally think it looks pretty. I got the idea for this craft at Spotted Canary.

I had been working on the reenactment for a couple days before we did it (thus not a lot of posts last week). From painting the Indian vests and making the headbands one day, to making the pilgrim hats and telescopes one day. I've realized sometimes it takes a while to prepare for things, but the fun we have overall definitely outweighs the time spent in preparation. And I believe my kids now have a greater understanding of how Thanksgiving came about.

We did one more craft to go along with the being thankful part of the reenactment. I'll share that with you on Wednesday. :)

Happy Crafting!!

Linking up to THESE Fun Parties.

It's Time to Mingle!

2011-11-10T00:00:00.000-08:00

There are no rules to this blog hop. Just link up your blog's main page. Then have fun reading new blogs and making new blog friends. We would love for you to follow the hostesses in the first four spots and our guest host in the fifth spot. We always follow back!!

Grab our button if you want to share our blog hop with others. There will be a new list every Thursday, so be sure to come back every week.

<center><a href="http://happy-go-lucky-harvey.blogspot.com/" target="_blank"><img border="0" alt="Happy Go Lucky" src="http://i100.photobucket.com/albums/m13/harveyusn/blog-hop-button-175.gif" /></a></center>

We hope you have fun and thanks for joining us! We are so excited to find new blogs, share great ideas, and inspire each other.

More Acorn Art

2011-11-09T12:23:00.000-08:00

Before taking our Acorn books back to the library we decided to make one more piece of art. I saw a great idea on The Nature of Grace where they painted with tea bags and I knew it was something that we HAD to try. My Mother-in-Law is an artist and uses tea bags for painting backgrounds all the time so I knew how beautiful it would look. Funny thing is that while my kids did enjoy painting with the tea bags, once they had the opportunity to use water colors on their picture, they painted completely over all of the tea painting. So it might have been in vain, but oh well. Here is our pictures and underneath I'll describe how we made them.

My Acorn Art. I made mine before trying it out with Luke so I could see if it would work out how I wanted it to)

Luke and Andy's Art. I had only planned on Luke doing this project so I only had one ready with the acorns traced on them. When Andy decided he wanted to make one too, we ended up just making a joint art piece. Luke did the left side, Andy did the right side.

To make the artwork, I started by tracing an acorn cookie cutter all over the card stock paper very lightly in pencil. Then after making a cup of tea we squeezed most of the water out of the tea bag and then pressed it and rubbed it all over our paper to make the background. You can see the effect in the top picture.

Once that was all dry (which only took a couple minutes) we traced our acorns very darkly with brown crayon. We also drew a line for the top of the acorn and colored them in, making sure to leave a little bit uncolored to fill in with green paint.

Last we got out the water colors and painted our acorns brown (Luke painted a couple red because it's his favorite color) and the tops green. I added some colors around the edge of my paper but the boys decided to paint over the tea background with fall colors. It was a little disheartening at first but as they got painting it looked so pretty so I really didn't mind. :) I thought it kind of looked like the acorns were laying in a pile of fall colored leaves.

If you missed our Acorns Everywhere Craft you can read about it HERE. I have pictures in that post of the books we read to go along with our Acorn crafts but they were Acorns Everywhere by Kevin Sherry and Nuts to You by Lois Ehlert.

Happy Crafting!!

Linking up to THESE great Parties.

Don't forget to Enter the Giveaway for the Robot Backpack! It ends tomorrow 11/10!

Taking the Time to See the Details...

2011-11-06T07:00:00.000-08:00

I don't know about you but whenever I walk into my children's bedroom after they've been in there playing for quite some time, it usually looks like a tornado swept through it. I have to admit that sometimes I pay little attention to detail and just tell them it's time to clean up.

But the other day I stood in their disastrous bedroom and realized how much I'm missing out on whenever I'm in a hurry to get it all cleaned up. When I take the time to pay attention to the small details the joy of Motherhood swells in my heart as I witness my children's amazing creativity.

They got every detail down just perfect from the ground underneath...

to the food in the animals mouths...

to even providing shelter for some of the animals...

to making sure there was plants and greenery...

and trees...

And even tree frogs in trees...

They even found a nice pond for Mr. Plesiosaur...

Sometimes I get so carried away in getting it all done, in staying caught up, in keeping up the housework that I don't appreciate these special moments. Before long, these boys of mine will be outgrown of Lego's and creating scenes with their animals. Before long, the tubs of toys will be replaced with computers and crazy posters all over the walls. Before long, there will be a sign hung on the outside of their door that reads "Boys Only" and I won't even be permitted to step foot inside....

I better start enjoying these messes. They only come around once a lifetime!

I HEART CRAFTY THINGS

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Velveeta Cheese Box Choo Choo Train

Finding Joy in Motherhood...

Giveaway: Dear Daughter/Son Keepsake Book

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Bald Eagle Day & Craft

Paper Plate Walrus

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Valentine's Activities--How much is a Heart Worth, Broken Heart Alphabet Matchching Game, Heart Art, Making Valentine's

Jillie Willie Apron Giveaway

Drawing Penguins

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Dot Art--A Lesson on Creativity

Paper Plate T-Rex

My Grandfather's Clock

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Review & Giveaway: Jelly Pals Ice Pack and Sleeper Peeper Eye Mask

Paper Plate Groundhog

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Chinese New Year Dragons

"A Bad Case of Stripes" by David Shannon

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Valentine's Monster Box

Lyle, Lyle Crocodile

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Ice Fishing for Letters

Polar Bear Masks

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

2011 Favorites

Top 10 Posts of 2011

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Why Every Blogger Needs a FranklinCovey Planner---Giveaway!

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

The Cutest Elf Craft you ever did see....

How Many Scoops? Guesstimation Activity using Marshmallows

DIY Christmas Gift Bags

Rudolph Puppets Tutorial

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

"That's When I'm Happy" Craft

Rudolph Puppets

Christmas Bingo Game Winners!

Gather Round Dinner Game Review and Giveaway

Fingerprint Snowmen

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Fingerprint Snowmen Collage

Christmas (or Hanukkah) Bingo Giveaway--3 Winners

Making Tracks in the Snow with Glitter Play Dough

Make a Snowman out of your child's sock!

Gloveables Giveaway Winner

Mingle With Us Blog Hop

Snowman Math

Winner of Ultimate Box of Projects

Making Housework Fun---Gloveables Review and Giveaway

Snow Globe Craft

Ultimate Box of Projects Review and Giveaway

There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie

My Memories Review and Giveaway

Apple Turkeys

Thankful Turkey Puppets

DIY Christmas Picture Frames

Thanksgiving Reenactment and Indian Corn Craft

It's Time to Mingle!

More Acorn Art

Taking the Time to See the Details...