Pinterest Is My Friend Again

When I first joined  Pinterest about three years ago, I spent time every night scrolling through and pinning various things.  And then I lost interest.  It was too overwhelming!  It also seemed like everything I tried was a "Pinterest Fail".  Remember my Lego birthday cake for Sam?

Now I usually get on Pinterest when it's time for me to plan for Vacation Bible School, Rustic Youth Camp, Back-to-School Celebration, and sometimes at Christmastime.

I have just spent over an hour on Pinterest looking at rainbow craft and art ideas! I am so happy with what I have found.  I discovered all of these really neat websites full of cool art projects for children.  And since I am not creative, I am so excited over finding these fun ideas!  I have already begun planning our Back-to-School Celebration, and I have not even ordered the first schoolbook for next year.

We began our VBS today, and the first day was a success.  Our theme is Running With Jesus, and as you can imagine, this theme (of running) was not too hard for me.  We are using a rainbow theme for our RYC class this year, and that is why I was looking for rainbow-related crafts.  So many to choose from!

I need to close the Pinterest window and start actually creating a plan.

A Flat Stanley Party

About ten days ago, Leah and Sam attended a Flat Stanley party hosted by our friend, Shruti.  She had another mom read the first Flat Stanley book to the children, and then the children moved into her kitchen to make a paper Flat Stanley.  Shruti had prepared a packet for each child to mail with his Flat Stanley to a far away friend.  That person will take the Flat Stanley to some fun and interesting place and take a picture with Flat Stanley in that location.  They will put a copy of the picture and a brief description of where they are inside the large envelope.  Then they will mail Flat Stanley and the packet to another friend.  

This continues until the 7th person mails Flat Stanley back to Leah or Sam.  After all of the children who attended the party receive their Flat Stanleys back after his travels, we will meet again and share where all our Flat Stanleys have been.  A map is also included in the packet for each recipient to mark the location of where they took Flat Stanley.

After making Flat Stanley, the children decorated sugar cookies to look like Flat Stanley too.  It was such a fun party!  I am so glad that I made the time to take Leah and Sam!

 Sam with his Flat Stanley cookie

 Sam with his Flat Stanley--he still had to cut him out and glue him on a large craft stick.

 Leah decorating her Flat Stanley cookie.

The completed cookie--Yum!

The La La Loopsy House

Olivia made Leah this cute little house for her miniature La La Loopsy dolls.  She used a shoe box, scrapbooking paper, scraps of fabric, and several odds and ends that she found in various places.

 the front of the house

 an inside view of the whole house

 the bedroom

 the bathroom 

the kitchen

Spending time on Pinterest has put me in a craftsy mood, and I normally don't even like to do crafts!  Mostly I have rekindled my interest in sewing.  Earlier this afternoon I cut out an apron for me and most of a capri pants and top outfit for Leah.  Having a designated space for all of our sewing/scrapbooking/crafting supplies plus my fabulous crafting table inspires me!

One of the advantages of homeschooling is that my children have time on most days to spend in creative pursuits.  They work really hard completing their schoolwork and chores, but unless we have somewhere to go, they always have time for their hobbies.  They also work on their projects after supper until bedtime.  As my younger children are growing older, I am finding that I am having a tiny bit more discretionary time as well.  So, I am getting to spend some time in creative pursuits of my own!

I'll post some pictures of my apron and Leah's outfit when I finish them---it may take me a couple of weeks or even a month--I just work on my projects a little bit at a time.

Clay's Knife

Ok, I had pictures of the wrong knife.  Clay actually fine-tuned his railroad-spike knife, but I don't have picture of that.  These are pictures of a knife that he made out of a saw blade.  He still used his forge and grinder, but he started with a different material.  

 He made a handle using paracord, and he hand sewed a cover for the blade out of leather.

The finished product!

Homemade Doodle Paint

I love Pinterest!  I have found so many cute ideas on there, and yesterday we tried one.  Here is the link to the original directions for Homemade Doodle Paint, and here is a recap of how we did it here at our house.

What You Will Need:

• all purpose flour
• salt
• plastic squirt bottles (I got mine in the cake decorating section of WalMart--$2 for 2 bottles)
• coloring--the original directions suggested gel icing, like I have in my picture below, but I found that regular food coloring produced much richer colors.

I found that mixing 1/3 cup flour, 1/3 cup salt, and a little more than 1/3 cup water made the right consistency.  I began by using a whisk, and then when I added the food coloring, I just used a spoon to stir.  If you want more paint, you can use 1/2 cup of each ingredient.

I mixed each color in the same glass measuring cup, so I had to wash the cup and spoon after every color.

This is the pink, made with red gel icing.  After making this light pink and a light blue, I switched to food coloring.  Much better!

Spoon the mixed paint into the squirt bottle using a funnel.  I snipped the end off of paper sno-cone cups to use as my disposable funnels.

After making eight different colors (and this took me about 30 minutes), Leah and Sam were eager to begin painting.  To paint, you just squeeze the bottle and draw.

Here are all the colors I made.

We used our doodle paint on cardstock.  The original directions suggested using poster board too.  I wasn't sure if the paint would dry, but the children painted last night while I was cooking supper, and this morning, they are dry.

Some of the finished products:

 by Sam

 by Leah

 enjoying the painting

by Leah

 by Sam

by Leah

I am not sure how long this paint should be stored, so I am going to encourage my children to doodle with it for the next few days.

5 Days of Christmas Gifts Kids Can Make

Today I shared my post about the Domino Christmas Ornaments at The Homeschool Classroom.  The children and I made these cute and easy ornaments last year.  The Homeschool Classroom is featuring gifts that your children can make all this week.  Be sure to check out their site each day for fun ideas.

Olivia and Julie are hosting a Christmas Tea Party this afternoon for Leah and her friends.  This tea party is part of their Home Ec curriculum.  They have planned and prepared the entire party.  I will post pictures and details hopefully tomorrow!

Make Something Fun for July the 4th

Sam, modeling the Patriotic crafts

I have a post over at The Homeschool Classroom that includes instructions for making the headband and wand that Sam is displaying.  I recently helped my 21 five and six year old campers construct these!  They really are fun to make and even more fun to wear!

Please visit The Homeschool Classroom for complete instructions.

Kool Aid Playdough

I have been trying to do at least one "art or craftsy" thing with Leah and Sam each week. Of course all five of the children want to participate, and that is fine! This week, we made homemade Kool Aid Playdough.

Here is the recipe:

1 cup all purpose flour

1/2 cup salt

2 Tbs. oil

1 package unsweetened Kool Aid

1 cup boiling water.

Mix all ingredients except the water in a bowl. I made three batches: one red, one blue, and one yellow. I bought lemonade Kool Aid for the yellow, but it turned out to be a yukky color. So we added a package of orange. Microwave the 1 cup water until it is boiling, and then add it to the mixture. Stir until combined, and then knead it as soon as it is cool enough to do so. This dough is not sticky, and is really easy to knead.

The Red

The Yellow

The Blue

Julie divided each color of dough into five balls, one ball for each child.

Each child got a ball of red, yellow, and blue.

Then they divided their balls into three smaller balls, and mixed red and yellow to make orange, red and blue to make purple, and yellow and blue to make green.

Leah with her dough

The finished product!

Colorful balls

A rainbow of colored playdough.

When the children were through playing, we put all of the balls of each color into separate zip-lock bags. I am not sure how long this playdough will last--but I plan to get it out a couple of times a week. The next time they play with it, I plan to give them cookie cutters.