Meet Frank

I found a tutorial for this adorable mouse and when I showed it to L she just had to make it!

While I was doing another project she spent the afternoon felting up the head.  She felted the nose and eyes and I helped with the ears and tiny paw.  

L was thrilled to have this little guy as a new addition to her room.  A relatively simple needle felting project for a Sunday afternoon and so effective.

I you would like to try it yourself the tutorial is from Pip's Poppies.  While you're there take some time to check out her other amazing creations.  Truly inspiring.

Catching up-22 and 23 months

I openly admit that over the last couple of months I've totally been neglecting taking pictures of my children.  Yup I have been so busy taking a million and one pictures of my needle felting creations that I have forgotten all about my children.  Well almost.

Here are a couple pics of things LJ has been up to.

Playing with his Very Hungry Caterpillar story stones.  LJ loves to tell bits of the story with the stones and the one with all the food on he calls Saturday.  Too cute.

Table setting.  This is a favourite.  It's hard to see but I traced all of the items in the place setting with a black sharpie so LJ know where to put them.  

He then gets to take out his leek and pretend to eat it.  Too much fun!

Land and water.  I simply cut land and water shapes out of felt and put assorted animals in a box for LJ to sort.  He enjoys this but knows them too well.  He is such a joker that he loves to put the wrong animals in the water on purpose.

Of course decorating Easter eggs.  He was so focussed on his work!

Not a lot documented.  We've been playing with a lot of new "toys".  I was lucky enough to do a toy swap with Sweetpea's mom.  She has some really cool things.  I will try and take some pictures of them for an upcoming post.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar Story Stones

We had such a great time with the Brown Bear story stones I made that when I saw these Very Hungry Caterpillar stones at Thrive 360 Living I knew they had to be my next project.

I made a small version for a birthday boy who was turning two.  They were such a success and LJ was so interested in them that I made a larger version for him.

I bought a wooden box from the Dollar store to keep them in.  At first I was going to paint a caterpillar on the outside of the box but then I realized I'm too cheap and would rather recycle the box for something else once we're done with these!

We love the Very Hungry Caterpillar book by Eric Carle so LJ was really into reenacting the story.

The front of the stones make up the green caterpillar and if you put them in order you can turn each one over as you tell the story to see what he eats.  Sooo much fun!

When the kids start getting owly.....

When the kids start getting owly.....give them an owl craft!

It's spring break for us here so L is home.  Yippee!  For two days last week I was also looking after two other children.  A 3 year old girl and a 6 year old boy both from L's school.

It was so much fun and I'd planned many crafts for them to do.

One of them was this owl craft.  I found the idea on Pintrest but can't seem to find the original link.

This is so simple to do and once I showed L (6) how to do it she could whip them off all by herself in no time.

What you need is some air drying clay.

Roll some into a small ball and flatten it into a pancake.

We did ours on wax paper.

Then take the top of a marker or straw and use it to make half circles on the bottom half of your clay pancake.

Then fold over both sides of the pancake for the wings.

Fold the top of the pancake over for the head and pinch the tips if you want more pointy ears.

Use the marker lid again to make two eyes.  We used the inside part of a pen for the smaller inner circles.  We used a knife to make the triangle nose.

There you have it the easiest, adorable little owls.

We let them dry over night and then the children painted them.  Even LJ painted my prototype!

Once the paint was dry I covered them in a layer of Modge Podge and glued magnets on the backs.

Perfectly adorable additions to our fridge!

On the shelves-19 months

 I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season.  It was very busy at our house with lots of family visiting and fun was had by all.  

I did manage to get a few works on the shelves for LJ in December.

Melissa and Doug pattern blocks. 

 I got these off of the used children's items site I belong to for a very reasonable price.  They come in a wooden box with several different wooden frames.  I just take out one at a time which has pictures on both sides.  I put it along with the shapes it needs into a basket for LJ to do.  

 Mystery Bag

Although we have been using the mystery bag for exploration for a while now we have only just started using it for stereognostic recognition.  I put an assortment of known objects into  the bag.  LJ pulls them out and names them.  He then puts them back into the bag and I ask him if he can find a certain one without looking.  He enjoys playing this game and is usually successful.

Putting Cheerios into a pill container.  

I bought a seven day pill sorter for my pills and vitamins but before I put it to use I gave it to LJ to sort Cheerios into.  He had great fun opening the sections to get the Cheerios in and out.

We even managed some Christmas themed activities.

Here is a Christmas mystery stocking with a tiny snowman, red ribbon, needle felted Christmas tree and several candy canes.  

Pushing colored pompoms through the correct hole and then retrieving them from inside the shoe box.  LJ was pretty random on when he chose to match the colors.

We did several Christmas crafts together but this one worked the best with both children.  Simply gluing tiny pompoms onto a pine cone to make Christmas trees.

 They both enjoyed this activity and they turned out nicely!

Brown Bear Brown Bear-Toddler Story Stones

"Brown Bear, Brown Bear what do you see?"

We love this book by Bill Martin Jr., illustrated by Eric Carle

 

I thought it would be fun to make up some story stones for LJ and L to play with.  It's been years since I made these Enormous Turnip story stones for L.

This was one of those projects that sounded fantastic at the time but after about the fourth animal I was seriously wondering what was going through my head.  Anyhow I pushed through and now we have these cute story stones to go alone with the book.

 

 

For those of you who are interested in making your own story stones I just used regular acrylic craft paint and then covered them with a layer of Modge Podge.

Magazine bead necklaces-the perfect gift!

L was invited to a friends birthday a few weeks ago and we were trying to think of a present we could make.  We came up with these beads made of magazines.

Super easy to make we just cut long triangles from different pages from a magazine, rolled them tightly around a wooden skewer and glued the ends.  It took L a couple of tries to get them right and then she was a bead making machine!

 After the beads were finished I covered them in Modge Podge to make them sturdier and give them a bit of a glossy look.  We left them on toothpicks and let them dry in the sun.

L found a necklace shell on the beach with a hole in the top and threaded the beads onto some cord.

 Here is L modelling the finished product.  We also made one for her auntie's birthday and are hoping to make matching ones for ourselves.  We have been combing the beach for more necklace shells.

Salt dough handprints

We finally got around to making salt dough hand prints.  I have to say this was much easier than baking!  I quickly mixed up the dough using 1 cup flour, 1 cup salt and about 1/2 cup water and then let the littles play with it.  Baby J seems to love salt and kept trying to eat the dough.  Sweetpea had more sense and after one taste she concentrated on other things.

 

 

 Having the baking treasure basket on the shelves has really made a difference since the last time we baked.  Sweetpea can now use the rolling pin properly after repeated experimentation on the carpet!

 

 "Oh look there's our hand prints cooking!"

 

The final product.  Super cute!

Some of our Christmas/Advent crafts and activities

The last couple of years I documented every day of our advent activities but I've found this year I just simply don't have the time!  Instead I've decided to just record some of our favourite crafts and activities.

On the first day of December L started off her advent calendar with a bang.  I was super excited to finally be able to take her to the Nutcracker Ballet this year.  I've wanted to take her for ages but it was just way too expensive for us.  This year a local dance school put on the whole production with professional dancers in the lead rolls.  It was spectacular and also fit our budget.  L didn't move for the whole thing and her eyes were glued to the stage taking it all in!  A definite early highlight.

 

We've also been crafting up a storm.  I wanted to make special ornaments for L and Baby J this year and found this adorable one for Baby J on the website Atelier Pippilotta.  She makes the cutest things!  I just love how it turned out.  So soft and gentle yet still masculine.  Perfect for baby's first Christmas.

 

 We've also been making a ton of these cute felt Christmas trees.  I found the idea from on Julia Crossland Art.  She uses thick felt but we just used cheap felt from the Dollar store and double up each color.  Now that L has learnt to sew they make the perfect presents for teachers and family from her.  We have a little Christmas tree assembly line going!

 Our Christmas nature scene.  This year we decided to add some gnomes and some cute little wooden penguins that Santa brought me last year.  L's favourite part is skating the skater around the tin foil pond and making marks on the "ice".

 Another advent activity was to make some Christmas art for Baby J's room.  We recycled the black and white star canvases and painted them with red and green.  L did the red one and I did the green one.  We just glued colored strips of construction paper onto the canvass and then put some jewel sticker on for ornaments.  I love how simple yet effective they are.  I found the idea on Pintrest somewhere but I'm afraid the reference got lost in the Pintrest black hole!  If this was your original idea please let me know and I will credit you!!

 

L also received How The Grinch Stole Christmas one day for her advent calendar and she loves it.  She loves having different people read it to her and reading it herself!

 

Another advent activity was to decorate the gnome home for Christmas this year.  I will have pictures soon!

Dancers Mobile

The next mobile in the Montessori Infant mobile series is the Dancers mobile.  I was originally going to just eyeball all of the dancers and draw them myself but then I found a pattern and instructions here.  It made life a whole lot easier!

You are meant to use holographic paper for the dancers.  I used different coloured gift bags from the Dollar Store.  The whole thing cost $2!  I have to say it was a pain in the neck trying to hang and tie all of the pieces with the invisible thread but totally worth it in the end.

 

I introduced this mobile around three months and once again the little guy totally loved it!

 

At four months he's still enchanted by it.  Although there is another mobile in the series called the Flowing Rhythm mobile I think I'm going to call it a day!



Solar System Part 3

We finished the solar system unit quite a while ago now but I only just got around to taking pictures of our last two projects.

The first is an Our Solar System book which L made using her library books and three part cards.  She made this after we'd finished all the other activities so the information was fresh in her mind.  She drew a picture of each planet on one page and wrote a few facts on the other.

 The piece de resistance!! Our solar system mobile.  We used different sizes of Styrofoam balls and painted them with a mixture of acrylic paint and Modge Podge.  This project was so fun until it came to hanging the planets.  That's when I sat with invisible thread, a needle and bunch of planets cursing the day I decided we should do the mobile.  L had long moved on to something else!  Well finally I finished it and I think the result was worth it.  We hung it above our kitchen table for a few weeks so we could observe it while we ate!

Infant Puzzle Ball and other bits....

After a long break I'm hopefully finally back.  I'm finally starting to feel human again after two weeks of solid coughing.  Poor L is on spring break and I've been completely useless.

Anyhow here is my first "baby stuff" post.  How exciting.  First off I have to mention one of my new favourite blogs.  Little Red Farm has been such a wealth of information and inspiration with tons of tutorials.  If you have an infant or toddler be sure to check it out.

The first baby project my mom and I made were these Montessori infant puzzle balls.  Not only are they cool to look at but have little hand holds for the baby to grasp.  We used the tutorials from Little Red Farm and The Secret of Childhood.

I have to say I do not sew and would never have attempted these without the help of my mother but they are fun to make and the results are stunning.

We also made this little ribbon blanket.  The ribbons are all different textures and the blanket is made out of lovely soft fleece.  So super easy to make.  I cut out all the ribbon pieces and two squares of material and then my mom sewed it all together. 

With some left over fabric we made this much smaller little rattle for the baby to be able to grasp before the puzzle balls.  It is so light and perfect for a tiny hand to grasp.  I also put a bell in one end.