Crafts

Quick Mother’s Day Craft

sarah • May 9, 2014

Mother's Day is on Sunday. The Girl's 2nd birthday is the following Saturday. In searching for party stuff for her bug themed party, I ran across these cute hand print butterflies and decided I'd make them for the grandmothers for Mother's Day. We actually made three sets, so I can have one and it can be used to decorate for the party.

All in all this was fast and easy. I used washable tempera paint and a paintbrush to coat the hand/foot. I realized early on that I needed the kid to relax and let me move their limb (and it was much easier on a nearly 4 year old than a nearly 2 year old). Then during nap time I cut out all the hands and cut the bodies out of black construction paper. The Girl woke up before I was finished, so she supervised my gluing of the pieces and attachment of the pipe cleaner antennae. And she helped adhere the googly eyes.

Lots of smudges with The Girl's hands (in red) so we did a bunch of extras.

I'll label with back with the year and whose hands are whose. The Girl's are red and The Boy's are blue, but you could just as easily use two sets of the same kid's hands to make them.

I finished those yesterday, but I hadn't used the footprints yet so I was inspired to make a dragonfly with The Girl's footprints. More decorations for the bug themed birthday party in two weeks. (Maybe he needs googly eyes, too.) I plan to fashion a ladybug out of The Boy's red footprints.

We also had time this morning to make paper plate butterflies. Super easy for any age! We used the dot markers, but you could just as easily use paint, crayons, markers, stickers, etc. Once the plate was decorated I cut it in half using a wiggly line and glued it together. I think I'll include stuff to make these on the craft table for the party.

Quiet Book Fish Pages • 4 Comments

sarah • April 5, 2014

Quiet books are usually made of fabric (often felt) and filled with quiet activities for kids. They are easily transportable and can be used for kids when they need to be entertained quietly (like at church or the waiting room at the doctor's office) or just around the house. To see a million example, just search "quiet book" on Pinterest or Etsy. :-)

Completed project! I'm participating in a quiet book page swap with some other crafty moms in my area. I've always been intrigued by the idea of a quiet book, but with the endless number of projects in my queue, I hadn't started one myself yet. I'm glad I joined the swap as a way to force me to dive in. I've made 13 of these fishy pages for the exchange. The fish slide across the page on the ribbon. Once I get back my set of pages from the swap I'll share them with you.

Just a couple of the process pics to follow, though I didn't capture the entire process. The background page is 12" wide and 9" tall, then the waves were cut from the 9" direction of two other blues. I freehand cut them using my rotary trimmer.

You could pin them down, but honestly, I only pinned them like this on the first one, then I found it was just easy enough to hold it in place. I sewed from the top wave down, sewing the top and side edges of each piece before adding the next, and only sewing along the bottom edge on the last/lowest wave, along the bottom of the page.

As for the fish, I cut two of each color (using the awesome felt cutting tips by Patty), then I sewed along the top half, then slipped the 9" piece of 1/8" ribbon between the layers before carefully sewing the second half of the border. Then I attached the ribbon at the ends with some three-step zig zag stitching.

I'd say they took me about an hour a page.

Thanks for swimming by!

Tangled in Yellow Yarn: Rapunzel Hair Tutorial • 30 Comments

sarah • March 12, 2014

(P.S. Make it in white as an Elsa hair braid.)

In January, I started the process of helping my friend Monica prepare for her daughter's 4th birthday party that was a month out at the time. The theme was Tangled. I did my due diligence and watched the movie the weekend before.

The first project was to make Rapunzel hair for the girls (and my son, the only boy attending the party).

So armed with three large skeins of bright yellow yarn we got to work. Taking measurements on The Boy, we decided to go with seven-foot lengths, aiming to have a two foot braid in the back. After making the prototype we realized that braiding shrunk the length more than we anticipated. In round two we cut nine-foot lengths. It's also important not to stretch the yarn taut as you measure or it shrinks back up after cutting.

For the 4-year-olds we decided that 20 inches around their head was a good length. It has a little give if they are bigger and can be tied if need be to shorten up that part.

HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN RAPUNZEL HALO BRAID

MATERIALS

scissors
tape measure
yarn

For Rapunzel braids, use bright yellow.

To make 2 braids: Red Heart Super Saver Yarn, Bright Yellow, 364 yards
To make 4 braids: Red Heart Super Saver Jumbo Yarn, Bright Yellow, 744 yards
To make 6 braids: Bulk Buy: Red Heart Super Saver Yarn (3-Pack) Bright Yellow, 1092 yards total

For Elsa braids, use soft white.

To make 2 braids: Red Heart Super Saver Yarn, Soft White, 364 yards
To make 4 braids: Red Heart Super Saver Jumbo Yarn, Soft White, 744 yards
To make 6 braids: Bulk Buy: Red Heart Super Saver Yarn (3-Pack) Soft White, 1092 yards total

Step 1: Cut sixty pieces of yarn, each 9 feet (108 inches) long. Put them in one stack and find the center (4.5 feet from the end).

Step 2: Measure about 15 inches from the center of the lengths and temporarily tie off the yarn with a small piece of yarn.

Step 3: Split the yarn into three sections and braid toward the center point until you have 20 inches of braid. Tie off the end of the braided section. (If you notice that the two unbraided ends aren't the same length, then you can untie one tie to braid further in that direction so this 20-inch section is roughly in the middle.)

Step 4: Leaving the temporary ties at the ends of the middle braided section, make a loop with the braided part and join the two ends of the yarn to braid down in one fat braid.

Step 5: Tie off the end of the braid and trim up the loose ends if needed.

Step 6: Untie the temporary ties that originally held the ends of the center section of braid. Tie around the top of the large braided section. This tie can be adjusted to change the length of the part that goes around the head. It's also kinda stretchy.