Art Projects

Little Man and I don't do many crafts anymore.  We just don't have the time.  He's at school for six hours a day.  He naps for an hour.  (Yes, he STILL naps!).  Depending on the day, we do an hour of our own "workbook" time--which is more like learning time, but we call it "workbooks".  He also has Tae Kwon Do twice a week, gymnastics once a week, and soccer practice once a week.  Any time we have left is his "free time" to play what he wants or watch TV.  These days it's mostly play.

So when he brought some art projects home from school that I thought were sort of cute, I thought I'd share.  (Please ignore my fingers.  I was covering his name.)

As much as I don't like cats, I think this project with the yarn is pretty cute.

Father's Day Craft #2

For G, Little Man and I made a stepping stone.  This has been a project that has been in my back pocket of crafts for literally years.  I've just always come up with something different each time, so I've never had to rely on my reserves.  This year it was time to pull out the reserves. :)

Thankfully, Michaels had them on sale.

I got this box for $8.

I bought a beach bucket for a dollar to mix the cement.  Then I just threw it away when we were done.  I didn't want to risk clogging drains, nor did I want to spend the time to clean it out.  The kit came with the cement, pieces of glass, tray to set it up in, and mixing stick.

You are suppose to pour the cement in a bucket and mix with a cup of water.  Stir until mixed, and then pour into plastic mold.

Apparently I added too much water, because ours was really soupy.  Oops.
It said if it was hot you may need to add more... it was hot!

The tiles started sinking!
I left it outside in the heat... hoping that would help.
(Still wet)

After a day of drying (it's suppose to take 48 hours)

The directions said the tiles could be cleaned off with soap and water, so this is after I cleaned it.  Some of them had more cement on them. :(  Oh well... what can you do?!  It says "# 1 DAD" in case you couldn't read it.

Honestly, at this point we are doing good just to have a Father's Day gift for G! :)

List o' fun--Painting Pottery

There are paint your own pottery places in almost every city.  They are fun for both kids and adults alike.  Since K's birthday was coming up, I figured I'd take Little Man to paint her something.  It gave us something to do one of those evenings that I was having to stay the night.  He loves to paint, so I thought it would be a perfect fit.

After realizing that I was not going to let him paint a dinosaur for his mom's birthday, he quickly decided on a set of coasters.

He was really into it at first

After he painted the bases he was pretty much ready to go.  He just wanted to get home and play. :(

The lady came over and showed us our options for decorating.  There were these fine point bottles to use, stencils, stamps, and variety of brushes.  He really really wanted to use the fine point bottle.

He drew a picture of him and mommy.

It turned out to not be as easy as he thought it was going to be.

I'll be honest, I was losing my patience a little.  He tends to have a one track mind sometimes and I'm not sure this was the best choice for us to do.  If you do this with your child, make sure you go into it with an open mind and little expectation.  Also, it's best to let them paint something they like and let it look how they want it to look then to go for the gift idea.  That way there is less pressure!

Finally after some banter back and forth he decided on some stamps and stencils

We had to leave them there for a week.  Here's the finished product:

The drawing of Little Man and Mommy

A flower stamp (that apparently had too much paint on it)

A heart stamp--then I suggested adding a border around the EDGE...this is what we got!

Star stencils

Lots of these places have "Mommy and Me" events or other special days where you can come in and do something with your little one at a discounted rate.  There was a place right by his house in Ohio, but we never made it to the Mommy and Me sessions because of scheduling conflicts.  It's worth checking out.

The session fee at our place was $6 for kids.  This included all the paint and supplies you needed and did not have a time limit (some go by the hour).  Then you just have to pay for the piece of pottery you choose.  The set of 4 coasters with wire rim holder was $20.  Not bad for a birthday gift for mommy.

A Gift for Daddy--Painted Hammer

I have no idea what is happening with blogger.  It went down sometime Thursday afternoon, and I wasn't able to access it until yesterday afternoon.  Some blogs are missing completely.  I usually have some scheduled to post up to a week in advance.  I had moved some around the other night and now they are back to their original dates.  If and when they get this fixed, this blog could end up with all sorts of crazy (possibly empty) posts.  Hopefully they'll get it together soon!

Anyway, G's birthday was this week, so Little Man and I set out to make him a present.  When I started working with Little Man almost 3 years ago, I sort of set myself up for this.  We made crafts for everything and everybody--grandparent's day, mommy's birthday, daddy's birthday, nana's birthday, papa's birthday, mother's day, father's day, Christmas...  So now I feel obligated to do something sort of handmade every time one of these events rolls around.

To me, it's harder to do for a dad than a mom.  Maybe it's just how I perceive G.  I know K is going to love anything--scribbles included.  I try to make the gifts for G something that he would appreciate.  Since you can't really google daddy birthday crafts, I just looked up Father's Day gift ideas.  I came across our idea here.

I picked Little Man up from school and we headed of to Lowe's to buy a hammer.  It was $5.  I've read that you can get them at a dollar store, but I wasn't trying to go that cheap. :)  Little Man was so excited.

I skipped the part in the directions where it said to sand it.  I figured it would work out alright.  So while Little Man ate his lunch, I primed with with (sorta) white paint to help speed up the process.

The directions also said you had to do one side at a time.  Wrong.  Who has time for that?  I just stood it on it's end and it dried just fine.

I showed LM the example of what we were doing, thinking a visual would help.  I'm not sure if it did or not, but it was his project and he was proud.

We had to let the paint dry while he napped.

Then we added a few more layers and used a paint pen.

I found this saying online and we made a card

I got an email saying Thank You and that G loved it.  Little Man has already informed me that mommy's birthday is in two weeks and we need to make sure we have something for her! :)  He loves this kind of stuff.

Yee Haw!

Olivia got her first pair of "cowboy boots" from Little Man this week! :)

He got a pair himself, so he was sooooooooo excited to give these to her.

(He was upset when there was a misunderstanding and he thought his dad had already given them to me.)

They are for a 6 to 9 month old.

He said something about her walking in them, and then was very confused when I explained she would not be walking in them.  That led to a whole conversation about babies not walking. :)

He then stated that I should swallow them so she could put them on.  Oh dear!

More Little Man and Olivia hilarity

I've already told you that Little Man is super excited about the arrival of Olivia.  He is always asking me questions, telling me things I should do, and talking to my belly.  Here are some more funny conversations for you.

Backstory: One day, while driving in the car, we discussed that Olivia will soon be joining him in the back seat.  I explained to him that she will be facing him, so he'll have to help me watch her.  He was pleased with that.  He also likes that she will be dropping him off at school and picking him up.

A few days later we were sitting around watching TV and he said, "I love you".  After a pause he said, "but not as much as I love mommy".  I told him that's how it should be.  He can love lots of people, but he should love his mommy and daddy the most.  Then I said, "Just like Olivia will love me the most because I am her mommy".  That led us to a circle of who loves who and how much.  A half hour later he said, "You know Bethany, I think Olivia might love me more than she loves you.  I know you are her mommy, but I have curly hair." Ha ha!

He followed that up "I think Olivia is going to think I'm her daddy".  Before I could even get a word out of my mouth, he emphatically said, "I KNOW Michael is her daddy, but I think she might think I'm her daddy.  You are going to watch her when she is home and I'm going to watch her in the car, so she might think that I'm her daddy". LOL!

Alphie the Robot

Little Man turned 5 on Monday.  I can't believe it.  I love looking back at old pictures and videos of him.  He's changed and grown so much!  So of course I had to get him a birthday present.  He has more toys than any child could ever possibly play with.  I knew I did not want to get him any more Star Wars toys.  I also knew that he would be getting a ton of dinosuar things since it's his new kick.  I can't really not get him a toy.  First of all, he has tons of clothes too.  Second, what else would I get a five year old?  So I always resort to getting something that is educational.  Let's be honest--I pretty much do that with all kids gifts, whether they have "everything" or not.  It's the teacher in me.  Plus, everyone else likes to buy all the fun/cutesy/popular toys.  So while wandering the aisles of Target, I stumbled upon this.......

It's Alphie!!

Do you remember Alphie?  He was around when I was little!

He looked more like this

I can't remember if I had one, or if I just played with ones my cousins had (Sonja? Melissa? remember?), but I definitely remember playing with him.  I also remember thinking it was super cool.  (Of course, a talking light up robot was a little more unique 25 years ago, but still.)

Michael was shopping with me and he thought it was pretty cool too.  So that's what we got.... along with a book about dinosaurs.  Michael said something about hoping LM likes it or hoping he plays with it.  I said, "I'm the nanny.  I will make him play with it!"  I thought that the fact it was a robot was on our side, but it's true...it's no star wars toy or dinosaur.

We went bowling on Saturday night and had a little mini party for LM, so he opened it then.  He was way more into his dinosaur toy from the TV show Dinosaur Train.  However, I came into work on Monday morning and saw Alphie was out of the box and on the table.  I told Little Man he'd have to show me how it worked.  G said he played with it all day Sunday.  Yay!  Educational toys can still win! :)

I highly recommend you getting this for a little one--either your own, or as a gift.  I paid $40 at Target.  I'm not sure if you can get it cheaper online or not.  Also, they have card booster packs for $10 each.  It comes with the robot, cards that are easily stored in the back, and batteries.  It says ages 3 and up.  Some of the stuff is a little easy for Little Man, but others aren't.  I also like that some of the things that he already knows are asked in a different way than he is use to (hello standardized testing!?!).  It makes him think about it!  I would say this is ideal for children ages 3 to 5--before Kindergarten.  It depends on the kid though.  A smart 2 year old could catch on to some of things, where as a slower learning 5 or 6 year old could still benefit from it.  The booster packs may be harder too.  I'm not sure.  One is specifically about letters and one is specifically about numbers.

Things the box says the cards can teach:

letter-sound recognition
phonemic awareness
print awareness
letter shapes
helping with numeral and shape recognition
working with patterns
matching and sorting
spacial reasoning
introducing multiple-step thinking patterns
cause and effect
compare and contrast
categorization
introduction to music
vocabulary development
color recognition
directionality

Reindeer Platter

Well, I guess I can tell you now... the reason I have been missing blogs lots of days, and have hardly done any crafts is because of the baby.  I have been worn out and tired most nights and just not in the mood to blog.  Also, the baby has seemed to zap all creative juices right out of me--at least for now.  I have no desire to craft and can't come up with something crafty to do for the life of me.

But... for the sake of Nana and Papa and all things Christmas, I (sort of) pulled something out.  (With some help and inspiration from my friend Laurie!)  Here is Little Man's Christmas gift to Nana and Papa.

I bought a $3 tray from Hobby Lobby

These are the other supplies I used

I went ahead and painted it.  I did it for three reasons... I wanted to save time.  I knew it might get a little complicated.  Lastly, I wanted an even cover so the rest of the project would work.  Call me a cheat.  I don't care.  I'm glad I did, because it was a little complicated.  I gave it two coats.  I maybe could have used a third, but I was ready to move on! :)

First I painted one of Little Man's feet (minus the toes) and put it down.  Then I painted both of the hands to make the antlers.

After it dried we added the details

I wrote Merry Christmas with a paint pen

(sorry, didn't realize when I took it that it was blurry)

When I bought this ribbon to put it on, A) I thought it would go under the face, but I ran out of room, and B) I wasn't planning on keeping the boarder of the tray the red that it was.  It sort of blends in, but is still cute.

I guess I could have got smaller red pom poms.  Apparently I thought Little Man's foot was going to be bigger? :)

That's OK.  Nana and Papa will love it!

Nativity gift

It is my humble opinion that you cannot have too many nativities at Christmas time.  After all, it's the reason for the season, right?  So this year when it came to making K & G a Christmas gift from Little Man, that is exactly what we did.  I have so much going on right now, that crafting is literally the last thing on my mind.  I feel so uninspired.  My friend Laurie and I went walking the aisle of Hobby Lobby to look for ideas and came across a cute nativity that you paint yourself.  We loved it.  I think it's one of those things that moms and dads (or grandparents) could set up for many Christmases to come.

I forgot to take a picture before I took it out of the plastic, but this is basically all that was on it anyway.

It's a 12 piece set, and we purchased it for 50% off.

I was sort of dreading the painting process.  I felt like it might take days and Little Man would tire of it.  I was wrong!  He LOVED it, and went to town painting it.  We knocked it out in about an hour and a half.

It came with the stable

and 11 little pieces

We started with the stable, because I thought it was going to take us a while.  It really didn't take us too long at all.  Little Man was sooo into it!

Then we moved on to the people and animals 

(He just had to do the animals first... then baby Jesus!)

I did do the faces... mostly just to save time, but also because they were sort of small.  I also did some of the beards.  (Although, I missed Joseph and he now has a blue beard!)

The finished product!

I did fill in some spots here and there, but for the most part I left it.  It's not as detailed or colorful as some others might do, but it's very Little Man and that's the point.

The angel

The shepherd (with one green eye!), the sheep and the donkey

Mary, blue-bearded Joseph, and baby Jesus

One wiseman and a cow

The other two wisemen

Then, when it's time to store it, all the little pieces go inside!

I hope it's something they treasure for years to come!