Crafting by not a very crafty mum - Valentine's craft?

I've just come across Asia Citro. She has beautiful craft and sensory play ideas for children.

However, most the photos she seems to take involve nothing more than a towel protecting her white carpet from two paint splattered children.

Not in my house!

I believe strongly in messy play, but Little E can do that in nursery where they have wipe down floor, walls and ceiling!

Also, the few times I have made a big effort to get paint, etc, out, it's only interested Little E for a very short amount of time and then there is a big clear up session. It has been pretty exhausting for little gain.

However, I still want to do some of these types of activities, because I enjoy them even if Little E is not that bothered. I also want to have lots of ideas for each day I am alone with Little E. He is so much more fun now that he is a toddler, but sometimes a whole afternoon of trying to keep him entertained seems to loom in front of me. I wish I could explain it, but it actually makes me feel a bit scared. It probably stems from when he was tiny. He would be fussy and difficult in the afternoon and I'd feel overwhelmed with how alone and bored I felt. It wasn't unusual for Big E to come home and for me to simply hand Little E over, as I just couldn't bear it anymore.

This too shall pass...and it did. Big E most often comes home to a happy (if tired) mum and Little E.

I can't always be out and about, so having lots of craft ideas up my sleeve keeps me sane.

Asia Citro posted a blog with a link to all her "Valentine" ideas. Lots of cute heart activities. I came across one that sounded do-able with my limited skills, wouldn't wreck the house and would be fast to put together.

http://www.funathomewithkids.com/2014/01/easy-babytoddler-valentines-day-art.html

I get the feeling her kids are a little more artistic than my little guy, but we still made this:

My shopping list and how to:

Cereal box - cut up into two "frames" and then shapes cut out of the middle.

Sticky backed plastic - I always wondered what this stuff was! I think Asia calls it "contact paper". It's that plastic wrap stuff you used to cover your text books with. Cut out the desired amount. Stick to cereal boxes and done...you now have a sticky surface poking through your shape.

Stuff to decorate with - I got some glitter and feathers from Pen to Paper. I threw in some cotton wool balls I had lying around. Asia has a blog about sensory play with cotton wool, so I thought it would be a good idea.

I laid it all out in the sitting room with an old table cover on the floor. The only thing likely to get messy was the glitter, but  hoped I could just shake the cover out when we were done.

Little E came down from his nap and look very interested, but I think mainly in the bowls! At 16 months he loves pouring things and he immediately poured the glitter out of the bowl. Fortunately, some of it hit the sticky bits!

He then moved on to the feathers. Little E has been pretty fascinated by feathers in the park, so I thought he would enjoy them. He watched as I threw them in the air and then had a go himself. Essentially, our piece of art was made by accident by whatever happened to hit the heart on its way down.

However, he did enjoy sticking the cotton wool to the sticky backed plastic. At first he just enjoyed touching the wool. He stuck it to the plastic by accident and kept holding it up to me, as if to say, "Mum! It's sticky!" He seemed a little freaked out, but then began taking them off and sticking them back down again.

I don't think Little E played with this stuff for more than about 20 minutes. He wandered off, so I got the dust pan, brush and broom out. I didn't want him walking glitter everywhere. The nice thing was he then joined in with the tidying. He was giggling as he swept up. I sort of hoped that tidying up would be part of the fun.

I have kept the feathers out since. He has had some great fun throwing them around. I also tried showing him how some of the feathers were the same colours as the bowls and trying to make it I to a game, but I think he is still too young.

I was really pleased with this activity. It was easy, tidy and looks very effective hung up in our window. If you wanted even less mess, just don't use glitter. I think it will be a great craft idea to return to when he is older and even inspired me with some card ideas.

Crafting by not a very crafty mum - toddler bean bags

I saw this idea ages ago and only just got to try it out.

Little E loves throwing things. It's a bit of a problem when it happens to be a wooden block aimed at my face. He really doesn't know it will hurt! At least...I like to assume he doesn't.

So, we're always trying to help him learn about how to throw things nicely and turn it into games. A common phrase in our house at the moment is a panicked, "Only at my hands!" We hope he'll learn he is trying to throw it for someone to catch and not to break noses!

We were tidying some laundry away and Little E started throwing a cushion into the laundry basket. He was roaring with laughter, so I finally had the motivation to make him some bean bags.

This was a no-sew project I pinned ages ago. Someone had pointed out that baby socks filled with beans were the perfect size bean bags for a child.

So...I took some socks I had kept in reserve, filled them with dried chickpeas and tied a knot.

Five minutes later, voila!

Little E was suitably entertained!

The bean bags in all their glory!

Good to have these little things in reserve when mum and Big E are tired and need 5 minutes peace!

Crafting by not a very crafty mum - cardboard oven

Little E has begun to do something I would call symbolic play. Nursery have noticed him tucking toys into bed and he has begun to copy us - trying to brush his hair by himself and offering to feed us.

This opens up lots of exciting toy opportunities. We have a space in our living room, which would be a great spot for something like a toy kitchen.

Of course, I do my research first and was overwhelmed by the choices! Did we go for a toy kitchen, a work shop, a market stall, laundry room, etc, etc. We certainly don't have room for everything or for some of the luxury models which are kitchen and laundry room combined. You can buy cute table top versions, but where do we store all of this? What if he loves "doing the laundry", but not "the dishes"?

What we needed was to try lots of different options and then see what Little E grows into.

I was given a lovely book by a friend, "Entertaining and educating babies and toddlers" by Caroline Young. It has been a great source of inspiration since Little E was born. 

It suggested making a simple oven out of a cardboard box with a picture of what you might be able to achieve.

Now...according to Pinterest you can make anything out of a cardboard box, but first you always seem to need the right kind of cardboard box. I remember this always being a problem with craft projects as a child. You never had a yoghurt pot when you needed it!

So, I just grabbed the nearest box and had a go. Little E won't mind and if he starts to really like something, we can wait for that perfect box to come along and make him something properly.

Step 1: a box that used to contain wipes. Other brands are available!

Step 2: cut off the side flaps and wrap in brown paper.

Step 3: decorate like an oven and hob. We have a gas hob, so I tried to make it look like this.

Step 4: pop a few items in for him to "cook" with - so far I have scavenged a toy saucepan, a weaning spoon and fork, a plastic plate and a plastic cup.

I like it and I've got ideas for other things. So far, Little E likes banging the saucepan against it! I'm hoping he might take an opportunity to "feed" his teddy if the objects are at least around. If he starts playing with it, I will find a way to secure the "doors", so he can close the oven properly.

My hope is we can assess what he likes playing with and then buy him a smart one when he is older and doing a lot more of this sort of activity.

Crafting by not a very crafty mum - Christmas vests

A recurrent problem parents with older children have is, "Oh no, school want them to come in costume tomorrow!"

I thought we would be spared this for a few years, but no...Little E's nursery were having a Christmas party and the children were allowed to come in their favourite costume. Nursery kept reassuring us that they could dress Little E up if we didn't have anything...

Isn't it amazing, that you want to be laid back about these things, but that little voice inside your head starts saying, "What kind if mother are you? Your child doesn't even have a Christmas outfit for nursery!"

I did have some outfits for Little E, but they were for Christmas Day and there was a good chance anything he would wear at nursery would be filthy by the end of the day.

There are so many places to buy cute, cheap, festive outfits now, but I can't help feeling it is a waste of money for something that is probably going to be worn once.

So...I did this last minute.

I'd seen the phrase on serveral Christmas outfits for kids and stole it for my purposes!

Nursery were really lovely about the top. They had a face painter who then decorated him like a little Christmas pudding! I got lots of other positive comments from friends, which is always nice for me.

I think it goes to show how infrequently we make our own things now, which is a shame. I wonder, is it due to embarrassment? Are we worried our kids will be teased for their parents' shabby efforts? Luckily, Little E is too young to worry about this yet, but we shall certainly see what the future brings.

Until then, I will enjoy making him these simple things. I look back at my childhood and I did so much drawing and painting, until I hit my exams and I just didn't feel I had time for it anymore. I'm glad I can reclaim some of this back.

So...I made another one!

My learning points:

1) Place the design as high as possible. The writing on the Christmas pudding one tends to disappear under the waistband.

2) Fabric pens are definitely so much easier than the paint and gel pens I have used before, but still very tricky to write anything.

3) I tried to use an embroidery ring to tighten the fabric across and make it easier to draw, but I found pulling the vest over a cereal box easier.

I used these pens: 

And have a few more ideas for other vests. Needs to be something very simple that I can actually draw!

Crafting by not a very crafty mum - Christmas fun - scribbly snowflakes

At last! We are scribbling! This is something Little E has only just started doing at 14 months and I was so excited that I wanted to keep everything.

I see a lot of posts about creating memorable keepsakes with your little one. I think this is a bit odd. Isn't the best keepsake the spontaneous one that comes out of your little ones own imagination?

Also, have you tried? Most of the memorable keepsakes seem to involve perfect foot or handprints. These are then artfully decorated to become animals, etc, etc.

This will NEVER work with a one year old!

However, this does mean I am slowly collecting reams and reams of cute, but not very interesting scribbles.

I am now aware, I can't keep everything! However, I want to enjoy them for a while before I bin..I mean recycle them!

I like cutting out snowflakes to put up in our windows. I started doing it a few years ago, as I used to make tons as a kid and wanted to capture the magic again.

When I first started doing this, I just used to fold the paper up, cut out some bits and hang it up. Big E then said, "You know that snowflakes usually have radial 6-fold symmetry?" Er...no.

Big E then showed me how to fold my paper to create said symmetry and, I must admit, they started looking a lot more like snowflakes! Why had no one taught me this before?

So, I've been taking Little E's scribbles and turning them unto snowflakes for the windows. It's lovely to display them in a slightly different way over Christmas.

Here is what I do...

Step 1 - scribble!

Step 2- cut out a circle

Step 3 - fold in half

Step 4 - fold into sixths

Step 5 - cut your design

Step 6 - open!

Step 7 - display proudly!

Crafting by not a very crafty mum - Christmas thank you card

Our second Christmas with Little E has been and gone. Now for all those thank you cards...

Until Little E can write his own thank you cards, I will keep endeavouring to make creations for him.

At 14 months, we were finally scribbling! This has opened some easier (and less messy!) craft options.

Like this!

Getting Little E to scribble was becoming a real issue for me. It felt like all his little friends have been doing it for ages, while we were Ralph Wiggum at the back of the class eating our crayons. It's so hard not to compare your child to others, especially when all the books says they should be scribbling at 12 months. It didn't matter that Little E could walk by 11 months, throw a ball accurately and stack three cubes by 14 months, I was getting pretty paranoid about the lack of fine motor skills. I've seen lots of kids struggling with sensory processing problems and having to use specially designed writing tools to help them at school. I was already jumping 10 years ahead and wondering if this was the start of problems. Of course it's not, but I think most mums I know find it hard not to worry about the future.

So for months I'd been trying Little E on pencils and crayons with little success. He either nibbled on them or threw them around. At least he was having fun! I was pretty scared at the idea of giving him felt tips, but a friend suggested they are much easier for little kids to use.

So I bought these and they have been an instant success.

Unlike pencils and crayons, he doesn't need to press hard to make a mark. He was so excited and laughed to see the colours appear. They also wash out beautifully! Little E is very messy, so he had felt tip all over him, but it washed off him and his clothes with no effort.

I already had an idea for a card before we finally had scribbles to work with. I'd seen some cards on Pinterest, where you cut out holes in a top layer, so an image behind can appear through.

I thought it would be nice for Little E to "decorate" a Christmas tree for a thank you card. I bought the green card from the wonderful Pen to Paper in Headington (again) and set him to work.

I liked the idea of a simple shape of a Christmas tree, found a stencil online and cut it out. I placed it over the top of Little E's "drawing" and voila! I added the star, as it had some left over from another time and wrote the message underneath. Again, I took a photo and had this printed onto postcards.

Not bad.

So, that might be our last thank you card for a while! 12 months until Christmas and 9 months until his birthday. I'll go have a sit down and a cup of tea then. :)

Crafting by not a very crafty mum - thank you cards

Little E just turned one! We can't quite believe it.

Knowing we would need lots of thank you cards, I began to prepare. Again, what can you do sensibly with a 11 month old baby? It was going to have to be something finger painting related.

I'd seen lots of things were you mask out areas on a canvas, let your child loose and then reveal a design or message by removing the tape. I was pretty sure I could achieve this.

I got some advice online first. My plan was to put something on card, take a photo and then print copies on postcards via a service like Snapfish. People suggested using the best quality cardboard you could fine and the cheapest masking tape!

First stage: use you cheap masking tape to write your message.

Second stage: let your child loose with finger paints.

I was fortunate that early September was hot and beautiful, so I set things up outside. I was better prepared this time (see my blog about making a Father's Day t-shirt), but I still found the experience pretty stressful. Little E is on the move, so would play with the paint a bit and then try to crawl off. I struggled to find suitable finger paints, so we were using poster paints. Little E ate a lot and chewed the paint brushes! Trying to clear up with a clingy baby around your leg, was also difficult! I had to wait until nap time to really sort it out and frankly I needed a lie down by that point too!

However, I got some gorgeous photos at least and I was pleased with the final result.

Third stage: peel the tape away

I was very careful, but it still ripped a bit. Even cheaper masking tape next time?

Fourth stage: define the letters

As you can see, some do the letters aren't that visible, as Little E didn't manage to get that much paint in those areas. I decided to use a pen to draw round the letters. I needed to make sure it would show up when printed on a postcard.

Fifth stage: print onto a postcard.

We happen to use Snapfish, but use whatever service you like best. We were really pleased with the final result. Even clearer then we hoped.

Everyone is pretty impressed and it was a nice to write special thank you cards for a special birthday.