Fish Craft

FUN FISH FROM OUR 2nd CRAFT CLASS


At our second craft class we made these fun fish. I loved that all the kids chose their favorite color and then preceded to decorate them however they wished. Out of 11 projects there were no two that were alike other than the shape.

To make the craft I free handed the basic form of the fish. I then traced it on various colored construction paper. The kids then cut them out, tweaking the lines a little if they wanted them bigger or smaller. They then added google eyes, streamers for the tail (we cut the streamers in half as otherwise I thought they looked to big). They used construction paper to make triangle shapes for fins, circles on the fish etc. They also used shiny paper and sequins to decorate. It was a simple fun craft that all ages had fun with.


What I love about this kind of project is that it can be a supplemental activity to go along with a great field trip. I love taking my kids to a pond, a pet store, or even the aquarium and then following it up with this type of craft at home. You can also serve a fun snack or dinner. Fish Sticks, goldfish crackers, and gummi fish are just a few ideas. If you have a little one at home try reading stories about fish, talk about the letter F, and then even practice writing the letter F or the word FISH. It makes for a fun and educational day.

Paper Bag USA.. day 1 craft class

A friend of mine is sending her kids to my house for crafts each week. She knows I love crafts, making projects with kids etc etc. I told her I would love to do it as long as she knew it was NOT an ART class. Something about the word ART scares me to death. I am NOT an art teacher nor do I know about all the different artists, history of art etc etc.

Crafts in my opinion are way different. I love to show the kids an idea that most of the time I get from somewhere else. (Family Fun, craft magazine, art book etc.) I then let them use their imagination to create a project all their own based on what they saw of the example. I don't mind the mess, enjoy seeing what they come up with and I love watching them have fun.

Project 1.... Paper Bag USA

This craft came from an old Family Fun craft book.

Materials needed

Lunch size paper bags.. brown and white.
Construction paper
Scissors
Glue
Stickers
Glitter glue
Crayons or markers

For each building you will need two paper bags. Decorate the first paper bag as your building. The possibilities are endless on the things you can do. Draw bricks, windows, flowers, make awnings, roofs, etc, Add in a flag, chimney using cotton balls as smoke etc. I think using a combination of materials makes the buildings more fun and gives them an extra special look. You will then stuff your other paper bag with newspaper. Place the first paper bag over top of the stuffed one. This is your basic building. It can be shortened by cutting both bags down. Made wider by laying it on its side.

Once all of the buildings are constructed set them up on a table to resemble a town. You can add in cars, people, etc.

Store ideas:
Hotel
Game store
Candy shop
Doughnut shop
Hospital
Police
Fire
Post Office
Library
Book Store
Pet Store
Gas Station
Music Store

This is a fun craft for ages 4-5 and up.

Perler Beads

Perler Bead Kits.. $12 or so at Michaels with a coupon around $8
Some of the FUN creations the Greeneteam has made in the past few weeks.

I am sure these have been around forever. However, they are new to us so I thought I would blog about them. When we went to Texas in November my niece and nephew had a carton of these. All of the kids ages 4-12 had a great time creating designs. If I was to tell the truth I sat down and made several myself. FUN!!

The kits run around $12 at Michaels. I have gotten them on sale using a 40% off coupon for around $8. Such a good deal. Each kit comes with 8500 beads, 3 or 4 shapes, a sheet of designs, and some wax paper. I think each kit can make over 30 crafts.

To make the craft you simply put the beads on the small points on the form. Once it is all filled in an adult takes a piece of wax paper and an iron and goes over the design melting it or fusing it together. The hardest part is making sure you don't knock over the design. If you do your beads scatter everywhere and you sadly begin again.

I thought it would be cute to have them as magnets so I hot glued a magnet on the back. I love that my refrigerator is now an art board. All of my kids..boys and girls are having a GREAT time making them. For the money I think it is an excellent craft with tons of potential for artistic expression!!

Our First Gingerbread House

Today the Greeneteam and I attempted to decorate our first Gingerbread House! We bought one of the premade store kits. We created our own design based on some of the inspiration we had seen at The Grove Park Inn.

The kids had fun for about an hour. Eating candy, competing on sides, decorating the roof. Lots of fun.. Then they got bored!! A little bit of a bummer for me as I ended up completing the outside yard area of the gingerbread house alone! I really thought that at least Makenna would hang in for the long haul. Oh well maybe next year.

I loved the premade kit just for the ease of it. Simple, boom bang done. We sat the plastic on a much larger piece of foil for the overall yard area. We used the boxed candy that came in the kit but added a lot of our own. We also made two batches of Royal icing.

Some of the extra items we used were large spice drops, candy canes, mini marshmallows, peppermints, fruit loops, cookie cereal, puffed wheat cereal, powdered sugar, and sprinkles.

Such a fun project!! We will definitely add this to our list of fun things to do and maybe just maybe in a few years we will enter one of our creations in the competition at the Grove Park Inn.

The Greeneteam with their first Gingerbread Creation Ever!! Watch out Grove Park Nationals!

Apple Sauce &Cinnamon Ornaments

Making Cinnamon and Applesauce Gingerbread Decorations has been a tradition at our house for the last 6 years. It was one of the first ornaments I started making with the kids. I remember once Makenna opening a saved Cinnamon ornament from the year before. She breathed in deep and said.."Ahhh that is the smell of Christmas". I love that they only require two ingredients and I love the smell of my house while we are making them.

Ingredients: 1/2 cup cinnamon and 1/2 cup applesauce.

Mix together to form dough. Sprinkle extra cinnamon on the rolling pin and cutting board. Cut your shapes out, make a hole with a straw at the top of the shape for hanging. Bake for 45min to an hour on 275 degrees. Let cool and then decorate with glitter glue, and sequins.

The Greeneteam prepped and ready to make ornaments!!

If I could be Oprah for a day!!

How many of us have seen the Oprah Show where she gives away her favorite things? Oh to be in the audience for one of those shows!! I can only imagine how much fun it is to be her during those give away episodes!! Just to see the look on everyones faces as she keeps bringing out new things. FUN!!



Well, if I could be Oprah for a day; one of my favorite things to give away at Christmas would be a copy of The Twelve Blessings of Christmas by T.J. Mills. I happened upon this book at a garage sale one day with the intent on giving it away as a door prize at MOPS. Just before giving it away I decided to read it first. You guessed it.. I kept it for myself.



I absolutely love it. I love getting it out every year at Christmas and just reading about the 12 different Blessings. It remindes me every year to be thankful. It is filled with wonderful Crafts, Recipes and reminders as to how we can be blessings at Christmas. It also focus's on traditional things to do with your family. I love that!!



If I could be Oprah for a day and send it to all my friends I would. I figure the next best thing to that is to share what a wonderful treasure of a book it is. So to each of you I would say order this book and if you are able buy an extra copy and share it with a friend. Merry Christmas!!

"THANKSGIVING IN A BAG"

This year my small group in our Home school Club was in charge of the Thanksgiving Feast. My idea for a coordinating service project was to create and then donate

"THANKSGIVING IN A BAG".

I had seen a similar idea from my friend Jennie a few years back. She had friends bring items for a Birthday bag. Cake mix, candles, plates, napkins, icing etc. The kids then decorated the bags, filled it with the Birthday party items and her kids took them to the local food shelter. I loved the idea and have had it in the back of my head since.

I got on a local food site to see what items were needed for their food pantry. Most of them were Thanksgiving oriented. (see Makenna's list below) I then posted the list to my home school group and asked them to bring what they could to our feast.

When I initially started this project I planned to go and buy all the foods on the list. However, during prep of the paper bags and sample bags Makenna said something that made me think maybe the kids should just go door to door collecting for our HS food drive.

I am so glad that we did the door to door collecting. The kids loved asking for donations. They ran around the neighborhood for over 2 hours. When they would get a can of food they would give me the thumbs up. When they were turned down they would give me a thumbs down, or shake their heads no. They all participated and in just a little over 2 hours had collected almost 45 cans of food.

Maddie was particularly excited after collecting several cans. I asked her why she was so happy and she replied..."Mama it just feels good to help other people"!!

Thats my girl.. Lesson learned!!

Our list for door to door collecting of foods!!In two hours the Greeneteam collected almost 45 cans!!
Our sample Thanksgiving bags.