Bottle Top Christmas Tree Art

I must admit to pinching this idea from Josephs(5) school, but it looked like so much fun through the window that Daniel (3.5) wanted a go too, and Joseph was more than happy to make another... Joseph told me at school that they had to stick the bottle tops to the (pre-cut) card in the pattern in the example. Then the next day, once dry, they got to decorate them.  

I'm really struggling to fit in crafts/activities after school, by the time we get home its almost time to cook/eat & then bath & bed. I've found that if I either set up the activity before I pick the boys up or at least have it all gathered & ready the night before (if I'm working) then we can fit it in straight after a snack. 

My Example

So before they got home I sorted through our bottle top collection (i was glad to use some up) for green/red milk bottle tops & some smaller ones in other colours. I did lay out some bottle tops on the card to show them (mainly Daniel) how he could make them look like a tree. 

Josephs Tree

Daniels Tree

I then let them loose with the glue to make their trees however they liked. Joseph really wanted to do the same as he had done in school, Daniel's was much more unique! Once they were happy with their tree shapes we used some of our sequins & Christmas craft stickers to decorate them. They both had lost of in creating this 3D effect tree & I then didn't feel guilty letting them crash in front of cbeebies whilst I cooked tea.

The finished trees...

I also would like to have a go at making a bottle top wreath using a paper plate but don't know if we will get around to it in time to write a blog post as we have still got many of our 20+ Pre-School Christmas Crafts on our to do list....

x Jo x

Zoo Small World - In a Cardboard Box

 

A couple of weeks ago our oven decided to break & keep tripping our electric. We ended up having McDonald's for tea that night & I started to panic about how i was going to cook the cakes & food for Joseph's party!

After a quote of at least £100 to fix it & with it being about 6-7 years old we opted to replace it. I can recommend AO.com for a very quick service ordering on the Saturday & having it delivered on the Sunday for only £9.99 extra! 

Anyway getting to the point... the oven came packed with a box top & bottom. One of which was got ripped when we opened it, but the other one was perfect. So I asked Daddy to keep it, que rolling of eyes & 'what do you wan that for'. He is of the opinion that my box & other junk collecting is getting out of hand! So  knew that I needed to use this one ASAP!

Daniel (3.5) & I decided that it would make a good Zoo, as we haven't had our animals out for a while now. Daniel decided that the water animals needed a pond in the middle & then we discussed what other animals would like to live together. I quickly drew the layout with a black permanent marker & used a green & blue to quickly colour it in. We then decided that it needed a entrance door so that people can visit. 

I've discovered that using a pumpkin carving knife like a saw works really well on cardboard & as ours isn't sharp I don't need to worry so much about doing it while the boys are around. It does however make more of a mess than scissors but is so much easier. 

Both boys have had lots of fun playing with this, though after being on the floor for a while its starting to get a bit battered. So it may well be in the recycle box this week, much to my husbands delight!

x Jo x

Blackpool Tower

When we herd about Tots 100's competition to win a family holiday to Blackpool, I was really excited as I've never been but always wanted to. So I explained to the boys that we needed to make a tower so we had a look at some pictures of Blackpool tower on goggle & this was our favourite. The boys really liked the colours. So we decided to make our tower using box's & then paint it to make it colourful.

As it was a nice day we took the painting outside, as it was a bit breezy we had to separate the tower in 2 so that it wouldn't blow over. This worked well as the boys had 1/2 a tower each.

Painting the tower proved a useful lesson in colour mixing, I don't know why but the ice cream tubs seamed to encourage this. It started out that Joseph mixed the blue with the yellow to make green, then after a little while I asked if they wanted to use some red, this then got mixed with the blue & made purple. After some time we ended up with all dark gray! Daniel was a little upset that all his nice colours had gone!

Once Joseph had finished Daniel started multi-tasking to get the job done!

 Once dry I dug out some fairy lights as a surprise for the boys! As it couldn't be Blackpool tower without lights! Yes we took it in the bathroom as its an internal room so is dark with the door closed.

I also took a little video of the lights, & the boys made up a song about the tower. Please excuse my baby brain (yes i still have it) for filming the wrong way around. And yes the tower does fall over at the end, if you ever need anything tall building like towers or road signs don't ask me!

This post is an entry into the Tots100/VisitBlackpool competition

x Jo x

Cardboard Box Storage

So I'm on a bit of a tidying & organising kick this year, I've not started let alone completed much yet however I thought I would share one small project that I have managed to do!

All of my Le Baby Bakery stock has had to live in our under stairs cupboard since we had Daniel, hes now 2.5 years old and I've never got round to organising this cupboard! Every time I need to choose the things to go in a nappy cake I end up taking nearly everything out spreading it all over the stairs & then having to put it all back! 

Before...

As I use a lot of nappies for my cakes & previously for the boys, I use a lot of Huggies boxes for storage. As I was taking these boxes in & out of the cupboard & searching for the contents, it occurred to me that it would be easier if i stood these boxes in their sides so that i could get things out & see things more easily. As I sorted through my large collection of Huggies boxes I had an idea to make something more permanent than a stack of boxes, a stack of boxes duck taped together!

Luckily I had several boxes that were the same width, I arranged these from tallest to shortest. And standing them on the floor (so the back would be flat) stuck them together using duck tape all the way round & back again. Once at the back & once towards the front. I then taped down the flaps of each box, which made this even more sturdy.

I then had the big task of taking everything out of the cupboard (hopefully for the last time) & then organising it in to the boxes. The top box has all my baby blankets, ready to use in nappy cakes, the next 2 hold all my fleece fabric for sewing. The second box up has several bags each containing all the things I need to make a cake, just add nappies, which are in the last box!

I'm really pleased how this quick & easy DIY project has transformed my cupboard, I even have floor space to walk in! I just need to find the time & motivation to organise the shelves on the left had side, which includes the rest of my fabric stash!

If you are looking for some organising tips & inspiration check out I Heart Organising, which is an amazing blog & they are focusing on home offices this month.

x Jo x

Christmas Round-Up

I just wanted to share a few pictures of our more recent Christmas activity's.

I changed out our Small World Box, to make a Christmas Sensory Box.

I first got this out for a play date with our friends little boy (2.5), they enjoyed finding 'treasure' the best of which was 3 chocolate Santa lolly pops! After a few minutes play did get a little rough though, snatching & swinging beads around etc. This also happened the second time we got this box out.

We had some fun making code trees. We re-used some cones that we had previously been used to make a rocket, I think they are from knitting machine yarn?

We painted them green, then once dry glued on sequins etc to decorate them. I really like these & will be putting them away to bring out next year.

We had a go at making mini ginger bread houses. We used the included icing to stick them together which held for about 2 minutes before falling apart. So after several failed attempts we settled with the pic we had and went on to eat them!

Next year I think I will go with a big kit & use melted sugar to stick it together the night before. Then let the boys decorate one side each.

We also made some mince pies, the boys love spooning the mince meat (I still find it a strange name given that it contains no meat) & cutting the pastry shapes out. Oh and they enjoy eating them as well!

On Christmas Eve I made the boys a 'Christmas lunch' using the cookie cutters that we bought for our salt dough decorations to cut out the sandwiches. This left quite a lot of waste sandwich so that was my lunch!

The boys received a lovely little tike's kitchen from Nanny, they actually had it a few days early while she was staying with us. We are so glad we didn't leave building it until Christmas Eve as it took 3 hours, even with an electric screwdriver!

The boys were very lucky as Daddy bought them a My 1st Scalextric which I think might have been more for him LOL

We had a fantastic Christmas, made all the better by all the other bloggers & pintrest giving us lots of ideas. I would like to wish you & your family's a very happy new year, may 2013 be kind to us all.

x Jo x

Tube Slide

I had a spare cardboard wrapping paper tube to hand (yes I have been wrapping already) & was wondering what it could be used for that wouldn't become a sward or hitting device! With 2 boys this is often the case, even though I have so far avoided buying anything sward or gun related, Joseph (4) has made a gun out of Duplo & started pointing it & shouting "kill kill kill"

Anyway... Daniel (2.5) is a fan of making slides from things either for himself or toys. He even quite often will stand his spoon against his breakfast bowl & say "made slide mummy". 

So I made him a slide for his toys by cutting up each side of a wrapping paper tube, then stapled them together to make it a double slide. I then attached it onto a table with some sticky tape - don't do this on your best table!

We found some figures (Duplo but others would work just as well), bob the builder & a fireman had lots of fun on the slide. I did try suggesting to Daniel that some small cars could use the slide but apparently it was a silly idea!

Daniel played with this for nearly 30 mins & then re-visited on and off throughout the afternoon, until Joseph came back from pre-school pulled it off & started to use it as a sward!

If you fancy making a ball run with your wrapping paper tubes take a look here a happy wanderer & if you cant resist making a sward take a look here ikat bag.

x Jo x