Hand Print Towel

We recently made hand print towels to give as gifts.  You can read more at This Simple Home.

Homemade Statue of Liberty Costume

Since my daughter was three years old and we read The Statue of Liberty she has loved the Statue of Liberty.  Earlier this year we visited family in NYC, and saw her for ourselves, too.

It was fun and easy to make the Statue of Liberty costume for Halloween this year.  To make one for yourself, you will need just a few items.

2-4 yards of green fabric (2 was perfect for my 5 year old) or bed sheet
cardboard or book
flashlight
crown (purchased or homemade)
colored paper~ 1 yellow or orange, 1 red, 3 green
tape
marker
scissors


Directions:
1. Cover book (or cardboard cut to preferred size) with the two pieces of green paper, front and back.  Tape in place.  Write JULY IV MDCCLXXVI on it.  (It means July 4 1776.)

2. Cover the main cylinder of the flashlight with green paper.  Cut hole for the thumb switch.  Tape in place.

3.  Cut triangles about 3 inches long from the red and yellow paper for flames.  You will need about ten flames.  Curl with scissors, if desired, the way you curl ribbon for gifts.  Tape to the top of the flashlight to complete your torch.

4.  Tie the fabric toga-style to child.  Hold one corner on right shoulder.  Wrap fabric around body, going under left arm, around the back, under right arm, and tied in the back at the shoulder.

5. Place crown on head, tablet in left arm, and the torch in the raised right arm.

You might be interested in our liberty and patriotic activities for young children.

Stitched Valentine's Card

Two years ago I made this card for my husband for Valentine's Day.  It still hangs on our refrigerator with a  Bible verse inside that remains an excellent way to show love.

Though this is perfectly appropriate for a grown up to make, it is equally appropriate for a child learning to sew.

The idea and template came from Make and Takes.  She has other cute stitched cards, too.  She also inspired me to make my own template for a Housewarming Stitched Card.

Last year I made an Owl Valentine's Day card for my husband.  Do you make your own cards?  I would love to see your ideas!  Please inspire me!

Curious about the verse I chose?  I can be quite selfish, so it's quite good for me.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.  Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of others. ~ Philippians 2:3-4

Playing School

Since M began school after her third birthday, she has enjoyed playing school, especially when she finds something suitable to be a pointer.  For over a year she has just pointed to blank wall space.  Not anymore!

On my rare (very rare) visit to Target this fall, I saw they had child-sized pointers in the dollar area.  I promptly picked one up for M and set it aside.

It was almost forgotten, until I awoke about 4:30 Christmas morning.  I did a google search of hundreds charts and alphabet charts and came up with some suitable charts.  (I wish I had a different font for the ABC's, but at that early hour in the morning I was not going to search out anything too special.  They are customizable fonts, too.)  I printed them out on some colorful paper and laminated them.   Before returning to bed, I placed them in her stocking.

I knew I'd wanted to do this for M for a really long time.  I thought I would get to the local-ish teacher store for a couple of charts, but am so glad I did not.  These 8 1/2x11 sized charts are perfect for play.  We are not homeschoolers, so we just use them for (purposeful) play.

Little Jewelery Box

My daughter has quite the collection of dress-up jewelery.  It probably didn't help when my son broke a necklace and he replaced it with a four necklace, four bracelet, four ring set-all for $1!  I'd been wanting M to have an appropriate jewelery box instead of her little plastic sandwich baggie.

I found a decent sized wooden box at Jo Anne's.  It's about 6x6 inches.  To spice it up (and cover the cheap wood), I painted it white.  Mod Podged a 5x5 piece of scrapbook paper on top, and stippled the sides for color.  Obviously, the scrapbook paper didn't cooperate with all of those wrinkles.  I embellished the flower paper with three-dimensional butterfly stickers that coordinated a bit.

(Photos taken on M's comforter that is purple, green, and a bit of blue.)
This was given to M for her fourth birthday.

Homemade Resurrection Eggs

Now that our daughter is 3 1/2, it is important for us to focus on the real meaning of Easter.  Though she doesn't completely understand the how and why of Jesus' death and resurrection, we want M to understand that Easter is not just eggs, bunnies, and baskets.

For our resurrection eggs, I used an empty egg carton, plastic eggs, and some small items to tell what actually happened to Jesus.  The following items are in the eggs.  I chose not to put the verse inside the egg, though I have them listed on a piece of paper.  I numbered each of the eggs to help tell the story in order.  (Click on verses to read the Scripture verses.)

Please read about all the verses and items I placed in our homemade Resurrection Eggs over at This Simple Home.  I have even created a Resurrection Eggs printable for you!!

We have been using these for years, and I am amazed at how my children can use these to tell the story of Jesus' death and resurrection!!

Button Snowflake

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We don't "do" glitter in our home.  Derek has a strong dislike for it.  :)  Frankly, I'm not fond of the mess it makes after the project is completed either.

We have lots of craft sticks, and I wanted to celebrate our snow with a snow craft.  So we made these snowflakes as a variation to glitter snowflakes that I have seen a lot.

Mine were pretty simple.  I glued the four craft sticks together and painted them with white acrylic paint when the glue dried.  (I think silver would look great!)  I wanted M (age 3) to help, so I only used craft glue to attach the buttons, but hot glue may hold better.  M had great fun choosing white buttons and placing them on the glue.  We used a ribbon so that it could be an ornament.

We made a bunch of these button snowflakes.  We kept one for our Christmas tree, and gave the rest away.

We gave one to our neighbors.  They are a family of eight, so I wrote each person's name on a "spoke" with the year 2009 in the center.

(Since the children are both sick...the messy variety...posting may continue to be sporadic as I use the evenings after they are in bed to recover from the day.)

Salt Dough Ornament Keepsake

We did a bit of a different salt dough ornament. I took a bowl and cut a circle to make a keepsake ornament instead of a cookie cutter type. The plan was to have the kids' hand prints in the circle. E (13 months) would make a lovely hand print and then dig deep enough to put holes in it. After 8-10 tries, I went to the back up plan. I think it turned out well.

My only regret is that I didn't do this keepsake sooner.

Read about how to make your own Salt Dough Ornaments at my new blog.

Multi-Crafting

It seems that I am multitasking my crafts these days. I have several things I am working on at once. I can't say that I like the idea of working on so much at once, but that's just the way it is, I guess. They are all related to Christmas.

• A mouse hand puppet.
• A Jesse Tree. I am making my own tree, but using Nicole's ideas at Tired, Need Sleep. If you are unfamiliar, it basically is a way to show the lineage of Jesus Christ in an advent calendar way. I will make a felt tree, but paper ornaments, hung with ribbon. The tree will have buttons to hang the ornaments. The button idea came from a real life friend, and I thought it was very clever.
• Salt dough ornaments. Classic. Simple. Fun. The two that are painted only by me are finished!

I will post details on all soon. I hope.

Teacher Gifts

So I just realized that M now has

1. a teacher
2. an aide
3. an SLP
4. a bus driver
5. a bus aide
6. Sunday school teacher

WOW! Now, as a former teacher I really appreciated Christmas gifts from my students. My favorites were not "teachery" but things like Christmas ornaments, lotions, and candles. I also loved books for my classroom. The best were the little gifts the children choose for me themselves. (I still use a bookmark from Claire on a regular basis.)

It is very, very strange to be on the parent side of education. I really don't know the personalities of any of these influential people in her life except her Sunday school teacher. (Or their health concerns. Hopefully with my plans they aren't on low fat, low sugar diets.)

I'd like to make (sew?) stuff, but I'm just not sure what would be appropriate. The bigger issue is what I have the time to make! I still want to do create some things for my own family, and I am not sure that I will get much of it completed. I guess I better get to work. But first I need some better ideas. Right now all I can think to do is a chocolate chip cookie pie and a homemade bookmark. Maybe we'll do those two items with a book for the classroom, too, for the teacher and SLP. Is it lame?

I don't like Christmas to be about the gifts, yet I like to give. Oh, and I tend to be frugal.(You can say cheap). Somewhere there is a balance! Last year M made pasta necklaces for some special ladies in her life. I'd like for her to be involved in the gift making process somehow, and the chocolate chip cookie pie is an easy way to do that. It's an easy recipe, and she can easily help.

What do you do for the teachers and such in your child's life? Do you have any suggestions for me? (I know gift cards would be appreciated, but I don't prefer to give them.) Any ideas for gifts that M could help make (other than food)?

Would you please forgive me for posting about Christmas (again) before Thanksgiving? It's the handmade thing that makes planning necessary. (Or at least I can tell myself that. In reality, I try to buy Christmas gifts year round. The earliest I've ever been done Christmas shopping was when I was in college. I finished in October once. Now that I have children, shopping doesn't happen often.)

You can also check out my handmade gift plans. We'll see what I have time for.

Let me know your ideas for handmade items or teacher gifts!

Today's the last day for the Fun Felt Giveaway! Be sure to check it out!

Finally! (How I Spent My Weekend)

This weekend I finally made myself a new purse. I made one in the spring, but it was definitely a summer purse in a bright orange color. It was also SMALL. Too small for a daily purse. I like a small purse. For the longest time (maybe the first 30 years of my life) I pretty much just used a wallet or even a wallet/keychain combo. However, now that I wear glasses daily, I MUST have my lens cloth to clean them at all times. Dirty glasses are annoying and they give me a headache. (I also like a clean windshield, if you care.) So here it is. A buttercup bag! Again. It's the same pattern as before, but this time I enlarged it by 15%. The handle is a bit too long, I think, but it will fit better with a winter coat. (My winter coat does not match the purse at all. I don't care though.) I love the fabrics. I have several more yards of the liner since it was a good price and quality. I like the outer fabric even more, but I only bought two yards because of the price. I added interfacing to the handle, outer purse, and the divider that I put in myself. I'm not sure the divider needed the interfacing, but I don't think it hurts either. I also added a large pocket to the divider. It might be too large; I'm not sure.

Here is the old purse (same pattern) and the new. You can see the size difference.

Just to give you an idea of how small the orange purse is, I will share what I keep in it that stuffs it FULL. Wallet, lens cloth, cell phone, lip balm, keys, pen(s), and a checkbook-size calendar. I found that if I put in more than two pens, closing it gets really tough! Isn't that funny!? Although in full disclosure, the magnetic snap I placed in it was placed too low so it took away room in the purse.

It's a pretty simple pattern. I'm a beginner sewer and I think it's doable, though I spent a lot of time (and wasted thread) seam ripping. If you are interested, the buttercup bag pattern is free, but if you want to sell them, the pattern is just $10. Too bad sewing is so stressful for me, otherwise I would love to sell something like this! (Not that the craftsmanship is great, either.)

The dark fabric just doesn't photograph well for details, but you can see enough.

Handmade Christmas Gifts

So I probably have some big dreams for Christmas this year; but in actuality I probably won't get everything done. 1. Mouse puppet - I will be making a pattern and the mouse will go with 2. Felt fruits and vegetables - I'm not sure what free patterns are out there since I need some very specific patterns. I will probably make them up as I go, but seriously, if you have an idea of how to make GRAPES, please share with me! Together the mouse and the fruit will go with the book Lunch by Denise Fleming. It's a great book and great for a little puppet kit. 3. Silhouettes - I just think it'd be neat to do these now before the children get any older. See my sidebar for two examples under "upcoming projects." 4. Family Tree - These will be for some family members. I already made some. You can see some here. So those are some ideas I have at this point. When I saw the idea over at Mommy's Wise Little Bookworms, I decided to take a break from our stress and share. Want to see more handmade ideas? Head on over to here. (It's nice to be home from the hospital, but it is better to not worry about E. Maybe I'm in denial, but I am really hoping that this was a one time thing. Even though he is on meds for seizures, I am really hoping that they aren't even needed. You know?)

Featured Friday

Today I am blog swapping with Fwanda. After you read all about Fwanda and her incredible craftiness here, you can hop on over to Fireflies and Jellybeans to read about me and some of my crafts. Be sure to check out lots of their other posts for some great craft inspiration!

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Hello Live Learn and Love readers! I am so excited to be swapping blogs with this fun, and cute blog! Annette has som fun ideas and great giveaways- huh?!?

Let me introduce myself:

I'm Fawnda from Fireflies and JellyBeans, a little DIY craft blog I co-author with my best friend Jeannine! Here is a little bit about me: I am a SAHM (that is a stay-at-home-mom) to a son. I am married to most amazing man (sorry ladies- I found him first!) We adopted our son from Korea about 10 months ago! He is 19 months old and he is truly a joy and probably one of the cutest kids in the world (right along with yours!). I tutor High School Math students (Before I became a SAHM I was a math teacher).

I love to craft!

I rediscovered my sewing machine about 8 months ago and I love it! I also love to make cards. I am addicted to the scrapbook paper packs (They have a theme for everything! and I want them all! ) I am a pretty picky eater so I prefer to be the one who cooks!

My hobbies besides crafting include:

Reading - I just got done reading the twilight series and loved it! Some of my other favorite books are Harry Potter (all 7 of them!) The Time Travelers Wife, The Princess Bride (Yes it was a book before the movie!) Watching movies- and than quoting them! Some of my favorite movies are: The Princess Bride, Mr and Mrs Smith, Ocean's 11, Pride and Prejudice Talking on the phone- I love it... I know I am weird! Hanging out with my girlfriends -Who doesn't love that?!?!

I just opened an etsy shop: Funky Joy Where I sell reusable snack bags, lunch bags and Auto trash bags. I am always adding more stuff so be sure to check often! Check out the snack bags here.

Check out the lunch bags here.

Check out the car trash bags here.

We have some great Halloween ideas for you!

How about dressing your whole family as pirates with this Thrifty Costume How To!

Or check out this Gum Under A Shoe easy costume idea! You can make this Trick-Or-Treat Bag from a bandanna!

Here are some of my other favorite projects that I have done: Fall leaf table runner

place mat children's art smock Reusable Lunch Bags.

I don't just sell them, I also show you how to make them! (I am nice like that!) Reusable Snack Bags Same with the Snack bags... Probably not the best marketing plan but I would rather have friends than money! : ) (although- if you would like to buy one that would be great too! Friends AND money is the best!)

Be sure to stop by Fireflies and JellyBeans for some fun ideas!

Thanks Annette for letting invade your blog today! It was so fun!

Stitched Card

I made this card in the spring when our good friends moved to a new house. It was inspired by Marie at Make and Takes. She is yet another great source for inspiration and has many stitched cards designs available and a good tutorial. This little house was my own design though. One thing I learned was that next time I design my own stitched card, graph paper would be very helpful! Recently some people we care about have moved. I'm not sure if I will manage to make another stitched card or if my Cricut will help me. I still wanted to share this though!

These are pretty simple to make. To make the template was pretty simple. I first sketched the house. Then I used a push pin to put holes in the template. I used the cork on the back of a trivet to protect my kitchen table.

Next I placed the template on cut cardstock and pushed all the way through the cardstock. Then I used all six strands of embroidery floss to create the card using the back stitch. Just don't tie knots or you will have bumps where you don't want them! I just used the needle to thread the floss back through some of the stitches on the back side of the card.

You will want an accent color, too. It will give you added assurance that the backside of your card won't show through! Marie recommends spray adhesive. Since I didn't have any, I just used what I had on hand from my scrapbooking supplies.

(And I will apologize now for the crooked picture!)

Portable Sandbox

There are a few reasons why a real sandbox isn't ideal for us, but I still wanted my children to have the sensory stimulation and  fun that a sandbox provides.

Our version is simple. It's a plastic storage box. Inside I buried several little "treasures." Included are mini-popsicle sticks with our names on them, rocks, colored pasta, ribbon, and a plastic crab. I also included a couple of scoops from E's formula. (I don't throw them away.)

After they were buried, M had fun playing for quite some time. 

We still need to work on the idea of not throwing sand, but this activity will be something we do often. It will be stored in our garage and taken outside when we use it.

Just a note: If you plan to make a sandbox for a little one, make sure you use play sand. It's been sanitized, unlike other sands.

Family Tree

This project was inspired in early summer when my older sister gave me a necklace that had a tree on it and it said, "Family is nature's masterpiece." Really, the credit goes to God, but it's a wonderful necklace and 100% my taste. I have a thing for trees.

Shortly after getting the necklace, I had a vision to make a visual family tree. I set to work drawing the tree. This took MANY hours. It's been a long time since I drew anything other than flowers, rainbows, and sunshines for M. (I used to be a bit of an artist. During college I even took a couple classes...enough for an art concentration with my elementary education degree.) At first I was going to keep the leaves uniform by drawing a pattern first. In the end, I decided to draw each leaf freehand. It makes sense since cutting them out is not an exact science for my hands.

I'm pleased with the outcome. The leaves can hold the name of family members. The circle can hold a family surname or initial. Of course it's important to leave blanks for new spouses, adoptions, or births.

If you make one of your own, please let me know! I do ask that you respect the time and effort I put into this and not copy the tree exactly as it is, but just use it as a guide.

Though I think it would be fun to sell (a tweaked version of) this one day, I am really pleased with how it turned out. The first people to get this were the three friends that signed up for the Pay It Forward post. This is the gift I sent them. They, in turn, choose something...anything...to send to three others.

The three blogging friends who got this (not filled out so that they could frame it and give it as a gift if desired) were Debbie (a friend from my church) at Debbie's Digest, Nicole at The Activity Mom, and Lisa at Cheerios Underfoot.

When I was spending an evening cutting (actually many evenings) the trees and leaves, Derek asked me why I didn't just use the Cricut. Wouldn't that be nice? The Cricut just doesn't do customized cutting for me. Wouldn't that be nice though? (I did use the Cricut for the circle and initial though.)

What do you think? Any suggestions for improving the design before I make any more? I'm already thinking to use darker brown for the tree. I used an off-white paper for the background, but a creamier color might be better. I'm not sure if a printed background would be better. What else might help?

Homemade Stencils and Free Art

We have an abundance of lids in our home. For the past couple of months, I have been saving them instead of recycling them. Our first project with them was to make some stencils. I just drew a heart and star on each lid.

They were cut using an Exacto knife.

The first day we tried the stencils we just used crayons. It worked pretty well. (Sorry, no picture.)

Here are some of the hearts we made with paint.

After painting a few hearts, M just wanted to paint.

We used another lid for a painting palette! I love the look of brightly colored paints on dark paper, especially after it dries!

Play-Doh Placemat

I used my handy little laminating machine to make Play-Doh placemats for M and E. (No E does not use it!) A long time ago I used my friend's Cricut machine and cut out the letters to their names. I also have some precut shapes on nice paper. On regular scrapbooking paper I typed the ABC's and numbers 1-10. I placed the letters, laminated, and was done!

It's a really easy project. M loves it. She prefers the side with her name in big letters which didn't surprise me.

If you do not have a laminator, you could use contact paper. If you do that, go with 12x12 cardstock instead of 8 1/2 x 11. You could even take it to a local teacher or office supply store.

Three Little Pigs Puppets

This past spring I made these finger puppets for M. She had really been enjoying the story of the Three Little Pigs, and I thought it might encourage some speech and eventually storytelling.
I had so much fun designing the puppets. They're my own design, but I did look at other puppets and drawings of pigs and wolves to try to get an idea of how to best portray the pigs and wolf. The little pockets on the pigs have hay, sticks, and bricks in them.
Each of the Three Little Pigs characte's puppet is completely hand-sewn. They're about 1 1/2 by 3 inches. Obviously, I am not good at French knots, but I got the blanket stitch down! Not including the designing time, I have six to seven hours of sewing involved in the four puppets!
I wanted to share these for the storytelling theme over at ABC and 123. Though M isn't interested (probably due to her limited speaking abilities) in storytelling, she does like it when I tell stories using puppets. I suspect other children might embrace little finger puppets more than she has! If you have any questions about how to make finger puppets, I'd be happy to answer them! You're welcome to imitate my design, but I'd appreciate the credit since I put a lot of effort into the design.

DIY: Personalized Name Stamp

We made a name stamp. It's just another way to have fun with letters and recognize a child's name. An older child might enjoy making unique "stationary" without the help of a computer. Materials Needed: wooden blocks scrap foam with sticky back exacto knife and mat (or cardboard) pen or marker On the white paper backside (NOT the foam) write letters or numbers. I just used a pen. Though it didn't leave ink on the paper, it left an impression that I could see. When you look at the foam, the letters will be reversed. This is necessary for the stamp. Cut out the letters and/or shapes. Place them on the wooden blocks in the reverse order. The shape stamps are about three inches tall. It was a good length for little hands.

If you have a large ink pad that would be nice and simple. I used a folded paper towel covered thinly with washable paint. A plastic lid is under it (for protection).

The blue on blue turned out well. I noticed the foam doesn't hold a lot of paint, so the stamps are rather light, but still leaves a nice picture behind.

This is fairly simple to make. If you don't have access to wood scraps, I'm sure a small sturdy box or glued together cardboard would work too. In the past I used a wooden ABC block from the toy chest. The paint absorbs into the wood, though, so I don't recommend that. :)