Birthday Nature Crafts

Once the Forest Fairy and Animal party theme was approved by my Birthday Girl, fun ideas were abundant. Simple, affordable, and quick ideas, however, weren’t as easy to come up with. Enter Pinterest, a world of nothing but cool ideas to browse.

I need to thank the creative Mom of Paint Cut Paste who inspired these no-sew Forest Animal Masks using felt and glue.

All this mask-making took was a mix of colorful felt squares from Michael's (about 39 cents each), some thin black elastic, and fabric glue (I used all-purpose Tacky Glue). Superhero masks littering our playroom served as starting patterns to provide the perfect size and placement of eye holes. Next I hand-sketched  animal shapes around those masks onto paper, playing around with them until they looked right.

"Easy Peasy!" as the dear Birthday Girl would say. Sadly, I didn't get any photos of her in these masks that day...  she was too busy changing into different fairy princess costumes during the party. Oh well, at least it wasn't Hello Kitty.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Sara. I love you more than words can say.

 

Art Lady

Eager to get involved in my son’s Kindergarten classroom, I volunteered to be the Art Docent. I had never heard of such a job before it was introduced to me at Parent Orientation but apparently, public schools have come up with this creative approach to filling the Art gap in the elementary school curriculum. At least once a month I’ll schedule a time with his teacher to come in and teach a brief art lesson. There were a couple training sessions and a  beautifully organized binder came home with me, full of creative ideas for classroom art projects.

Considering the season (and wanting something simple), we started with Leaf People using Lois Ehlert’s book “Leaf Man” and this blog post as inspiration and the leaves around us for materials. To prepare for the lesson in William’s classroom, the kids and I wandered around the neighborhood collecting leaves of all shapes and sizes (the ones picked directly from the trees are best—they have the brightest colors and are still nice and pliable to work with). We ended up with big, messy bags full of leaves but once they were sorted and organized, they looked like beautiful art just stacked in their piles ready to be rummaged through by Kindergartners.

I have to admit I was more than a little nervous about heading into a room full of 5 year-olds, they can be a tough crowd… but this kind bunch was gentle with yours truly, Ms. Liz the Art Lady, and the lesson went really well. They arranged their leaves first, used glue stick to secure the leaves, then added googly eyes, signed their names and gave their artwork a title. Some of the kids decided it was a self-portrait and gave it their own name while others came up with friendly names like Earl and Nancy. My personal favorite was the name one creative young man decided his fierce leaf monster:  "Hanny the Alien Beaver."

If you decide to do this project, be sure to press the leaf arrangements and let them dry before posting them... I'm afraid the leaves shriveled up a whole lot more than I realized they would

William decided his Leaf Man should go in a boat

 Along with providing an opportunity to have a lot of fun, I was able to teach them a new word, “Collage,” and introduce the concepts of shape, color, and contrast.

I made a little Leaf Family too -- isn't my Leaf Lady having a good hair day?

Nature Craft: Autumn Crowns

In search of uses for droopy golden sunflower petals and fun fall crafts, we just discovered one more reason to love duct tape. Thank you, Maya of the creative and inspiring Maya Made blog for this wonderful idea.

All you need is duct tape, brown paper grocery bags, scissors, and a colorful mix of leaves, flowers, and anything else you’d like to use for embellishments on your crowns.

• Step 1:  Measure the circumference of each queen or king’s noggin. Use that measurement (plus an extra couple inches for the “seam”) to cut a two inch wide strip from the paper bag that will fit around their heads.
• Step 2:  Cut another paper bag strip of the same length, but this time cut one side straight and one side in whatever pattern that you’d like to appear along the top edge of the crown (we did a simple zigzag cut).
• Step 3:  Tear off a piece of duct tape of the same length then lay it down on a flat surface, sticky side up. Attach your plain strip of paper bag at the bottom edge (make sure any printing on the bag faces down) and the shaped strip along the top edge (again with printed bag side down), leaving most of the sticky tape area exposed. This adhesive strip is where you’ll attach all of your beautiful fall adornments to create a glorious crown!

A Max (Where the Wild Things Are) moment for William

Queen Curly Sue. Look closely for the huckleberries (one green and one purple). My silly Sara insisted on using them saying "I put a huckleberry on my crown and people see it and dey say 'look, there a huckleberry on her crown!' Ha ha ha ha ha" 

Nature Craft: Pounded Flower Bookmarks

I know, all good things must come to an end but it was still sad to watch our glorious sunflowers bow down and face earth-ward after just a couple of days of rain. Propping them up seemed futile… more rain is coming. Sure, I could let them just lay there and decay, becoming food for the slugs, squirrels, and birds along the way (and that time will eventually come) but I’m not ready. We only just started enjoying them!

Time to get creative (and time to say thank you to the lovely and talented Rachelle of TinkerLab where I found this idea). If these vertically-challenged beauties aren’t going to stand up straight and behave themselves then look out sunflowers, we are going to appreciate you some other way… and did you notice the title of this post? Things could get a little rough.

• Step 1:  Gather supplies (for two children you’ll need 2 sheets of watercolor paper, 2 pieces of waxed paper, a hole puncher, some ribbon, scissors and two rocks).
• Step 2:  Have your kids find a rock that is bigger than their palm and let them know they’ll be using it as a hammer. Wash that rock… scrub it with a firm brush if your kids choose muddy rocks encrusted in clay as mine did.
• Step 3:  Gather a colorful mix of flower petals (and a couple leaves if you’d like—Sara insisted her beloved mint not get left out of the fun). Show your kids how to do this gently unless you are looking to punish some unruly sunflowers.
• Step 4:  Place a layer of mixed petals onto the watercolor paper.
• Step 5:  Set the waxed paper on top of the flowers.
• Step 6:  Let your little ones hammer away with their rocks. Encourage them to pound all around the whole paper, not just focus on one spot.
• Step 7:  When they’re done, remove the waxed paper and flower petals to reveal colorful, interesting shapes left behind from their work!
• Step 8:   Cut the paper into bookmarks, about 2 inches wide, then punch a hole in the top and loop your ribbon through.

Both kids stayed focused throughout this whole task. Sara's creative addition of mint made a lovely green mark and smelled great in the process.

Voila!

With any luck you’ll have leftover flower materials for more crafty fun… stay tuned.

Nature Craft: Leaf and Pinecone Bat

Don't you love it when evidence of your efforts come back to you in a positive way? My five-year-old son, William, surprised me with the greatest little nature craft the other day. After gathering supplies on a trail walk with Daddy, he came up with this idea completely on his own. When I said “this is SO cool, I think we need to write a blog about it” he practically jumped for joy. So here it is, in the thick of summer even though it is really more of a fall craft... oh well, his excitement is more important than keeping things seasonally specific.

Here are the instructions from William:  First, you go out and look for a pinecone and then find a maple leaf. Use tape to wrap the top middle point of the leaf around the pinecone and secure the tape to the leaf’s stem. Then “write a smile on it” and there is your bat!

And there is my boy! Love him sharper than the sharpest bear claws (as he likes to say).

Crafty Kiddos: A Springtime Nest

First, a quick simple idea you may have already seen: tuck yarn and other soft nesting materials into pinecones, hang them from trees, and watch birds choose the nest-worthy pieces. Cotton balls were the kids’ idea and it turned out that the hummingbirds loved this! It was remarkable to watch them hover while they pecked and picked at little bits of cotton before flitting back to their nests.  This got us thinking, if the birds are making their nests right now, why can’t we give it a try? Every step of this activity was educational and a lot of fun BUT every step also exceeded the attention span of my 3 & 5 year-olds. That was OK with me—I enjoyed helping, but it is something to be aware of. The finished product is totally worth it and you’ll be able to use this little gem as a spring time decoration for years.

Step 1. We gathered fallen twigs, moss, and lichen on our trail in the woods, visiting banana slugs, millipedes, and more slugs along the way. We talked about not taking too much of anything because the animals need it for their habitats and we did our best not to disturb anything that was intact.

Step 2. Breaking the twigs into 2 to 3 inch pieces was a snappy, satisfying activity for about 5 minutes. Then Sara decided the sticks were stop signs so she spent a solid half hour running back and forth for “more top signs, Mom!” and doing her best to stick them all around the yard. Oh well, she was happy and being creative!

Step 3.  Start building your nest using a small bowl set on a piece of cardboard, cookie sheet, or something easily moved when you want to let your nest dry. We used small melamine bowls as our forms and Elmer’s glue to make everything stick as we arranged twigs, moss and lichen around the bowl. I helped the kids get started so they weren’t overly frustrated by the twigs moving when accidentally bumped. This provided a great opportunity to talk about what excellent builders birds are! I carefully placed twigs on my own little nest but as usual, I should have paid attention to my little Teacher Sara. She dipped big hunks of moss into the glue then slopped them onto the bowl, stuck on a couple twigs and called it good. I finished it for her, just making it thick enough to be stable but her “generous” use of moss and lichen made the prettiest nest! 

Unbelievable but Sara's gloppy nest turned out beautifully!

Step 4. When everything is in place, drizzle more glue on and don’t be shy. It dries clear so you don’t have to worry about quantity or placement.  Allow to dry for about an hour then check on them to see if the glue has set enough to remove the bowl from the inside of the nest. Remove the bowl then allow them at least another 24 hours to fully dry.

William let Ted E. Bear help him with his nest