Christmas Crafting for Kids

Hi friends!  I hope that you are well!  We are doing ok.  We are getting into the Christmas spirit which is good.  I've been baking all week.  How about you?  What do you bake for the holidays?  I made molasses cookies, chocolate chip cookies, and I tried making saltine toffee but I overcooked it a bit so we are calling it "caramel brûlée bites" this year.  ;)

This last weekend, I had my cousin and some friends over for a Christmas crafting night for the kids. I poked around a bit on Pinterest and came up with a couple crafts that we tried out.  The first was a Christmas card made with washi tape.  I saw THIS PIN and decided to do it with washi tape instead so I didn't have to cut tons of strips of paper.  I pulled a bunch of red, green, and yellow washi and we used some brown washi for the tree trunk.  I used a Stampin' Up punch to punch the stars out of yellow sticker paper from DCWV.  That paper is AMAZING for working with kids!  You don't have to put out any messy glue!  It is textured card stock that's adhesive on the back and they just peel off the back like a sticker.

Next up, we did sugar cone Christmas trees.  In a stroke of genius, I gave each kid their own little cup of frosting and plastic butter knife.  Hooray for no mixing colors or sharing germs!  I also asked each kid what color frosting they wanted and added some food coloring if they wanted.  Avery ended up making a purple tree because she's currently obsessed with purple.  This photo is actually the tree that I made.  It looked like fun so I decided that I should make one too.  I'm quite pleased with it.

I think this craft night will become a tradition.  I asked each family that came to bring a craft and a finger food.  We also made beaded candy canes on pipe cleaners, pompom wreaths, and snowman soup.  It was a fun night!

Have a great day, friends!  

Fun Toddler/Kid Snack and Raise Awareness

Hi friends!  I hope you are doing well!  We are pretty good over here.  The baby is teething but other than that, we are pretty healthy.

Today, I wanted to share these little Valentine's Day treats that I made for Avery to give to her friends.  These are so cute and very well received.  They are fairly simple other than the filling of the bags part.  I had the most success with filling one side, zipping it shut, then using my fingers to create a clamp on that bag in the center and filling the other side then closing it.  I used the snack sized baggies because I wanted them to look more like a dragonfly than a butterfly.  I used a regular sized clothespin and covered the bottom part with washi tape.  I drew on a face with Sharpie pen.  I added pipe cleaners as antennae.  I printed out these cute Valentines (but I think you could use them for handing out a snack at school or a sports event or even party favors.  You can download the Unravel Color Valentines HERE or the black and white ones HERE.  I did the black and white ones since I don't have a color printer.  Then I used some glitter glue to fill in the hearts and dragonfly wings.   I ended up slipping the paper into the top of the clip so I could just hand them out as one piece.

For different ideas on how you can help Unravel Pediatric Cancer, check out their Give Us 12 page.

Minecraft Birthday Party (Photo Heavy)

Hi friends!  I hope that you are well.  I've been better.  Not going to lie.  Fingers crossed that I'll be a-okay for Halloween.

Today, I'm doing an extremely overdue blog post.  I'm posting about the boys's Minecraft Birthday Party that happened four months ago.  I don't know why but I always drag my feel on blogging about parties.  I think it's all the editing photos and figuring out what I want to say about the crafts.  Also, let's take a moment to mention that I know NOTHING about Minecraft.  I had to run these things by D and the boys to make sure they were in the game.  If I say something wrong about the game, I'm sorry.  Ok, here we go!

As per usual, Dustin made the invite.  Honestly, it was nicer when he made it but I went in and edited out our personal information and made it not as good.  But you get the idea.

Sorry for the blurry picture.  Actually, none of these are pictures I took.  I get really overwhelmed doing everything for a party that I forget to take pictures.  Brady wanted a portal into the party.  Apparently, Minecraft has portals.  Dustin printed out the sign in this font he found and then we used black and purple streamers to make it look like the portal.

Also for decoration, we had these spiders.  It's just a black balloon and I cut out red rectangles for the eyes.  Then D did the legs with streamer.

For food, we had all food that could be found in Minecraft or food that looks like things from Minecraft.  For example, we had pretzel sticks for sticks, we had gold wrap chocolate pieces from gold ingot, swedish fish for fish, etc...  D created signs for all the food including what you can use them for in Minecraft.  For example, you can use coal and sticks to make a torch.  I think.  I'm trying to read tiny signs in pictures.  

 For the party favors, I bought Green Paper Party Favor Bags and colored Creeper Faces on them.  The kids got to fill a bag with all the Minecraft "supplies" (aka candy) to take home.  Sorry parents but this idea was too good to pass up.

For drinks, we make a Brewing Stand which is a thing in the game.  Our friends had made a lemonade stamp for their daughter's birthday and we asked to use it.  We covered up the top with poster board and our sign.  We added balloons and streams.  On the left is "Creeper Aid" which is lemonade with green food coloring.  On the right, we have "potions" which were a bunch of those favorings you add to water bottles.  We had the drops and the single packet powder things.  There was a tub next to this with ice and water bottles.  This was a HUGE hit.  

My bestie Summer made the boys this cake for their birthday gift.  She spent DAYS cutting out the little fondant squares and making it all fit.  It looked AWESOME!  The kids loved this cake!

Since the cake only feeds 20, I made some cupcakes to look like the cake in the game.  I couldn't find red square sprinkles or candy so I used hearts.  No one seemed to mind.  

For games, I made a Pin the Tail on the Pig.  I just made this out of a poster board and some card stock.  You know you love your kids when you pull out your nice Bazzill cardstock for a pig game.  I put numbers on the tails and had the kids remember their numbers.  

We also had a craft station where you could make your own mask.  We cut 10x10 pieces of foam board and duct taped tongue depressors to them.  I cut out a BUNCH of different colored squares from construction paper and provided glue sticks.  D had to sit there and cut out the eye holes with a pocket knife during the party.  We also had a contest where a judge picked the best mask and they got a prize.  My step brother was in the other room doing homework and he randomly picked the smallest kid to get the prize, it was adorable.  

We also set up a Photo Booth for the kids.  We bought the Minecraft Creeper Head and the Steve Head.  I just used construction paper to make the tree and clouds for the background.  It was the world's easiest photo booth and the kids LOVED it!

 I spent HOURS making this sword because I didn't want to spend the money buying one.  It was an extremely frustrating project and I do not recommend it at all.  I cut all the squares, Dustin cut the foam then it wasn't thick enough so he had to cut another piece of foam and it was STILL not thick enough so he had to put cardboard in the middle.  Yeah, it probably took close to 13 hours to complete.  Do yourself a favor and BUY Minecraft Diamond Sword for the $12 instead.  Seriously.

 This is Brady and Dustin in their matching shirts.  Teehee!

It was a fun party and everyone had a great time.  I told the boys that this was the last year that I'm doing a huge DIY craft party for them.  Sigh... we'll see when next year rolls around.  Plus, I still have a little princess to plan a party for in December...

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Brady's Teacher Christmas Cards

Hi friends!  I hope you are doing well.  Alas, I'm still here and very pregnant.  Please keep your fingers crossed that I don't have this baby on Christmas or Christmas Eve.  I don't want to be in the hospital.  I'd like to be with my boys that day.  ;)

Speaking of Christmas, this year Brady decided to make his own Christmas cards for his teachers.  That boy is SO sweet!  He told me he wanted a Christmas tree on the card so Dustin and I drew some triangles for him to cut out himself.  I trimmed the tree trunks and punched the stars our for him but he picked the colors.  He added the rhinestones and Stickles himself.  He wrote From Brady on the front of both as well.  Then he wrote a special message inside for his teachers.  He really is a sweet little doll.  I didn't do anything crafty for their presents this year.  They will get these cards with some gifts basket things from Starbucks.

Have a great day, friends!  

Egg Carton Crafts

Hi friends! I hope you had a lovely day! We had a VERY full day! We went to an Easter egg hunt put on by our town then had lunch. We came home then colored eggs and made crafts with the empty egg cartons.

Here are the bugs the kids made. I saw something like this on Pinterest, it's from Kaboose (project HERE.) Then just pulled out what supplies I had and tried to re-create it. Well, the kids just got to use the supplies how they like and we helped them with the cutting and gluing.

And then I decided to use the egg carton to make my own craft. I saw this idea on Pinterest but I didn't use a specific tutorial. I just kind of went with it. I used two of the egg carton cups, trimming them and cutting petals. Then I sprayed them with shimmer mist. I added a crotchet flower and a pearl button from Creating is Fun.

For the card I used Chupa's Sketchbook Saturday Challenge #54. I am also entering this in the Moxie Fab World Household Items Challenge. The paper is Cosmo Cricket's Tea for Two. The stamps are Mini Thoughts from My Thoughts Exactly. Both trims are from Creating is Fun. The leaves are made using a Martha Stewart punch.

Have a great day friends!

My Little Artists! :D

Hi friends! HAPPY FRIDAY!!! YAY!!! I went and picked up my new medicine yesterday and I'm hoping that it will work better than the last one. Tomorrow is Brady's birthday. :) We told him that we would take him to see Kung Fu Panda 2 and this will be Parker's first movie. Should be a very exciting weekend!

I've been holding on to these darling pictures for a while now. A couple months ago, my good friend Maigan had an art contest on her blog. She had several categories and since she's such a sweetie, BOTH my kids and the one other child who entered won. So, they entered their first contest and they won. Honestly, I didn't really want the kids to win or lose or anything but Maigan said each child would get a certificate of completion and I thought that would be great for them.

Needless to say, I'm beyond proud of these coloring sheets and I think they are the BEE'S KNEES! :D

This is Parker's

And obviously, this is Brady's (his real name is Brayden)

Happy weekend everyone! I *might* be back later with a creation but I will definitely be drawing a winner for my blog candy once the kids wake up and can draw a name for me.

My Mother's Day Cards

Hi friends! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! We are just ending ours today since hubby works on Saturdays now. I hope all you moms were spoiled rotten yesterday! I just wanted to pop onto my blog and share the handmade cards I got yesterday. :)

First up is my card from Brady (and Parker.) Brady doesn't really let Parker do that much of the crafting, he will someday. Brady made this card with a cute little Hello Kitty stamp set I got for $1 at Michael's. They are just little kid stampers/pencil toppers but I love Hello Kitty so I bought them.

Next up is the card Dustin made for me, with Brady's help. You see, Brady LOVED to cut paper into tiny little pieces. I've tried giving him shapes and lines to cut out but he prefers cutting everything into little pieces. Dustin took the little pieces he cut and made a mosaic. Isn't this nice? They also used my favorite Martha Stewart punch on this and a bunch of old SU papers.
Have a great day, everyone!

Crafting With Kids 3

Hi friends! Hope you are having a good week so far! Our week is going pretty well.

These are actually old pictures that I never got around to posting. We had originally did these on Jan 14 for the Kona Kids challenge that was anything goes. Lucky for me, this week's challenge is anything goes as well! And hopefully, they'll accept our tardy entry but it doesn't matter if we win the prize. I just am upset with myself that I didn't get Brady's card up in time for the challenge when I told him that's what we were making it for.

Here's a close up of his card. This is an image my friend Jan sent me. I let Brady have this one since it's a little boy with a dog. That is SO Brady! And his paper is from an old DCWV stack. I had to help him with the coloring since he INSISTED.

We made some cards today and I'll post those later. Have a great day friends!

Crafting with Kids 2

Hi friends! Sorry, I'm ignoring the blog so much lately. I'm just overwhelmed with the holidays coming and some other stuff. I have so many projects but I haven't had time to sit and blog them yet.

Ok, here's the project we did last Friday when I was watching my friend's little girl. It's awesome because she's 5 and gets really excited about crafting which makes Brady really excited. We wait until Parker takes a nap to craft since he just wants to eat all the paper. :)

Last week's project was hand wreaths. The base is a paper plate I cut a circle in. I had the kids color the plates green to keep them occupied while I was cutting out hands, etc.... I traced the kids' hands a bunch of time. (D. asked me later why I didn't just make a template. Opps!) Then I helped them cut out their hand prints. Sophia is actually able to cut her own! That was awesome! Then I helped them use glue dots to decorate their wreaths. I just let them pick out the embellishment, place a glue dot on the back, and then they can stick it on there like a sticker. After we were done, I just punched a couple holes in the plates and tied ribbons on them.

We had a lot of fun! I love crafting with the kids especially when there's an older child who's really into it!

Have a great Thursday everyone!