Some Valentine's Day Crafts

So I saw a great idea on One Artsy Mama yesterday. Amy and her little crafter made some festive placemats. I loved the idea so Hazel and I made one today. Well, mostly Hazel did after I cut everything. I probably should have helped her with the glitter a bit more, but she enjoyed it and wants it in her play kitchen.

They are very easy to make. You take a piece of clear contact paper and decorate half of it (or at least that is what we did. I cut the length about 20 inches so the finished width would be about 10 inches.  I let her decorate it with cut hearts, doilies,stickers, and glitter. Then you fold the other half over it and press it to seal and trim if necessary.

We also decorated a felt lace heart I bought at one of the craft stores or dollar store.

I gave her gem stickers and her glitter glue and stickers. She is going to keep this in her play kitchen as a trivet. Again she had a lot of fun and I left her to decorate it how she wanted.

Those are the few things we did today besides our early play date and errands and a nap. Now I need to get ready for the Parish Council meeting at church tonight. Have a great day!!

A Mouse or Two

On Saturday, Steve and I went to Hazel's school for a special presentation for parents in the parent/child classes that are interested in the nursery school class for next year. Although we didn't gain too much information from it, we did get to make some felted mice. I had to help Steve with the sewing of the ears, but we had fun.

The mouse body is wet felted. We took some grey wool roving and rolled it tightly folding the ends in a bit as we went. Then we dampened it with water with a bit of Ivory soap in it and rolled it between our hands until it became felted. Then we made the tail by rolling it between our damp hands. Then we went and rinsed the mouse in hot water (as hot as we could stand) and then cold water and also rinsed the soap out of the tail. Then we sewed on the tail and the ears (which the nursery teacher had precut from grey felt for us). We brought them home to dry. Hazel loves them. She had asked me for a mouse awhile ago so it had been on my list of things to try. Now the only trick is to keep them away from the cats!

Another interesting article to share about our children and education: From the Asia Times Online: How America Made Its Children Crazy.

We are getting a good number of people interested in the Kids' Valentine Swap. Are you interested in having your child make valentines for kids internationally and send them with a post card and then receive them from the same kids? Check it out--just click on the button above.

Sharing Saturday is also open!! There are over 130 entries thus far. Go check them out by clicking on the button above.

I hope you are having a terrific Monday!!

Some Needle Felting

Last night was a rather quiet night at my home. My dear husband fell asleep with Hazel in her bed. I knew he was really tired, so I didn't wake him. I did go in and turn off the light before I went to bed, but since I had time to myself, I visited many of the entries to Sharing Saturday.  (If you haven't gone to check them out, you really should--they are amazing! And of course it is still open for more sharing!!)

I had total control of the television. Steve and I only watch it when Hazel is sleeping or not home. Of course Saturday night television is not very great, but I watched a few shows On Demand that are on later than I would like at night. And I did some needle felting. I had bought a needle felting kit at the Paper Source which was on their clearance table. It was to make a flower pin. It came with three bright colors of wool roving--brighter than I have seen around here. I made the flower and decided I would either glue it onto a barrette or sew it onto a hairband for Hazel.

Then I played with making some hearts. I started with the bright colors since all three colors came with equal amounts but then used a purple and white that I already had to fill in the center.

Then I made a red and white one. Seems perfect for a Valentine.

Finally I made a smaller pink one and then added a white H on it for Hazel. Then I thought about what I wanted to do with these. I decided to make the smaller one into a necklace for Hazel. This morning I sewed a piece of embroidery floss onto it and she wore it to church.

And I sewed a loop on one of the other ones for Hazel's craft tree (or small Christmas tree that I bought on clearance and we are going to hang our crafts on).

Now we just need to hang it up and sew strings on the other two. Hazel of course loved them.

An interesting article to share which makes me happy that we are sending Hazel to a Waldorf School: Wall St. Journal Article: The Importance of Child's Play

Hope you are having a relaxing weekend!

Sharing Saturday #4

Wow, we had over 150 entries last week. Mia and I are so excited about the amazing ideas being shared and I know I have already tried some with Hazel. Thank you to everyone who shared and to everyone who checked them out (and especially those of you who showed some blog love with comments).

While I have your attention I want to mention my Kids' Homemade Valentine Swap. We are looking for your children to make a small number of Valentines to swap with other kids close in age and possibly all over the world. I'm hoping people would also include a postcard from near their house so it can be a learning event. If you are interested click over on my side bar and check it out more.

Happy Friday!

Hand Love Tree

Today Hazel and I had a fun mother and daughter day! It started with a little painting for Valentine's Day. Then Hazel went to the dentist. I bribed her into doing what they asked by telling her we would go to the Lakeshore Learning Store afterwards (we are lucky enough to have an actual store only a few minutes away). But right afterwards we drove to Boston to drop off the donations we collected at her birthday party for Cradles to Crayons. Hazel surprised me and asked if we could go in for the tour. Then we went to one of our favorite restaurants for lunch (one Daddy doesn't really like so we usually go there for lunch with friends). Then we made it to the Learning Store. We spent several hours there (and since she was distracted with all the toys and books we had a few accidents there). Then we went to Starbucks. Hazel got a cookie, a kids' hot chocolate and some milk and I got my chai. A pretty good day overall. Here are a few pictures from our day.

Painting using cookie cutters, bubble wrap hearts and rubber stamps

Oh, and we made the love tree craft yesterday. As well as this picture.

I was framed

Then here are a few from Cradles to Crayons. They always like to take pictures of their visitors and especially their Birthday Stars.

I was glad I waited so long to bring the donations in since we just bought a new wardrobe in the next size this past weekend as her clothes were beginning to get tight.

Oh, and  a reminder of the Valentine Swap. Do you have a young child who would like to exchange homemade Valentines with people from all over the world? Please check it out.

Hope you will visit a bit later or over the weekend for our Sharing Saturday! We had over 150 wonderful entries this past week.

Kids' Valentine Swap

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So I have been seeing such cute Valentine ideas all over the place. We don't really do much for Valentine's Day since Steve's birthday is the day before. We exchange cards and that is about it. And since we have school on Thursday I doubt there will be much done there.

I got to thinking, wouldn't it be fun for our kids to do a homemade Valentine exchange with maybe a postcard of some place around where you live. It can be a learning experience for the kids to see where they all come from and go and also it is always fun for them to receive mail.

If you are interested please send me an email: craftymomsshare@gmail.com. Let me know your child(ren)'s names and ages and address. I'll put together a list and make it a reasonable number and try to match ages, etc. Please feel free to grab a button and spread the word.

Also, if you need ideas you can check out my Valentine's Day Pinterest Board.

We are off to school today, I hope you are having a great day!
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Valentine Day Painting

Today we did a lot of painting. Last week we bought some t-shirts to do an idea I saw in Family Fun Magazine (a great magazine for craft ideas). Yesterday we picked up the fabric paint and sponge brushes and I pulled out the doilies that I bought at the Dollar Tree. We had fun doing this.

Today was...

Hazel's craft today

Today we had a rather busy day. Our morning was full of play and crafts. Oh, and we put together a slow cooker dinner for tonight. We made the heart crafts I featured yesterday. Then we went out to run errands. One stop was Target. We bought a lot of new clothes for Hazel from the clearance items including four pairs of shoes in her next size! Another stop was Joann Fabrics for a few supplies for a craft for tomorrow. Then we went to the library to return books and we picked out several new ones.

My Heart Craft

While running errands we realized it was a gorgeous day and we wanted to get outside to play. It was in the 50's today here and sunny. So we hurried our errands and then came home for a late lunch and  got outside. Then it was off to the hairdressers for hair cuts. We met Daddy there and he took Hazel home while Mommy got her hair cut. I always take Hazel in with me to get her bangs cut. She loves it!! She also likes to play hairdresser to Ducky when we get home. Then after a quick dinner I had to run a stewardship meeting at church. Now I'm tired, but wanted to share these crafts with you and some pictures of our outside play.

With the rain last night and the warmer temperatures, most of the snow melted. One of our first activities was moving the snow from the few snow piles left from the plow and our snowmen to the yard. Hazel did this with her shovel and then she wanted to use her hands. She touched it and said, "Cold!" So after a few tries she decided she needed some mittens.

Her Shovel

Her First Snowball

I suggested using the toy truck she brought out. She tried that for a bit, but it was small.

She ran into the garage and came out with her bigger truck to use.

She is always thinking!

Then she wanted to play basketball, catch, tag/gingerbread man and finally blow bubbles. She had a great time blowing bubbles.

She is finally getting how to blow things--bubbles, horns, etc.

Oh, she also had to bring out her chair to sit on for two seconds. Then it was time to bring out the sidewalk chalk. She tried to draw squares but they came out more like circles. We worked on straight lines a bit and then she wanted me to make her a hopscotch game.

Unfortunately, the time we had flew by and it was time to get to our appointment. Hopefully we will get another nice day outside again soon. Though I did have to promise her it would snow again. (I just added that it might not be this year.)

That was our day. How was yours?

Oh, and one more thing to share--check out this article on children and playing from  The Christian Science Monitor. It makes me so happy we are not pushing Hazel to learn to read, etc. and have made the choice to send her to a Waldorf school where they are not taught to read until they are 7.

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